TYBA-SEM-VI-PAPER-VIII-20th-Century-British-Literature-II-2-munotes (2024)

Critical Study of
Background Topics -I

3 Virginia Woolf’s literature throws light on gender separation. As a
proponent of equality, her literature & lectures are about the basic need of
women. Her first essay on feminism entitled A Room of One's Own asserts
that a woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write.
To Woolf, centuries of bias and economic and educational disadvantages
have repressed women's creativity. It investigates t he social and material
conditions required for women to write literature.
Mary Wollstonecraft, a renowned women's rights activist authored a
radical text A Vindication of the Rights of Woman which is one of the
classics of rationalist feminism advocating f emale emancipation. She read
Charles Maurice de Talleyrand -Périgord's 1791 report to the French
National Assembly, which had stated that women should only receive
domestic education. It caused the creation of her radical literary
compositions. To her opini on, women are not naturally inferior to men,
but appear to be only because they lack education. Both men and women
should be treated as rational beings. She imagines a social order founded
on reason. She underlined the need of giving men and women equal
opportunities in education, work, and politics.
Audre Lorde is an African -American writer, and a radical feminist
devoted to the injustices of racism , sexism , and classism . Her poems and
prose largely deal with the exploration of black female identity. Her
writing deals with lesbian feminism and racial issues. Her essay The
Master's Tools Will Never Dismant le the Master's House challenges
extensive racism and hom*ophobia that exists within feminism. Her short
story Fourth of July reveals how one should resist and retaliate when
afflicted with prejudice. The essay The Fourth of July describes how she
obtained her memory and meaning of independence during her summer
trip to Washington, D.C.
Simone de Beauvoir, a feminist activist is best known for her work The
Second Sex a classic of contemporary feminist literature. To her, women
need access to the same kinds of activities and projects as men placing her
to some extent in the tradition of liberal or second -wave feminism.
Women must be treated as equal to men and laws. The customs and
education must be altered to encourage this. As a socialist feminist, she
highlights the problems found in patriarchy and capitalism. In The Second
Sex a classic of contemporary feminist literature, she famously stated,
"One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman." To her, women are
different from men because they have been taught so and socialized to do
so.
Angela Carter known for radical -libertarian feminism criticizes the
patriarchal roles placed on women throughout time. Her book The Bloody
Chamber is about manipulative power and the objectification of women.
Betty Friedan ig nited the second wave of feminism with her book, The
Feminine Mystique. It unveils the frustration of millions of American
women with their limited gender roles. It helped to spur extensive public
activism for gender equality. It criticized the postwar bel ief that a woman's munotes.in

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5 heroine’s point of view. Pamela comments on domestic violenc e and
questions the dynamic line between male aggression and a contemporary
view of love. It rejects traditional views of women and supports the new
and changing role of women in society. Tristram Shandy is regarded as a
forerunner of many narrative devices and styles used by modernist
and postmodernist authors later on. Its first -person narrative is quite
introspective and unique . However, the psychological novel reached its
full potential only in the 20th century. The growth of psychology and the
discoveries of Sigmund F reud caused though little bit for the emergence of
the psychological novel.
The penetrating perception into psychological complexities and
unconscious motivations of Fyodor Dostoyevsky and Leo Tolstoy, the
external events’ impingement on individual consci ousness of Henry
James, the associative memories of Marcel Proust, the stream -of-
consciousness technique of James Joyce and William Faulkner , and the
continuous flow of experience of Virginia Woolf , Emile Bronte, Agatha
Christie were unique in their contribution to the growth of psychological
novel.
Heathcliff f rom Wuthering Heights by Emile Bronte represents the id of
Sigmund Freud's personality theory. It is the primitive and natural instinct
found in the subconscious part of the mind. It drives Heathcliff to seek the
immediate fulfillment of an instinct and is unaffected by logic or morals.
James Joyce's novel Ulysses is a landmark in which the episodes
of Homer 's Odyssey are paralleled in the manner of stream of
consciousness. He enters the minds of characters to reveal innermost
thoughts, feelings, and sensations.
Fyodor Dostoyevsky is one of the influential novelists of the Golden Age
of Russian literature . His novels are masterpieces for those who are
interested in psychology. His deep faith and love of humanity unveil the
psyche of his characters. Hailed as a creative wri ter next to Shakespeare,
Sigmund Freud praised the novel The Brothers Karamazov as "the most
magnificent novel ever written".
The novels of Henry James describe the internal states of mind and social
dynamics of his characters. Contradictory motives and i mpressions are
compared in the discussion of a character's psyche. The characters in his
notable novels The Portrait of a Lady , The Turn of the Screw and The
Ambassadors lack self -awareness and still, they possess unfulfilled
yearnings. The novels of McGra th such as The Wardrobe Mistress and
Last Days in Cleaver Square reveal the effect of fascistic tendencies in
international politics on the psychology of his characters.
The plot in the psychological novel is always subordinate to the internal
upheavals in the mind of the characters. It ultimately harms the
chronological ordering of events. The events occur in the character’s
thought associations, memories, fantasies, daydreams, inspections, and
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7 Jules Verne ’s Paris au XXième siècle predicts elevated trains, automobiles,
facsimile machines, and computer -like banking machines. His techno -
thrillers teach us balloons, submarines, trains, mechanical elephants, and
many other e ngineering marvels. With him, “scientific romance” became a
permanent feature of the Western test.
The fiction of Albert Robida, a French illustrator is akin to the 20th
century’s reality. Great Britain and France experienced a flowering of
creative imagin ation in the 1880s and ’90s. In his novel, The Strange
Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Robert, Louis Stevenson creates a hero in
Dr. Jekyll, who is aware of the evil in his being and is sick of the duplicity
in his life. By way of his experiments on himse lf, he succeeds in freeing
the pure evil part of his being as Mr. Hyde, so that each can indulge in a
life unfettered by the demands of the other.
H.G. Wells’s The Time Machine , The Invisible Man , and The War of the
Worlds are the landmarks in the realm of science fiction. Wells an
ardent and tireless socialist campaigner predicted a rationalized,
technocratic society. His novel Brave New World , reveals how moderns
are wonderfully chased down, persecuted, degraded, and commonly killed.
His science fiction novella The Time Machine is generally credited with
the popularization of the concept of time travel by using a device to travel
purposely and selectively forward or backward through time. The story
The Invisible Man concerns the life and death of a scientist named Griffin.
He learns how to make himself invisible. His The War of the Worlds is an
inspiring masterpiece of an alien invasion. Its terrifying, tentacle race of
Martians devastate the Earth and feeds on their human victims while their
voracious vegetation, the red weed, spreads over the ruined planet.
George Orwell’s nov el Nineteen Eighty -four gives an image of the future
as “a boot stamping on a human face —forever.” Howells’s novel A
Traveler from Altruria depicts a utopian world with Christianity and the
U.S. “ethical socialism”.
A Princess of Mars , by Edgar Rice Burr oughs combined European
elements of fantasy and horror with the naive expansionist style of early
American westerns. With this, science fiction became a distinctly
American genre
Science fiction became popular after the advent of the atomic bomb and
the launch of Sputnik. With sophisticated, urbane, and satiric touch, it
became anthropological speculation about societies and cultures . The
fictions Aelita by the Aleksey Tolstoy and My by Yevgeny Zamyatin in
Russian literature influenced the great dystopian novels of the 20th
century viz. Aldous Huxley ’s Brave New World and George Orwell ’s
Nineteen Eighty -four.
Sir Thomas More ’s Utopia is a new thought experiment. It assisted the
writers to spot and nurture tomorrow’s dominant progressive trends. It
destroyed the feudal superst itions of false consciousness. Social perfection
was the intention behind it. Hence, a Bostonian in Edward Bellamy’s
Looking Backward awakes from a mystical sleep in the year 2000 to find munotes.in

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9 Elizabeth Bowen, Elizabeth Taylor, and Barbara Pym also gave
expression to this complexity in their novels. Later the novelists John
Braine , John Wain Alan Sillitoe, Stan Barstow, and David Storey known
as Angry Young Men dealt with social mobility from the northern
working class to the southern middle class.
Anthony Powell’s A Dance to the Music of Time is a chronicle of class and
cultural shifts in England from World War I to the 1960s. The novels of
Kingsley Amis satirize social change in the post -world war period. C. P.
Snow’s novel Strangers and Brothers are about man’s journey from the
provincial lower classes to London’s “corridors of power”. Angus
Wilson ’s No Laughing Matter is the most inspired fictional parade of
social and cultural life in 20th -century Britain . His works unite 19th -
centu ry breadth and delight with 20th -century formal flexibility and
experiment.
From the late 1960s onward, the outstanding trend in fiction was
enthrallment with empire. J G Farrell’s novels Troubles , The Siege of
Krishnapur , and The Singapore Grip are spotli ghted imperial
discomfiture. Then postcolonial voices found expression in Salman
Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children which energetically mingles material from
Eastern fable, Hindu myth , Islamic lore, Bombay cinema, cartoon strips,
advertising billboards, and Latin American magic realism. Julian
Barnes ’s A History of the World in 101/2 Chapters mixes fact with fantasy .
Rushdie’s Shame , The Satanic Verses , The Moor’s Last Sigh , and The
Ground Beneath Her Feet exhibit the reviving effects of cultural cross -
fertilization. Vikram Seth’s novel A Suitable Boy is about India afte r
independence. It combines social breadth and emotional and psychological
depth.
The novels by Timothy Mo report on colonial predicaments in East Asia
with political acumen . His novel An Insula r Possession vividly harks back
to the founding of Hong Kong . Kazuo Ishiguro’s refined novel An Artist of
the Floating World reveals the imperialistic ethos of 1930s Japan.
In his most ambitious novel, A Bend in the River , V.S. Naipaul explores
the themes of personal exile and political and individual corruption. The
Radiant Way by Margaret Drabble reveals two nations’ panoramas of an
England cleft by regional gulfs and gross inequities between rich and poor.
Martin Amis’s novels Money and London Fields play over vistas of urban
corruption, greed, and degradation. The feminist novelists experimented
with Gothic, fairy tales, and fantasy. As the end of the century
approached, historical novels emerged with new strength. Barry
Unsworth’s novels The Rage of the Vulture, Stone Virgin , and Morality
Play reveal the settings such as Ottoman Empire , Venice & northern
England. Beryl Bainbridge, Patrick O’Brian,
1.6 CONCLUSION
Every background topic dealt with has unveiled the fundamental identity
of 20th-century British literature. Feminism relied on the basic principle of munotes.in

20th Century British
Literature -II
10 equilibrium has made literature complete by adding half of the
population’s contribution to the experience of life. The sense of pure
subjectivity, psychological ups, and downs & inner urge of expression of
every sensual creator has got their identity in the psycholo gical novels
written in 20th century Britain. Similarly, scientific approaches to life are
found expression in science fiction, the novel & recent genres
encompassing minute experiments in the mind of creative men of letters.
As literature is an acute refl ection of the black and bright side of life, it has
always given justice to every major & minor happening. Post -World War
II British novels reveal life after the war.
1.7 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Discuss the movement of f eminism in Modern Literature .
2. Ex plain the features of Psychological Novel .
3. Trace the development and rise of Science Fiction .
4. Discuss the features of Post-World War II Novel .

1.8 BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Abrams, M. H., A Glossary of literary Terms (7th edition). (New
York: Harcourt Brace), 19 99), p. 167.
2. Marshall Berman, All that is Solid Melts into Air . (Harmsworth:
Penguin,1988), p. 23.
3. Frenz, Horst, ed. (1969), "Yeats bio", The Nobel Prize in Literature
1923, Nobel Lectures, Literature 1901 –1967, retrieved 23 May 2007 .
4. Encyclopædia Britanni ca. Encyclopædia Britannica Online Academic
Edition. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 15 November
2012.
5. Beebe, Maurice (Fall 1972). "Ulysses and the Age of
Modernism". James Joyce Quarterly (University of Tulsa) 10 (1): p.
176.
6. The Bloomsbury Guide to English Literature , ed. Marion Wynne
Davies (New York: Prentice Hall, 1990), p. 118.

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Critical Study of
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13 In Brave New World , Huxley ridicules how government runs a society. It
predicts the demise of individuality, art, and culture in the face of
governmental control through technology and mass consumerism. The
government of Brave New World retains control by making its c itizens so
happy and superficially fulfilled that they do not care about their freedom.
State control results in a loss of humanity. As a political satire, the novel
satirizes a totalitarian society in which the trends of Huxley's day have
been taken to extremes. It underlines the fact that humans while trying to
better themselves and obtain knowledge, end up becoming their enemy.
The satire about contemporary social and moral issues is relevant to our
consumer -based society of today.
Ray Bradbury Fahrenheit 451 is a warning against state -based censorship
in our culture. Its political message is that all books are burned by a
government organization whose personnel are known as firemen. They
make fir es instead of putting them out. The novel is relevant to modern
society which has censorship of individual ideas and beliefs. Modern
media has to censor things that they feel will upset people. Libraries are
getting closed down and books are treated with d isrespect and thrown
away. It reveals the importance of knowledge and identity in a society that
is easily corrupted by ignorance, censorship, and the tools designed to
distract from the realities of our world.
The totalitarian government in George Orwell 's Nineteen Eighty Four tries
to control everything about its people. It takes every precaution that lower
people remain loyal to them. The novel underlines the rising of
communism in Western countries that are nevertheless uncertain about
how to approach it. It is a satire of tyrannical administrations and what
might happen if the government was allowed to be in complete and total
control of the people. The malicious oppressive government in its pursuit
of power uses various methods to have ultimate contro l over the
population. The constant war results in the loss of highly valued
democratic ideals.
Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver's Travels is a political allegory that reveals the
total political corruption beginning in the 16th century and ending in the
18th century. In it the seventeenth -century society is highlighted in many
aspects. It satirizes party politics, religious differences & western culture
as a whole which is relevant in today’s time too. Gulliver travels to four
different foreign countries, each r epresenting a corrupt part of England.
The novel criticized the corruption of such parts. It has critically focused
on the government, society, science, religion, and man. Lilliput is like
England and Blefuscu is like France. Swift satirizes the needless f ighting
between two nations. The two Lilliputian parties stand for English
political parties.
Political allegories in the guise criticism strive to improve the quality of
life. It reveals the need of modification in the attitude of every human
being in th e chair of ruling life. munotes.in

Critical Study of
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15 Ulysses by James Joyce is about alienation and the quest for belonging.
The Irish were also the colonized people of their day. Joyce too
experienced the contempt of the colonizers. In A Portrait of the Artist as a
Young Man Ireland's subservience affects Stephen Dedalus who is
determined to escape the bonds that his Irish ancestors have accepted. He
strives to emerge from his Irish heritage. He wants to be free from the
shackles that have traditionally confined his country. H e decides to use his
art to reclaim autonomy for Ireland. Using the borrowed language of
English, he plans to write in a style that will be both autonomous from
England and true to the Irish people.
Rudyard Kipling believed that ideally the colonized shoul d recognize their
inferiority and accept their governed position. His novel Kim unveils the
postcolonial impact on the life of a young boy. It reveals the theme of
Loyalty and Racism. It chronicles the adventures of an Irish orphan in
India who becomes the disciple of a Tibetan monk while learning spying
from the British secret service. His novel The Jungle Book includes
subliminal messages of imperialism. It explores how a nation exercises
political or economic control over a smaller nation. Mowgli the “ma n-
cub” is portrayed as the larger nation for he is a human, though he has
been raised by animals in the wild.
D.H. Lawrence explores the dehumanizing effects of modernity and
industrialization. His novel Sons and Lovers reveals the theme of nature
and indu strialism. The totalitarian government in George Orwell's
Nineteen Eighty -Four tries to control everything about its people. Big
brother puts an unfair control on the people of Oceania and controls them
socially and somewhat economically on what they can p urchase and how
they can live. The novel satirizes tyrannical administrations and what
might happen if the government was allowed to be in complete and total
control of the people. The malicious oppressive government in its pursuit
of power uses various me thods to have ultimate control over the
population. The constant war results in the loss of highly valued
democratic ideals.
In his novel The War of the Worlds , H.G. Wells uses a Martian invasion of
Earth as a vehicle to discuss the validity of late -ninet eenth -century British
colonialism. It draws parallels between England's fictional plight and the
real hardships of native populations throughout the empire. In short, it
reveals Wells' attitudes toward the idea of colonization.
In Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh satirically explores the British
class system which is dependent on the idea that power was hereditary and
the established gentry was superior to other social classes. Zadie Smith's
novel White Teeth examines the masculine experience (both migra nt and
English) by reflecting on the complex effects that cultural history can have
on identity. It traces the personal history of the protagonists interlaced
with the cultural history of post -Postcolonial Britain.
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Wolf reveals th e interconnectedness of
perception and reality across individuals and social spheres. Dalloway is munotes.in

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17 society of hypocrites. The novel ad vocates personal enlightenment.
Individually each person must hit bottom to truly rise or transcend their
old self.
The ideas of thinkers like Dostoevsky, Foucault , Kafka, Nietzsche,
Herbert Marcuse, Gille s Deleuze, and Eduard von Hartmann infuse the
works of artists like Chuck Palahniuk, David Lynch, Crispin Glover,
and Charles Bukowski. Existential works maintain a balance between
distastefulness and beauty. Jean -Paul Sartre’s play No Exit has the quote,
“Hell is other people.” The play begins with a Valet leading a man into a
room that the audience soon realizes is in hell. Eventually, he is joined by
two women. After their entry, the Valet leaves and the door is shut and
locked. All three expect to be to rtured, but no torturer arrives. Instead,
they realize that they are there to torture each other, which they do
effectively, by probing each other’s sins, desires, and unpleasant
memories.
The Theatre of the Absurd has totally relied on existentialist them es. In
Samuel Beckett’s play Waiting for Godot , two men pass the time
aimlessly, while waiting for someone who never comes. They claim Godot
to be an acquaintance but hardly know him, admitting that they would not
recognize him if they saw him. To occupy t hemselves, they do anything
“to hold the terrible silence at bay.” It illustrates an attitude toward man’s
experience on earth: the pathos, tyranny, friendship, hope, corruption, and
confusion of human experience that can only be reconciled in the mind
and art of the absurdist. It also examines the questions like death, the
meaning of human existence, and the place of God in human existence.
The works of Franz Kafka reveal the themes of alienation and persecution.
Their apparent hopelessness and absurdity represent existentialism. The
novella The Metamorphosis is a story of a salesman Gregor Samsa, who
wakes one morning and finds himself mysteriously transformed into a
huge insect and subsequently stru ggles to adjust to this new
condition. Gregor's unexpected and unexplained conversion is compared
with a lot of day -to-day details. The novel resounds the feelings of
alienation and revulsion.
Kafka’s next novel The Trial is the story of Josef K., a man a rrested and
prosecuted by a remote, inaccessible authority, with the nature of his
crime revealed neither to him nor to the reader. The novel reveals
alienation, bureaucracy, the seemingly endless frustrations of man’s
attempts to stand against the system, and the futile and hopeless pursuit of
an unobtainable goal.
Albert Camus introduces his theory of the absurd in his philosophical
essay The Myth of Sisyphus . Sisyphus’s perpetual and pointless toil
metaphorically represents modern lives spent working at futile jobs in
factories and offices. Sisyphus, an absurd hero lives life to the fullest,
hates death, and is condemned to a meaningless task. According to Camus,
absurdity is the resu lt of our desire for clarity and meaning within a world
and condition that offers neither. His novella The Stranger unveils his munotes.in

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19 2.6 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Write an essay on Political Satire.
2. Comment on the elements of i mperialism and postcolonialism in
Modern British Fiction
4. Discuss the features of Existentialism in Modern British Literature.
2.7 BIBLIOGRAPHY
 Appignanes i, Richard; Zarate, Oscar (2001). Introducing
Existentialism. Cambridge, UK: Icon.
 Appignanesi, Richard (2006). Introducing Existentialism (3rd ed.).
Thriplow, Cambridge: Icon Books (UK), Totem Books (USA).
 Barrett, William (1958). Irrational Man: A Study in Existential
Philosophy (1st ed.). Doubleday.
 Cattarini, L.S. (2018). Beyond Sartre and Sterility: Surviving
Existentialism. Montreal.
 Cooper, David E. (1999). Existentialism: A Reconstruction (2nd ed.).
Oxford, UK: Blackwell.
 Deurzen, Emmy van (2010). Everyday Mysteries: a Handbook of
Existential Psychotherapy (2nd ed.). London: Routledge.
 Henderson, J. (1993) Comic Hero versus Political Elite pp.307 -19
in Sommerstein, A.H.; S. Halliwell; J. Henderson; B. Zimmerman, eds.
(1993). Tragedy, Comedy and the Polis. Bari: Levante Editori.
 Stinson, Emmett (2019 -08-28). "Satire". Oxford Research
Encyclopedia of Literature.
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20 3
NOVEL: 1984 BY GEORGE ORWELL - I
Unit Structure
3.0 Objectives
3.1 Introduction
3.2 George Orwell
3.3 1984: Critical Summary
3.4 Character Sketch of Winston Smith
3.5 1984 as a Political Allegory
3.6 Check Your Progress
3.7 Bibliography
3.0 OBJ ECTIVES
The objectives of this Unit are to make the learners familiar with:
 George Orwell as a writer
 1984, a novel by George Orwell
 1984 as a political satire
3.1 INTRODUCTION
“1984 ” is a dystopian novel by George Orwell, published in 19 49. The
novel is set in a future totalitarian society, in which the government, under
the control of a Party led by a figure known as Big Brother, has total
control over all aspects of citizens' lives. The story follows the protagonist,
Winston Smith, a lo w-ranking member of the Party who secretly rebels
against the Party's oppressive rule. Winston begins a forbidden love affair
with Julia, a fellow Party member, and together they seek to undermine
the Party's authority.
As the story progresses, Winston and Julia become embroiled in a
dangerous conspiracy against the Party, and are ultimately captured by the
Party's brutal Thought Police. Winston is subjected to a grueling process
of brainwashing and torture, until he ultimately betrays Julia and fully
embra ces the Party's doctrine.

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21 3.2 GEORGE ORWELL
George Orwell was a journalist, author, essayist, and critic best known for
his novels Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty -Four . He was a man of
strong opinions who addressed some of the major political movements of
his times, including imperialism, fascism, and communism. Eric Arthur
Blair known by his pseudonym George Orwell was born on 25th June
1903 in Motihari, Bengal, India, during the British colonial rule. His
father, Richard Walmesley Blair, was working as an Opium Agent in the
Indian Civil Service. As a son of a British Civil Servant, Orwell spent his
initial days after his birth in India, where his father was stationed. When
Orwell was only a year old his mother moved back to England while his
father stay ed in India until 1912. Orwell was educated in Henley and
Sussex at the school level.
In 1921 he joined the British police in Burma. However, Orwell ’s
dissatisfaction and dislike for British imperialism leads him to resign from
his job in 1927. He decided to become a writer, In 1928, he moved to Paris
and began a series of low -paying jobs. In 1929, he moved to London again
with less money. He described those experiences and real incidents in the
form of fiction in his first book, ‘Down and Out in Paris and London ’
published in 1933, which earned him some initial literary recognition. He
took the name George Orwell, shortly before its publication.
During 1932 -1933, Orwell worked as a teacher in a small private school in
Middlesex, he came down with his first outbreak of pneumonia because of
tuberculosis, a condition that would plague him throughout his life and
require multiple hospitalizations. Orwell gave up his teaching job and
spent nearly a year in Southwold writing his next book, Burmese
Days. Throughou t these days, he worked part -time in a bookshop, where
he met his future wife, Eileen. He married to Eileen in 1936, just before he
moved to Spain to write newspaper articles about the Spanish Civil War.
The war was between the left -wing Republicans and Th e Fascist
Nationalists.
While in Spain, Orwell had begun to consider himself a socialist and
found that he had been searching for true socialism. He joined the struggle
against the Fascist party, he was wounded in the throat. In meantime,
communists began to arrest dissenters, he had to flee from Spain as the
group with which he was associated was falsely accused of secretly
helping the fascists. After arriving in Britain, he wrote A Homage to
Catalonia. By 1939 George Orwell had returned to England. At t he
beginning of the Second World War, he was rejected for military service
but he joined British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) as the person in
charge of broadcasting to India and Southeast Asia. Orwell didn ’t like this
job, as he was in charge of broadca sting propaganda to these British
colonies, this act was totally against Orwell ’s nature and his political
philosophy. In 1943, he took a job of his choice, as the literary editor
of The Tribune a left -wing magazine. munotes.in

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23 pasted everywhere. The government is on a miss ion to control their minds
and for which they impose a new language ‘Newspeak ’ which aims to stop
political uprisings by removing all words associated with it. It ’s against
the law to even have rebellious thoughts and such a crime is called
thoughtcrime an d is considered as the worst of all crimes. Winston notes
his every rebellious thought in his secret diary and joins O ’Brien, who is
supposed to be a member of the secret group that works to overthrow the
party.
The book starts with the 39 -year-old feeble man, Winston, entering the
building to reach his apartment. He takes the stairs despite having some
ailment in the right ankle of his leg because his elevator is always out of
service and on every floor, he is greeted by the poster of ‘Big Brother ’
returni ng home. In his apartment, there is a telescreen that is always on
and spews propaganda through which the party is able to monitor every
action of the citizens, they are constantly under surveillance. Winston
takes out the diary, which he secretly got from a secondhand store. He is
unable to write anything as he is not sure for whom he is writing the diary,
instead, he starts thinking about a dark -haired woman working in the same
office, whom he finds attractive but considers her a spy who keeps a watch
on him. He also recalls his meeting with an inner officer O ’Brien. Winston
feels that he also hates the authoritarian rule and they share the same
hatred towards them. He continues writing down his feelings about the big
brother on the paper. Winston looks at the page and realizes that he has
created a thoughtcrime and he will be caught soon. Just then somebody
knocks on the door and when he frightfully opens it, he finds his neighbor
Mrs. Parson who needs his help in unclogging the sink. When Winston
goes to help them, he is accused of committing thoughtcrime by her
children. They are junior spies who also work for the party and
continuously keep a watch on their elders and then report to the party.
Winston returns home to write his diary again but the thought s of O ’Brien
kept his mind occupied. He recalls a dream in which he heard a voice
telling him that “We shall meet in the place where there is no darkness. ”
Winston dreams about his mother on a sinking ship with his younger sister
in her lap. He holds himse lf responsible for his mother ’s disappearance
when he was almost ten or eleven years old. He believes that they
sacrificed in order to keep him alive and the memory of which tears him
apart. Suddenly the scene shifts towards a different scenery, which he
names ‘The Golden Country ’ after waking up. He also sees the dark -
haired girl stripping off her clothes and running towards him in such a
gesture that it seemed to annihilate the whole system. He wakes up
uttering the word “Shakespeare ”. The telescreen blow s a high -pitched
whistle as a wake -up call for office workers. It ’s time for the exercise
known as the ‘Physical Jerks ’. During the exercise, he recollects his
childhood memories and gets engrossed in his thoughts which makes it
difficult for him to concen trate on the exercise, suddenly he hears a voice
shouting at him from the telescreen for not doing the exercise properly.
Winston goes to his job, where he works with a “speakwrite ” (a machine
that types as he dictates into it) and updates the orders of B ig Brother to munotes.in

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25 Winston wakes up terrified from the dream and tells Julia about the
memories of his mother and sister and blames himself for their death.
Later they went to O ’Brien ’s home and confess that they are the rebels
who hate the party. Julia and Winston are welcomed into the secret
Brotherhood by O ’Brien after he describes how it works as a loosely
organized group dedicated to overthrowing the Party. Winston is given a
copy o f “the book, ” a heretical work by Goldstein.
After a long tiring day at the office, Winston comes home and starts
reading ‘The Book ’, Julia also joins him in reading, the book accounts for
all the ideology and history of the party. ‘You are the dead ’, a voice says
abruptly from behind the wall -mounted image. The image has a telescreen
behind it. Winston and Julia are caught, and Mr. Charrington reveals
himself to be a Thought Police agent.
Winston finds himself in the Ministry of Love, where there is no da rkness,
sitting in a bright, empty cell and constantly observed by four telescreens.
Winston thinks of O’Brien and Julia. Winston ’s coworker, Ampleforth
(the poet), is then placed in the cell with him. As they talk about their
“crimes, ” Ampleforth is summ oned from his cell to Room 101. To
Winston ’s surprise, Parsons, his orthodox neighbor, is also placed in the
cell.
Winston is concerned about Julia. He makes the decision to endure twice
as much pain as she does because he feels she is suffering, possibly more
than he is. However, he soon realizes that this is just an intellectual
decision. O ’Brien enters the cell to retrieve Winston after a series of
unpleasant incidents involving the other convicts. At first, Winston thinks
O’Brien has also been discover ed, but he soon realizes that he has
deceived him. Winston is tortured continuously for days. He is betrayed
by Julia and O ’Brien, he is tortured and ruined, and every hope he had for
a future without the Party is destroyed. Winston learns that Goldstein ’s
book was written partially by O ’Brien and that Big Brother exists just as
the Party exists, eternal and omnipotent. Winston is starved and tortured
for several months in order to change his beliefs to those of the Party.
O’Brien says “Party seeks power en tirely for its own sake. Not wealth or
luxury or long life or happiness; only power, pure power. ”
O’Brien brings Winston to Room 101 or the last phase of re -education,
which is very dreadful as the prisoners are being confronted with their
biggest fears an d in Winston ’s case it was the rats. Winston betrays Julia
when confronted with a cage holding furious rats, and Winston betrays
Julia by wishing the torture upon her instead. After returning back in
society, Winston encounters Julia, who was also tortured . Both admit they
have betrayed each other and are no longer in love with each other. Back
in the café, a news report praises Oceania ’s claimed resounding triumph
over Eurasian armies there. Winston finally acknowledges that he loves
Big Brother.
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26 3.4 CHEC K YOUR PROGRESS
1. Write a note on George Orwell as a writer.
2. Critically analyse George Orwell ’s novel, 1984 .
3.5 BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Taylor, D.J. (2003). Orwell: The Life . Henry Holt and Company.
2. Crick, Bernard (2004). “Eric Arthur Blair [ pseud. George O rwell]
(1903 –1950) ”. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography . Oxford,
England, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
3. Seaton, Jean. “Why Orwell ’s 1984 could be about now ”. BBC.
Retrieved 3 December 2019.
4. Leetaru, Kalev. “As Orwell ’s 1984 Turns 70 It Pred icted Much of
Today ’s Surveillance Society ”. Forbes. Retrieved 3 December 2019.
5. “The savage satire of ‘1984 ’ still speaks to us today ”. The
Independent. 7 June 1999. Archived from the original on 7 January
2023. Retrieved 7 January 2023. Orwell said that h is book was a
satire - a warning certainly, but in the form of satire.
6. Grossman, Lev (8 January 2010). ”Is 1984 one of the All -TIME 100
Best Novels? ”. Time. Retrieved 29 December 2022.

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29 the anti -Party Brotherhood. Winston ’s efforts to achieve freedom and
independence ul timately serve to highlight the Party ’s terrifying power.
By the end of the novel, it is clear that Winston ’s rebellion served
O’Brien ’s plan to subject him to physical and mental abuse. Winston has
been reduced to an obedient, unquestioning party member w ho genuinely
loves “Big Brother. ”
4.3 THEMES IN 1984
"1984" by George Orwell is a dystopian novel that explores a number of
complex themes. Some of the key themes in the novel include:
Totalitarianism: The novel explores the dangers of a totalitarian soci ety in
which the government controls every aspect of citizens' lives, including
their thoughts and beliefs.
Power and control: The Party's control over society is maintained through
manipulation of information, surveillance, and violence. The novel
highlig hts the dangers of unchecked power and the ways in which those in
power can manipulate and control individuals and society as a whole.
Language and communication: The Party's control over language and
communication is a key theme in the novel. The developm ent of
Newspeak, the Party's official language, represents the Party's attempt to
control and limit thought and communication.
Rebellion and resistance: The novel explores the theme of rebellion and
resistance against an oppressive government. Winston's re bellion against
the Party is driven by his desire for freedom and his belief in the
importance of individual thought and expression.
Memory and history: The novel highlights the importance of memory and
history in shaping our understanding of the world. Th e Party's
manipulation of history represents its attempt to control the past and shape
the present.
Overall, "1984" is a powerful critique of totalitarianism and the dangers of
government overreach. Its themes and ideas continue to be relevant today,
and t he novel remains a widely read and studied work of literature .
4.4 1984 AS A POLITICAL ALLEGORY
Nineteen Eighty - Four is a dystopian novel written by the English writer
George Orwell in 1948, set forth a f uture under the iron rule of
totalitarianism. Orwell throws light on the issue of the increase in
dictatorship and the decline of democracy by painting the imaginary
picture of a future where human rights, freedom, and democracy does not
exist. Orwell ’s dominant goal in this novel was to warn about the serious
danger of totalitarianism in society. He explains the terrifying degree of
power and control that a totalitarian regime can acquire and maintain.
Orwell supported socialism and strongly believed in th e power to rebel for
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31 Police. H e gave Winston a book named The theory and practice of
Oligarchical Collectivism written by Emannuel Goldstein. After making
love with Julia, Winston started reading the book, and after a while, they
both fall asleep. They awake hours later and are capture d by the Thought
Police, who apparently knew of their hideaway. There, they get to know
that O ’Brien is in reality a member of ThoughtPolice; he tortures Winston
and tries to convince him that he must love Big Brother.
When torture fails, Winston is shifte d to Room 101, in which every person
who enters is faced with their greatest fear. For Winston, it ’s rats. Musing
on the impending rats -chewing on his face, Winston immediately calls out,
“Do it to Julia! ” And finally convinced that he loves Big Brother, that’s
what O ’Brien wanted. The novel ends as Winston, having exchanged
mutual conversations of betrayal with Julia, sits at the Chestnut Cafe,
drinking Victory Gin, completely and highly brainwashed and committed
to Big Brother.
Although the work is fict ional, but it ’s an indirect political documentary
featuring the historic conflict between democracy and dictatorship. They
are absolutely reflections of Orwell ’s political and social beliefs. His
dynamism with democratic socialism is unique and interestin g. Orwell
believed that socialism is the birthplace of dictatorship and that striving
for the ultimate power is irresistible.
4.5 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Draw the character sketch of Winston Smith.
2. Discuss George Orwell ’s novel, 1984 as a political sati re.
3. Comment on Orwell’s thematic concerns in his novel, 1984.
4.6 BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. Taylor, D.J. (2003). Orwell: The Life . Henry Holt and Company.
2. Crick, Bernard (2004). “Eric Arthur Blair [ pseud. George Orwell]
(1903 –1950) ”. Oxford Dictionary of National Bi ography . Oxford,
England, United Kingdom: Oxford University Press.
3. Seaton, Jean. “Why Orwell ’s 1984 could be about now ”. BBC.
Retrieved 3 December 2019.
4. Leetaru, Kalev. “As Orwell ’s 1984 Turns 70 It Predicted Much of
Today ’s Surveillance Society ”. Forbes. Retrieved 3 December 2019.
5. “The savage satire of ‘1984 ’ still speaks to us today ”. The
Independent. 7 June 1999. Archived from the original on 7 January
2023. Retrieved 7 January 2023. Orwell said that his book was a
satire - a warning certainly, but in th e form of satire.
6. Grossman, Lev (8 January 2010). ”Is 1984 one of the All -TIME 100
Best Novels? ”. Time. Retrieved 29 December 2022.
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33 and novelist. From 1974 to 1 992, she also married Warton Professor of
English at Oxford who she had met in 1954. The trio had an unusual
romantic partnership that lasted almost 40 years. Murdoch had "multiple
affairs" with both men and women which, on discomposing occasions
meanin g to disturb the calm, were witnessed by Bayley. She lived a life
of Self -indulgent love and it finds expression in her novels and books.
Dame Murdoch spent the last 5 years of her life with Alzheimer’s disease
and died in 1999. Her husband was at her bedside.
Dame Murdoch published more than 26 novels. Her novel The Sea, the
sea, won a Booker Prize in 1978. She published her last novel, The Green
Knight , in 1994. This was the year she was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s
disease. The list of her publicat ions is given at the end of this article.
5.3 THE BLACK PRINCE : CRITICAL SUMMARY
The Black Prince is remarkable for the structure of its narrative,
consisting of a central story introduced by forewords and post -scripts by
characters withi n it. It largely consists of the description of a period in the
later life of the main character, ageing London author Bradley Pearson
(Authoritarian tone is noticed), during which time he falls in love with
the daughter of a friend and literary rival, Arnold Baffin. For years
Bradley has had a tense but strong relationship with Arnold, regarding
himself as having 'discovered' the younger writer. The tension is
ostensibly over Bradley's distaste for Arnold's lack of proper literary
credentials, thoug h later the other characters claim this to be a matter of
jealousy or the product of an Oedipus complex . Their closeness is made
apparent from the start of the book, however, as Arnold telephones
Bradley, worried that he has killed his wife, Rachel, in a domestic row.
Bradley attends with his former brother -in law, Francis Marloe, in tow.
Together they calm the injured Rachel and restore peace to the Baffins'
household.
Bradley begins to get trapped in a growing dynamics of family, friends,
and associ ates who collectively seem to thwart his attempts at achieving
the isolation he feels necessary to create his 'masterpiece'. His
intervention in the Baffins' marriage, for instance, prompts Rachel to fall
in love with him. His depressed sister, Priscill a, leaves her abusive
husband, demanding that her brother shelter her. The Baffins' young
daughter, Julian, declares her admiration for Bradley and begs him to
tutor her. Even Christian, Bradley's ex -wife, invades his life by seeking to
repair their long -defunct relationship.
Bradley attempts to navigate these complications with mixed success. His
inability to reciprocate Rachel's affections ultimately defuses their affair.
She agrees, much to Bradley's satisfaction, to be no more than his friend.
Chris tian meanwhile starts an affair with Arnold, drawing her attentions
away from Bradley. Indeed, Arnold informs Bradley that he intends to
leave Rachel for Christian. Yet Bradley fails to give proper attention to
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35 work of fiction that he hopes will be his masterpiece. Obsessed by this
ideal of perfection, he accepts the artis tic calling as “a doom,” a
condemnation to a severe penalty and the true Last Judg ment of his life.
5.5 USAGE OF THE POST -SCRIPTS
This section is told from the point of view of the other characters, each
being said to have had the luxury of reading the main section before
drafting their responses. Each interprets the action differently, focusing
on separate issues to a more or less selfish degree. They exist to cast
doubt not only on the reliability of the fiction that preceded it, but also on
themse lves. Christian, for example, dismisses any accusation of self -
interest, claiming that Bradley lied because he was still in love with her.
Francis assesses Bradley as a dysfunctional phobic to promote his new
book. Rachel claims that Bradley may have li ed due to unrequited love.
Julian herself has little to say: she states that she remembers little of that
time, and that she has no wish to remember anything more. The "editor"
of the entire volume concludes the novel by supporting Bradley's account
and praising his devotion to love as an all -empowering force.
The framed postscripts bring in new (critical) perspectives on what is until
this point the only truth for the reader; so Bradley’s account can be
doubted as “the postscripts set the reader up f or closure or consolation that
nevercomes.”11 Nevertheless, the discussion about narrative unreliability
should remain a subsidiary aspect of this paper. Instead it is relevant to
scrutinise, at first, one of the initial concerns, namely Murdoch’s
depict ion of Bradley Pearson as a writer.
Romberg calls the narrator’s situation when writing a narrative “the epic
situation,” and “in a novel of the first -person ... the epic situation ...
belongs to the fiction,” and “can, from the aspect of narrative tec hnique,
be an important key to the novel” (33). Further, the narrative technique,
whereby the main character himself surveys his eventful life, or
particularly exciting parts of it, or else lays bare his soul to his friend,
gives to author the opportuni ty to take advantage of the primitive but
remarkably persistent demand that the novel -reader in general makes of a
narrative: namely, that it shall give an illusion of reality and truth.
The authoritative “I” binds the reader more tightly to the fictio n; there is a
sort of two -man partnership between reader and narrator, and here we
glimpse the primitive epic situation, where someone who has had some
experience or other relates this experience to someone else. (58 -59)
On the other hand, Wallace Mar tin claims any first -person narrative ...
may prove unreliable because it questions from speaking or writing to
self-addressing someone. This is the condition of discourse, in which, as
we know, the possibility of speaking the truth creates the possibili ty of
misunderstanding, misperceiving, and lying, whereas “we cannot question
the reliability of third -person narrators” (142). These two statements are
not necessarily contradictory, but may refer to different levels of reader
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37 (317). Thus we have the situation whereby the narrating voice of what
Dipple calls “the flayed BP” (113) (referring to the deep mythological
basis of the novel in the legend of Apollo’s flaying of Maryssa) is
holding back his knowledge of events and his understanding of their
meanings, and letting the “unflayed BP” speak, nonetheless hoping “that
the light of wisdom falling upon a fool can reveal, together with folly, the
austere outline of truth” (xi).
Within the world of this fiction, we have little alternative but to trust our
narrator when he is describing the course of events, while suspec ting his
assessments of the significance of these events, and his knowledge of the
thoughts and motives of the other characters. This is indeed what he asks
of us in the Foreword, when he writes “I have endeavoured in what
follows to be wisely artful an d artfully wise, and to tell the truth as I
understand it” (xi).
That we should trust this truth – which is the domain only of P. Loxias,
the “editor,” and the “flayed” Bradley, is an assumption upon which the
novel is founded. Loxias’ postscript, fol lowing the postscripts of four of
the other characters commenting on the novel and denying its accuracy,
draws attention to their self -serving motives; their egotism in each
believing Bradley to be motivated by love of themselves, and their self -
promoti on. In the person of Bradley Pearson, we have both a protagonist
acting in a fantasy -ridden and prejudiced manner, and a narrator relating
these past events in prison, some years after they happened. He still has
perfect recall of letters he wrote and r eceived during this period
(including the one from Arnold which he destroys) and he can remember
events and conversations accurately, even when he was under severe
emotional stress and in some cases deluded when they occurred. The
reader’s acceptance o f such improbabilities would usually go unnoticed,
as they are so large a part of the conventions of first -person writing. The
readers question, did he love Rachel that he took the punishment for a
crime committed by Rachel, he wasn’t naïve neither stup id, did he self -
inflict the punishment for betraying the love of so many people!
5.6 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Write a note on Iris Murdoch as a writer.
2. Discuss the narrative technique used in The Black Prince.
3. Comment on the usage of the postscript in The Black Prince.
5.7 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Richard Todd, I r is Murdoch (London and New York: Methuen, 1984) f..
Cf. Todd 76.
Barbara Stevens Heusel, Patterned Aimlessness – Iris Murdoch’s Novels
of the 1970s and 1980s (Athen s and London: The University of Georgia
Press, 1999) 127. munotes.in

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38 Iris Murdoch, The Black Prince (London: Vintage, 1999) 11. All page
references within the following text belong to this edition. Hilda D.
Spear, Iris Murdoch (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995) 79.
Bellamy, Michael O. “An Interview with Iris Murdoch.” Contemporary
Literature 18 (1977): 129 -140.
Bigsby, Christopher. “Interview with Iris Murdoch.” The Radical
Imagination and the Christopher Bigsby. London: Junction Books, 1982.
209-230.
Biles, Jack I. “An Interview with Iris Murdoch.” Studies in the Literary
Imagination 11 (1978): 115 -125.
Bloom, Harold, ed. Iris Murdoch. New York: Chelsea House Publishers,
1986. ---. The Rhetoric of Fiction. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1983. Bove, Cheryl K. “Iris Murdoch.” Dictionary of
Literary Biography Volume 194: Gale Group. 16 August 1999.
---. Understanding Iris Murdoch. Columbia: University of South Carolina
Pres

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41 many ways Francis is a sad character, often talking about the pain of his
life.
6.1.4 Arnold Baffin : The very successful popular writer whom Bradley is
accused of killing at the end of the novel. Arnold and Bradley's
friendsh ip is one of the primary relationships within the novel. Although
Bradley frequently dislikes Arnold, Arnold is portrayed very favorably.
He is a polite, interesting man who always wants to know more about
people's characters and who always longs to tal k to them. He takes great
pleasure in hearing about Francis Marloe's life, for example, while
Bradley at the same time is trying to get Francis out the door. Arnold's
compassionate interest contrasts Bradley's coldness. He tries to reason his
daughter, b ut fails. Arnold was a docile character in front of his Rachel.
6.1.5 Rachel Baffin : The wife of Arnold Baffin. Rachel is a forceful
woman whom both Arnold and Bradley underestimate. Arnold seems to
think that all is well between him and his wife; Brad ley regards Rachel as
a benign, older woman. Rachel's firm speech and unforgiving tone,
however, suggests the power within her personality, even if the other
characters cannot see it. Rachel herself predicts her fierceness when she
tells Bradley that sh e still has "real fire" in her. Despite Rachel's
fierceness, she is also a sympathetic character who also helps to articulate
the difficulties of being a middle -aged housewife. She feels neglected
when both the men ignore her, thus instigating her to ta ke the drastic
step. She plans the murder in such a way that she could take revenge on
both the men. . Traces of Macbeth could be found in her.
6.1.6 Priscilla Saxe : The sister of Bradley Pearson. Priscilla is a
sympathetic, but pitiful woman who spends the majority of the book
moaning about the ruined state of her life. Priscilla's life, it appears, is
somewhat ruined, since she spent most of it in a loveless marriage. Her
painful experience testifies to the difficulties of life as well as the specifi c
difficulties of being a woman. Priscilla's great regret is the abortion that
left her unable to have children. Priscilla's sadness helps to establish
Bradley's coldness as a character, because, despite her needs, he basically
ignores her. He never fulf illed his duty as a brother.
6.1.7 Christian Evansdale : Bradley Pearson's ex -wife. Christian is a
confident, strong woman who has aged but still remains sexually
attractive. She has lived in America for the past few years and appears
slightly brassy and American. Christian's character is seen entirely
through her interaction with Bradley, which is not entirely credible given
his previous hatred of her. She, like Rachel, is a woman of power, even
though she has aged. Christian is a sympathetic and even admirable
character, given the strength of her personality, but at the same time her
brassy quality gives her a slightly comic edge
6.1.8 Roger Saxe : Priscilla's husband and Bradley Pearson's brother -in-
law. Bradley always has disliked Roger's chummy, non-intellectual style.
Roger has done bad things in the past, namely having Priscilla undergo an
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43 relationships. Bradley, for example, struggles with his identity as a writer
and his desire to be recognized as a great artist.
Art and creativity: The novel explores the role of art in so ciety and how
creativity can both inspire and corrupt individuals. Bradley's obsession
with Julian, for example, is partially driven by his desire to use her as
inspiration for his writing.
Betrayal and loyalty: The novel explores the theme of betrayal and the
ways in which people can be both loyal and disloyal to each other.
Bradley's relationships with various characters in the novel are
characterized by a sense of betrayal and mistrust.
Morality and ethics: The novel raises questions about morality and e thics,
particularly in relation to the pursuit of personal desires and the potential
harm that can result from selfish actions.
Overall, "The Black Prince" is a rich and complex novel that explores a
wide range of themes and ideas, and it continues to be w idely studied and
discussed by literary scholars and readers alike .
6.3 CHECK YOUR PROGRESS
1. Comment on the art of characterization of Iris Murdoch with reference
to the novel, The Black Prince.
2. Discuss the themes in The Black Prince.
6.4 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Richard Todd, I r is Murdoch (London and New York: Methuen, 1984) f .
Cf. Todd 76.
Barbara Stevens Heusel, Patterned Aimlessness – Iris Murdoch’s Novels
of the 1970s and 1980s (Athens and London: The University of Georg ia
Press, 1999) 127.
Iris Murdoch, The Black Prince (London: Vintage, 1999) 11. All page
references within the following text belong to this edition. Hilda D.
Spear, Iris Murdoch (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1995) 79.
Bellamy, Michael O. “An Intervie w with Iris Murdoch.” Contemporary
Literature 18 (1977): 129 -140.
Bigsby, Christopher. “Interview with Iris Murdoch.” The Radical
Imagination and the Christopher Bigsby. London: Junction Books, 1982.
209-230.

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44 Biles, Jack I. “An Interview with Iris Mu rdoch.” Studies in the Literary
Imagination 11 (1978): 115 -125.
Bloom, Harold, ed. Iris Murdoch. New York: Chelsea House Publishers,
1986. ---. The Rhetoric of Fiction. 2nd ed. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1983. Bove, Cheryl K. “Iris Murdoch. ” Dictionary of
Literary Biography Volume 194: Gale Group. 16 August 1999.
---. Understanding Iris Murdoch. Columbia: University of South Carolina
Pres

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Short Stories - I

47 oppressive, with her abusive father highlighting the idea that the older
generation needs to be cast off if young Ireland is to forge itself into a new
nation. Even the good aspects of the old Ireland, such as Eveline’s mother
and her older brother Ernest, are dead and gone.
7.2.3 Introduction to Characters
7.2.3.1 Eveline : Eveline is the central character in the story. The story is
named after Eveline, the protagonist of the story. Eveline is about nineteen
years of age. Her mother as well as elder brother Ernest has been died.
Another brother, Harrywas engaged in the church decorating business .
Eveline has to shoulder all the responsibilities of the household. Her father
is a drunk and only reluctantly tips up his share of the weekly
housekeeping money . She works in a shop. She has to work hard both in
the house and at workplace. She wants to get rid of abusive father and
poverty -stricken existence in Ireland . She made a plan to elope with
Frank, a sailor who is her secret lover and start a new life in Argentina.
Even though, she was experiencing some sort of dilemma, whether to
continue the same dreary , mundane life or go along with Frank and start a
new life in Argentina. Eveline has given a promise to her mother before
her death. She had promised her mother to keep the home together as long
as she could .
7.2.3.2 Frank : Frank is Eveline ’s secret lover . Frank is very kind, manly
and open -hearted. Eveline made a plan to goaway with Frank by the night
boat to be his wife and to live with him in Buenos Aires where he had a
home waiting forher. Frank is fond of music and singing. He is a sailor. He
had tales of distant countries. Eveline and Frank were meeting every
evening outside the Stores. Hetook her to see the movie The Bohemian
Girl. He used to call her Poppens out of fun. Eveline’s father had strong
disapproval to their affair. So, they were meeting secretly. Frank is
Eveline’s lover and supporter. He encourages Eveline to go with him and
start a better life with him. Eveline followed him, but at the last moment
she changed her mind and decided not to go with him.
7.2.3.3 Eveline’s Father : Eveline’s father is a drunk. He often uses
abusive language while talking with Eveline. He strongly disapproves
Eveline’s attraction towards Frank. He is irresponsible father, who does
not care about familial responsibilities. Eveline is completely fed up with
her father’s behaviour and her present situation.
7.2.4 Theme s
7.2.4.1 Promise vs. Escape : Thefemale protagonist of the story, Eveline
undergoes a sort of dilemma. She was experiencing a sort of conflict
between ‘promise’ and ‘escape’. Eveline plays her role like a mother in
the story. Her mother died. Before the death of her mother , she promised
her mother that she will keep the home together . Her drunken father is the
major challenge to Eveline. Her father was not supporting her to run their
household. She was working hard in the home as well as at her workplace.
Her father used to abuse her and insult her on many occasions. She wants
to free herself from this situation. Fortunately, she got her lover, Frank. munotes.in

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49 Dahl is well -known for unexpected endings in his short stories. His
children's books have portrayed unsentimental, macabre , often darkly
comic mood, featurin g villainous adult enemies of the child characters.
His children's books champion the kind -hearted and feature an underlying
warm sentiment. His works for children include James and the Giant
Peach , Charlie and the Chocolate Factory , Matilda , The Witches ,
Fantastic Mr Fox , The BFG , The Twits , George's Marvellous Medicine
and Danny, the Champion of the World . His works for older audiences
include the short story collections Tales of the Unexpected and The
Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Six More .
7.3.2 Critical Analysis of the Story : ‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ was written
in 1954 by Roald Dahl . It was initially rejected, along with four other
stories, by The New Yorker , but was published in Harper's Magazine in
September 1953. It was adapted for an episode of Alfred Hitchco*ck
Presents (AHP) that starred Barbara Bel Geddes and Harold J. Stone .
Originally broadcast on April 13, 1958, this was one of only
17 AHP episodes directed by Hitchco*ck .
‘Lamb to the Slaughter’ presents Dahl’ s fascination with horror (with
elements of black comedy ), which is seen in both his adult fiction and his
stories for children. The story was suggested to Dahl by his friend Ian
Fleming : “Why don't you have someone murder their husband with a
frozen leg of mutton which she then serves to the detectives who c ome to
investigate the murder?”
The story begins with Mary Maloney faithfully waiting for her
husband Patrick to come home from his job as a detective. Six months
pregnant and happy in her marriage, she eagerly watches the clock while
she sews. When Patrick arrives, she is ready to hang up his coat, prepare a
drink for him, and sit in silence with him as he rests. For Mary, who is
alone in the house during the day, this after -work ritual is one she looks
forward to. However, as Mary attempts to care for her husband, Patrick
brushes off her effo rts, drinks more than usual, and declares that he has
something to tell her. While a nervous Mary scrutinizes him, Patrick tells
her that he is leaving her. Though the narrator leaves out the details, it
becomes clear that Patrick still plans to take care of her financially but that
their marriage is over. Mary, who is in disbelief, decides to act as if
nothing has happened and fetches a frozen leg of lamb from the ce llar to
prepare their supper. When Patrick tells her not to bother and begins to
leave, Mary suddenly swings the frozen meat at the back of Patrick’s head
and kills him .
Once Mary realizes that her husband is dead, she thinks rapidly of how to
protect he rself and thus her unborn child from the penalty of murder. She
puts the meat into the oven, and while it begins to cook, she practices her
expression and voice, and then goes out to a nearby grocery store and
chats amiably with Sam, the grocer, about what she needs to buy for her
husband’s dinner. On her way home, she purposefully acts as if everything
is normal, and then is shocked to “discover” Patrick’s body on the floor
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51 store. Later, the police confirm her story with the grocer, who, like the
detectives, has been deceived by Mary.
7.3.4 Theme s
7.3.4.1 Gender and Marriage : Throughout the short story, Mary
Maloney is firmly situated in a patriarchal society —that is, a system in
which men hold more power than women politically, socially, and
economically. Historically, women have been often consigned to the
private sphere of domestic life, as they were deemed by men to be
intellectually and emotionally unfit for the public sphere outside of family
and home life. Men, on the other hand, were able to move through both
spheres, enjoying the comforts of domestic life provided by wives and
mothers while interacting with t he political and economic institutions of
the public arena.
Mary’s marriage is a perfect example of gendered hierarchy, as her entire
life revolves around that of her husband. While Patrick works in the public
sphere as a detective, Mary stays at home in the private domestic sphere,
working on her sewing and eagerly awaiting his return “after the long
hours alone in the house.” Once her husband arrives , all of her energy is
devoted to anticipating his needs. Fulfilling the duties of a stereotypical
housewife, Mary, demonstrates her affectionate submission by performing
various domestic tasks for her husband — for example, hanging up his
coat, making him drinks, offering to fetch his slippers and make supper —
despite the fact that she is six months pregnant and Patrick barely
acknowledges her efforts.
Like the society in which the story is set, Mary’s marriage is heavily
influenced by male or masculine dominance. The narrator explicitly
describes Mary’s love for her husband as an idolization of or subservience
to masculinity. Patrick’s return home is “blissful” for Mary not only
because she has been isolated in the house all day but also because she
“loved to luxuriate in the presence of this man, and to feel —almost as a
sunbather feels the sun —that warm male glow that came out of him to her
when they were alone together.” Mary’s comparison of masculinity to the
sun, to a powerful celestial force indiffe rent to yet shining upon mere
humans, reinforces a gender hierarchy in which men are associated with
strength and perfection, and women with weakness and inferiority.
This male dominance also manifests in the lack of reciprocity in the
Maloneys’ marriage . Despite Mary’s repeated endearments of “Darling”
and attempts to make her husband more comfortable, Patrick responds
brusquely, without reciprocating her affection or acknowledging the effort
it must take her, as a heavily pregnant woman, to care for him and the
house. Furthermore, when Mary attempts to engage him in conversation or
requests that he eat s something, Patrick ignores her, but when he wishes to
speak to her, he orders her to “Sit down,” expecting her to submit as a dog
would to its master. Wh ereas Mary attends to both his physical and
emotional needs (preparing him drinks, offering him food, sympathizing
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53 policemen are persuaded by Mary to eat the leg of lamb, unaware that they
are assisting a murderer by destroying the evidence.
7.3.4.3 Food/Consumption : Much of ‘Lamb to the Slau ghter’ is occupied
with eating and food. At the beginning of the story, food is closely linked
to domesticity and marriage. Mary ’s repeated attempts to feed Patrick
demonstrate not only her affection for her husband but also the role she
plays as homemaker and housewife. Similarly, Patrick’s refusal to eat
Mary’s food is a rejection of that affection and foreshadows his rejection
of the domestic life Mary has built around him. Even after Patrick’s death,
food still is (or appears to be) associated with marriage, as Mary attempts
to maintain the façade of domes tic bliss by establishing her alibi of buying
Patrick’s food from Sam, the local grocer.
After Patrick tells Mary he is leaving her, food becomes a literal and
figurative wea pon. In the literal sense, food is weaponized when Mary
kills her husband with a frozen leg of lamb , which is said by the narrator
to be as effective as a “steel clu b.” Metaphorically, food also works
against the other policemen, as they never suspect that Mary’s frozen meat
could be used as a weapon, and they begin to eat the evidence for which
they have been searching all night.
Just as the weaponization of food is both literal and metaphorical, so too is
the motif of consumption. Mary, a happy housewife, is consumed with her
marriage and her husband’s masculinity, and thus her role within a male -
dominated culture. Obsessed with domestic bliss, her entire life revol ves
around her husband. Patrick, on the other hand, is consumed with his
work. Though he is always tired because of his work as a detective, he
values his job more than he does his wife. After Patrick’s death, this
consumption becomes literal and possibly cannibalistic for the detectives,
who eat the murder weapon. As the detectives’ “thick and sloppy” mouths
wolf down the leg of lamb, the men fail to realize that it had been bashed
into Patrick’s skull and may even contain his blood. Whereas Patrick
Malone y was once consumed with his work, now he is consumed by his
work, or rather by his former friends and colleagues on the police force.
Like the men’s suspicion that the weapon is “right under our very noses,”
this is another example of the story’s ironic b lack humour .
7.3.4.4 Betrayal : Patrick ’s betrayal of his marriage drives the rest of the
story’s plot, leading to both his wife’s betrayal and that of his colleagues.
When he leaves his wife, Patrick betrays not only the love Mary has for
him but also the unborn child she is carrying and their private domestic
life together. At the sudden breakdown of her marriage and the world she
built around Patrick, Mary commits her own betrayal by killing her
husband. Covering up the murder primarily for the sake of her child, Mary
calls the police, maintaining a façade of inno cence and manipulating the
policemen to inadvertently commit a betrayal of their own. As they
investigate the murder, the policemen unknowingly betray both their
former colleague and their profession by drinking whiskey on the job and
by eating the evidenc e, ironically speculating in another example of
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55 7.2 BIBLIOGRAPHY
Joyce, James . “Eveline”. Dubliners .1914. Penguin Books, 1992.
Lee, Sophia. "Lamb to the Slaughter Plot Summary." LitCharts. LitCharts
LLC, 8 Dec 2016. Web. 17 Apr 2023.
Webliography
https://interestingliterature.com
https://ncert.nic.in/textbook/pdf/lekl102.pdf
https://www.britannica.com/biography/James -Joyce
https://www.britannica.com/topic/Eveline
https://www.classicshorts.com/stories/lamb.html
https://www.litcharts.com/lit/lamb -to-the-slaughter
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57 ● The Man Within (1929)
● Stamboul Train (1932)
● England Made Me (1935)
● A Gun for Sale (1936)
● The Confidential Agent (1939)
● The Power and the Glory (1940)
● The Heart of the Matter (1948)
● The Third Man (1949)
● Twenty -One Stories (1954)
● Loser Takes All (1955)
● Our Man in Havana (1958)
● In Search of a Character: Two African Journals (1961)
● The Comedians (1966)
● A Sort of Life (1971)
● The Honorary Consul (1973)
● Ways of Escape (1980)
● Monsignor Quixote (1982)
● Getting to know the General: The Story of an Involvement
(1984)
● The Tenth Man (1985)
● The Last Word (1990) (Short Stories)
● Twenty -one Stories (1954)
In 2007 , a selection of his letters was published as Graham
Greene: A Life in Letters . The unfinished manuscript The
Empty Chair , a murder mystery that G reene began writing
in 1926, was discovered in 2008.
8.2.2 Critical Analysis of the story:
The Saturday Evening Post published The Invisible Japanese
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59 on men, especially financially, while the girl in th is story wants
to be financially independent. Her words repeatedly interact
with his as she tries to be heard, crying, "Darling, you don't
listen, do you?" They are always conversing at cross -purposes,
as if two separate discussions are taking place. Their attempt to
interact devolves into a battle of words in which both speak but
neither listens, and the link is forever severed.
The Japanese gentlemen of the title are indeed invisible to their
fellow diners. Their converse interrupts the other dialogues,
briefly distracting the narrator from his observations. Their
language, their "incomprehensible tongue," which is physically
located squarely between the couple and the narrator, physically
forces a distance between the major characters. Despite their
aggre ssive intrusion into the conversation, they go unnoticed,
"invisible" to the girl. She is so engrossed in her own attempts
to dominate the speech that she fails to notice the presence of
others.
Greene's story is a razor -sharp critique of how words may
isolate rather than connect, exposing the shaky bonds that bind
human to human and person to individual. Graham Greene's
The Invisible Japanese Gentlemen explores themes of hope,
failure, conflict, independence, innocence, and terror. The
narrative, taken fro m his Complete Short Stories collection, is
told in the first person by an unidentified narrator, and the
reader learns after reading it that Greene may be examining the
concept of hope. Bentley's girl believes that her novel, The
Chelsea Set, will perform well. She believes the hype that Mr
Dwight has given the book and has decided to spend six months
in St. Tropez writing another book. Her fiancé, on the other
hand, has real concerns, according to some detractors. He isn't
as sure as the girl that the boo k will be a success. If anything,
he is open -minded enough to accept the book's failure. As a
result, he tries to persuade the girl to take a job with his uncle.
This could be significant because the fiancé looks to want to
assist the girl. However, she is so enthralled by Mr. Dwight's
words that she feels she should be supporting her fiancé. This
could be significant since it adds conflict to the plot. The pair is
about to marry, but they haven't decided how they would
finance themselves in the future.
Greene could possibly be investigating the concept of
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60 on the advance and royalties from the book. Her intellect may
be influenced by the idea that the book must be a great success.
She believe s it will be purely dependent on Mr. Dwight's
opinion. If anything, the step allows the girl to assert her
individuality and become less dependent on her fiancé. This is
significant since, at the time the narrative was written, very few
women were independ ent of their husbands. The girl appears to
be empowered, yet this strength appears to be based purely on
the advance that Mr. Dwight has promised her. She is not
concerned about the book's success, although the narrator and
her fiancé are. The girl's fianc é desires greater stability in his
life. As a result, he is considering the job that his uncle has
offered him. The talk between the girl and her fiancé is
extremely interesting because the reader can sense the fiancé's
apprehension. He wants his forthcomi ng marriage to the girl to
be founded on something real, not on revenues for the girl's
book, which may or may not be paid. He does not doubt that the
book will be a success, but he is unwilling to take the risk. This
may imply a degree of innocence. The g irl can't think of
anything wrong with her book, which is rare for a writer. At
times, most writers have doubts about their abilities to compose
something worthy of publication. This is not the situation with
the young lady. She exudes confidence, mainly b ecause Mr.
Dwight believes in her writing ability.
The eight Japanese gentlemen who are also seated in the
restaurant could be significant. The narrator, as a writer, is
continuously studying them. Nonetheless, she fails to notice the
group of Japanese gen tlemen. If anything, the reader is left with
the impression that the girl's book will be a disaster, and any
goals or dreams she may have for a career as a writer will be
dashed. She was tested without her knowledge and failed the
test. The narrator, on th e other hand, has watched everyone in
the restaurant and communicated the knowledge to the reader.
As any writer does. The fact that her fiancé is so level -headed is
the one saving grace for the girl. He is thinking about the
future, while the female is fo cusing on the present. Mr.
Dwight's move on her stunned her. The reader is left with the
impression that the girl's feeling of empowerment in the
restaurant may be transitory.

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61 8.2.4 Characters:
8.2.4.1 The Young Woman: She had a thin blonde hair and
how she spoke showed that she studied in one of the best
schools of London.
8.2.4 .2 Her Fiancé: He was doomed and easy to control by
others.
8.2.4. 3 The Japanese Gentlemen: They spoke in their mother
tongue. They were having smiling faces and doing a lot of
bows.
8.2.4. 4 Narrator (author): He was a reflective person who
analysed different situations from what people spoke and
expressed physically.
8.2.4. 5 Mr. Dwight: A publishe r of the book written by the
young woman.
8.2.5 Critical Aspects:
8.2.5.1 Theme s:
8.2.5.1.1 Innocence and Overconfident: The short story The
Invisible Japanese Gentleman analyses the matter of innocence
in the sense that the young woman writer sincerely believed all
of Mr. Dwight's words. She is extremely confident in her
writing abilities. She mindlessly accepts all of the publisher's
instructions. This is evident when s he discusses modifying the
title of her first book according to Mr. Dwight's wishes.
Furthermore, she truly believed the entire flat compliments the
publisher had given her, so she was overconfident in her ability
as a writer.
8.2.5.1.2 Independency: As p reviously said, the woman writer
was flattered by the publisher's compliment on her skills. She
was convinced that she could earn enough money to be self -
sufficient. She is certain that her book will be a success. So she
could be financially independent.
8.2.5.2 Symbol ization : The eight Japanese Gentlemen
symbolize a girl's lack of self -consciousness in the story. The
girl was quite confident in her ability to observe and write. The
presence of Japanese gentlemen helped show her inability to
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62 gentleman in the story can be taken to symbolize the girl's lack
of self -consciousness.
8.3 ANGELA CARTER AND HER THE COURTSHIP OF
MR. LYON
8.3.1 Introduction of Author:
Angela Olive Stalker, author, writer, and professor, was born on
May 7, 1940, in Sussex, England. She lived with her
grandmother in Yorkshire during World War II. At the age of
20, she got married to Paul Carter in 1960. She received a
degree in English wi th a specialization in mediaeval literature at
the University of Bristol. Carter wrote regularly for the British
political weekly magazine, New Society . She divorced Paul
Carter in 1972. She worked as a reporter in Japan for three
years. Carter taught at B rown University in Providence, Rhode
Island. During this time, she settled down with Mark Pearce,
with whom she had a child, Alexander, in 1983. She died at the
age of 52 due to lung cancer in 1992. Following are her
important works:
Novels:
1. The Shadow Dance (1966)
2. The Magic Toyshop (1967) - won the John Llewellyn
Rhys prize
3. Several Perceptions (1968)
4. Hero and Villains (1969)
5. Love (1972)
6. The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman (1972)
7. Wise Children (1991)
Short Story Collections:
1. Fireworks: Nine Profane Pieces (1974)
2. The Bloody Chamber (1979)
3. Black Venus (1985)
4. American Ghosts and Old World Wonders (1993)
5. Burning Your Boats (1995)

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63 8.3.2 Critical Analysis of story The Courtship of Mr. Lyon
The Courtship of Mr. Lyon is based on a classical story, Beauty
and the Beast , and told in the ‘once upon a time’ third person
common to traditional fairy tales. Carter's classic backdrop of
basic story and narration emphasizes her tale's
unconventionality with its feminist themes and plot reversal.
Like many of Carter's stories, far from being 'classic,’ The
Courtship of Mr. Lyon is a tale of self -discovery and rejection
of female objectification. We need to see Beauty and the Beast
as diametrically opposing forces, with Beauty being feminine,
beautiful, innocent , and gentle while the Beast being masculine,
ugly, experienced, and wild. As per the original tale, the two
sides of this duality are irreconcilable. The author’s characters
are more 'ambiguous.' The story begins in this manner, but she
swiftly reverses i t. Beauty begins as an impoverished, helpless
girl who is forced to live in the Beast's mansion by the affluent,
powerful, and world -weary Beast.
She, on the other hand, quickly becomes an even more active,
experienced, and daring character. While the Beas t remains
hidden from the rest of society, she is confident enough to live a
high-profile life in the city. While she is initially afraid of him,
she soon realizes that he is actually afraid of her. Carter uses
symbolism in The Courtship of Mr. Lyon to emp hasize her main
feminist agenda. She employs a paradigm commonly found in
literature, distinguishing the city as a masculine place of
experience and corruption and the country as a feminine one of
inexperience and purity. However, she uses this literary
convention to undermine a gender convention. The Beast is
trapped in isolation in the country, while Beauty has free range
in the city. They are both unhappy when they are limited to
being in one place. These characters need to access both their
masculine and feminine attributes in order to be happy. The
country is so innocent or devoid of activity that it weakens the
Beast almost to the point of death. The city is so worldly and
full of superficial interactions that it hardens Beauty and begins
to replace he r inner beauty with a spoiled, false air. The author
uses the city and country as symbols to strengthen her
contention that a person needs to be both masculine and
feminine to have an authentic and fulfilled existence. Carter
utilizes food as an equalizer since it represents both animal and
human nature. They need nourishment to survive. Initially, food
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65 The Beast is so self -conscious about his appearance that his
spaniel is his only company before Beauty. By the end of the
story, we see how the Beast's loneliness causes him to become
weak and inactive. Beauty's absence weakens him to the point
where he can't even eat himself, and he ne arly dies of misery.
Beauty is still a lovely woman at the end of the story, but she is
energetic and brave; she is a hybrid of Beauty and the Beast. So
is the Beast, who retains traces of his leonine appearance even
after transforming into a gentle human. He also keeps the name
Lyon, which represents his old identity. When Beauty marries
him, she assumes his name. Taking one's husband's name can
be interpreted as a sign of submission, but in this case it is an
acknowledgement of Beauty's own masculinity. S he is
demanding her proper title because she, too, is a powerful
Lyon.
8.3.3 Characters:
8.3.3. 1 Beauty: Beauty is the heroine of "The Courtship of Mr.
Lyon." She is beautiful and kind, and her love, freely given,
transforms Mr. Lyon back into a human. Be auty in 'The
Courtship of Mr. Lyon' is a worrier, an obedient daughter who
becomes a spoiled child. In the end, however, she is redeemed
as a prodigal daughter. She transfers her love for her father to
the Beast so she can come home. She is clearly manipul ated,
first by her father and then by Mr. Lyon; though she
demonstrates little independent will, she surrenders it to him.
Her most defining characteristic is her desolating emptiness.
8.3.3. 2 Mr. Lyon/ Beast: He is a massive lion -like beast who
fiercely shakes Beauty's father and throws him to the ground
while yelling that he is "the Beast" and the father is a thief. He
is quick -tempered and easily enraged. He is angry at himself for
what he has done, but he ta kes it out on others. Regardless, he
has inner beauty. Mr. Lyon in The Courtship of Mr. Lyon is a
wealthy recluse beast who has no staff. Beauty's love restores
him to his human form.
8.3.3. 3 Beauty’s father: Beauty's father is a ruined gentleman
who takes temporary shelter in a grand, and apparently empty,
mansion, from whose garden he plucks a white rose to take to
his daughter as a present. Beauty's father is trapped in car
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67  Hill, Rosemary (22 October 2016). "The Invention of Angela Carter: A
Biog raphy by Edmund Gordon – review". The Guardian.
 Gordon, Edmund (1 October 2016). "Angela Carter: Far from the
fairytale". The Guardian .
 Michael Dirda, "The Unconventional Life of Angela Carter - prolific
author, reluctant feminist, The Washington Post , 8 March 2017.

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