In a literary piece, the reenactment of a certain type of reality is directly assimilated by the mimetic criticism of readers, concerning their experiences in the real world, the present world and the literary world. Various postmodernist writers employ this technique in their writings for the purpose of engaging and interacting their readers with the realist ideas they present throughout their work. Reality is presented in different ways so that it essentially influences the reader’s perspective concerning the interpretation an author has about the real world. For this reason, I will follow Theo D’haen and argue that Nabokov and Calvino synthesize the “real” reality of Realism and the “psychological” reality of Modernism to redefine a mimetic reality for their readers, by examining the position of Theo D’haen, the novels: Lolita and In a Winters Night, A Traveler and Gunter Bebauer’s stance on Mimesis.
Theo D’haen, a professor at the University of Leuven, synthesizes that a postmodernist writer is one who uses a “combination of any number of techniques that were seen as innovative and perhaps even transgressive, especially with regard to all forms of referentiality, be it reference to some “real” reality as in realism or to a “psychological” reality as in modernism”(Theo D’haen 272). Following this explanation, the self-reflectiveness, interdependency, parody and mimetic reality that readers are exposed to when reading a metafictional piece, branches into the different interpretations presented by D’haen: a ‘real’ reality and a ‘psychological’ reality. The act of judging any work of art in relation to its representation of reality is a parallel to the reader’s assimilation of a mimetic reality, acknowledged by a physiological th...
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...reality for their readers. This can be expressed through Theo D’haen’s work, Vladimir Nabokov and Italo Calvino’s novels; Lolita and If on a Winter’s Night a Traveler and through Gunter Bebauer’s standpoint on Mimesis. The portrayal of a certain truth and the effect it has on the audience is directly related to how the author opts for the mimetic assimilation of their stance on reality. There are various qualities attributed to mimesis that authors use to influence the way their readers self-consciously absorb a psychological reality. By disregarding the use of artificial facts throughout their stories, authors sketch a type of verisimilitude to prevail their idea of the real world to their readers. Therefore, the readers have a first person view on how the author presents a mimetic reality that is eventually assimilated in a psychological and realist way.
The clearest vision of reality is often the most abstract. While the rise of science and progress suffocate the notion of an extrasensory experience within the reading of literature, the phenomena persist. Meanings are communicated, participating in a magnificent cosmic-cultural aura, penetrating a communication of meaning, intent, and scandalously--truth. There is a process of intertextuality occurring, a conversation between authors, texts themselves, and the readers who venture to interpret them. Richard Brautigan's imaginary novel, In Watermelon Sugar converses well with a poem written many years after his death, Tunnel Music by Mark Doty. This conversation appears to be about the collapse of our techno-egocentric society.
In conclusion, according to Simmon O. Lesser in “The Role of Unconscious Understanding in Flaubert and Dostoevsky”, “ It is interesting to compare the way Flaubert and Dostoevsky handle triangular situations, realism puts the reader in flow of the story from the beginning; paints the picture. The description in “A Simple Heart” gives the reader a front row sit in a day in the life of Felicite. In the description of Notes from the Underground gives the reader a front row seat inside a man mind.
Deep-seated in these practices is added universal investigative and enquiring of acquainted conflicts between philosophy and the art of speaking and/or effective writing. Most often we see the figurative and rhetorical elements of a text as purely complementary and marginal to the basic reasoning of its debate, closer exploration often exposes that metaphor and rhetoric play an important role in the readers understanding of a piece of literary art. Usually the figural and metaphorical foundations strongly back or it can destabilize the reasoning of the texts. Deconstruction however does not indicate that all works are meaningless, but rather that they are spilling over with numerous and sometimes contradictory meanings. Derrida, having his roots in philosophy brings up the question, “what is the meaning of the meaning?”
Many have condemned realist art for “sacrificing beauty for exactitude and obviating conceptual integrity if favour of in-your-face reality”. They argue that the glorification of ordinary, banal subjects may in fact be a pathetic attempt to ignore the drab realities of contemporary life by attempting to ‘spice up’ commonplace objects. Perhaps they think that modern technology and flashy photographical equipment defeats the purpose of original realist art, and provides a far more accurate reproduction of contemporary life. I however, beg to differ. For the realist artist, the vast world is their subject and their aim is to present this world through their art in what they see as their honest representation of it. To label realism as obsolete is to call these artists’ sincere opinions obsolete. People often fail to remember that the world is constantly changing and the ‘ordinary’ doesn’t always remain so. The writer J.P. Stern remarked once that realism is “the creative acknowledgment of the data of social life at a recognisable moment in history”. True, photography and digital technology may produce a more accurate reproduction of real life but representation-wise, a genuine hand-made artwork may in fact offer a far more meaningful result- not merely due to the allowance for modification and
REFERENCESJean Baudrillard Simulations--1983 Semiotext[e]. America--1988 (English Edition) Verso. Seduction--1990 (English Edition) St. Martin’s Press. The Illusion of the End--1994 (English Edition) Stanford University Press. Simulacra and Simualtion--1994 (English Edition) University of Michigan Press. Jean-Francois Lyotard The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge--1984 (English Edition) University of Minnesota Press. The Postmodern Exaplained--1993 (English Edition) University of Minnesota Press. Michel Foucault Madness and Civilization--1973 Vintage Books. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison--1977 Vintage Books. The History of Sexuality--1980 Vintage Books. Linda Hutcheon A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Thoery Fiction--1988 Routledge. The Politics or Postmodernism--1989 Routledge.
Milan Kundera contends, “A novel that does not discover a hitherto unknown segment of existence is immoral” (3). In this it is seen that the primary utility of the novel lies in its ability to explore an array of possible existences. For these possible existences to tell us something of our actual existence, they need to be populated by living beings that are both as whole, and as flawed, as those in the real world. To achieve this the author must become the object he writes of. J.M. Coetzee states, “there is no limit to the extent to which we can think ourselves into the being of another. There are no bounds to the sympathetic imagination” (35). Through this sympathetic faculty, a writer is able to give flesh, authenticity and a genuine perspective to the imagined. It is only in this manner that the goal of creating living beings may be realized. Anything short of this becomes an exercise in image and in Kundera’s words, produces an immoral novel (3).
Literary critic and the novel’s annotator Alfred Appel Jr. claims “what is extraordinary about Lolita is the way in which Nabokov enlists us, against our will, on Humbert’s side… Humbert has figuratively made the reader his accomplice in both statutory rape and murder” (Durantaye, Style Is Matter: the Moral Art of Vladimir Nabokov 8). Nabokov employs various literary devices such as direct second reader address, metaphor, and allusions through Humbert Humbert as a means to conjure up feelings of empathy. The reader comes to find that . It is clear that Humbert Humbert uses second person address as a way to control how the reader perceives him. Through the use of this narrative mode, he aims to convince the reader that his sexual violence is artistically justifiable and that the art he creates is a remedy for mortality. I will argue is that art is not a remedy for mortality because in Humbert Humbert’s creation of Lolita, t...
The success of the film Amelie, also known in France as Le Fabuleux desin d'Amélie Poulain directed by Jean Pierre-Jeunet, can be attributed to both the vision of the director and brilliant writing of the screenplay. This is a film which takes place around the year 1997 a day after the incident of Princess Diana's death is televised all around the world. We are then guided through the life of Amelie Poulin (Audrey Tautou) who is trying to find meaning in her life by doing good deeds for others around her. Amelie is a film which was made in the modern society of France, but one of the elements that makes this a postmodern film is its tendency to look back at past times, be retrospective of modernism in our society and build an image of it. Postmodernism is to be understood as a movement beyond modernism which is nonetheless able to make use of modernism techniques and conventions as one set of stylistic choices amongst others. By analyzing Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s 2001 ward-winning film Amelie, we will identify the presence of many underlying motifs in both the narrative and the characterization of the film when using influential theorists such as Frederic Jameson and Jean Baudrillard’s concepts on postmodernism.
In the 1950s, authors tended to follow common themes, these themes were summed up in an art called postmodernism. Postmodernism took place after the Cold War, themes changed drastically, and boundaries were broken down. Postmodern authors defined themselves by “avoiding traditional closure of themes or situations” (Postmodernism). Postmodernism tends to play with the mind, and give a new meaning to things, “Postmodern art often makes it a point of demonstrating in an obvious way the instability of meaning (Clayton)”. What makes postmodernism most unique is its unpredictable nature and “think o...
Postmodernism is a vague term that can describe a variety of disciplines that include, architecture, art, music, film, fashion, literature…etc. (Klages). In the case of “Videotape”, postmodern literature would be the main focus or area of study. This type of literature emerged in the era that succeeded World War II and relies heavily on the use of techniques such as, fragmentation, the creation of paradoxes, and questionable protagonists. Furthermore, postmodern literature also exudes ambiguity and critical thinking where the focus is mainly on the reader and his/her experience of the work rather than the content and form. Building upon that, the selected passag...
Reality is an idea that many singers, artist and writers have been trying to show through their work. Cervantes’ intention was to portray a story of life for others to hear his story but believe it. The display of the story needs to be told in a truthful manner as possible, and can help a production go from a play to an experience of witnessing history for the viewer. In a production reality is based on how much believability the audience is willing to believe and how close the piece of work resembles real life. The piece of work needs to have a realistic feel, giving the audience illusion of that things are real. Creating reality starts with honest and true thoughts for any production whose goal is to represent reality. Pedro the Great Pretender goal is to represent reality through costume, actions, and dialogue.
Many believed that Modernist works were not “art” because they did not always look like real life. But what is “real life”? A new outlook on reality was taken by Modernists. What is true for one person at one time is not true for another person at a different time. Experimentation with perspective and truth was not confined to the canvas; it influenced literary circles as well.
Postmodern literary criticism asserts that art, author, and audience can only be approached through a series of mediating contexts. "Novels, poems, and plays are neither timeless nor transcendent" (Jehlen 264). Even questions of canon must be considered within a such contexts. "Literature is not only a question of what we read but of who reads and who writes, and in what social circumstances...The canon itself is an historical event; it belongs to the history of the school" (Guillory 238,44).
Michael Levenson said in The Cambridge Companion to Modernism that Modernism fiction was “involved in the radical modern departure, across all of the arts, from representational verisimilitudei”. It was stylistically and thematically focused on rebellion against the way art was presented in the past and what its main focus was.
Gavin argues, “During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, empirical philosophy recognized a perilous disconnect between knowledge and the actual existence of things in the world” (Gavin 301-325). These ideas of knowledge, and those of the real world, were shaped by Descartes’ theory that reality is perceived by the individual and is not attached to previous ideas of reality. Unlike the novels before, realistic novels appealed to middle-class readers who wanted to read about ordinary people; they could see themselves as main characters in the story (Mario). With the influence of Descartes, novels and the genre of realism came together forming realistic novels. Realism is the attempt to depict all characteristics of human life with such attention to detail that the events seem as realistic as possible, as if readers could perhaps know the characters personally or even be them. Regarding Crusoe, he faces many realistic chall...