The focus of this seminar paper will be on a theoretical approach called aesthetic of character, with examples from a novel Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. Various terms, coined up by theoreticians of this approach, will be explained through some of the examples taken out of the above mentioned novel.
To begin with, this approach is concerned with what is the function of the characters in the narrative and how the characters are characterised. According to it, characters are agents performing actions in a story. They can be persons, anthropomorphised animals or objects. There are two main theoretical approaches within this one, and those are mimetic and semiotic approaches. While the mimetic approach considers characters as real people, semiotic approach views characters only as a set of words.
In 1960s and 1970s, another approach appeared. It was called sociohistorical approach to literature, and was mainly concerned with how characters’ behaviours resembled to those of the real people’s, and whether their portrayal is truthful to the general script, or to its gender role. In close connection to this, another term appeared, called gender performance, which implies both, men and women, behaving according to the norms and expectations put by the society. For example, while men were allowed to be active, assertive and dominant, women should have been submissive, dependant and passive. Exceptions, both for men and women, were not gleefully accepted in the society. This is the main reason for appearance of another term, which is closely connected to the terms gender roles and gender performance, called gender stereotypes. Examples for gender stereotypes can even be found in the book Little Women, mainly through the characters of ...
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...representatives of the society of their time. In addition to this, we could also see that women are much more oppressed by the society. Their liberties are limited. This is the reason why we say that girls are doubly oppressed in children’s literature. What is more, it is said that “in literature boys grow, while girls shrink”. The character of Jo is the perfect example for this. Even though at the beginning of the story Jo was very much tomboyish, and a ‘deviation’ from the script, as the story developed, her character went through the process of the assimilation, until at the end, she became much more like ‘a proper lady’ should be.
Works Cited
Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth Editions Limited, 1993.
Nikolajeva, Maria. Aesthetic Approaches to Children's Literature: An Introduction. Maryland: The Scarecorw Press, Inc., 2005, 145-154.
...ia J. Campbell. New York: Twayne Publishers, 1996. 39-65. Rpt. in Children's Literature Review. Ed. Scot Peacock. Vol. 82. Detroit: Gale, 2003. Literature Resources from Gale. Web. 14 Jan. 2014.
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... (eds), Children’s Literature Classic Text and Contemporary Trends, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan in association with Open University
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