Dissertation > Excellent graduate degree dissertation topics show

A Polyphonic Study of Humboldt’s Gift

Author: XuRuXue
Tutor: WangYong
School: Shandong University
Course: English Language and Literature
Keywords: Humboldt’s Gift Polyphone Analytical Skepticism
CLC:
Type: Master's thesis
Year: 2008
Downloads: 155
Quote: 0
Read: Download Dissertation

Abstract


Humboldt’s Gift is a 1975 novel by Saul Bellow, which won the 1976 Pulitzer Prize. As to the narrative style of the novel, many critics have described the narrative in the novel as monologic or autobiographical.This study refutes the claim that Bellow’s narrator functions as his mouthpieces. Examining the narrator of Humboldt’s Gift, the thesis demonstrates that there is no single narratorial discourse that can be identified with that of the author. The narrator’s language displays the competing tendencies of other character’s language and the discourse associated with various cultural forces. Ostensibly it is a monologue, but the possibility of dialogue is hidden.This study employes Bakhtin’s concept of dialogue as multiple-voiced speech within a single speaker’s language. Because each voice provides a background against which other voices are heard, no single voice is given absolute say.Thus, although Bellow’s narrator initially assumes those forms of discourse privileged by the dominant culture, the act of telling their stories reorients them. Specifically, in joining discrete forms of discourse within a single speaker’s language, various explanations have the effect of debunking the privileged language of the dominant culture.Chapter 1 is about the several modes of discourse influenced by analytical skepticism. Citrine confronts the analytical skepticism found in business lingo, radical discourse and psychological discourse. Ostensibly Citrine makes use of the discourse style of a consumer society, but that only provides the initial context for the radical discourse. Although he is a representative of petty bourgeois, Citrine follows Humboldt’s radical style of discourse. The style defines itself by an irreverence and antagonism toward a society that is seen to enslave its working class, making use of crude language to criticize the social structure. Nonetheless, it is a mode of analysis that is itself a reflection of that social structure. Psychological discourse is also based on the ideology of analytical skepticism. It is an integral part of the modern personality as entity. Psychological discourse is shown to have supplanted religion as the chief explainer of human action and the main interpreter of the meaning of human existence. Psychological discourse is so popular that even those those who had been excluded from its ranks utilize it. American materialism is likewise seen to depend on psychological discourse. Citrine adopts the legitimizing rhetoric so that he seems less like an agent for someone else. What the rational orthodoxy of analytical skepticism has achieved would seem to be an excuse-finding to excuse one’s behavior and faults. He also resorts to the occult discourse of Steiner which he finally drops.Chapter 2 focuses on his male discourse under the influence of analytical skepticism. The male viewpoint of skepticism has a higher priority and the only thing held sacred is the fraternity provided by mutual support group. It is Citrine’s adherence to the ideology of analytical skepticism that is ultimately responsible for the failure of his relationship with Renata. The marriage between art and business is an assertion of "ideal manhood". The fraternity provided by mutual support groups is also characteristic of the male dominating society.Chapter 3 posits different ways to view death. . On the metaphysical assumption about death everyone in the world had apparently reached, everyone would be snatched by death. The metaphysical assumption has been all pervasive is clearly demonstrated in Citrine’s life, but he later changes his attitude toward the discourse that adopts the oblivion view. While Citrine is emotionally and therefore physically unable to stand still and observe Humboldt, he is also ideologically unable to maintain the oblivion stance when considering Humboldt’s actual death.Chapter 4 aims to find out the humanizing effect of the narrative. Because it does not recognize the legitimacy of a soul or discourse about the soul, business rhetoric makes it impossible for Citrine to say what he feels. All Citrine can really draw from to prove his intuitive sense that there is something more than nonbeing and oblivion is the experience of unconditional love. It is the experience of unconditional love and belief in soul’s existence that change Citrine and lead him to take up a different kind of life entirely. Citrine finally embraces the conventional ideology of his youth, an ideology that prizes the good, the true, and the beautiful.The interplay of language systems within the narrative of Humboldt’s Gift provides the impetus for renegotiated identity. While telling his tale, the narrator discards social mask, slough off false self, and cast aside restrictive gender-role assignment found in his investment in popular forms of language use and finally comes to a degree of self-realization.

Related Dissertations

  1. Social Role of Intellectuals in the Post-industrial Society-A Case Study of Saul Bellow’s Three Novels,I712.074
  2. Seize the Day and Humboldt’s Gift: Reflecting the Relationship between Father and Son in Two Contexts,I712
  3. The Comparative Research of the Dictionary of Mandarin’s Phonetic System,H116
  4. Changes and significance of the implied author from the Herzog to拉维尔斯坦\,I712.074
  5. On the yellow since the creation of the polyphony,J614.2
  6. Chinese Polyphone,H124
  7. Pinyin Automatically Marked for Multi-tone Words in Modern Chinese Study,TP391.1
  8. "Explanation Attached to Each Note a Little Rhyme Ministry of Rites" Multi-character Study of Sound,H131
  9. \,I712.074
  10. Experience · Memory · narrative,I712.074
  11. On the post-modern historical writing impossibility : \,I712.074
  12. Uncertainty and metafiction : \,I712.074
  13. Absurd and Revolt: right \,I712.074
  14. \,I712.074
  15. From the point of view of ecological criticism Jack London 's novel \,I712.074
  16. \,I712.074
  17. Interpretation of the Theme of \,I712.074
  18. Free will and determinism \,I712.074
  19. Jack London works in the imagery analysis,I712.074
  20. Faulkner 's major works of the parent-child relationship,I712.074
  21. An Analysis of Family Relationships in Faulkner’s Three Novels,I712.074

CLC: >
© 2012 www.DissertationTopic.Net  Mobile