English 338 Midterm 2
"grit in a sensitive instrument, or a crack in one of his own high-power lenses, would not be more disturbing than a strong emotion in [Holmes]" ("A Scandal in Bohemia," 209). Context: The Sherlock stories are based on reason instead of emotion. This was in the power point.
"A Scandal in Bohemia"
About story-telling.
"The Lifted Veil"
Aesmodeus
"The Lifted Veil"
Latimer sees not human beauty, but a steaming dung pile, like Gulliver in Brobdingnag.
"The Lifted Veil"
Novel of exploration. She played with narrative conventions by giving away the end of the novel at the beginning.
"The Lifted Veil"
Stress characterization over suspense, stress psychology rather than plot, within that psychology, they chart a double bind (we can't help needing others but that need gives us pain).
"The Lifted Veil"
"The Hatter's remark seemed to her to have no meaning, and yet it was certainly English" (AAW 7;114)
AIW
"Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle!" (AAW 2;72)
AIW
-Nonsense -in the poem at the beginning, Alice states that she hopes the story contains nonsense
AIW
-figuring out the rules of the system
AIW
Latimer's older brother
Alfred "The Lifted Veil"
7 year old protagonist who doesn't know her place in the world
Alice- AIW
Main Character of the story, is playing with two kittens in a sitting room and wonders what's on the side of a looking glass. She finds out she can pass through the looking glass and goes on to explore the world there. She finds that she doesn't know what most of the creatures there are actually saying because they speak insanely literally, then speak in riddles, and then just say things that are essentially made up. She almost learns how to be polite from the red queen, but at the end of the novel just insults her on accident and then basically fights her.
Alice- TTLG
Alfred's fiance/Latimer's shitty wife
Bertha Grant "The Lifted Veil"
Doyle believed in fairies. Defended a photograph that claimed to have captured fairies.
Connan Doyle
Doyle believed that Houdini was being controlled by entities but didn't realize it.
Connan Doyle
"Mr. Utterson the lawyer was a man of a rugged countenance, that was never lighted by a smile; cold, scanty, and embarrassed in discourse; backward in sentiment; lean, long, dusty, dreary, and yet somehow lovable. At friendly meetings, and when the wine was to his taste, something eminently human beaconed from his eye; something indeed which never found its way into his talk, but which spoke not only in these silent symbols of the after-dinner face, but more often and loudly the acts of his life. He was austere with himself; drank gin when he was alone, to mortify a taste for vintages; and though he enjoyed the theatre, had not crossed the doors of one for twenty years. But he had an approved tolerance for others; sometimes wondering, almost with envy, at the high pressure of spirits involved in their misdeeds; and in any extremity inclined to help rather than to reprove." Context: This introduction of Mr. Utterson holds a lot of information that Dr. Langbauer went over. He is who we meet first, and he is our narrator. She mentioned several times that he was there to give us space from Mr. Hyde. He practices self-control and temperance.
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
"The Lifted Veil"
George Eliot
"You can't go on once you know something like that, you simply can't go on."
Georgia Rose
-Omniscient narration is a hallmark of realism, although that convention is incredibly unrealistic when you think about it.
Georgia Rose
Lee smith hopes to find contentment in the ordinary.
Georgia Rose
Sits on a wall and takes offense to almost everything that Alice says to him. Eventually she starts learning his game and he's more happy. He recites poetry to her, even though she really doesn't want to hear it. Alice recites the Humpty Dumpty nursery rhyme and he hears her, states it doesn't matter if he falls because the king and his men will come help him. Of course, he falls and the king is unable to help. Humpty Dumpty also runs through a lot of the schools of linguistics, including the "Bow-Wow" school and others. A lot of his dialogue is about *why* words mean what they mean.
Humpty Dumpty-TTLG
"An ordinary, secret sinner" Context: This is talking about Utterson and is found in the portion where Jekyll explains the case.
J&H
-the nonsensical poem with made up words that Humpty Dumpty attempts to define for Alice
Jaberwocky- TTLG
"You know the secret which is the key to my life" (Vol. 2; Chap. 9) -speaker: Lady Audley -Written in a letter to her landlady while she still lived with her father
LAS
-"To call [women] the weaker sex is to utter a hideous mockery. They are the stronger sex, the noisier, the more persevering, the most self-assertive sex. They want freedom of opinion, variety of occupation, do they? Let them have it. Let them be lawyers, doctors, preachers, teachers, soldiers, legislators—anything they like—but let them be quiet—if they can" (2;6;207) -Speaker: Robert -Context: Reaction to Clara's passion
LAS
-Fear that women might be dangerous
LAS
-Sensation Novel -borrow from Newgate novels (ripped from the headlines)
LAS
Insanity- anyone could be insane or inspected of insanity
LAS
-Hierarchy is based on looks and mannerisms
Lady Audley's Secret
neurotic protagonist, egotistical
Latimer "The Lifted Veil"
Cold (brrrrrrrrrrrr), distant, and disapproving
Latimer's Father TLV
"Georgia Rose"
Lee Smith
Father was a typical victorian patriarch, but was witty and funny also
Lewis Carroll
Lady Audley's Secret
Mary Elizabeth Braddon
New servant (who knows Bertha plans to poison Latimer)
Mrs. Archer TLV
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Robert Louis Stevenson
"From a drop of water...a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic or Niagara without having seen one or heard the other. So all life is a great chain, the nature of which is known whenever we are shown a link of it" (Study in Scarlett).
SH
"When I hear your reasons, the thing always appears to me so simple that I could easily do it myself" (Scandal in Bohemia). Context: I think this is Watson.
SH
"the motives of women are so inscrutable...How can you build upon such a quicksand? Their most trivial action may mean volumes. Or their most extraordinary conduct may depend upon a hairpin or curling tongs" (Second Stain).
SH
Holmes stories were written at the end of the age of realism. -Everything about Holmes brings order to the chaos. When he solves a case, he brings everything together in a nice neat way so that everything has meaning and makes sense. His room is incredibly messy, yet Holmes knows where everything is. There is an order to his chaos.
SH
In other novels that we read such as Frankenstein, The Lifted Veil, Georgia Rose, and Jekyll and Hyde, science undermines what is going on in these stories. With Sherlock Holmes, science upholds these stories rather than undermining them.
SH
Readers become invested in Holmes and believes that he is real. Doyle tries to get rid of Holmes, but he can't.
SH
The stories reassure us that Holmes will get the "bad guy." His method of catching the criminal and solving the case comforts people because it makes them feel as if there is a simple formula to solving the crime. It was reassuring to people that there was a human who could act like a computer in a world where people didn't want the technology. The roots of crime lie simply in bad people who can be caught.
SH
"You see, but you do not observe. The distinction is clear." (Scandal in Bohemia) Context: This was in the powerpoint.
SIB
Realism is important in the Holmes stories. Dr. Langbauer mentions that they may even be hyper-realist. Emphasis on rationality rather than emotion.
Sherlock Holmes
"Give me no light but such that turns to human fellowship" Who says it: Latimer
TLV
"Is this what it is to live again?... to wake with our unstilled thirst upon us, with our unuttered curses rising to our lips, with our muscles ready to act out their half committed sins?" Who says it: Latimer Context: Mrs. Archer is revived by Muelier's experiment, and accuses Bertha of the poisoning scheme
TLV
"O God, let me stay with known and be weary of it: I am content" Who says it: Latimer
TLV
"The quick thought came, that my selfishness was even stronger than his - it was only a suffering selfishness instead of an enjoying one" Who says it: Latimer Context: He sees his Alfred's egotism, but then momentarily steps back from his hatred of Alfred to hate himself
TLV
"Was it a power? Might it rather not be a disease?" Who says it: Latimer
TLV
-Partial knowledge -Double-bind of needing human contact, yet being hurt by this need -Double Consciousness -prescience/clairvoyance -crippling self-consciousness -term in mesmerism
TLV THEMES
"I can explain all the poems that ever were invented—and a good many that haven't been invented just yet"
TTLG
"My name means the shape I am—and a good handsome shape it is, too. With a name like yours, you might be any shape, almost"
TTLG
"There's the tree in the middle," said the Rose. "What else is it good for?" "But what could it do, if any danger came?" Alice asked. "It could bark," said the Rose. "It says "Bough-wough!" cried a Daisy. "That's why its branches are called boughs!" "Didn't you know that?" cried another Daisy
TTLG
"What's the use of their having names?" the Gnat said, "if they won't answer to them? "No use to them," said Alice; "but it's useful to the people that name them, I suppose. If not, why do people have names at all?"
TTLG
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less." "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things." "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty," which is to be master—that's all"
TTLG
I've heard nonsense, compared with which that would be as sensible as a dictionary!
TTLG
Lots of poetry recited and most of them involve fish in some way. Also everything on the other side of the looking glass is part of one huge chess game. The story ends with Alice questioning if all of the characters were just a part of her dream or if she was just a part of the Red King's dream, and a poem that ends with: Life, what is it but a dream?
TTLG
Asleep under a tree in the forest. Tweedledee and Tweedledum tell alice that she is just a figment of his dream and when he wakes up she will disappear.
The Red King- TTLG
The more put together of the two queens, is met by Alice in the garden and tells her that she can be a white pawn in the Chess game that is life and if she reaches the eighth square she can be a queen. Later she attends the dinner party that Alice "throws" as a queen and is last seen getting beat up by Alice at the table before alice wakes up and tells Kitty that she was the red queen all along.
The Red Queen- TTLG
Promised humpty dumpty that his men would put him back after he fell. Oversees the fight between the Lion and the Unicorn and is uncomfortable around them because they are fighting over his crown.
The White King- TTLG
Helps lead Alice to the the final square so she can be a Queen. The man can't stay on a horse to save his life. Moving forward and then falling off the horse mimics the way a knight piece moves in chess (two forward, one sideways or one sideways, two forward). His "escorting" alice also corresponds to the spaces in the game which are one move away for the knight (spaces in which the Alice pawn is covered). He also makes a lot of useless inventions, which according to the footnote is a reference to Dodgson himself, who was always inventing things.
The White Knight- TTLG
Is met by alice as she loses her shawl or something like that. Events occur in her memory in reverse order (for example she screams in pain before she is stuck with a pin, then is fine saying there is no use yelling now that it is over). She also becomes a sheep and sits in a boat that Alice is rowing and yells feather at her over and over again, then sells Alice an egg that is actually Humpty Dumpty sitting on his wall.
The White Queen- TTLG
Two characters that pretty much just talk in circles around Alice. They recite her poetry (The walrus and the carpenter) and then make her dress them with an assortment of items used as armor so that they can fight. They are scared away by a Giant crow. Their thematic importance is about identity, and whether they have separate identity or not--opposition becomes identity.
Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum-TTLG
