ASSIGNMENT BRITISH LITERATURE BEGC-133 Programme: BAG/2021/2022 Course Code: BEGC 133 Max. Marks: 100 Answer all the questions in this assignment. SECTION A 1 Explain the following passages with reference to the context. 10x4=40 1. “have no spur” To prick the sides of my intent, but only Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself And falls on th’ other.” 2. “Out, damned spot: out I say! One, Two: Why then ‘tis Time to do’t. Hell is murky. Fie, My Lord, fie: a Soldier, and affear’d? What need we fear? Who knows it, When none can call our Power to accompt”? . “How strange it is to be talked to in such a way! You know, I’ve always gone on like that. I mean the noble attitude and the thrilling voice. I did it when I was a tiny child to my nurse. She believed in it. Ido it before my parents. They believe in it.” we 4. “Thou hast betray’d thy nature and thy name, Not rendering true answer, as beseem’d Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight: For surer sign had follow’d, either hand, Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.”IL. Write short notes on the following: 5x4=20 a. Thomas Hardy and the fictional region of Wessex. b. Tennyson’s “Idylls of the King” and the Arthurian Legend. The ‘Banquet Scene’ in Macbeth. d. The “Victorian Conflict’ as expressed in the poems of Tennyson, IIL. Write short essays on the following: 10x2=20 a. Write a short essay on Beard Shaw’s political vision. To what extent did this vision colour his dramatic work? b. According to Terry Eagleton, the real heroines of the play Macbeth, are the “witches. Do you agree with this view? Justify your answer with your views on the role of the witches in Macbeth. Section C IV __ Discuss Thomas Hardy’s philosophical views. In what way is his philosophy as expressed in Far From the Madding Crowd different from that in later novels like The Mayor of Casterbridge? 20ASSIGNMENT REFERENCES MATERIAL (2021-22) BEGC-133 BRITISH LETERATURE Answer all the questions in this assignment. SECTION A I Explain the following passages with reference to the context. 1. “Ihave no spur To prick the sides of my intent, but only Vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself And falls on th? other.” Ans. In this line, Macbeth is describing his lack of motivation, and the fact that the only thing driving him at present is ambition. He recognises at this point in the play that ambition can make people rush and make mistakes, so he is almost pre-empting the disasters to come. A little- known psychiatrist, Elvin Semrad, once said: “You can achieve whatever you want, as long as you are willing to pay the price. 2. “Out, damned spot: out I say! One, Two: Why then “tis Time to do’t, Hell is murky. Fie, Ne My Lord, fie: a Soldier, and affear’d? * What need we fear? Who knows it, When-none can call our Power to accompt”? Ans. These words are spoken by Lady Macbeth in Act 5, scene 1, lines 30-34, as she sleepwalks through Macbeth’s castle on the eve of his battle against Macduff and Malcolm. Earlier in the play, she possessed a stronger resolve and sense of purpose than her husband and was the driving force behind their plot to kill Duncan. When Macbeth believed his hand was irreversibly bloodstained earlier in the play, Lady Macbeth had told him, “A little water clears us of this deed” (2.2.65). Now, however, she too sees blood. She is completely undone by guilt and descends into madness. It may be a reflection of her mental and emotional state that she is not speaking in verse; this is one of the few moments in the play when a major character — save for the witches, who speak in four-foot couplets ~ strays from iambic pentameter. Her inability to sleep was foreshadowed in the voice that her husband thought he heard while killing the king — a voice crying out that Macbeth was murdering sleep. And her delusion that there is a bloodstain on her hand furthers the play’s use of blood as a'symbol of guilt: “What need we fear who knowsit when none can call our power to account?” she asks, asserting that as long as she and her husband retain power, the murders they committed cannot harm them. But her guilt-racked state and her mounting madness show how hallow her words are. So, too, does the army outside her castle. “Hell is murky,” she says, implying that she already knows that darkness intimately. The pair, in their destructive power, have created their own hell, where they are tormented by guilt and insanity, 3. “How strange it is to be talked to in such a way! You know, I’ve always gone on like that. I mean the noble attitude and the thrilling voice. I did it when I was a tiny child to my nurse. She believed in it. I do it before my parents. They believe in it.” Ans. This act shifts to the Petkoffs’ library, a setting which Shaw uses to let us know that this is a very poor excuse for a library: it consists of only a single room with a single shelf of old worn- out paper-covered novels; the rest of the room is mare like a sitting room with another ottoman in it, just like the one in Raina’s toom in the first act. The roam ig also fitted with an old kitchen table which serves as a writing table. At the opening of the act, Bluntschli is busy at work Preparing orders, with businesslike regularity, for the dispasition: of the Bulgarian anny. Petkoff is more of a hindrance than a help, for be constantly interripts to see if he can be of any help. Finally, his wife tells him to stop interrupting. Petkoff, in turn, complains that all that he needs to be comfortable is his favorite old coat, whicl he can’t find. Catherine rings for Nicola and tells the servant to go to the blue closet and fetch his master’s old coat, Petkoff is so certain that it is not there that he is willing to make abet of an expensive piece of jewelry with her. Sergius is about to enter a bet also, but Nicola suddenly returns with the coat, Petkoff is completely astonished and perplexed when Nicola announces that it was indeed hanging in the blue closet. At this moment, Bluntschli finishes the last order,gives it to Sergius to take to his soldiers, and then asks Petkoff to follow to make sure that Sergius doesn’t make a mistake. Petkoff asks his wife to come along because she 1s gogdat giving commands. Left alone with Raina, Bluntschli expresses his astonishment at an army‘where “offi for their wives to keep discipline.” Raina then tells Captain Bluntschli-how'fauch better he 46oks now that he is clean, and she inquires about his experiences after he left her bedroom. She lets him know that the entire story has been told so many times that both her father and her fiance are aware of the story, but not the identities of the people involved. In fact, Raina believes that “if Sergius knew, he would challenge you and kill you in a duel.” Bluntschli says that he hopes that Raina won't tell, but Raina tells him of her desire to be perfectly open and honest with Sergius. Because of Bluntschii, Raina says, she has now told two lies — one to the soldiers looking for him in her room and another one just now about the chocolate pudding — and she feels terrible about lying; Bluntschli cannot take her seriously. In fact, he tells her that when “you strike that noble attitude and speak in that thrilling voice, I admire you; but I find it impossible to believe a single word you say.” At first, Raina is indignant, but then she is highly amused that Bluntschli has seen through the disguise that she has used since she was a child: “You know, I’ve always gone on like that,” she tells him.When Raina asks him what he thought of her for giving him a portrait of herself, Bluntschli tells her that he never received it because he never reached into the pocket of the coat where Raina had put it. He is not concerned until he learns that Raina inscribed upon it “To my Chocolate Cream Soldier.” In the meantime, Bluntschli confesses, he pawned the coat, thinking that was the safest place for it. Raina is furious, and she accuses him of having a “shopkecping mind.” At this Point, they are interrupted by Louka, who brings Bluntschli some letters and telegrams, which inform him that his father has died and that Bluntschli has inherited several hotels which he will have to manage, He must leave immediately. Alarmed, Raina follows him out. 4. “Thou hast betray’d thy nature and thy name, Not rendering true answer, as beseem’d Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight: For surer sign had follow’d, either hand, Or voice, or else a motion of the mere.” « Ans. ‘Morte d’ Arthur’ was written shortly after the death of Tennyson's friend Arthur Hallam, and the portrayal of kingly Artur may owe something to Hallam (“Morte d° Arthur’ means, of course, “the death of Arthur”), Hallam died in 1833, and Tennysog wrote ‘Morte d’Arthur’ in 1833-34, before adding a prefatory poem,.‘The Epic’, a few years later in 1837-38, before publishing the poem in his 842 volume (his First in ten years). But that wasn’t the end of the pocm’s involvement in Tennyson’s longstanding interest in all things Arthurian, for ‘Morte d° Arthur’ would later be incorporated (as “The Pagsing of Arthur’) into Tennyson’s vast Idylls of the King, written in the 1850s and 1860s, a medieval epic that T-S..Eliot scathingly described as “Chaucer retold for children’. “Morte d’ Arthur’ describes the death of the great British king, Arthur’ and Bedivere’s depositing of Arthur's sword, Excalibur, in:the lake from which Arthur first. acquired it. Bedivere tends to the dying king, who hands his knight the sword’nd.tells him to go and throw it in the lake. * < Bedivere goes to the lake but finds fie “throw away such a mighty sword, so he hides it and returns to his king. Arthur cap tefl Bédivere has disobeyed him, so off Bedivere goes again, but once again he cannot bring hiriSlf to fling Excatibur into the water, When he returns to Arthur again, the king can tell Bedivere has disobeyed him and commands him to go back. Bedivere succeeds on the third attempt, and once he has thrown the sword into the lake, a hand, clothed in white samite, rises from the water and grabs the sword, brandishing it three times before disappearing with it under the water. When Bedivere retums to the dying king, Arthur can tell from Bedivere’s shock that the knight has thrown the sword back, and Arthur prepares to die. A barge arrives to carry him off to his final resting-place, and Arthur is placed on board, where he is tended by three queens, The barge sails off to the isle of Avilion (Avalon), Section B a. Thomas Hardy and the fictional region of Wessex.Ans. The English author Thomas Hardy set all of his major novels in the south and southwest of England. He named the area "Wessex" after the medieval Anglo-Saxon kingdom that existed in this part of that country prior to the unification of England by thelstan. Although the places that appear in his novels actually exist, in many cases he gave the place a fictional name,[1] For example, Hardy's home town of Dorchester is called Casterbridge in his books, notably in The Mayor of Casterbridge. In an 1895 preface to the 1874 novel Far From the Madding Crowd he described Wessex as "a merely realistic dream country", The actual definition of "Hardy's Wessex" varied widely throughout Hardy's career, and was not definitively settled until after he retired from writing novels, When he created the concept of a fictional Wessex, it consisted merely of the small area of Dorset in which Hardy grew up; by the time he wrote Jude the Obscure, the boundaries had extended to include all of Dorset, Wiltshire, Somerset, Devon, Hampshire, much of Berkshire, and some of Oxfordshire, with its most north. easterly point being Oxford (renamed "Cbristminstet" in the novel). Cornwall was also referred to but named "Off Wessex", Similarly, the nature and significance of ideas of "Wessex" were developed over a long series of novels through a lengthy period of time. The idea of Wessex plays an important artistic role in Hardy's works (particularly his later novels), assisting the presentation of themes of progress, primitivism. sexuality, religion, ature and naturalism: however, this is complicated by the economic role Wessex played in Hardy's career. Considering himself primarily to be a poet, Hardy wrote novels mostly to earn money. Books that could be marketed under the Hardy brand of "Wessex novels" were particularly lucrative, which gave rise to a tendency to sentimentalised, picturesque, populist descriptions of Wessex which, as a glance through most tourist gifishops in the south-west will reveal, remain popular with consumers today. Hardy's resurrection of the name "Wessex" is largely responsible for'the popular modem use of the term to describe the south-west region of England (with the’ exception of Comwall and arguably Devon); today, a panoply of organisations take their name from Hardy to describe their relationship to the area. Hardy's tonception of Wessex.as a separate, cohesive geographical and political identity has proved. powerful despite. it was originally created purely as an artistic conceit, and has spawned a luctatiye-tourist trade, and even a devolutionist Wessex Regionalist Party. b, Tennyson’s “Idylls of the King” and the Arthurian Legend. Ans. Idylis of the King, published between 1859 and 1885, is a cycle of twelve narrative poems by the English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson which retells the legend of King Arthur, his knights, his love for Guinevere and her tragic betrayal of him, and the rise and fall of Arthur's kingdom. Tennyson's Idylls of the King is his longest and most ambitious work. It is a collection of twelve narrative poems, published between 1842 and 1888 about the legend of King Arthur and the rise and fall of Arthur's kingdom. These were published in various fragments and combinations. Four books, “Enid,” “Vivien,” “Elaine,” and “Guinevere”, were published as Idylls of the King in 1859. Idylls of the King can be considered Tennyson's magnum opus, his biggest achievement and subscribes in many aspects to the definition of an epic poem. The structure of an epic by definition is an extended narrative presented either in 12 or in multiples of 12 books.Tennyson was fascinated by Thomas Malory’s work Le Morte d’Arthur and based his poem on it. It traces the life and history of King Arthur, his lady love Guinevere, King Arthur's famed Round Table with his twelve knights, symbolic of equal status enjoyed by cach one of them and his final battle when he gets mortally wounded. An ‘Idyll’ refers to a narrative poem on a grand epic or romantic theme. In the earlier Unit, you have studied how under Queen Victoria, Britain had emerged as an imperial power and had made great advances in new scientific discoveries. It had become a growing state with a booming economy though it also witnessed the decline of tural England. It is a part of our human nature to glorify the past of the nation we are born in, its rich culture and civilisation, its ancient history and its mythologies. Tennyson who was a Poet Laureate, felt he owed it to his nation to pay tribute to its glorious past and chose the Arthurian legend for his epic narrative Idylls of the King and make the people feel proud of their glorious inheritance. “Tennyson sought to entapsulate the past and the present in the Idylts. Arthur in the story is often seen as an embodiment of Victorian ideals; he is said to be “ideal manhood closed in real man" and the "stainless gentleman." Arthur often has unrealistic expectations for the Knights of the Round Table and for Camelot itself, and despite his best efforts he is unable to uphold the Victorian ideal in his Camelot.” The Victorian age had its strict moral codes to follow. Any infringement of the codes evoked the anger of the society and the citizens. In such a context, Temnyson presents Arthur as the embodiment of the highest ideals of manhood and kingship. In the first part, ‘Dedication’, Arthur is described as modest, kindly, all-accomplished, wise, just and not:swaying to this faction or to that, with no winged ambitions, ‘and wearing the‘white flower of a blameless life. He was a simple knight among his knights. There were many in his kingdom who deemed him to be more than a man, someone who had dtopped from heaven. Fa Queen Victoria and her husband Albert, the description of Arthur as an exemplary’ King.and-aS-dn ideal man was highly flattering as it was obvious that Tennyson had modellel{ his Arthuf on the British monarch and her consort The book is divided into twelve long poems, in keeping with the requirement of an epic. It starts with the coming of Arthur as the King of Camelot, his love for and his marriage with the beautiful Guinevere, and his setting up of the famous Round Table exemplifying the unique democratic ideal where the King is given the status as the first among equals. The Book introduces all the 12 knights, including Lancelot, the best among them. The narrative through the twelve books is woven around the betrayal of King Arthur by Guinevere and Lancelot and the gradual disintegration of the Round ‘Table. The last betrayal of the king was by the son of one of the Knights, Mordred, In a battle with Mordred, Arthur is grievously injured. Book11, “Morte d’Arthur” (The Passing of Arthur) as the heading shows, deals with the death of Arthur, The entire work Idylls of the King is about Arthur’s failed efforts to usher in a new order to lift up mankind and create a perfect kingdom, when he dies at the hands of the traitor Mordred. Thelast book “To the Queen” is where Tennyson, the Poet Laureate praises Queen Victoria and her recently deceased Prince consort, Albert, after whom he had modelled Arthur, and prays that she, like Arthur, is remembered as a great ruler long after her reign is over. In a nutshell, the story of King Arthur is one of the most popular legends in medieval history. There are a number of stories and pieces of literature written about King Arthur's reign. Among them is Morte d’ Arthur, written by Sir Thomas Malory first published in 1485. Malory’s work is written in Middle English. It is a reworking of existing tales about the legendary King Arthur, Guinevere, Lancelot, Merlin and the Knights of the Round Table. Although King Arthur tried to maintain structure and order as a king, betrayal by the people closest to him eventually led to his demise. c. The ‘Banquet Scene’ in Macbeth. Ans, Onstage stands a table heaped with a feast. Macbeth and Lady Macbeth enter as king and queen, followed by their court, whom they bid welcome. AS Macbeth walks among the company, the first murderer appears at the doorway. Macbeth speaks to him for'a moment, learning that Banquo is dead and that Fleance has escaped. The news of Flegnce’s escape angers Macbeth—if only Fleance had died, he muses, his throne. would have been secure. Instead. “the worm that’s fled/Hath nature that in time will venom breed” (3.4.28-29). Returning to his guests, Macbeth goes to sit at the head of the royal table but finds Banquo’s ghost sitting in his chair. Horror-struck, Macbeth speaks to the ghost, which is invisible to the rest of the company. Lady Macbeth makes excuses for her husband, saying that he occasionally has such “visions” and that the guests should simply ignore his behaviour. Then she speaks to Macbeth, questioning his manhood and urging him to snap out’ of his trance. The ghost disappears, and Macbeth recovers, telling his company: “I have.a strange infirmity which is nothing/To those that Kyow rie” (3.4.85-86}.-As he offers a toast to company, however, Banquo’s specter reappears and ‘shocks Macbeth into further reckless outbursts. Continuing to make excuses for her husband, Lady Macbeth sepds-the-alarmed guests out ofthe room as the ghost vanishes again. Macbeth mutters that “blood will have blood” and tefls Lady Macbeth that he has heard from a servant-spy that Macduff intends to keep away from court, behaviour that verges on treason (34.121). He says that he will visit the witches again tomorrow in the hopes of learning more about the future and about who may be plotting against him. He resolves to do whatever is necessary to keep his throne, declaring: “I am in blood/Stepped in so far that, should I wade no more,/Returning were as tedious as go o’er” (3.4.135-137). Lady Macbeth says that he needs sleep, and they retire to their bed. Analysis Macbeth leams that his first attempt to control fate has failed. Is Banquo’s ghost real or a figment of Macbeth's guilty mind? The uncertainty emphasises that Macbeth’s fate is part of him, caused by his character: his ambition and guilt.Macbeth and Lady Macbeth continue to try to lie to keep their secrets and hold on power, but these lies become less and less effective as guilt about the violence they have committed begins to affect them. Macbeth has become so warped he cannot tell the unnatural from the natural anymore. Lady Macbeth sees lying is useless and chooses isolation: she tells the thanes to leave. Macbeth’s desperation to keep power motivates him to visit the weird sisters. He has sacrificed everything for his ambition... now ambition and violence are all he has left, and he knows it, d. The ‘Victorian Conflict’ as expressed in the poems of Tennyson. Ans. While romantic poetry is a movement, Victorian poetry is a chronological phenomenon. Consequently, if a broad group of characteristics such as a rebellious spirit, a spontaneity of effusion, a return to nature, att taterest in the seff and a luxuriant sensibility may be said to characterised almost all romantic poetry, no such effluence of poetic characteristics may be predicated of Victorian poetry. Tennyson was influenced early on by the romantics, and although the effect of Shelley upon him was intermittent and slight, the effect of Keats Was profound. This effect may be seen in his early poetry, in the luxuriant texture and rich colouring of some of the poems, chiefly Lyrical (1830), such as Recollections of the Arabian night and Mariana. While some of the poems exemplify the contemporary vogue of prettiness, there are some in which there is real passion, and there are yet others in which the young poet luxuriates in stately melancholy. The theme of the palace of Art is the conflict between wisdom and Beauty and suggests a deliberate effort at self-discipline as though the poet were rejecting the aestheticism to which he had béen devoting his gift. The death of his friend Hallam caused him profound sorrow, but in the magnificent dramatic monologue Ulysses, he looked to the future; although withaitt.the ‘old strength’. The determination to follow knowledge wherever it may lead is characteristic ofthe scientific speculation of the time. In Morte d’ Arthur Tennyson sets the narrative of Arthut’s last battle within a ‘frame’ of modern life. The theme of the princess suited thé gerteral taste because of its mild liberalism and “gentlemanly” support of the cause of female education. In Memoriam (1850) is the one poem over which largely rests Tennyson's fame and recognition as a poet. The death of his close friend Arthur Henry Hallam (in 1883) added an abiding sense of loss to his personal worries, and the grief and the worries came together over a number of years to produce slowly the series of linked lyrics he called In Memoriam. The series describes, broadly speaking, the ‘way of the Soul’ as Tennyson sometimes called it, in the presence of a great loss. The regret felt by the living for the dead and of the louging for his bodily presence is gradually transformed into a sense of spiritual contact and possession, and a wider love and faith in humanity and god: ‘One god, one law, one element And one far — off divine eventTo which the whole creation moves. The modem theory of Evolution which explained evolution in terms of natural selection went against traditional faith in God and Immortality. The new theory stated that the evolutionary process took place with change in biological organisms over time in heritable physical and behavioural traits. Tennyson’s poems reflected this conflict though he left it to the reader to form his own judgement. This period also saw some of his characteristic poems- “The Two Voices”, “Ulysses,” “St. Simeon Stylites,” and, probably, the first draft of “Morte d’Arthur.” “Ulysses ‘is a good example of Tennyson’s dilemma as to the function of art. The Romantics before him had made art as @ subjective self expression of their feelings and emotions. In other words art was used distinctly for arts sake, ie., that art needs no justification, it need serve no political, didactic or other end. Ulysses depicted in the poem desires to abdicate his responsibility as the King of Ithaca in favour of his son, Telemachus and go on a journey in search of new knowledge, “To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” The question is whether his quest for personal knowledge should be at the cost of his responsibitity tawards his people. The Victorian age with its attempts at reforms viewed art as the possible means to bring about a reformation of society. Tennyson camed his laurels as a National poet with his three poems - Ode on the Death of Duke of Wellington, Charge of the Light Brigade at Bataktava and Maud. Tennyson’s poem on King Arthur was based on Book 21 of Thomas Malory’s 15th century epic Le Morte d’Arthur. Malory was an English writer and he wrote this classic English-language chronicle of the Arthurian legend. ‘In Memoriam’ is a vast poem of 131 sections of varying length, with a prologue and epilogue. Inspired by the grief Tennyson felt at the untimely death of his friend Hallam, the poem touches on many intellectual issues of the period as the author searches for the meaning of life and death and tries to come to terms with his sense of los: Tennyson was conscious of the schism between Romantic emphasis‘on emotion, its worship of Nature and beauty, and subjectivity and the Victorian ideals of objectivity, and a constant dialogue with the intellectual and. critical thoughts of the time. In “Morte d?Arthur” Tennyson sets the narrative of Arthur's last battle-within the frame of modem life. One of the most important and obvious characteristics of Victorian poetry was the use of sensory elements. A majority of Victorian poets’ including Tennyson, used imagery and the senses to convey the scenes of struggles between Religion and Science, to make it possible for readers to comprehend the Victorian conflict. Alfred Tennyson lives up to this expected characteristic in most of his works. IIL. Write short essays on the following: a. Write a short essay on Bernard Shaw’s political vision. To what extent did this vision colour his dramatic work? Ans. A pamphlet, titled ‘What Socialism Is", was published in 1890 by the socialist political think tank, the Fabian Society. It was written by Irish playwright and Fabian, George Berard Shaw.In the pamphlet, Shaw addresses the issues of private property, labour, poverty, education, and the dominance of the rich, upper classes in government. Shaw writes: Poverty and riches together mean the perversion of our capital and industry to the production of frippery and luxury whilst the nation is rotting for want of good food, thorough instruction, and wholesome clothes and dwellings for the masses. He continues, ‘Socialism means equal rights and opportunities for all’, and sets out the Fabian vision for nationalisation (ie. government control and ownership) of ‘land and machinery’ — or, in other words, property, including housing and industry, such as the railways. Beginning with a political manifesto in 1884, Shaw regularly wrote pamphlets and speeches for the Society. The production of this kind of literature was a key element of the Fabian Society's reformist approach. It was viewed as an opportunity to circulate facts about living conditions and other social issues, and promote socialist ideas to the public: Fabian Essays published in’ 1889, contained essays by political thinkers like George Berard Shaw, Sidney Webb, and Annig Besant, The Fabiaits rejected violent revolutionary methods, preferring to enter local government and use trade unionism to transform society. The involvement with the Fabian Society left a permanent mark on Shaw’s political and social vision. As his biographer notes, as a socialist, he believed in equality of opportunity and in the possibility that through social change, the human aspiration to lead a better life could be attained (Weintraub, (“George Bernard Shaw”)Shaw remained a socialist all his life and most of his plays have socialist themes and sub-texts. His socialist perspective colours his critique of the rigidities of the British class system and of the capitalist order in almost all his writing. Nicholas Grene points out how in his various prose writings, such as Fabian Essays (1889), The Intelligent Woman’s Guide to Socialism and Capitalism (1928), and Everybody's Political What’s What (1944), Shaw maintained a condis ick on the injustices of the capitalist system (135). Throughout his life, he\gotitimied to support various social causes such as women’s rights, and was an advocate of equality of income, the abolition of private property and changes in the voting system (Drabble, Oxford Companion892).Most of his plays are built around such social issues and concerns. After arriving in London in 1876, Shaw lived almost entirely in England. However many critics note a distinct Irish quality in his literary output. The critic Sternlicht points out that like Oscar Wilde (a playwright, who like Shaw, was born in Dublin, Ireland) Shaw had a distinctively Irish wit. The theatre critic Christopher Innes observes how living and working in England, while always aware of his Irish heritage, gave Shaw a unique perspective, and that “this independent perspective gave his critique additional point". Thus many critics are of the view that his Irish heritage gave Shaw a unique perspective on British society which made it possible for him to view its social problems from a new angle.b. According to Terry Eagleton, the real heroines of the play Macbeth, are the witches. Do you agree with this view? Justify your answer with your views on the role of the witches in Macbeth. Ans, Eagleton analyses the context of the witches in Macbeth. According to Eagleton the real heroines of the play are the witches. He associates them with a “positive value” as he calls them, “Exiles from that violent order, inhabiting their own sisterly community on its shadowy borderlands, refusing all truck with its tribal bickerings and military honours’, The “riddling ambiguous speech” by the witches is another instance of their subversion of the structure of power. In that sense, the witches are considered by the critic to be the “unconscious” of the drama”.Posing a threat to the normative society, this power needs to be repressed even as the possibility of its return remains a vital one. This argument is in line with our discussion of witches and witcheraft in terms of the debates and texts around it. They challenge the monarch’s power and the ones in power exercise control through legistation; the passing of an Act. In trying fo quell these forces, the monarch’s ‘writing’ tries to contain the domain of witches and witcheraft, Eagleton foregrounds these Wornen as “androgynous (bearded women), multiple (three-in-one) and ‘imperfect speakers’. They undermine the “stable social, sexual and linguistic forms” which is essential for the working of the world in the ptay and even outside it. Take a look at the following lines by Eagleton: Their words and bodies mock rigourous boundaries and make sport of fixed positions, unhinging received meanings as they dance, dissolve and re-materialise. But official society can only ever imagine its radical ‘other’ as chaos rather than creativity, and is thus bound to define the sisters as evil. Foulness—a political order which thrives on bloodshed—believes itself fair, whereas the witches do not so much, invert thig opposition as invert it”. Eagleton traces the transgression by the Macbeths within history and the subversive nature of the witches within cyclical time. The use of the moon, dance, verbal repetitions seen as “ininyical to linear history”. For the critic, the witches know no nat rative-Applying the logic of Marxism to the witches, Eagleton feels that once their energy is placed within the political context, it becomes a “freedom which remains enslaved to the imperative of power” and thus reproduces the same “oppressive law”, As a result when Macbeth kills Duncan he attacks the body politic as also his own life. As a result, the Macbeths are “torn apart”. But the witches are “mutable” and do not experience this kind of disintegration. Section C IV. Discuss Thomas Hardy’s philosophical views. In what way is his philosophy as expressed in Far From the Madding Crowd different from that in later novels like The Mayor of Casterbridge? Ans, Hardy is primarily a novelist, but his novels go beyond the story to articulate his philosophy and his views on life. It will not be inaccurate to say that his novels reflect the 19th century conflict between religion and science, faith in God and belief in human rationality, Farfrom the Madding Crowd, raises many questions about society, religion, morals and ends on a positive note that virtue gamers rewards as evidenced in Gabriel Oak's happy union with Bathsheba as a reward for leading a life of goodness, humility, loyalty and selfless love. The 19th century was an age of transition, The transition is evident in the change: + from an agrarian rural life to industrial urban life, + from fundamental beliefs in God as the Creator of the world and as regulator of human affairs through his omnipotence and ommiscience to acceptance of scientific laws based on Charles Darwin’s The Origin of Species about the creation of the universe as an evolutionary process in defiance of earlier theological belief about God as the originator of the Universe, + from a predominantly rural society with its strong belief in tradition and customs that gave some degree of security and stability and dignity to the rural folks to a urban society, with its new outlook on life and morals, along with a focus on material well being and a new social order that brought a sharp clevage between the educated elite and the uneducated or semi- educated poor. + from an acceptance of life's ups and downs as the working of a beneficent, omnipotent, and omniscient deity to questioning the {unction of that deity in the face of omnipresent evil and unreasonable happenings leading to unhappiness. It had become increasingly difficult to reconcile the prevalence of unhappiness in life with the operation of a benevolent deity, As Brennecke observed, “He (Hardy) cannot reconcile the idea of aa omnipotent and mereifill Deity with human sufferings.” Hardy was not a philosopher given to abstract mxétaphysical speculations. He was primarily a novelist and therefore it is appropriate to describe him as a philosophical novelist. His novels are not about an esoteric or an abstruse world bit about the real world of the 19th century Victorian society to which he belonged, The novel form Baye hifi’ the opportunity to reflect on Victorian society, its morals, ethics and warldview as iL-was Caught between the old world that was slowly disappearing and the new world ushered itr‘by the Industrial revolution, yet to be bor. Though a Christian by birth and upbringing. Hardy, under the influence of the 19th century scientific thinkers and writers like Charles Darwin, lost his faith in a Christian God. Darwin’s work scientifically traced the origin of man as a natural evolution from a primordial form to his present state and thus questioned the prevailing concept of the creation of man by God. As a result, all the older Christian values appeared to the Victorians including Hardy as redundant, Darwin's work undermined the prevailing concept of the divine creation of man. He learnt from Darwin that the natural order is indifferent to man’s desires and aspirations. As a consequence, he broke with Victorian optimism and self-complacency and developed pessimism and discontent. Hardy was an extensive reader who had read the ancient Greek tragedies, Shakespeare’s works, contemporary thinkers such as the English philosopher, Thomas Huxley, and the French radical reformers and philosophers, such as Charles Fourier, Hippolyte Taine, and Auguste Comte. His conception of human life was shaped in part by his extensive critical reading of the Bible. Hisnovels are full of Biblical allusions and Far From the Madding Crowd is rich in its Biblical allusions. All his readings were further supported by his rural background. Emest Brennecke, who wrote one of the earliest appraisals of Hardy’s philosophy of life, argued that Hardy developed “a consistent world-view through the notions of Chance and Time, Circumstances, Fate, Nature, Providence, Nemesis and Will tinged with metaphysical idealism”. His novels scem to suggest that the old Christian values did not help man to face misery and unhappiness, Thus we see the dilemma in his writings where on the one hand he castigates religion as it had very little to offer to the modern man and on the other he is acutely aware of the place of religion in tradition and customs that had given some degree of solidity to the culture of the people. As Lennart A. Bjork noted, “Hardy’s castigation of traditional religion is an integral part of his social criticism” as religion cannot offer comfort and consolation during moments of crisis. Thus we see his writings that deal witl the, loss of an eatlier simpler Christian faith and its total abandonment to the will of God, anda longing for a new order to teplace that loss of the older faith in God by making the ehurch an important social institution, He told Edmund Blunden, “If there is no church in a country village, there is nothing.” Hardy’s critical vision of life was deeply rooted in tts Hellenic and pagan sympathies of the rural countryside which held more charm for Hardy than did Christianity. In his Wessex novels and stories, Hardy’s vision of an old, rustic England was essentially pagan. He shared fellow Victorian, Matthew Amold’s ideal of Hellenic paganism, with its emphasis of the development of a complete man with the harmonious body and soul. He preferred Auguste Comte’s religion of humanity as a substitute for Christianity. One more aspect of his philosophy is that of Determinism. Determinism also referred to as necessitarianism is the philosophical doctrine/that all events, including human choices and decisions, are necessarily determined~by extemal forces acting on the will. Man’s life is controlled by what we call Fate or Destiny: His majar'fiction shows that human existence is intrinsically tragic because people are trap) ‘the laws of Nature and the laws of civilisation. Novels like Tess, Jude the Obscure and Thé Mayor of Casterbridge end in tragedy where Fate or Chance plays a causal role in human affairs. Chance or Fate, can change man's destiny. Chance is for Hardy everything over which man has no control. It is not that fate is always sinister, but the fact is Man cannot overcome his fate. More often than not his men and women become tragic victims of Fate, Contrary to the Christian belief in God's justice and compassion for humanity, Hardy presents the universe as a rigid mechanism which is indifferent and apathetic to human suffering. But Far from the Madding Crowd is an exception as it ends on a positive note of bringing Gabriel Oak and Bathsheba together. The return of Sergeant Troy at the very moment Boldwood is getting ready to marry Bathsheba is an instance of the operation of forces outside man’s plans and actions. Gabriel Oak shows how despite all odds against human life, man can overcome it by taking responsibility for fellow men. Hardy saw at least one hope for mankind, which is expressed in his view of evolutionary meliorism that is, that the world can be improved by human effort, Hardy said: 14“I believe that a good deal of the robustious, swaggering optimism of recent literature is at bottom cowardly and insincere. My pessimism, if pessimism it be, does not involve the assumption that the world is going to the dogs. On the contrary, my practical philosophy is distinctly meliorist. Whatever may be the inherent good or evil of life, it is certain that men make it much Worse than it need be. When we have got rid of a thousand remediable ills, it will be time cnough to determine whether the ill that is irremediable outweighs the good.” Hardy, like many writers before and after him, is concerned with existential questions, such as the human condition, personal freedom and determinism, the attitude to God and religion, the role of destiny, failed human relationships and the alienation of human beings in the modem world. He presents life's happenings as events that are unalterable and believed that man cannot take any preventive measures to change or stop them. Worse is the certainty of suffering Hardy's world is dictated by Chance and therefore his people live in an uncaring, unfeeling and unfriendly universe, made worse by theic painful awareness of their existence. Between man’s desire and its fruition comes destiny. Hence his philosophical outlook was certainly deterministic, pessimistic and tragic, yet it offered a possibitity of positive morality. Hardy insisted that there is a lintited personal freedom in the midst of his state of being un-free It is in his strength to transcend his natural, bondage, he may achieve personal freedom, which means that he is free to make his own choices ~ but he will have to pay dearly for them. It is easy to resign oneself to fatalism which acknowledges that all action is controlled by Fate which is a great, impersonal, primitive force. But it takes a tot of man’s spiritual energy to take action even when action will prove a failure us, in his novels, man is pitted against chance or Fate. Fanny's life ends on a tragic note because of the fateful mistake of waiting outside a wrong church. Similarly Fate interferes at the moment Boldwood and Bathsheba get ready for their marriage. The man who for seven years had not tumed up and was therefore assumed/to.be drowned, turns up at that very moment thereby nullifying Bathsheba’s widowhood. But those who are contented, calm and balanced and not protesting against life's hard dispensations « overeae é'chance and succeed at the end as is the case with Gabriel Oak. While in his novels barring the early ones like Fat trom the Madding Crowd, Hardy shows power of Chance or Fate triumphing over the power of Man, he makes a plea that social laws and conventions that are man-made must be changed so that man is not helplessly and hopelessly doomed. 15