Theories: Marxist, Ecocritical, Feminist and Queer Criticism

Hello! This blog is assigned by Dr. Dilip barad sir. It deals with the various literary theories like Feminism, queer study, eco- criticism, and Marxism. This blog deals with Marxism, other blogs which deals with other theories are hyperlinked in the end.

Marxism

Karl Marx is the one to bring this theory and it is named after him only. Marxism is a philosophy developed in the second half of the 19th century that unifies social, political, and economic theory. It is mainly concerned with the battle between the working class and the ownership class and favors communism and socialism over capitalism.

Key Concerns of Marxism

1. In the Marxist literary analysis, the evolving history of humankind, of its social groupings and interrelations, of its institutions, and of its ways of thinking are largely determined by the changing mode of its “material production”— that is, of its overall economic organization for producing and distributing material goods.

2. Changes in the fundamental mode of material production effect changes in the class structure of a society, establishing in each era dominant and subordinate classes that engage in a struggle for economic, political, and social advantage.

3. Human consciousness is constituted by an ideology—that is, the beliefs, values, and ways of thinking and feeling through which human beings perceive, and by recourse to which they explain, what they take to be reality. An ideology is, in complex ways, the product of the position and interests of a particular class. In any historical era, the dominant ideology embodies, and serves to legitimize and perpetuate, the interests of the dominant economic and social class.

Seminal Writers and their works-

• Marx and Engels -The German Ideology,
• The Hungarian thinker Georg Lukács,
• Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheime-.
• Andrew Arato and Eike Gebhardt (1982),
• Walter Benjamin,
• French Marxist Louis AlthusserPierre Macherey, in A Theory of Literary Production (1966, trans. 1978)
• Italian Communist Antonio Gramsci
• Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe-Hegemony and Socialist Strategy (1985)
• Raymond Williams
• Terry Eagleton-A leading theorist of Marxist criticism in England
• Fredric Jameson- The Political Unconscious: Narrative as a Socially Symbolic Act (1981),

Marxist political theory views history as a constant struggle between these two classes. The bourgeoisie is the capitalist class that owns the wealth and the means of production. While the lower class who struggles and are depended on the bourgeoisie for income. Mostly this type of Bollywood movies are old movies where we see this struggle. The upper class is not ready to accept the lower class. They don't let their children marry the lower class and the struggles used to happen.

The recent movie of struggle between two classes is 2018 film Kedarnath. Here the struggle is between Hindu- Brahmin and Muslim couple which is perhaps the hot topic in India. But looking from the Marxist canon we see the same struggle the upper class not wishing their chlid to marry lower class who was local Muslim porter.

Ishq, 1997 movie also deals with the same theme of class issues. Children of two friends who belonged to the upper class wanted their children to marry so that their wealth remained with them but their children loved each other's friend who belonged to lower class. Parents tried to create problems among them but later they got married. Here also for the sake of wealth decide to go for same class marriage.

Looking at the literature, we find such themes are covered as a minor theme or can be read in various books. The Great Gatsby novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald.

The Great Gatsby is a story which begins with a narrator Nick Carraway talking about the market and his introduction which clarifies that he belongs to upper class society along with Tom Buchanan and her wife. The main Character is Jay Gatsby, his only aim is to win Daisy (upper class) to whom he couldn't marry. So he gets rich in order to win her, she is also in love with her. But he is judged on his dressing and living a fake life. When he died no one visited his funeral from the Buchanan family which shows that however a person struggles to be in the upper class, aristocratic society will never accept them and women like Daisy might fall in love but will never get ready to marry living their respectable way of life.

Marxism says that society involves a struggle between the upper and lower class, which is in essence what Gatsby is struggling against, as he fights to be accepted as upper class for once and all, ridding himself of his more humble origins. The Marxist idea that life is a continuous struggle between the bourgeois and the proletariat

Read the Great Gatsby from the Marxist canon in detail. CLICK HERE.

Richardson’s Pamela is also about a relation between two different classes. Panama is a proletarian. In the novel, Mr. B, upper class, falls in love with Pamela and being rich he feels his right on Pamela. He kidnaps her, tries to abuse her. In the end they get married as it was to Mr. B . We feel as if Pamela has lost her individuality.

Salman Rushdie’s Midnight Children contains all the aspects of India. We also have a character Joseph D'Costa, Mary Pereira's sweetheart and he is a Marxist. His love Mary Pereira is a nurse, he influences Pereira to change the children in the hospital, poor child to rich family so that that the imbalance of capital, wealth in the society can be balanced.

I hope this blog is useful. Thanks for visiting.

READ MY BLOG ON ANOTHER THEORY- FEMINISTIC THEORY

READ MY BLOG ON ANOTHER THEORY- ECOCRITICISM

READ MY BLOG ON ANOTHER THEORY- QUEER THEORY

Presentation 2: Paper no.: 102

RICHARDSON’S PAMELA AND SELECT BOLLYWOOD CHARACTER: A STUDY

This is my presentation on Paper no.:102 Literature of Neo- Classical

RICHARDSON’S PAMELA AND SELECT BOLLYWOOD CHARACTER: A STUDY from Jheel Barad

This is Video Recording of My same presentation

Thank you for visiting I hope this presentation and video recording are useful to you. 

Pamela or Virtue Rewarded - Samuel Richardson

Pamela- Unreliable Narrator!

This blog is in response to the blog task given to us by Vaidehi ma’am on the epistolary novel Pamela or virtue rewarded.

Basic Knowledge about the text:

Pamela or Virtue rewarded is an epistolary novel published in 1740 by English writer Samuel Johnson, Novel of a Neo- classical era. Epistolary novel is a novel written in a series of documents, it can be the series of letters or diary writing or newspaper clippings. This novel has the series of letter writing by Pamela, a protagonist to his father and later in other parts of the novel it is a series of diary writing by Pamela. Pamela tells the story of a fifteen-year-old maidservant named Pamela Andrews, whose employer, Mr. B, a wealthy landowner, makes unwanted and inappropriate advances towards her after the death of her mother. The full title, Pamela; or, Virtue Rewarded, makes plain Richardson's moral purpose. The novel Pamela brings out the commentary of the domestic violence of that time and brings into question the dynamic line between male aggression and a contemporary view of love.

Pamela, a novel of manners, is divided into 32 letters starting with the publisher’s note. It is set in Bedfordshire, England and Lincolnshire, England. This Novel deals with the psychological changes taking place in various characters. The novel Pamela deals with various themes like the social classes of English society, the importance of chastity, virtue and femininity, religion, a bit of feminism, and love and marriage. The novel Pamela is narrated by two narrators, first is third person narrator who is an editor who presents Pamela's letters to us and comments on her life and fate. Second, the first person narrator Pamela herself. In this blog I am going to discuss whether Pamela is a reliable character/ narrator or not.

Here the question of Pamela’s reliability as a narrator rises because when the novel is written in the letter form it presents a direct view of characters' thoughts and feelings without any interference of the author. We see the events and acts happening from one point of view. In this case it becomes difficult to know whether the narrator is telling us right or just forming a good or bad image of a particular character. When we read novels in the form of letters we get to know a shade of a character from one perspective only. As we know ‘one is always bad in someone’s story’. It might happen that the character tower which is built in front of us might be wrong and if we get to know the same character from another perspective we might favor that character. So it becomes very much important to question the reliability of Pamela as a narrator as we also find that in spite Mr. B is not a person with good character as told by Pamela yet she marries him. The Saying and Actions of Pamela don't Go parallel to each other. So here let us discuss in detail about the reliability of Pamela as a narrator.

Unreliable Narrator:

We cannot rely on anyone unless we see with our naked eyes. Sometimes the view scene with our own eyes turns out to be incorrect so listening to something through others and believing it might bring us to the wrong conclusion.

No one more control over the plot than the narrator. Whether its first person limited or third person omniscient the narrator controls the pacing chooses the language and is often the moral compass telling you who to root for and how you should feel about what happens the reader listens, believes and empathizes so what happens when the person telling the story isn't telling the whole story? How can we even tell if a narrator is unreliable?

The term unreliable narrator was coined in 1962 by literary critic Wayne C Booth in his book ‘The Rhetoric Of Fiction’. ‘I have called the narrator reliable when he speaks or acts in accordance with the norms of the work (which is to say the implied author’s norms) unreliable when he does not’ which says that the narrator is not reliable when it does not share the perspective of reality or morality shared by author and reader.

An unreliable narrator is a character whose telling of the story is not completely accurate or credible due to problems with the character's mental state or maturity. An unreliable narrator, however, holds a distorted view of the events, which leads to an inaccurate telling of the story. This can give readers or viewers a chance to offer their own interpretations.

In context to Text:

The novel Pamela is divided into two parts. Pamela was a 15 years old young girl, working as a maid far from her family. This shows her love and self- sacrifice for her family. In the whole novel she seems to be a virtuous character. She was working as a maid for Mrs. B from many years ago. But she dies suddenly handing over Pamela responsibility to his son Mr. B. The first impression of Mr. B to Pamela was of Gentleman. "Indeed he is the best of gentlemen, I think!” we find this image of Mr. B in Pamela's mind through her letters to her parents.

“I always thought my young master was a fine gentleman, as everybody says he is: but he gave these good things to us both with such graciousness, as I thought he looked like an angel.”

Even moving further in the novel towards sixth letter of Pamela we realize that she has still positive thoughts about Mr. B but reading of letter from her father shows that they are afraid for her daughter and finds Mr. B fearful for her.

In the same part of the story happens so that Mr. B starts getting a lustful feeling for the young girl Pamela. And instantly in the letter ten and eleven we find the negative personality of Mr. B drawn. In this letters she claims to be sexually harassed by is master. 

"This very gentleman (yes, I must call him gentleman, though he has fallen from the merit of that title) has degraded himself to offer freedoms to his poor servant! He has now shewed himself in his true colors; and, to me, nothing appears so black, and so frightful.”

In further reading also we find that Pamela was mentally broken and harassed by Mr. B. Mr. B tried to have physical relation with her but she to safeguard her virtues did not allow Mr. B to touch her. Mr. B started harassing Pamela and insulting her. Mr. B asks for marriage to Pamela but she refuses to marry him. He gets angry on her and spreads rumors of Pamela’s relation with Mr. Williams. And he kidnaps her.

In part two, Pamela is kidnapped in another house. From where she isn't able to send or receive the letters from her family. So she started writing a journal. 

“I looked after him out of the window; and he was charmingly dressed: To be sure he is a handsome fine gentleman!—What pity his heart is not as good as his appearance! Why can't I hate him?—But don't be uneasy, if you should see this; for it is impossible I should love him; for his vices all ugly him over, as I may say.” 

After reading this statement of Pamela how can one resist believing that she is not on love with Mr. B. and here she is again contradicting with her own statements she wrote in the letter before.

Here these things can be interpreted in two ways. First there can be psychological changes happening in Mr. B. it might happen that firstly when Pamela ignored or didn't support him or did not agree for physical advances his male dominant ego or his standard of socially upper class than Pamela might be hurt. Which resulted in abducting Pamela and having rude behavior towards her. And later he must have realized that Pamela is doing everything for her virtuous family and he had a change of heart towards her. And this change of Mr. B bright changes in the statements of Pamela.

Or the second interpretation can also be the psychological changes in Pamela. Pamela is a teenage girl. This is the age when generally children get attracted to the opposite gender. In the starting she was in a frame of mind that Mr. B is a master and she is a maid. Mr. B is generous towards her and was not able to understand his early advances. Later when He tries physical advances she was not able to accept it. After being kidnapped she was all alone and we can see through her writings that she was always in thoughts of Mr. B. This was her beginning to fall for Mr. B. Also, when in the second He proposed to her for marriage and she agreed to it shows that she was attracted to her little or more. We can also say she has the temptation of being a part of upper class society.

Here we see that we are interpreting Pamela with different views. We can also say that Pamela herself is not clear in her own mind! Pamela is presenting us two different shades of Mr. B. we as a reader cannot connect to the character of Mr. B or cannot draw her specific character sketch. So it becomes difficult to say that what Pamela is telling is correct or not; not only in terms of Mr. B but in the overall novel. So we conclude Pamela is an unreliable narrator.

I hope my interpretations and blog is useful to you. Thanks for visiting.

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