CHAP 3 - GENERIC HYBRIDITY Flashcards
3.1. A Parody of travel narratives
→ The call of the sea : Gulliver and the figure of the traveller
- B1, C1 : G’s introduces himself as an average Englishman destined to travel the world
> I, 1, 15 : “I laid them out in learning navigation and other parts of the Mathematicks, useful to those who intend to travel, as I always believed would be some time or other my fortune to do”
> Antanaclasis : Fortune can be understood as posterity or as Destiny / fate
⇒ He travels because he feels compelled to travel and also because he needs to make a living
Antanaclasis
is the literary trope in which a single word or phrase is repeated, but in two different senses.
G as this travel figure : because he is curious and want to discover new lands, people, customs etc
BK 1 : structure i.e beginning and ending : a pattern in the following books
> I,1, 76 “an advantageous offer”
> I, 8, 71 “ my insatiable Desire of seeing foreign COuntries would suffer me to continue no longer”
The traveller and the writer : he initially described himself as a reluctant writer
II, 3, 135 : Captain Wilcocks suggest he write an account of his voyages “we were already over-stocked with Books of Travels : That nothing could now pass which was not extraordinary ; wherein I doubted, some Authors less consulted Truth than their own Vanity or interest or the DIversion of ignorant Readers”
⇒ judgement on both authors and readers :
author by vanity and interest : want to make money VS ignorant reader who wants to be entertained. Gulliver positions himself in opposition of these writers and in opposition of this writers
IV, 12, 272 “faithful history” of his travels v. the “grossest Falsities” some “books of Travels” impose on “the unwary Reader”
⇒ direct address to the reader he opposes the faithful history of his travels (veracity) to the falsities Faithful
⇒ opposition which readers should not take at face value
Travels narratives are written by travel liars.
Defining parody (with Linda Hutcheon)
♠ Greek noun parodia meaning “counter-song”
♠ Prefix para : 2 meanings : 1 = “counter” or “against” (parody as opposition or contrast btw 2 texts) : 2, “bdeisde” (suggestion of intimacy or accord instead of contrast)
Parody functions only if identified as such by the reader
‘Parody […] is repetition with difference. A critical distance is implied btw the backgrounded text being parodied and the new incorporating work, a distance usually signalled by irony.’
Ways to apply parody ?
“The Author, after the Manner of Travellers, is a little too circumstantial”
→ Repetition
→ Critical distance
Repetition
borrowing narrative patterns and motifs from travel narratives, 18th century narrative. Their goal was to confirm the veracity of travellers’ accounts : be precise about geographical conditions. ++ ref to cardinal points.
“Circumstantial” description whose goal is to confirm the veracity of the traveller’s account
Critical distance
“Finding it was like to overblow,* we took in our Sprit-sail,* and stood by to hand* the Fore-sail; but making* foul Weather, we looked the Guns were all fast,* and handed the Missen.* The Ship lay very broad off,* so we thought it better spooning* before the Sea, than trying* or hulling.* We reeft the Foresail and set him, we hawled aft the Fore-sheet;* the Helm was hard a Weather.* The Ship wore* bravely. We belay’d the Foredown-hall;* but the Sail was split, and we hawl’d down the Yard,* and got the Sail into the Ship, and unbound all the things clear of it. It was a very fierce Storm; the Sea broke strange and dangerous.* We hawl’d off upon the Lanniard of the Wipstaff,* and helped the Man at Helm. We would not get down our Top-Mast, but let all stand, because She scudded before the Sea very well,* and we knew that the Top-Mast being aloft, the Ship was the wholesomer,* and made better way through the Sea, seeing we had Sea room. When the Storm was over, we set Fore-sail and Main-sail, and brought the Ship to.* Then we set the Missen, Maintop-Sail and the Foretop-Sail. Our Course was East North-east, the Wind was at South-West. We got the Star-board Tacks aboard,* we cast off our Weather-braces and Lifts;* we set in the Lee-braces,* and hawl’d for- ward by the Weather-bowlings,* and hawl’d them tight, and belayed them, and hawl’d over the Missen Tack to Windward, and kept her full and by as near as she would lye.*” (II, 1, 75-76)
⇒ Texte is saturated by technical tones that are not easily understandable for most readers. Here Swift uses — but uses it with excess. It is not proved that GT are true story. Attention = it’s way too much : doesn’t help you understand but rather the contrary.
Gulliver V Crusoe
What differentiates GT from RC
RC : the triumph of human ingenuity /
GT : a satirical exploration of human nature ⇒ desert become a profitable commercial land
RC : the only threat = the terrifying cannibals /
GT : the only atrocities = those of civilised societies which have degenerated
No explicit mention of Defoe but allusion in the text
→ IV, 11, 4265 “My Design was, if possible, to discover some small Island uninhabited, yet sufficient by my Labour to furnish me with Necessaries of Life”
→ Discussion with Captain Pedro de Mendez : finding such an island “altogether impossible to find “ (iV, 11, 270)
→ By 1719 (the publication date of RC); no “desert” islands to be found anymore
18th readers would have been aware that Pedro’s assessment was entirely correct. No desert island to be found in the Caribbean
→ Contrary to its pretence to factual verisimilitude, the very premise of RC is entirely fictional
⇒ Swift has as character in his book that remind the reader there is no desert island anymore
⇒ the very premise of Defoe’s novel is fictionnal because Defoe like Swift but presents itself as an “authentic 1st person account”
Gulliver imitating Crusoe
→ Accumulation of Useless objects made of somewhat disgusting material
→ Discrepancy : G’s pride at his on ingenuity and at the rarity of his collection / the rader’s probable reaction when reading the list.
==>
BK 2, chap 8. Gulliver is pagest being rescued, he is on board a shop and on his way back to Bunkingam And in order to impress the captain he shows him the objects in his box = useful object
BK 2, chap 8. Gulliver is pagest being rescued, he is on board a shop and on his way back to Bunkingam And in order to impress the captain he shows him the objects in his box = useful object
II, 8, 134-135: “I opened it in his Presence, and shewed him the small Collection of Rarities I made in the Country from whence I had been so strangely delivered. There was a Comb I had contrived out of the Stumps of the King’s Beard; and another of the same Materials, but fixed into a paring of her Majesty’s Thumb-nail, which served for the Back. There was a Collection of Needles and Pins from a Foot to half a Yard long. Four Wasp-Stings, like Joyners Tacks: Some Combings of the Queen’s Hair […] I desired the Captain would please to accept this Ring in Return of his Civilities; which he absolutely refused. I shewed him a Corn that I had cut off with my own Hand from a Maid of Honour’s Toe; it was about the Bigness of a Kentish Pippin, and grown so hard, that when I returned to England, I got it hollowed into a Cup and set in Silver. Lastly, I desired him to see the Breeches I had then on, which were made of a Mouse’s Skin.”
→ Map : real and imagined places
Each book, each voyage is preceded by a map. The 18th century would recognize those maps as being the work of the photographer Herman Moll ( reference IV, 11,266).
→ Typical of contemporany travel narratives: veracity / verisimilitude
→ 1726 : blanks, terra incognita
→ Falsified maps : situating imaginary places in real geographic places.
→ Most of the toponyms : real place (Redriff, the Downs, Cape of Good Hope, East Indies, Fort Saint George, Tonquin etc.). It doesn’t matter where thos place are situated. What matters = how they are situated in relation to England.
⇒ Gulliver discovers new land. Swift decides to create both an explorer and someone who discovers new lands, lands that are situated on actual maps.
→ What matters : this islands situated in relaO to England’s remoteness, distance from England
→ Geographical distance : measuring what separates the countries Gulliver discovers from the country he has left behind.
Defining Utopia and dystopia
Isolation and self-contained geography; ISland = a topos of Utopia
Utopia comes from Utopia by Thomas more
2 possible meanings : an ideal place (eu-topos) or a place that doesn’t exist (ou-topos)
Dystopia = an anti-utopia, utopia gone wrong
