C haracterisation in the N o v e l : an A esth etic of the U n c a n n y Submitted by Patrick Martin B.A., M.A. Supervisor: Dr. Bill Dorris School of Communications, Dublin City University July 2004 D eclaration I hereby certify that this material, which I now submit for assessment on the programme of study leading to the award of Ph.D. is entirely my own work and has not been taken from the work of others save and to the extent that such work has been cited and acknowledged within the text of my work. Signed M ^ . 0 .t ........... ID No. Date: - T a b l e o f C o n t e n t s Title Pa; Abstract 1 Introduction 3 The Viability of a Subversive Aesthetic of Characterisation 7 A Definition of Character 10 Character and The Uncanny 11 Creative Writing Discourse and Academia 13 Structure of the Dissertation 15 The Two-Headed Novelist 17 Modular Approaches to Characterisation 23 Models of Character 23 Social Cognition about Others 27 Creative Writing Discourse 31 Elements of Character Composition 34 Name 36 Character Type 37 Story Goal, Objective or Motivation 39 Inter-Relatedness of Traits 40 User-Oriented Characterisation 42 Discourse and Writer-orientation 45 The Effect of the Writer’s Self-Concept on Characterisation 47 Conclusion 52 The Grammar of the Uncanny 57 Introduction 57 The Concept of the Uncanny 60 Rules of the Fantastic Uncanny Narrative 64 Misrecognition 67 Formal Properties of the Uncanny 70 Hesitation 70 Blurred distinctions between the animate and inanimate 71 Allusions to fear, taboo and the ‘pre-rational’ 73 Ontological Confusion and Paradox 75 The Uncanny of Beckett and Auster 78 The failure of the distinction between the self and the other 81 and of the identity of the other to be maintained The gradual loss of the self s coherence and continuity 85 Displacement of purpose from self to an unidentified 86 external agency Conclusion: Outlines For Uncanny Characterisation 88 i Names and Naming Strategies 94 Introduction 94 Reference and Reader Orientation 96 Modular Rules of Referential Naming 105 Reference and Frustrated Nomination 107 Beckett’s Strategies of Elision and Entropy 109 Auster’s Names and Echoes of Names 116 A Grammar of Uncanny Referential Naming 119 Contingency of Names 120 Frustrated Nomination 122 Multiplication of Names 124 Conclusion 126 Character Behaviour and Free Will 131 Introduction - Social Cognition About the Behaviour of 131 Others Modular Approaches to Characterisation and Action 134 Uncanny Aspects 142 Change and Transformation 146 Beckett and Transformation 149 Transformation in Auster 152 Transformation in Monsters Worse to Come 154 Free Will and Agency 156 Beckett and Agency 157 Auster and Agency 159 Agency in Monsters Worse to Come 160 Sublime Obstacles 162 Sublime Obstacles in Beckett 163 Sublime Obstacles in Monsters Worse to Come 165 Epistemological Uncertainty 167 Epistemological Uncertainty in Beckett 168 Epistemological Uncertainty in Auster 170 Epistemological Uncertainty in Monsters Worse to Come 171 Conclusion 172 Conclusion 178 A Model of the Uncanny 178 Coherent Character Impression 179 Uncanny Character Impression 182 Rules and Creativity 184 ii A Blending of Spaces Caveat Lector Bibliography Abstract C haracterisation in the N o v e l : A n A esth etic of the U ncanny A bstract The aim of this dissertation is to devise techniques for characterisation in the novel which eschew the dominant, rational and integrated model o f subjectivity promoted in creative writing discourse. It examines the Freudian uncanny and cognate concepts of the sublime, the abject and ontological confusion which lead readers to hesitation, doubt and misrecognition in the process of ‘reading’ character. The emergence of creative writing degree programs and the popularity of guidebooks on the subject have had a modularising effect on approaches to novel writing: decomposing the process into constituent teachable parts. Within this discourse about novel writing, characterisation has become a chronically fixed element in which received models of the self, drawn from reductionist behavioural psychology, tend to dominate. The dissertation examines the grammar o f this modular characterisation and the series o f explicit and implicit rules o f selection and transformation upon which it is based. It argues that it is necessary for the writer to disidentify with this discourse and re-examine their being-towards-others to achieve one o f the primary critical or epistemological goals of the novel: exalting the wisdom of uncertainty with relation to the representation o f self and other. Concepts drawn from structuralist and poststructuralist philosophy, social cognition, postmodern literary theory, cognitive science, analytical philosophy and psychology are examined for their usefulness to this creative problem of eliciting reader reactions of hesitation, misrecognition, ontological confusion and doubt about the nature o f the characters. The novel trilogies o f Samuel Beckett and Paul Auster are offered as contemporary prototypes of the effect, with their non-referentiation and disorientation effects in characterisation. The “grammar o f the uncanny” is then analysed with respect to two important aspects o f characterisation: name and character behaviour. Commentary on the approach to characterisation in Monsters Worse to Come is also presented. 1 Chapter One Introduction Chapter One: Introduction 1: Introduction Those who refuse to re-examine the rules of art pursue successful careers in mass conformism by communicating, by means of the ‘correct rules’, the endemic desire for reality with objects and situations capable of gratifying it. Pornography is the use of photography and film to such an end. It is becoming a general model for the visual or narrative arts which have not met the challenge of the m ass media. (Lyotard 1986:75) And when it comes to rejecting fundamentals, I think I have nothing to learn, and indeed I confuse them with accidentals. (Beckett 1994:80) The aim of this dissertation is to devise techniques for characterisation in the novel which eschew the coherent, rational and integrated model of subjectivity upon which the dominant poetics of characterisation, as espoused in popular creative writing guides, is based. The objective is to outline strategies which create a “disquieting estrangement” for the reader in her1 decoding or reading of characters. It attempts this by performing a discourse analysis of a set of popular creative writing texts and outlines the epistemological framework for the understanding of otherness which defines them. With the aim of generating an opposing epistemology, a variety of ideas, drawn from research in social cognition, (Fiske and Neuberg 1990; Schank 1958), psychoanalysis (Freud 1919; Schelling 1936; Kristeva 1982; Lacan 1955; Zizek 1973) poststructuralist philosophy (Lyotard 1994; Kearney 2000; Heidegger 1997), analytical philosophy (Kripke 1982; Austin, 1962; Searle, 1969), discourse analysis (Fairclough 2000; Teo 2000), cognitive science (Lakoff 1980; Rosch 1970; Haslam and Rotschild 2000), and neuroscience (Ramachandran 1998; Dejode et al 2001) are presented. In particular, the Freudian concept of the uncanny and, to a lesser extent, those of categorial confusion, the sublime and epistemological pathology are considered 3 Chapter One: Introduction for their usefulness in the development of such techniques. The novel trilogies of Samuel Beckett (The Beckett Trilogy) and Paul Auster (The New York Trilogy) are presented as examples of the uncanny approach to characterisation. The application of this uncanny characterisation aesthetic in the creative writing component, a novel entitled Monsters Worse to Come, is discussed. The examples of creative writing discourse which are examined are books selected from reading lists for aspiring writers which are circulated on mailing lists, through writer support websites and online booksellers. They have been written by people formally involved in the academic and publishing worlds, as teachers, lecturers, writers and literary agents.2 While their work does not wholly represent the heterogeneity of advice, assumptions and approaches which circulate within creative writing discourse, their mutual co-validation of approaches, coherence and popularity (gauged by sales, testimonials and inclusion on reading lists) attest to the fact that they are, at the very least, indicative of the commercially-driven facet of the genre. That they are marketed to, and seek to advise, beginning novelists has the result of encouraging the nascent writer’s identification with the singular philosophy of characterisation which the discourse promotes. The following books were selected: Stein on Writing (Stein 2000); The 38 Most Common Mistakes in Fiction (Bickham 1997); The First Five Pages (Lukeman 2000); How to Write a Damn Good Novel (Frey 1987); Novel Writing (Marshall 2000); 45 Master Characters (Schmidt 2001); The Writers Guide to Essential Character Traits (Edelstein 1999); Creating Unforgettable Characters (Seger 1990). Critical discourse analysis examines how rhetorical strategies of identification, agency deletion, selectivity and elision within a set of texts tend towards making its contingent claims to knowledge appear to be self-evident truths in such a way that dissident points of view can be denied a space of articulation and the very existence of alternative viewpoints can be repressed or symbolically disparaged in their absence (Bourdieu 1992; Fairclough 1992). Or, as Teo puts it, its purpose is... 4 Chapter One: