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English Summary: Culture and Literature
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A full summary of the lectures and novels for the subject of English: Culture and Literature, taught by Frank Albers (2022)
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ENGLISH: CULTURE&LITERATURE- The concept of outsiders, relations of power explored through fiction
- Outsider X hermit = the hermit withdraws into the wild/woods, self-
reliant individual X outsider is defined by a negative bond to society
(he/she bears the scars of a failed integration)
- Outsidership – adolescent – not a kid anymore, neither an adult –
stuck in between mentally and physically, growing up is a painful
process, coming-of-age novels (The Catcher in the Rye)
- This year’s nobel prize for literature Abdulrazak Gurnah
Herman Melville
- New Yorker
- He wrote novels based on his trips to the ocean and travels, whaling
industry – whaling ships and long trips on the sea
- Part Dutch
- 1851 he publishes a novel about a white whale of 600 pages –
MOBY DICK (way too long for the people of his life)
THE CASE OF BARTLEBY (1856)
- Published anonymously because of Melville’s depression and
sickness following the publication of Moby Dick
- Important description of the office – describing the feeling of
isolation
- The story is the attempt to understand the meaning of the famous “I
would prefer not to”
- “I would prefer not to” the linguistic evocation/construction of
outsidership, he is not exactly refusing
- He is not in, not out = a complete outsider who cannot be an
outsider
- The lawyer starts the story by describing him and not Bartleby so
we learn a lot about the lawyer from his point of view “I am a safe
man”
- The story turns around when Bartleby “refuses” to check the copied
papers
- Bartleby’s fate a in a way Melville’s fate as a writer in America,
bartleby is not misunderstood but simply just not understood
- Bartleby is the most forlorn/lonliest character, he never complains,
he turns down whatever it is this world (the office) has to offer
- Bartleby stays in an empty building when the law firm moves
- Outsider is defined by negativity = the lawyer defines Bartleby
exactly like that :
, - “I now recalled all the quiet mysteries which I had noted in
the man. I remembered that he never spoke but to answer;
that though at intervals he had considerable time to
himself, yet I had never seen him reading—no, not even a
newspaper; that for long periods he would stand looking
out, at his pale window behind the screen, upon the dead
brick wall; I was quite sure he never visited any refectory or
eating house; while his pale face clearly indicated that he
never drank beer like Turkey, or tea and coffee even, like
other men; that he never went any where in particular that
I could learn; never went out for a walk, unless indeed that
was the case at present; that he had declined telling who
he was, or whence he came, or whether he had any
relatives in the world; that though so thin and pale, he
never complained of ill health.”
- “I have decided to do no more writing” – autobiographical
- This story is an autobiographical portrait of a depressed man
- Other interepretations: Bartleby = Jesus Christ
o Reading the story as a warning
o It is a story of a hunger striker
o Bartleby is a caricature of the narrator
o Barleby’s life reads like the dead letter (the office of dead
letter where Bartleby used to work)
o The story as a critique of capitalism, drawing on Marx’s
alienation of labour (work you do for someone else) –
Barlteby prefers not to do the work/labour anymore
- Radical and inexplicable outsidership of Bartleby
F. SCOTT FITZGERALD (1896 – 1940)
- The book cover was finished before the story was
finished – the cover jacket was a success and a
timeless painting made by Francis Cugat (“the only
cover that should ever be given” - professor) ->
certain elements in the novel were inspired by the
cover
- a young, promising, controversive author
- born in Minnesota (kinda a redundant place in the
US)
- joined the US army in 1917
- married Miss Alabama (he was there with the army)
– Zelda Sayer – daughter of the highest judge in the state, but
, she does not want to marry him because he is poor (hence he
writes the novel!)
- after his book was successful she finally married him (1920)
because of his instant success (This Side of Paradise)
- very young, living the rich/boho lifestyle
- in the 1920s Fitzgerald spent a lot of time in Europe and hang
out with expats who’d gone to Europe because they were
disappointed with America after the WW1 -> “Lost generation” –
Stein, Ezra Pound, Hemingway
- 1925 he published The great Gatsby (a title he never liked) –
criticised – a “dud”, not received well!!
- The critique of The great Gatsby influenced the disintegration of
Fitzgerald and he became an alcoholic and Zelda suffered from
a nervous breakdown and sent to sanatorium in Switzerland and
diagnosed with schizophrenia (a couple of an alcoholic and
schizophrenic…)
- Zelda wrote to Scott while she was in Switzerland and some of
them are very high drama and intense and probably her best
literary work
- Fitzgerald’s essay Echoes of the jazz Age published in 1931
- 1934 – Tender is the night (there are 2 version of that book)
- His lifestyle in the 30s: alcoholism, money problems, marital
problems
- He made most of his money selling short stories
- Went to Hollywood – story/scriptwriters in the 30s were very
high demand
- Zelda was still shuttling between hospitals, died 8 years after
Fitzgerald in a fire in an asylum
THE ROARING TWENTIES
- Or the Jazz Age
- Age of miracles, art, excess, satire
- The Great Gatsby is a masterpiece of satire literature
- Age of money spending, drinking and prohibition at the same
time (a paradox lol) - > the prohibition was a complete failure
because people made fortune selling alcohol under the table ->
SPEAKEASY (a bar with two entries to escape through)
- Gatsby is involved in crime money (he is often wanted on the
phone) - references to making Gatsby’s money off the illicit
alcohol sales
- Wall Street Crash (1929): “the most expensive orgy in history”
was over (aka roaring 20s) – ending of the Jazz Age
- 1919-1930 – Prohibition
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