Values in life and literature : a comparative reading of the depiction of disintegration, insecurity and uncertainty in selected novels by Thomas Mann, William Faulkner and Thomas Pynchon
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Authors
Wilke, Magdalena Friedericke
Issue Date
1999-06
Type
Thesis
Language
en
Keywords
Reflections of life in Literature , Psychological/ philosophical values , Characterization techniques , Comparative reading , Language and the unconscious , Fin de siecle , Disintegration , Individual anguish , Fixation, its psychological impact , 'Inner life' portrayal , Memory monologue, selective, associative , Shifting identities , Postmodernism , Irrational quests , Characters as textual construct , Dehumanization, commodification of people
Alternative Title
Abstract
The reading of selected literary texts in this thesis traces
the changes from a divinely ordered world of stability
(Thomas Mann's Bud<lenbrooks) to surroundings characterized
by insecurity (William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury) to
an unstable environment giving rise to largely futile attempts
at finding answers to seemingly illogical questions
(Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49). As a product of the
accelerated speed of technological progression and the information
revolution in the twentieth century, man is more
often than not incapable of adjusting to changed circumstances
in a seemingly hostile environment. Indeed, instability
and unpredictability are external factors determining
the sense of insecurity and uncertainty characterising
the 'world' depicted in the literary texts under consideration.
For this reason judicious use will be made of
philosophical and psychoanalytical concepts, based, amongst
others, on Nietzschean and Freudian theories, to explain the
disintegration of families, the anguish experienced by individuals
or, indeed, the shifting identities informing the
portrayal of character in selected literary texts.
Description
Citation
Wilke, Magdalena Friedericke (1999) Values in life and literature : a comparative reading of the depiction of disintegration, insecurity and uncertainty in selected novels by Thomas Mann, William Faulkner and Thomas Pynchon, University of South Africa, Pretoria, <http://hdl.handle.net/10500/16482>