Eventfulness in British Fiction
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Peter Hühn
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With contributions by:
Markus Kempf
About this book
An event, defined as the decisive turn, the surprising point in the plot of a narrative, constitutes its tellability, the motivation for reading it. This book describes a framework for a narratological definition of eventfulness and its dependence on the historical, socio-cultural and literary context. A series of fifteen analyses of British novels and tales, from late medieval and early modern times to the late 20th century, demonstrates how this concept can be put into practice for a new, specifically contextual interpretation of the central relevance of these texts. The examples include Chaucer’s “Miller’s Tale”, Behn’s “Oroonoko”, Defoe’s “Moll Flanders”, Richardson’s “Pamela”, Fielding’s “Tom Jones”, Dickens’s “Great Expectations”, Hardy's “On the Western Circuit”, James’s “The Beast in the Jungle”, Joyce’s “Grace”, Conrad’s “Shadow-Line”, Woolf’s “Unwritten Novel”, Lawrence’s “Fanny and Annie”, Mansfield’s “At the Bay”, Fowles’s “Enigma” and Swift’s “Last Orders”. This selection is focused on the transitional period from 19th-century realism to 20th-century modernism because during these decades traditional concepts of what counts as an event were variously problematized; therefore, these texts provide a particularly interesting field for testing the analytical capacity of the term of eventfulness.
Author / Editor information
Peter Hühn, University of Hamburg; Markus Kempf, Hamburg, Germany.
Topics
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Frontmatter
I -
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Contents
VII -
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1. Introduction
1 - Late Medieval and Early Modern
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2. Geoffrey Chaucer: “The Miller’s Tale”
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3. Aphra Behn: Oroonoko, or The Royal Slave: A True History (1688)
31 - 18th Century
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4. Daniel Defoe: Moll Flanders (1722)
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5. Samuel Richardson: Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded (1740)
63 -
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6. Henry Fielding: The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling (1749)
74 - Premodern and Modernist
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7. Charles Dickens: Great Expectations (1861)
87 -
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8. Thomas Hardy: “On the Western Circuit” (1891)
104 -
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9. Henry James: “The Beast in the Jungle” (1903)
114 -
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10. James Joyce: “Grace” (1914)
125 -
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11. Joseph Conrad: The Shadow-Line: A Confession (1917)
133 -
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12. Virginia Woolf: “An Unwritten Novel” (1921)
145 -
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13. D. H. Lawrence: “Fanny and Annie” (1921)
156 -
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14. Katherine Mansfield: “At the Bay” (1922)
164 - Contemporary
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15. John Fowles: “The Enigma” (1974)
175 -
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16. Graham Swift: Last Orders (1996)
185 -
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17. Conclusion
201
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