DOCSLIB.ORG

California State University, Northridge John Fowles

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
California State University, Northridge John Fowles CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY, NORTHRIDGE JOHN FOWLES' THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN: PAST FORMS, NEW DIRECTIONS A thesis submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in English by Rose Marie Skertic January 1988 The Thes~~ of Rose Marie Skertic is approved: Dr. Arthur E. Lane Dr. ~hony Arthur Dr. Richard W. Lid, Chair California State University, Northridge ii DEDICATION For my family. iii ACKNOWLEDG~ffiNTS I wish to thank the members of my committee for their time and expertise. I am especially grateful to Dr. Lid, the chairperson, for his patience, his encour­ agement and his kindness. iv (.l ' TABLE OF CONTENTS Page DEDICATION • • • . .. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . iv ABSTRACT • • • • vi Chapter 1 - INTRODUCTION . •.. 1 Chapter 2 - THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN AS A VICTORIAN NOVEL • • . • • • • • • • 15 Chapter 3 - THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN AS A MODERN NOVEL • • • • • • • • 42 BIBLIOGRAPHY • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 81 v ABSTRACT JOHN FOWLES' THE FRENCH LIEUTENANT'S WOMAN: PAST FORMS, NEW DIRECTIONS by Rose Marie Skertic Master of Arts in English John Fowles is a writer who is consistently willing to take risks. While he pays tribute to the novel's past forms with his considerable narrative skills, he expands the tradition of the novel as an art form with his experi­ mental narrative technique. At the same time, Fowles reveals in the content of his novels his own unique exis­ tential view--a concern for modern man's attempt to estab­ lish a personal identity in a world hostile to the self. In The French Lieutenant's Woman (1969), Fowles has successfully imposed a twentieth century voice on a tale that is not only set in 1867 but adheres to the traditions of the Victorian novel in many ways. Using the techniques afforded him by the Victorian novelists, he measures one vi era against another and discusses his role as a modern writer--within the narrative. Fowles thus lifts The French Lieutenant's Woman beyond the realm of the Victo­ rian novel and expands the modern tradition as well. Chapter One will present the claims made for The French Lieutenant's Woman as a popular and a critical suc­ cess. Fowles' other works will also be discussed to reveal his continuing concern with man's quest for per­ sonal authenticity. Chapter Two is concerned with The French Lieutenant's Woman as a Victorian novel. Fowles has lovingly borrowed many of the traditions of the Victorian novel, such as a strong plot, stock characters and epigraphs, giving the novel the "look" of a Victorian novel. Chapter Three focuses on The French Lieutenant's Woman as a modern novel. Its existential theme, its con­ cern with the novel-writing process, and its unique narra­ tive treatment move the novel as an art form in a new direction. Lastly, Chapter Three discusses Fowles' use of history to reveal the forces that were being exerted on his characters and on Victorian society as a whole. The historical framework and modern perspective enable the reader to see how the Victorian world evolved into the modern one. vii Chapter 1 INTRODUCTION John Fowles' The French Lieutenant's Woman, written in 1967, is unusual in that it has been both a popular and a critical success. Its popularity with the general pub­ lic can be attributed to its success as an historical novel that richly and skillfully evokes the Victorian era of one hundred years ago--an era when duty, convention, and class consciousness had an overwhelming influence on English society even as the specter of change (in the form of Marx and Darwin) began to assert itself. The novel's great critical success, however, is a result of its narra­ tive treatment, and of its twentieth century voice and perspective. Fowles' technique affords the narrator the opportunity to comment, often ironically, on both nine­ teenth and twentieth century morals, values, and histori­ cal events, as well as on the novel form itself. While The French Lieutenant's Woman, then, is in so many aspects a conventional Victorian novel in form--complete with epigraphs, stock characters, an intruding and editorializ­ ing narrator and more--its twentieth century features can be seen in its existential theme, its self-conscious nar­ rator, and its concern with the godlike role of the novel­ ist. Thus, operating within two realms, the novel has a 1 2 unique quality which seems to be the product of the interplay of nineteenth and twentieth century ideas of form and technique and nineteenth and twentieth century social and political attitudes. I propose to examine The French Lieutenant's Woman in terms .of these tensions of form and ideas between centuries and to assess the nature of Fowles' achievement. Many claims can be made for the success of The French Lieutenant's Woman. Immediately upon its publication, American, German, and Italian readers received the novel particularly well, more so than did the British literary establishment, only a few members of which recognized Fowles' achievement (Huffaker 131). An international suc­ cess, it has now been translated into nineteen languages. With the screenplay by Harold Pinter, it was also made into a major film in 1981. The third of seven novels by Fowles, The French Lieutenant's Woman is still considered to be one of his finer efforts. According to Fred Kaplan, it is a "highly intelligent work of fiction that is also a highly popular work of fiction" (108) • In terms of its content, Kaplan calls it one of "the most serious and exhilarating explo-: rations of the Victorian consciousness in recent years" (108). Fowles himself considers it "technically the best written" of his novels (Barnum 193). 3 Although at its most basic level The French Lieutenant's Woman is an historical novel, "a fresh attempt to capture the real undercurrents of Victorian life, based on historical evidence," Fowles revealed that he did not want to write an historical novel (Rackham 98). Instead he chose to write "a modern novel about Victorian England" (Garis 48). Thus, while Fowles has authentically evoked the Victorian milieu from the provincial country­ side to Lyme Regis to the darker side of London, and entertainingly informed the reader about Victorian atti­ tudes and concerns as well, his major achievement in The French Lieutenant's Woman lies in his "modern expansion of the traditional literary forms" (Huffaker 98). One such "expansion" of the novel form is evident in its narrative technique, particularly in its twentieth century omni­ scient narrator "whose consciousness and experience span at least a century," measuring the Victorian past against the modern present (Kaplan 118). Another "expansion" of the traditional literary form results when Fowles interrupts the narrative of the novel and questions the "fiction writing process itself," (Olshen, Reference Guide, ix) discussing with the reader the characters he, as the godlike novelist, has created. Rejecting this role, he pledges to free his characters, to allow them to choose their own destinies, their own authenticity. Fowles then not only lifts the restrictions .. 4 upon narrative technique but refutes the traditional role of the novelist as well. In so doing, he promotes the modern, existential theme of the novel. As Jeff Rackharn observes, "The Victorian figures which Fowles envisions are those who took the first timid steps into a world in which traditional values and accepted conventions are left behind and loneliness -- or, if you will, their alienation is all the more poignant for their early adventures in an unknown emptiness" {Rackharn 100). Thus, in employing a twentieth century perspective and an exis­ tential theme in his nineteenth century tale, Fowles had indeed expanded the traditional literary form and suc­ ceeded in writing a "modern novel about Victorian England." As noted by William Palmer {and other critics as well), the major theme of The French Lieutenant's Woman, "modern man's attempt to establish a personal identity in a world hostile to the individual self," recurs as the major focus of most of Fowles' novels {3). These other works include his first published novel, The Collector (1963), which has also been successfully produced on stage and made into film. The Magus, Fowles' personal favorite and one he spent twelve years writing, was published in 1965 and revised, a rather unconventional procedure for a novel, in 1977 {Huffaker 30). Fowles' latest novels are Daniel Martin {1979), Mantissa {1982) and A Maggot (1985). 5 Fowles" most important non-fiction work is The Aristes (1964, 1968, 1970). Presented merely as a listing of ideas or "notes • • • one side of a dialogue which the reader might ignore or reject as he pleases," The Aristes is nevertheless significant, for it is here that Fowles relates his philosophy of life and art (Wolfe 21). To understand and appreciate Fowles as a writer, then, it is important to look closely at The Aristes. Fowles derives his ideas from the Greek philosopher Heraclitus, "who divided mankind into a moral and intellectual elite (the aristoi) and an unreflecting conformist mass (hoi polloi)" or, in Fowles• terms, the Few and the Many (Burden 30). It is Fowles• belief that, "In societies dominated by the Many, the Few lthe elect] are in grave danger of being suffocated" (Newquist 225). Miranda in The Collector is Fowles• chosen symbol of the Few who "suffocates" at the hands of Clegg, a symbol of the Many. In the Preface to the 1970 edition, Fowles states, "My chief concern in The Aristes is to preserve the freedom of the individual against all those pressures to conform that threaten our century" (7). It is a theme that runs, with variations, throughout the novels: "The individual struggling to maintain his individuality, struggling to achieve a measure of self-realization amidst the undirect or mis­ directed masses" (Olshen, Fowles, 3) .
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Fiction John Fowles, the Collector, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1963
    BIBLIOGRAPHY WORKS BY JOHN FOWLES Fiction John Fowles, The Collector, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1963. —— Daniel Martin, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1977. —— The Ebony Tower, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1974. —— The French Lieutenant’s Woman, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1969. —— A Maggot, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1985. —— The Magus, New York: Dell Publishing, 1978. —— Mantissa, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1982. Nonfiction John Fowles, The Aristos, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1964. —— The Enigma of Stonehenge, New York: Summit Books, 1980. —— Foreword, in Ourika, by Claire de Duras, trans. John Fowles, New York: MLA, 1994, xxix-xxx. —— Islands, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1978. —— Lyme Regis Camera, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1990. —— Shipwreck, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1975. —— A Short History of Lyme Regis, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1982. —— Thomas Hardy’s England, Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1984. —— The Tree, New York: The Ecco Press, 1979. Translations Claire de Duras, Ourika, trans. John Fowles, New York: MLA, 1994. 238 John Fowles: Visionary and Voyeur Essays John Fowles, “Gather Ye Starlets”, in Wormholes, ed. Jan Relf, New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1998, 89-99. —— “I Write Therefore I Am”, in Wormholes, ed. Jan Relf, New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1998, 5-12. —— “The J.R. Fowles Club”, in Wormholes, ed. Jan Relf, New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1998, 67. —— “John Aubrey and the Genesis of the Monumenta Britannica”, in Wormholes, ed. Jan Relf, New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1998, 175-96. —— “The John Fowles Symposium, Lyme Regis, July 1996”, in Wormholes, ed.
    [Show full text]
  • Dalrev Vol68 Iss3 Pp288 301.Pdf (6.837Mb)
    Frederick M. Holmes The Novelist as Magus: John Fowles and the Function of Narrative It is difficult to trap John Fowles the writer under conceptual nets. Having announced his intention not "to walk into the cage labelled 'novelist,' " 1 he has published, in addition to his best-selling novels, a volume of poems, a philosophical tract, and discursive prose on such subjects as Stonehenge, the Scilly Isles, trees, cricket, and Thomas Hardy. When we restrict our attention to his fiction, he is equally hard to classify unambiguously. His aesthetic has been called "conservative and traditional,''2 and yet John Barth includes Fowles, along with himself, in a group of avant-garde novelists who have been tagged postmodernist.J On the one hand, Fowles has championed realism, 4 repudiated art which exalts technique and style at the expense of human content,5 endorsed the ancient dictum that the function of art is to entertain and instruct, 6 and announced a didactic intention to "improve society at large."7 To some extent, his novels do realize these traditional aims. They usually create an intense illusion that real human dramas are being played out before the reader's eyes. Each of these dramas is a didactic exemplum of Fowles's belief in the value of freedom. 8 On the other hand, though, Fowles has affirmed the reality of the crisis often said to have made the contemporary novel prob­ lematic.9 This awareness has rendered his fictions self-referential in ways that cast doubt upon their mimetic capacity. His narratives frequently expose themselves as arbitrary, decentred, and inconclusive structures of words cut loose from any legitimating origin or trans­ cendent authority.
    [Show full text]
  • The Post-Postmodern Aesthetics of John Fowles Claiborne Johnson Cordle
    University of Richmond UR Scholarship Repository Master's Theses Student Research 5-1981 The post-postmodern aesthetics of John Fowles Claiborne Johnson Cordle Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.richmond.edu/masters-theses Recommended Citation Cordle, Claiborne Johnson, "The post-postmodern aesthetics of John Fowles" (1981). Master's Theses. Paper 444. This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Research at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Master's Theses by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE POST-POSTMODERN AESTHETICS OF JOHN FOWLES BY CLAIBORNE JOHNSON CORDLE A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE FACULTY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF RICHMOND IN CANDIDACY FOR THE DEGREE OF ~.ASTER OF ARTS ,'·i IN ENGLISH MAY 1981 LTBRARY UNIVERSITY OF RICHMONl:» VIRGINIA 23173 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION . p . 1 CHAPTER 1 MODERNISM RECONSIDERED . p • 6 CHAPTER 2 THE BREAKDOWN OF OBJECTIVITY . p • 52 CHAPTER 3 APOLLO AND DIONYSUS. p • 94 CHAPTER 4 SYNTHESIS . p . 102 CHAPTER 5 POST-POSTMODERN HUMANISM . p . 139 ENDNOTES • . p. 151 BIBLIOGRAPHY . • p. 162 INTRODUCTION To consider the relationship between post­ modernism and John Fowles is a task unfortunately complicated by an inadequately defined central term. Charles Russell states that ... postmodernism is not tied solely to a single artist or movement, but de­ fines a broad cultural phenomenon evi­ dent in the visual arts, literature; music and dance of Europe and the United States, as well as in their philosophy, criticism, linguistics, communications theory, anthropology, and the social sciences--these all generally under thp particular influence of structuralism.
    [Show full text]
  • A Critical Study of the Novels of John Fowles
    University of New Hampshire University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository Doctoral Dissertations Student Scholarship Spring 1986 A CRITICAL STUDY OF THE NOVELS OF JOHN FOWLES KATHERINE M. TARBOX University of New Hampshire, Durham Follow this and additional works at: https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation Recommended Citation TARBOX, KATHERINE M., "A CRITICAL STUDY OF THE NOVELS OF JOHN FOWLES" (1986). Doctoral Dissertations. 1486. https://scholars.unh.edu/dissertation/1486 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Student Scholarship at University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations by an authorized administrator of University of New Hampshire Scholars' Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. A CRITICAL STUDY OF THE NOVELS OF JOHN FOWLES BY KATHERINE M. TARBOX B.A., Bloomfield College, 1972 M.A., State University of New York at Binghamton, 1976 DISSERTATION Submitted to the University of New Hampshire in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in English May, 1986 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. This dissertation has been examined and approved. .a JL. Dissertation director, Carl Dawson Professor of English Michael DePorte, Professor of English Patroclnio Schwelckart, Professor of English Paul Brockelman, Professor of Philosophy Mara Wltzllng, of Art History Dd Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. I ALL RIGHTS RESERVED c. 1986 Katherine M. Tarbox Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. to the memory of my brother, Byron Milliken and to JT, my magus IV Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner.
    [Show full text]
  • Writing the Feminine: John Fowles's Modern Myth Priscilla Peichin Lin
    Writing the Feminine: John Fowles’s Modern Myth Priscilla Peichin Lin, Fongshan Elementary School, Taiwan The Asian Conference on Arts and Humanities 2019 Official Conference Proceedings iafor The International Academic Forum www.iafor.org Fowlesian women struck me as being courageous and other-worldly upon my first reading of them. Rather than voiceless sources of male creativity, John Fowles’s women characters tend to be vivid practitioners of the arts, presiding over all the arts which constitute civilized life. In Fowles’s works, he invokes a mythic struggle for the emergence of the independent and self-defining voice of modern women as both thinkers and creators. He reflects on “sexual differences” 1 and explores relationships between men and women, and has built his major themes around the contrast between masculine and feminine mentality. Despite his technical experimentation and stylistic diversity, Fowles exhibits a thematic consistency in his advocacy of feminism.2 His preoccupation with the individuals’s place in the world of social and sexual relations generates a number of recurring motifs. Of these, the question of freedom and the search for a valid foundation on which to base one’s choices have in fact occupied much of Fowles’s works. Taken as a whole, he has created multi-leveled romance fiction of considerable complexity and depth. Labeled a “fellow-traveller with feminism,”3 Fowles has always constructed his fiction upon the principle that women are intrinsically better, more authentic, and freer than men. In his fiction, women tend to appear as the representatives of a humanizing force (Lenz 224).
    [Show full text]
  • The Concept of Truth and Artifact in the Fiction Of
    THE CONCEPT OF TRUTH AND ARTIFACT IN THE FICTION OF JOHN FOWLES By MICHAEL GEORGE MERCER B.A., Sir George Williams University, 1967 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF Master of Arts in the Department of English We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA October, 19?0 In presenting this thesis in partial fulfilment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make it freely available for reference and study. I further agree that permission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the Head of my Department or by his representatives. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department of The.University of British Columbia Vancouver 8, Canada Date T&/CZT. 2 0/ 7Q 1 ABSTRACT The aims of this thesis are to investigate the use of artifice in John Fowles' The Collector, The Magus, and The French Lieutenant's Woman, and show how, through the mani- -pulation of illusion and reality, Fowles explores his own belief that the purpose of the artifact is in revealling the truth. In the Introduction, Fowles' vision of reality is examined with particular reference to his philosophical work, The Aristos> A Self-Portrait in Ideas. To Fowles, the universe is ruled only by.hazard and flux; and. therefore, the meaning of life is, in the absence,of a comprehensible force of causality, an eter- -nal mystery to man.
    [Show full text]
  • Vol. 13 No. 1 2018 Journal of English Studies
    Possession, Self-possession and Multiple Selves in the Writings of John Fowles ______________________________________________________________________________ Thomas Hoy Independent Scholar Email: [email protected] Abstract In his work, John Fowles (1926-2005) ponders questions of existential freedom. For him, the biggest obstacle to this freedom is the Cartesian paradigm of self-possession with its analytical and classifying obsessions. Fowles does not see freedom as emanating from an understanding of the self as a unity but rather as emanating from embracing the multiplicity of possible selves that each person has. In this paper, I trace these ideas through John Fowles's work, in particular The French Lieutenant’s Woman, The Collector and The Aristos. I also outline some of the intellectual influences such as Heraclitus, Sartre, Descartes and Linnaeus who he variously sympathizes with and reacts against in his writing. Keywords: John Fowles, possession, the self, multiple selves 1 Vol. 13 No. 1 2018 Journal of English Studies บทคัดย่อ ในงานเขียนทั้งหมดของ จอห์น ฟาวล์ส (John Fowles) ช่วงปี ค.ศ. 1926-2005 เขาได้ตั้งคาถามเก ี่ยวกบั เสรีภาพตามแนวปรัชญาอัตถิภาวนิยม เราอาจมองวาอุปสรรคส่ าคัญที่สุดต่อการได้มาซึ่งเสรีภาพนี้คือกระบวน ทัศน์แบบคาร์ทีเซียนเรื่อง การควบคุมตนเองที่วิเคราะห์และแบ่งประเภทแบบครอบงา ฟาวล์สมิได้มองว่า เสรีภาพเป็นสิ่งที่เกิดจากความคิดว่าตัวตนนั้นมีเอกภาพ แต่เกิดจากการยอมรับว่าบุคคลอาจมีตัวตนได้ หลากหลายตัวตนในบทความนี้ ผู้เขียนวิเคราะห์แนวคิดดังกล่าวผานมุมมองจากงานเขียนของฟาวล์ส่ โดยเฉพาะ อยางยิ่ ่งจากเรื่อง The French
    [Show full text]
  • The Hegelian Themes in John Fowles's the Collector
    OTHERNESS, RECOGNITION AND POWER: THE HEGELIAN THEMES IN JOHN FOWLES’S THE COLLECTOR by SEUNGJAE LEE (Under the Direction of Ronald Bogue) ABSTRACT This study explores the problematic interpersonal relationship between the two main characters, the captor Clegg and the captive Miranda, in John Fowles’s The Collector , drawing upon Hegel’s ideas of otherness, recognition and power in his master-slave dialectic. First, it presents the problem of otherness that takes place in the unexpected encounter of the two sharply contrasting characters, with an emphasis on their mutual incomprehensibility. Second, it demonstrates that their relationship is characterized by what Hegel calls “the struggle for recognition.” Finally, it examines the dynamics of their power relationship by analyzing their relationship in terms of a struggle between master and slave. It concludes that as an objective approach to the two characters, the Hegelian reading of The Collector allows us to see the novel as a critique of domination, that is, as an analysis of the necessary failure of self-other relationships based on non-mutual recognition and power, rather than as a case-study of male abnormal behavior or as a parable about the triumph of evil over good. INDEX WORDS: Bluebeard, double narration, collector mentality, Hegel’s master-slave dialectic, otherness, recognition, power OTHERNESS, RECOGNITION AND POWER: THE HEGELIAN THEME IN JOHN FOWLES’S THE COLLECTOR by SEUNGJAE LEE B.A., Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Korea, 1999 A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree MASTERS OF ARTS ATHENS, GEORGIA 2005 © 2005 Seungjae Lee All Rights Reserved OTHERNESS, RECOGNTION AND POWER: THE HEGELIAN THEMES IN JOHN FOWLES’S THE COLLECTOR by SEUNGJAE LEE Major Professor: Ronald Bogue Committee: Karim Traore Masaki Mori Electronic Version Approved: Maureen Grasso Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia December 2005 iv DEDICATION This thesis is dedicated to my parents, Jong Soo Lee and Jeong Soon Kim.
    [Show full text]
  • Proquest Dissertations
    INFORMATION TO USERS This reproduction was made from a copy of a document sent to us for microfilming. While the most advanced technology has been used to photograph and reproduce this document, the quality of the reproduction is heavily dependent upon the quality of the material submitted. The following explanation of techniques is provided to help clarify markings or notations which may appear on this reproduction. l.The sign or "target" for pages apparently lacking from the document photographed is "Missing Page(s)". If it was possible to obtain the missing page(s) or section, they are spliced into the film along with adjacent pages. This may have necessitated cutting through an image and duplicating adjacent pages to assure complete continuity. 2. When an image on the film is obliterated with a round black mark, it is an indication of either blurred copy because of movement during exposure, duplicate copy, or copyrighted materials that should not have been filmed. For blurred pages, a good image of the page can be found in the adjacent frame. If copyrighted materials were deleted, a target note will appear listing the pages m the adjacent frame. 3. When a map, drawing or chart, etc., is part of the material being photographed, a definite method of "sectioning" the material has been followed. It is customary to begin filming at the upper left hand corner of a large sheet and to continue from left to right in equal sections with small overlaps. If necessary, sectioning is continued again-beginning below the first row and continuing on until complete.
    [Show full text]
  • The Writability of the Female Character in John Fowles's Mantissa
    Eger Journal of English Studies XV (2015) 59-72 Authority and Authorship: The Writability of the Female Character in John Fowles’s Mantissa and The Collector Tamás Tukacs In The Fictions of John Fowles: Power, Creativity, Femininity, Pamela Cooper paints a rather unfavourable picture of Fowles’s attempt at redefining the man- woman relationship and his philosophy based on certain metaphysical and romantic oppositions. Speaking about Mantissa, perhaps the most experimental and postmodern of Fowles’s text, she claims that Erato’s endless transformations are downright boring (205). She goes on to assert that “this presentation of the female would-be narrator in terms of a fantasy of narratorial transvestitism is extremely cynical” (209), arriving at the final verdict regarding Fowles’s 1982 novel: “Mantissa, like The Magus, reconstitutes and promotes […] male egotism” (212). In this essay I wish to show that, as regards the conflict of male authorship and female autonomy, both Mantissa and its obvious predecessor in this respect, The Collector, are far from being examples of “male egotism.” I am going to have a look at the concepts of supplement and repression to make sense of the woman characters’ ontological status in these novels and show those self-reflective and textualising processes that subvert Fowles’s didactic and metaphysical hierarchies, concluding that what a certain school of feminist criticism prefers to view as the conflict of tyrannical male authorship and the autonomy of female characters is, in fact, a dynamism endlessly reinforcing and mirroring these two sides of the antagonism in a mutually subversive manner. 60 Tamás Tukacs 1.
    [Show full text]
  • Existentialism in the Works of John Fowles Existencialismus V Díle Johna Fowlese
    Jiho česká univerzita v Českých Bud ějovicích Pedagogická fakulta Katedra anglistiky Diplomová práce Existentialism in the Works of John Fowles Existencialismus v díle Johna Fowlese Autor: Bc. Eva Petránová Studijní program: Učitelství pro základní školy Studijní obor: Anglický jazyk se zam ěř ením na vzd ělávání Výchova ke zdraví se zam ěř ením na vzd ělávání Vedoucí práce: Mgr. Alice Sukdolová, Ph.D. České Bud ějovice, leden 2015 Prohlašuji, že jsem diplomovou práci na téma Existencionalismus v díle Johna Fowlese vypracovala samostatn ě s použitím pramen ů uvedených v bibliografii. Prohlašuji, že v souladu s § 47b zákona č. 111/1998 Sb. v platném zn ění souhlasím se zve řejn ěním své diplomové práce, a to v nezkrácené podob ě, elektronickou cestou ve ve řejn ě p řístupné části databáze STAG provozované Jiho českou univerzitou v Českých Bud ějovicích na jejích internetových stránkách, a to se zachováním mého autorského práva k odevzdanému textu této kvalifika ční práce. Souhlasím dále s tím, aby toutéž elektronickou cestou byly v souladu s uvedeným ustanovením zákona č. 111/1998 Sb. zve řejn ěny posudky školitele a oponent ů práce i záznam o pr ůběhu a výsledku obhajoby kvalifika ční práce. Rovn ěž souhlasím s porovnáním textu mé kvalifika ční práce s databází kvalifika čních prací Theses.cz provozovanou Národním registrem vysokoškolských kvalifika čních prací a systémem na odhalování plagiát ů. V Českých Bud ějovicích 5. 1. 2015 ............................... Bc. Eva Petránová Pod ěkování Ráda bych touto cestou pod ěkovala Mgr. Alici Sukdolové, Ph.D. za cenné rady, trp ělivou pomoc a p řipomínky p ři vypracování své diplomové práce.
    [Show full text]
  • John Fowles' Narrative Stylistics in the Collector, Daniel Martin, and a Maggot
    California State University, San Bernardino CSUSB ScholarWorks Theses Digitization Project John M. Pfau Library 1990 John Fowles' narrative stylistics in The Collector, Daniel Martin, and A Maggot Laura Lee Hope Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project Part of the Literature in English, British Isles Commons Recommended Citation Hope, Laura Lee, "John Fowles' narrative stylistics in The Collector, Daniel Martin, and A Maggot" (1990). Theses Digitization Project. 564. https://scholarworks.lib.csusb.edu/etd-project/564 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the John M. Pfau Library at CSUSB ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses Digitization Project by an authorized administrator of CSUSB ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. JOHN FOWLES' NARRATIVE STYLISTICS IN THE COLLECTOR, DANIEL MARTIN, AND A MAGGOT '• ■t' 'A; 'Thesis; Presented to the ^ : ;RacuIty:-'of ■ ' dalifornia State University, San Bernardino In Partial Fulfiillnertt of the Requireroents for the Degree Master of Arts in English Composition by Laura Lee Hope May 1990 JOHN FOWLES' NARRATIVE STYLISTICS IN THE COLLECTOR, DANIEL MARTIN, AND A MAGGOT A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of California State University, San Bernardino by Laura Leel Hope May 1990 Approved by: Rodney SiroaJd, Chair, English DateJ Clark Mayo ife Randisi Abstract; Narrative structures have been traditiohailY framed by a conventional 1ineai: presentation of events. Thus, most readers approach a text with an expectation of sequence and chronological movement. These literary assumptions have been challenged by critics, such as Barthes, claiming that the events of any narrative are subordinate to a design.
    [Show full text]