The Comic in Henry James´ Fiction

• Thesis title in Czech: Komický element v díle Henryho Jamese
• Thesis title in English: The Comic in Henry James´ Fiction
• Key words: Holubičí křídla, Zlatá mísa, Portrét dámy, Vyslanci, Přitažení šroubu, Šelma v džungli, komedie, konzumerismus, materialismus, morální úpadek, objektifikace, komodifikace, komercializace, kořistnická ziskuchtivost, rozbujelé sobectví, vzájemný průnik veřejného života a soukromí, performativnost.
• English key words: The Wings of the Dove, The Golden Bowl, The Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, “The Turn of the Screw,” “The Beast in the Jungle,” comedy, consumerism, materialism, moral abasement, objectification, commodification, commercialization, predatory financial acquisitiveness, rampant egotism, the interpenetration between the public and private spheres, performativeness.
• Academic year of topic announcement: 2013/2014
• Thesis type: Bachelor's thesis
• Thesis language: angličtina
• Department: Department of Anglophone Literatures and Cultures (21-UALK)
• Supervisor: doc. Erik Sherman Roraback, D.Phil.
• Author: hidden - assigned and confirmed by the Study Dept.
• Date of registration: 02.10.2013
• Date of assignment: 02.10.2013
• Administrator's approval: not processed yet
• Confirmed by Study dept. on: 21.10.2013
• Date and time of defence: 02.02.2016 09:00
• Date of electronic submission: 05.01.2016
• Date of proceeded defence: 02.02.2016
• Submitted/finalized: committed by student and finalized
• Opponents: David Lee Robbins, Ph.D.

Guidelines

The topic of this bachelor thesis is the exploration of the forms, examples and functions of the comic in Henry James' fiction against the background of the challenges and issues of modernity. In James' works aspects of the conflict between the Old World and the New World often hover above or beyond his plots, being a characteristic source of inspiration for his fiction. The traditional, decaying worldview with its accompanying increasingly irrelevant values is taken to be symbolized by the European settings, like that of Victorian England, while the culture of the U.S.A and its citizens embody incontrasttotheestablished knowledge and practices that crystalized out of the past agesthe newly emerging versions of personal and national identities in an environment which is less stifling to personal freedom. Since the Americans have seemingly greater personal independence in James, they are free to take on them the exploration of changing notions about societal and moral topics-ideas about social mobility, the independence of women on men, and others-in a society which is holds many formerly definitive ways and traditions of thought and action of the past as suddenly less static and ambiguous, since they are being intensely and passionately explored, redefined and negotiated by and within the new American ethos.
Nonetheless, James does not provide straightforward and easy answers to the topics brought up or suggested by his plots largely because his characters generally have trouble understanding certain layers of meaning. This introduces a sense of ambiguity for his readers, commentators and critics, which itself is a purposeful and distinctive, defining part of James' masterful impressionistic psychoanalytical writing style.
According to many critical judgments, James employes different forms of the comic as walls that invoke resistance to interpretation along the lines of modernist writers like Kafka;others point to the comic serving as means of deeper psychological understanding ofmoralissues of modernity, saying James offers a realistic image which decries U.S. policies, criticises capitalism, materialism and consumer-oriented society through his focus on the psychological perspective of his characters. Yet other critical views altogether turn away from James' criticism alleged by some commentators, claiming there is no moral motivation in James, and postulate their own answers to the question of what functions humour, comedy, irony and other features of the comic serve.
This bachelor thesis aims to give a preview of these different critical opinions, ascertain their validity and arrive at own conclusions, which it aims to support with relevant arguments and specific material in the form of textual instances taken from James' works. The thesis will especially use The Beast in the Jungle, The Turn of the Screw, The Portrait of a Lady, The Ambassadors, The Wings of the Dove, The Golden Bowl to establish the forms, examples and functions of the comic. The thesis will also look at the relation between tragedy and comedy, and discuss the role of unconsciousness in relation to the comic.

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