Ecumenical Craft: Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, and their Victorian Masters Item Type text; Electronic Dissertation Authors Holler, Seth C. Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 26/09/2021 00:46:36 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/323220 ECUMENICAL CRAFT: EVELYN WAUGH, GRAHAM GREENE, AND THEIR VICTORIAN MASTERS by Seth C. Holler __________________________ Copyright © Seth C. Holler 2014 A Dissertation Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 2014 2 THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA GRADUATE COLLEGE As members of the Dissertation Committee, we certify that we have read the dissertation prepared by Seth Holler, titled “Ecumenical Craft: Evelyn Waugh, Graham Greene, and their Victorian Masters” and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy. _____________________________________________________ Date: May 9, 2014 Gerald Monsman _____________________________________________________ Date: May 9, 2014 Suresh Raval _____________________________________________________ Date: May 9, 2014 Homer Pettey Final approval and acceptance of this dissertation is contingent upon the candidate’s submission of the final copies of the dissertation to the Graduate College. I hereby certify that I have read this dissertation prepared under my direction and recommend that it be accepted as fulfilling the dissertation requirement. ________________________________________________ Date: May 9, 2014 Dissertation Director: Gerald Monsman 3 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This dissertation has been submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this dissertation are allowable without special permission, provided that an accurate acknowledgement of the source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the copyright holder. SIGNED: Seth C. Holler 4 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For liberality with their time, and for encouragement, guidance, and expertise, I’d like to thank the members of the Dissertation Committee: Dr Gerald Monsman, Dr Suresh Raval, and Dr Homer Pettey. I am grateful to Tim Holler, Pam Holler, Rob Matte, and John Sturgis for reading and responding to drafts in progress. For fruitful discussions of literary matters, as well as the regular pleasure of their company, I am thankful for my friends Jon LaGuardia, Ruth Reiniche, and Reena Thomas. For correspondence and a long, clarifying conversation on Maritain, I thank Dana Gioia. 5 Dedicated to Noelle, patient partner and fellow traveler in a strange land 6 Table of Contents ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................................... 8 INTRODUCTORY ......................................................................................................... 10 CHAPTER 1: INITIAL DIFFICULTIES .................................................................... 19 Theme and form ............................................................................................................. 22 Martin Chuzzlewit and A Handful of Dust ............................................................... 24 Martin Chuzzlewit and Brighton Rock ...................................................................... 35 Post-Victorian influences .............................................................................................. 37 Film: a post-Victorian art ............................................................................................. 49 Excursus: Vile Bodies ............................................................................................... 51 Excursus: “The Balance” ........................................................................................... 56 Recursus: Vile Bodies ............................................................................................... 59 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................... 68 CHAPTER 2: THEORIES OF THE ENGLISH CATHOLIC LITERARY RENAISSANCE .............................................................................................................. 70 “Woman is the cross”: Conor Cruise O’Brien ............................................................. 70 Catholic Romantics: Albert Sonnenfeld ........................................................................ 78 Opposition, Convergence, Confluence: Gene Kellogg ................................................. 83 The International Catholic Novel: Fraser, Allitt, Hitchcock ........................................ 86 Excursus: Brighton Rock, “Credo in unum Satanum” .............................................. 88 The Third Spring: Read, Pearce, Ker, Schwartz, Crowe .............................................. 93 Modernist Recusants: Timothy Sutton......................................................................... 101 Conclusion ................................................................................................................... 103 CHAPTER 3: GOD AND THE NOVEL .................................................................... 107 The outrageous idea of the Catholic novel.................................................................. 109 A definition of the novel .............................................................................................. 116 Realism and the worldliness of the novel: Ian Watt .................................................... 117 The atheism of the novel: José Ortega y Gasset ......................................................... 125 The protestantism of the novel: George Orwell .......................................................... 132 Two Catholic novelists on the Catholic novel ............................................................. 139 Avowedly partisan: G.K. Chesterton ....................................................................... 141 Anagogical vision: Flannery O’Connor .................................................................. 143 CHAPTER 4: A MARITAINIAN THEORY OF THE CATHOLIC NOVEL ....... 160 Perils of the modern scholastic ................................................................................... 160 Glories of Art and Scholasticism ................................................................................. 166 A Maritain glossary ..................................................................................................... 172 Fundamentals ........................................................................................................... 173 Mind, virtue, & aesthetics........................................................................................ 177 The novel & literary criticism ................................................................................. 180 A definition of the Catholic novel ................................................................................ 185 CHAPTER 5: EVELYN WAUGH .............................................................................. 187 Evelyn Waugh, Literary Critic .................................................................................... 190 Style and content ..................................................................................................... 194 7 Architectural prose .................................................................................................. 200 Fundamentals of fiction and the novel .................................................................... 200 Other elements of fiction ......................................................................................... 207 Conclusion ............................................................................................................... 209 Rossetti: Biography as autobiography ........................................................................ 212 The problem of Waugh’s religion ........................................................................... 212 The publication and reception of Rossetti ............................................................... 215 Excursus: Decline and Fall ...................................................................................... 216 Opposing the Modern, Celebrating the Victorian ................................................... 218 Rossetti and Catholicism ......................................................................................... 222 Ninety-Two Days: A Handful of Dickens .................................................................... 227 Reading Dickens abroad .......................................................................................... 228 Reading Orwell on Dickens ..................................................................................... 231 Put Out More Flags: Smallweed’s triumph ................................................................ 235 Love