Intro : Naturalism.. Flashcards
Stephen crane date
Stephen Crane 1871-1900
Genre principal de Maggie
Réalisme, naturalisme
Naturalisme date et def
emblématique de fin du 19è
// zola : characters you put in a specific environment and you see how they react.
Naturalisme ideas
they wanted to portray characters who will be driven by their animal instinct
→ Ici = lieu ou grand rêve américains ne peuvent plus tenir : people are doomed, stuck from the beginning, you won’t see ++ evolution. Can also be seen in the title “A girl of the street” = it is said in the book = a prostitute + a girl who lives in the street because home isn’t a comfortable place.
⇒ people cannot really evolve or escape from their environment
⇒ Some social classes are doomed and are not able to become rich, not able to succeed in the American Dream.
18è VS 19è & courants littéraires
18è = early america : romans, exploration, sermons, texte politique
grand 19è = romantisme avec branche philo le transcendantalisme (au milieu grands réalistes dont Mark Twain)
Social context end of 19th century
- Industrialization and the rise of urban centers : Lower classes were often neglected and were not considered as a topic.
- Rise of inequalities : in Maggie : all belong to the same social class, even PEte
- A more heterogeneous society : people are extremely rich or poor
- The rise of journalism and « muckrakers »
muckrakers
terme pour parler des journalistes qui vont s’intérésser aux bas-fonds de la société
Literary context
♥ Heredity and environment = man = a superior animal but someone conducted by two driving forces
environment in which he evolves = environment
environment in which he is born = heredity
⇒ Doomed : much you down is done according to circumstances
By what is Maggie driven ?
Maggie driven by :
amour qu’elle porte à Pete
fuir son foyer dans l’espoir d’obtenir une vie différente (de sa mère) & espoir de la richesse = elle est fascinée par l’argent : tenues des femmes quand va au théâtre, le costume que porte Pete.
⇒ On pourrait avoir un narrateur qui a de l’ empathie envers Maggie MAIS NON : on observe juste Maggie aller vers sa marche funèbre sans que la narration nous pousse à être bouleversé. Dès le départ on comprend qu’elle ne va pas s’en sortir : indices dès le départ.
Zola, Le Roman expérimental, 1880 : présente principe naturalisme
“Et le naturalisme, je le dis encore, consiste uniquement dans la méthode expérimentale, dans l’observation et l’expérience appliquées à la littérature.”
June Howard: quote
“the idea that art and literature should present the world and people just as science shows they really are.” = something new
Paul Binford quote
“The main criteria for naturalism is the idea of determinism, that humans (and animals) are capable of acting only within pre-determined environments.”
Auguste Comte (1798-1857)
Knowledge = pure science
Believe in the laws of nature
Objective observation of facts
Founded Positivism : all phenomena as subject to invariable natural Laws.
⇒ ++ rational : science became crucial to understand the way people act and live in society.
Fiction def quote
Fiction “should above all be truthful rather than polite, amusing, or ennobling, and truth was achieved by depicting life in accord with scientific laws and methods.”
⇒ fiction is not meant to be entertained.
⇒ Litterature = a tool helping science to explain phenomena.
BUT some think literature should be less serious etc.
Freedom in Maggie
Illusion of freedom before going back to the idea that freedom = sth she never really got. Sth that is ignored. Clinical description of feelings which are not tolerated in naturalism : it is not the main purpose
⇒ tout s’explique soit par désordre du système organique soit par conséquences.
American naturalism VS French one
Not the same form of determinism as in Zola’s work for example.
American naturalism offers a SOCIAL OUTLOOK on the world and a study of the forces that destroy individuals.
It unravels the mechanisms that lead people to poverty and keep people in poverty.
It exposes the dark underside of the Gilded Age of the 1890s, in which technological advancements were proclaimed as beneficial to all humanity.
Redéfinition de la figure de l’auteur
⇒ décortiquer gens avec procédés scientifiques.
⇒ un peu saddique. Redéfinition de la figure de l’auteur : pas de sentiments
partagé, livré de manière objective.
Characteristics of American naturalism
Flawed characters
Brutes whose nature is determined by genetic and environmental factors. (Ex : Pete who is ++ violent and doesn’t care)
Their pursuit of money / sex is led by uncontrollable drives
Naturalism focuses on obsessive traits
Blunt artlessness = sans artifice
Amoral universe = no moral condemnation
Dark underside of the Gilded Age of the 1890s
Literature should serve a social purpose.
Definition of naturalism by Donald Pizer, The Theory and Practice of American Literary Naturalism. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press.
” It is not realism. It is a school by itself, unique, somber, powerful beyond words. It is naturalism”.
Example of naturalist description
For McTeague was a young giant, carrying his huge shock of blond hair six feet three inches from the ground; moving his immense limbs, heavy with ropes of muscle, slowly, ponderously. His hands were enormous, red, and covered with a fell of stiff yellow hair; they were hard as wooden mallets, strong as vices, the hands of the old-time car-boy. Often he dispensed with forceps and extracted a refractory tooth with his thumb and finger. His head was square-cut, angular; the jaw salient, like that of the carnivora. McTeague’s mind was as his body, heavy, slow to act, sluggish. Yet there was nothing vicious about the man. Altogether he suggested the draught horse, immensely strong, stupid, docile, obedient.
→ Perso qui incarne la démesure
→ Comparaisons étranges
→ Animalité & vice
WHAT IS NATURALISM? Definition by Frank Norris.
“The naturalist takes no note of common people, common in so far as their interests, their lives, and the things that occur in them are common, are ordinary. Terrible things must happen to the characters of the naturalistic tale. They must be twisted from the ordinary, wrenched out from the quite uneventful round of every-day life, and flung into the throes of a vast and terrible drama that works itself out in unleashed passions, in blood, and in sudden death.”
Naturalism en une phrase
Naturalism = to portray certain characters and obsessions
WHAT IS REALISM? Definition by Frank Norris
Realism is minute; it is the drama of a broken teacup, the tragedy of a walk down the block, the excitement of an afternoon call, the adventure of an invitation to dinner. It is the visit to my neighbour’s house, a formal visit, from which I may draw no conclusion. I see my neighbor and his friends - very, oh such very! probable people - and that is all. Realism … says to me … “That is life.” And I say it is not.”
Naturalisme
⇒ On peut partir de personnages ordinaires mais il ne faut pas raconter l’ordinaire !
Maggie on ne raconte pas sa vie à l’usine, on raconte Maggie amoureuse de Pete,
Maggie qui va mal etc.
⇒ extract common people from ordinary situations and put them in situations to
unleash their passions.
⇒ Passe pour du réel mais on va toujours chercher des situations où le dram
