Fraser, C, 2018.Pdf

The PIT: A YA Response to Miltonic Ideas of the Fall in Romantic Literature Callum Fraser Submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy June 2018 Department of English Language, Literature and Linguistics Newcastle University i ii Abstract This project consists of a Young Adult novel — The PIT — and an accompanying critical component, titled Miltonic Ideas of the Fall in Romantic Literature. The novel follows the story of a teenage boy, Jack, a naturally talented artist struggling to understand his place in a dystopian future society that only values ‘productive’ work and regards art as worthless. Throughout the novel, we see Jack undergo a ‘coming of age’, where he moves from being an essentially passive character to one empowered with a sense of courage and a clearer sense of his own identity. Throughout this process we see him re-evaluate his understanding of friendship, love, and loyalty to authority. The critical component of the thesis explores the influence of John Milton’s epic poem, Paradise Lost, on a range of Romantic writers. Specifically, the critical work examines the way in which these Romantic writers use the Fall, and the notion of ‘falleness’ — as envisioned in Paradise Lost — as a model for writing about their roles as poets/writers in periods of political turmoil, such as the aftermath of the French Revolution, and the cultural transition between what we now regard as the Romantic and Victorian periods. The thesis’s ‘bridging chapter’ explores the connection between these two components. It discusses how the conflicted poet figures and divided narratives discussed in the critical component provide a model for my own novel’s exploration of adolescent growth within a society that seeks to restrict imaginative freedom. This chapter will also address specific areas of craft used within the novel, including the use of place, metaphor, and characterisation. iii iv Acknowledgements Special thanks to my supervisors, Margaret Wilkinson and Meiko O’Halloran, for encouraging me to rein in my worst instincts and pursue my better ones. I would also like to thank my family for their support and generosity, as well as Catherine Raisbeck for her tolerance and her kindness. v vi Table of Contents The PIT ....................................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1. Back of the Line .................................................................................................... 3 Chapter 2. Laundry Day ....................................................................................................... 14 Chapter 3. George Gordon.................................................................................................... 23 Chapter 4. Divine Intervention ............................................................................................. 27 Chapter 5. An Empty Corridor ............................................................................................. 36 Chapter 6. Mary .................................................................................................................... 47 Chapter 7. St Joseph’s School for Boys ............................................................................... 55 Chapter 8. A Funeral ............................................................................................................ 61 Chapter 9. The Farm ............................................................................................................. 67 Chapter 10. The Greenhouse ................................................................................................ 74 Chapter 11. A Request .......................................................................................................... 81 Chapter 12. Fire from the Gods ............................................................................................ 86 Chapter 13. Betrayals ........................................................................................................... 92 Chapter 14. A Test .............................................................................................................. 100 Chapter 15. A Miscalculation ............................................................................................. 104 Chapter 16. Nowhere to Run .............................................................................................. 113 Chapter 17. The Escape ...................................................................................................... 117 Chapter 18. Knives and Blood ............................................................................................ 124 Chapter 19. A Choice ......................................................................................................... 129 Epilogue .............................................................................................................................. 130 vii Miltonic Ideas of The Fall in Romantic Literature ................................................................ 136 Chapter 1. Romantic Poets’ Responses to Miltonic Ideas of the Fall .................................... 137 1.1. Milton and Paradise Lost: The Necessary Fall and the Fallen Poet Figure ............... 138 1.2. First Generation Romantics: Revolutionary Responses to Miltonic Ideas of the Fall 143 1.2.1 William Blake: Poetry as Rebellion — Reconciling Blake and Milton ................. 144 1.2.2. Coleridge: Retrospective Conservatism and the Intervening Voice .................... 150 1.2.3. Wordsworth: ‘Two Consciousnesses’ and The Consummation of the Poet’s Mind ........................................................................................................................................ 154 1.3. Byron and Keats: Intergenerational Conflict and Rising From the Fall ..................... 159 1.3.1. Byron: ‘being/ Yourselves in your resistance’: The Value of Ideological Integrity in Cain ............................................................................................................................ 160 1.3.2. Keats: The Necessary Transition to a New Poetic Order .................................... 165 Chapter 2. Writing from the Literary ‘Lacuna’: Divided Voices and Divided Sympathies .. 173 2.1. Frankenstein and Mary Shelley’s Radical Scepticism ............................................... 174 2.2. ‘Neither Whig, Tory, Radical, nor Destructionist’: The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner and the ‘Polydoxy’ of James Hogg ............................... 182 2.3. Wuthering Heights: ‘As Different as a Moonbeam From Lightning’ — Reconciling Romanticism and Victorianism .......................................................................................... 190 Chapter 3. Conclusion ............................................................................................................ 198 Chapter 4. Bridging Chapter: The PIT and Romantic Imagination ....................................... 200 4.1. The Romantic Child and the Romantic Adolescent .................................................... 201 4.2. The PIT in Context ...................................................................................................... 205 4.3. The PIT: Craft and the Romantic Adolescent ............................................................. 208 viii Bibliography ........................................................................................................................... 214 ix x The PIT Word Count: 56280 1 Figure 1. 2 Chapter 1. Back of the Line ‘Fall’n cherub, to be weak is mis’rable’ John Milton – Paradise Lost The morning bell was ringing. Jack buried his head and counted to twenty. He could already hear the Wing Matron banging her way along the corridor, running her stick against the iron radiators while shouting out the day’s schedule. It wasn’t necessary. Jack had memorised his weekly timetable on his first day in The PIT — it hadn’t changed since. He sat up and looked around the dorm. He’d been in this one for about a month, and it was much nicer than the old one. It only had twenty beds for a start, and the floor had proper wooden boards instead of the stringy carpet they seemed to use everywhere else. There were windows here too, set high up in the vaulted ceiling — little round portholes that let in the early morning light. In his old dorm there’d only been fluorescent tubes. A lot of the others were already getting up, pulling on their uniforms or queuing for the water basin. Jack gave himself a sniff. He would be okay for another day or so. If it came to it, he still had that sliver of soap that Billy gave him. Jack put on his uniform and packed his Day Bag. His uniform was blue, just like the ones everyone else wore, and it was way too big for a five foot tall, eight stone fourteen year old. With his greasy brown hair and long, pointed nose, Jack looked like a rat dressed up in human clothes. Nobody ever pointed this out though, because of the one part of his uniform that wasn’t blue — the piece of red rag tied around his bicep. Nobody else in the dorm had one of those. Jack’s Day Bag also had things in it that nobody else had. Drawing was Jack’s chief way of passing the time, and so he’d made his own set of charcoals, using the embers of a cooking fire Billy made after catching a seagull. It was a treat to get freshly cooked meat, and birds didn’t often get through the wire mesh of The Dome. Jack had enjoyed the meal, but he wished that Billy would’ve

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