Skip to main content

Behn's "Oroonoko"

The Empire has done some terrible things, but the slave trade may be amongst it's worst contributions to the world. Oroonoko traces the story of an African Prince taken into slavery and sold. The novel (if that's what you want to call it; it may be better to think of it as a novella) plays with structure and form. It seems to be an early example of a "frame" novel. The narration is strong, and there are vivid and wonderful descriptions of Africa. Location and scene is developed nicely. There are unusual elements where the novel shifts from 1st to 3rd, but this doesn't hinder the reader. The novel seems to want to suggest the evils or perils of slavery, and using the primary character as a price, does seem to really want to focus the readership of the novel to British elites. The novel makes you think about slavery and it makes you see slaves as people, not just as objects for trade and labor.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I. Seductive Forms and the Progression of the Novel

I am no authority to speak on behalf of the development of the novel, but regarding the various theories presented in the first chapter of Ballaster’s Seductive Forms , I can only conclude that reason and logic would seem to indicate a preference for Michael McKeon’s theory / understanding of the development of the novel as form and object.  Ballaster does a wonderful job at expressing the weaknesses of theories presented by Watt, Davis, and others within the formalism / historicism/ hybrid theory debate. When reviewing these theories, I struggled to grasp the complexity of some of these narratives. I also struggled with what appeared to be a lack of basic logic in terms of the progression of structure and device. The historicists seem to ignore or undervalue the progression of literary tradition. The formalists seem to forget that every writer, regardless of position or gender, are people living in a given time; that as individuals who exert themselves as writers of the pag...
2 comments
Read more

Haywood's Anti Pamela

If contemporary pop music has taught us anything, it’s that the “haters” are going to “hate, hate, hate”. I’d imagine that when confronted by all the “haters”, Richardson probably just shook them off. Haywood's Anti Pamela is one such story (yes I'm saying that she was a hater. But to be fair, I'd been a hater of Pamela too!). The narrative structure is a bit different. Anti Pamela does incorporate letters, but some of the story is told in traditional third person narration. This is an interesting technique because it gives the reader a much more fulfilled and rounded view of the events which are unfolding in the text. The structure of the story is easy to follow (even if the language at times is very difficult to fully comprehend. Having now read a few pieces by Haywood, I can firmly say that her writing style isn't suited for my tastes. That being said, she's still vitally important to read, and I do see the importance of her work, even if I don't parti...
Post a Comment
Read more

Book Report: Vermeule's "Why Do We Care About Literary Characters?"

1. Thesis of Work Why Do We Care about Fictional Characters is primarily concerned with the cognitive approach to understanding relationships readers enjoy with fictional characters. Vermeule outlines three specific goals for her book in the first chapter: How do humans engage with fictional characters Why do humans spend a great deal of time and energy explaining themselves to others How does the relationship we have with fictional characters relate to our relationships with real people 2. Methodology Blakey Vermeule is a professor of Literature at Stanford University. She received her Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley in 1995. Vermuele incorporates several different traditions into her work including literary criticism, neuroaesthetics, philosophy, and cognitive science. 3. Contribution The major contribution of this work is the establishment of literary characters as being important or reimagined as integral to understanding literature as ...
Post a Comment
Read more