JOSEPH CONRAD'S THE SECRET AGENT AND THE GROTESQUE by BRIAN GEORGE MARRS B.A., University of British Columbia, 1971 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, 1974 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 English The University of British Columbia Vancouver 8, Canada Date: October, 1974 ABSTRACT This thesis seeks to examine Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent in the context of the grotesque mode. Part I discusses narrative and narrative style as a function of the dynamic relationship between text and reader, and emphasizes the degree to which the interplay between text and reader may be determined and manipulated by the author's esthetic exploitation of the conventions and expectations that com• prise this relationship. The discrepancy between narrative and reader expectation as a potential source of the grotesque the nature of the grotesque as a critical concept and as a mode possessing specific forms, images, and effects, and the historical development of the grotesque, are examined in Part II. Particular attention is paid to the modern development of the grotesque mode, to the use of the grotesque in the novel, to the specifically literary features of the grotesque and to the creative aspects of the mode. Part III investi• gates the narrative structures of The Secret Agent, and reveals the various characteristic grotesque motifs, images, and characters that perform important esthetic functions in the narrative. The extensive presence of the grotesque at this level suggests an examination of the narrative structure perspective, and style within the context of the grotesque. This leads to an explanation for the apparent discrepancies between perspective and content in The Secret Agent, and pro• vides a unified description of those aspects of perspective, style, and language which determine the narrative function and effect. At a more speculative level, the grotesque mode also suggests certain creative attitudes and psychological motives which might be associated with the novel. Supervisor TABLE OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 1 PART I .... • 10 PART II 1. THE TRADITIONAL AND MODERN GROTESQUE 27 2. THE NATURE OF THE GROTESQUE . 49 PART III 1. THE SECRET AGENT: GROTESQUE CONTENT 86 2. THE SECRET AGENT; THE GROTESQUE PERSPECTIVE . 147 3. THE SECRET AGENT: THE GROTESQUE VISION .... 181 CONCLUSION 200 NOTES 206 LIST OF WORKS CITED 213 iii A NOTE ON REFERENCES The edition of Conrad's works cited throughout is that of the Medallion Edition published by the Gresham Publishing Co. Ltd. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to acknowledge the kind and willing assistance given to me by my supervisor, Mr. Andrew Busza. iv 1 INTRODUCTION Certain characteristic, and therefore important, aspects of Joseph Conrad's The Secret Agent have not been satisfactorily explained by the critical writing on the novel; the problem is, I believe, one of approach rather than of critical perceptiveness. I feel the criticism of The Secret Agent to be espe• cially inadequate in two principal ways. First, it has not sufficiently accounted for certain "discrepancies" and "discontinuities" which are present at all levels of the narrative, from content through structure to perspective. These dissonances may range from large structural "gaps," such as exist between chapters three and four or in the chronology of the novel, to the suppression, delay, ambiguity, or even gratuitous presence of certain details within the context of single scenes, sentences, or images. Secondly, one of the most evident of these discrep• ancies is the relationship between form and content, and it is largely the failure to describe this relationship satis• factorily, and therefore the failure to account for what is perhaps the central discrepancy, that has prevented a com• prehensive and meaningful description and interpretation of the narrative as a whole and of the interrelationship of its components. The form/content relationship is commonly described in terms of irony and detachment: such a description 2 in fact prevents recognition of the vital, dynamic, and continual interplay between perspective and content, a recog• nition important to an understanding of the unique effect of the novel. It is my contention that this relationship, its apparent discrepant-mature, and the other discontinuities, dissonances, and incongruities which are characteristic of the narrative, can be accounted for and described in a manner consonant with the thematic concerns of the novel, by means of the grotesque mode. Although writers on the grotesque commonly assume, and rightly so, I believe, that the grotesque exists as a complete and independent esthetic category, there exists no satisfac• tory definition and description of the mode which is truly comprehensive in the generic sense. This is especially true of the grotesque as a literary mode. It is first of all necessary, therefore, to define and describe the grotesque in as comprehensive a manner as possible, so that its charac• teristic motives, attitudes, contents, structures, stylistic devices, and effects are related to each other within a single concept. The foundation of any such concept will be Wolfgang Kayser's The Grotesque in Art and Literature, originally published under the title Das Groteske; seine Gestaltung in Malerei und Dichtung (1957) .This study is primarily useful 3 in its provision of a catalogue of the principal motifs and images which characterize grotesque art and literature, and in tracing the development of the grotesque as a mode and as a critical concept from the Renaissance to the modern era. It is limited in three important ways, however: first, although it outlines the nature of the grotesque as an inde• pendent esthetic category, and suggests certain motives, perspectives, and effects associated with the mode, its main emphasis is upon the content of the grotesque; second, its trans-generic scope tends to prevent or obscure any clear sense of a distinctly literary grotesque; and third, whenever the focus does become purely literary, the definite bias toward the German Romantic literary tradition essentially invalidates the observation insofar as most post-Romantic English and American grotesque literature is concerned. These limitations apply generally to most writing on the grotesque, although a few studies of individual works, and a recent emphasis upon the psychological implications of the grotesque, have extended the concept in important ways. I have employed such studies where relevant, and have attemp• ted to compensate for the Romantic or "gothic" bias of the standard definitions by referring to the writings of such modern exponents of the grotesque as Charles Dickens, G. K. Chesterton, James Joyce, William Faulkner, Flann O'^Bfieh, Nathanael West, Flannery O'Connor, and Samuel Beckett. By 4 assessing the ways in which the grotesque in their writings is a function of specific literary perspectives, structures, and devices, I have tried to provide a more modern context for the grotesque in The Secret Agent. Generally speaking, the problem of defining the genre of the grotesque is one which attaches itself to the attempt to define any genre. This problem is clearly stated by Wellek and Warren in Theory of Literature: The dilemma of genre history is the dilemma of all history: i.e., in order to discover the scheme of reference (in this case, the genre) we must study the history; but we cannot study the history without having in mind some scheme of selection.2 That some scheme of selection is necessary in attempting to reach a definition of the grotesque is indicated in George Gibian's remark that: The danger in using the term GROTESQUE is of attributing to it too broad rather than too narrow a meaning. The grotesque borders on or even par• takes of numerous otherqqualities: the fantastic, distorted, exaggerated, bizarre, absurd, ludicrously eccentric, extravagant, monstrous, or macabre. Yet these adjectives are not a list of its synonyms. The grotesque must moreover be distinguished from simple caricature and the tragicomic.^ The need for, and difficulty of, such comparative definition is further indicated by the fact that Philip Thomson's The Grotesque, the best short introduction to the subject, devotes over one-third of its discussion to making precisely the types of distinction mentioned by Gibian. Thomson relates the grotesque respectively to the absurd, the 5 bizarre- the macabre, caricature, parody, satire, irony, and the comic. He points out that even "the conflict of incom- patibles," which is the most fundamental element of the grotesque, "is not exclusively a criterion of the grotesque"; that, for instance, Irony and paradox depend on this sort of conflict or confrontation, and all theories of the comic are based on some notion of incongruity, conflict, juxtaposition of opposites, etc.^ Such distinctions are therefore especially pertinent when it comes to examining The Secret Agent within the context of the grotesque, for the elements of disharmony which characterize The Secret.Agent are usually explained in terms of the ironic, and sometimes the comic, mode. While such explanations are valid up to a point, they are unable to deal with some of the basic facts and relationships of the narrative. The description of the grotesque as a literary mode is facilitated by stressing a certain concept of style—namely, one which takes account of the ongoing relationship between reader and text, and between reader and author.