الروايه الحديثه
Discusions
-Dis1:What is Verisimikitude"and how does it realate to the Novel
Refers to the illusion that the novel is a representation of real life
Dis2:-What is the difference between realism and naturalism Realism:Middle class
Pragmatic
Mimetic art
Objective, but ethical
Sometimes comic or satiric
How can the individual live within and influence society?
Honore Balzac, Gustave Flaubert, George Eliot, William Dean Howells, Mark Twain, Leo Tolstoy, George Sand
2-Naturalism:Middle/Lower class
Scientific
Investigative art
Objective and amoral
Often pessimistic, sometimes comic
How does society/the environment impact individuals?
Emile Zola, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Thomas Hardy, Stephen Crane, Theodore Dreiser
Dis5:Crusoe sets on a sea voyage in August 1651, against the wishes of his parents, who want him to stay at home and pursue a career, possibly in law.
After a tumultuous journey that sees his ship wrecked in a storm, his lust for the sea remains so strong that he sets out to sea again. This journey too ends in disaster and Crusoe becomes the slave of a Moor (Muslims in Northwest Africa)
After two years of slavery, he manages to escape and is rescued and befriended by the Captain of a Portuguese ship off the west coast of Africa. The ship is en route to Brazil. There, with the help of the captain, Crusoe becomes owner of a plantation.
Years later, he joins an expedition to bring slaves from Africa, but he is shipwrecked in a storm about forty miles out to sea on an island (which he calls the Island of Despair) on September 30, 1659.
His companions all die, save himself, and three animals who survived the shipwreck, the captain's dog and two cats. Having overcome his despair, he fetches arms, tools and other supplies from the ship before it breaks apart and sinks. He proceeds to build a fenced-in habitation near a cave which he excavates himself.
Crusoe leaves the island December 19, 1686 and arrives in England on June 11, 1687. He learns that his family believed him dead and there was nothing in his father's will for him.
Crusoe departs for Lisbon to reclaim the profits of his estate in Brazil, which has granted him a large amount of wealth. In conclusion, he takes his wealth overland to England to avoid traveling at sea. Friday comes with him and along the way they endure one last adventure
together as they fight off hundreds of famished wolves while crossing the Pyrenees
Discussion Question 6:
Discuss the theme of colonialism in Robinson Crusoe
The . Robinson Crusoe is the true symbol of the British conquest: The whole Anglo-Saxon spirit is in Crusoe.
vCrusoe attempts to replicate his own society on the island: application of European technology, agriculture, and even a rudimentary political hierarchy.
vThe idealized master-servant relationship between Crusoe and Friday.
vCrusoe represents the “enlightened European.” Friday is the “savage” who can only be redeemed from his supposedly barbarous way of life through the assimilation into Crusoe's culture.Nevertheless, within the novel Defoe also takes the opportunity to criticize the historic Spanish conquest of south america
7-
What are the characteristics of modernism? How did it affect the novel?
By the end of the 19th century, artists and novelists were already becoming unsatisfied with realism.
Rejection of Realism and Naturalism became common.
a wide range of experimental and avant-garde trends (all the –isms: dadaism, surrealism, expressionism, futurism, etc.)
A reaction to the modern, urban experience
A rejection of the bourgeois values
Discontinuity and Fragmentation
Realism stressed the role of art as a mirror of social reality, the values of bourgeois society, and notions of progress.
Modernism questioned art’s capability to reflect reality, questioned the coherence of that reality, the bourgeois values of society and the notions of progress and happiness.
Life and reality are not coherent or simple and it is an illusion to think that the novel or art in general can simply depict them like a mirror.
Bourgeois values and morality are fake and superficial
--
Juxtaposition and multiple points of view
Emphasis on individualism
“Self” is seen as artificial, a social fiction
The individual is stripped of the traditional defining categories of personhood
8- Discuss the Berlin Conference and the Belgian colonization of the Congo
The Congress of Berlin was not the start of the "Scramble for Africa," but it laid down the rules that governed the European conquest of Africa for the next fifteen years. It was unusual because international conferences were usually held to sort out the aftermath of a war, but almost never to settle problems before they led to war. But all of the major powers had reasons to attend, especially France, Britain and the new powerhouse, Germany. Although there were many issues at stake, the most important one was the future of the Congo River basin.
9-
Heart of Darkness is a story that is framed within another story. Discuss how it is done and what is the purpose behind this stylistic strategy?
, author of Heart of Darkness, said that Heart of Darkness is a documentary--the things described in it really happened. Conrad actually did go to the Congo and was the captain of a steamboat on the Congo River. Heart of Darkness is a record of his experience. Marlow in the novella = Joseph Conrad Kurtz in the novella = Leon Rom, head of the Force Publique.
10
How does Heart of darkness describe Africans? Give examples.
African are also often described in zoological terms (ants, animals, insects, etc) and it can be argued that Heart of Darkness participates in the dehumanization of the Africans. Notice that no African is allowed to speak in the novel, and they are often portrayed as sub-humans and primitives. They just make primitive sounds, but they never talk.
11
How does Heart of darkness describe Europeans? Give examples.
the novel also sets against the hypocrisy of the company and the Europeans in general. Marlow (and Joseph Conrad through him) prefers Kurtz’s honesty to the Company’s and the Europeans’ hypocrisy.
12-
Discuss the theme of colonialism in Heart of Darkness
Heart of Darkness pays more attention to the damage that colonization does to the souls of white colonizers than it does to the physical death and devastation unleashed on the black natives. Though this focus on the white colonizers makes the novella somewhat unbalanced, it does allow Heart of Darkness to extend its criticism of colonialism all the way back to its corrupt source, the "civilization" of Europ
13
Discuss the influence of modernism in Heart of darkness
Modernism began as a movement in that late 19th, early 20th centuries. Artists started to feel restricted by the styles and conventions of the Renaissance period.
Thusly came the dawn of Modernism in many different forms, ranging from Impressionism to Cubism
14
Discuss the influence of modernism in Heart of darkness
Oppositional relations between the individual and the social, (the alienation of the individual in his/her social environment)
Antibourgeois (because bourgeois values and lifestyle are fake and superficial)
Uses first person narrator, and he/she is often unreliable, reflecting the difficulty to represent reality
Reflects a sense of urban dislocation and alienation