Higher level ideas Flashcards
(29 cards)
The 5 books of Rousseu Emile
book 1- outline how one would have to raise a child ‘everything degenerates in the hands of man’
Book 2-Rousseu believed that at this phase the education of children should be devived less from books and more from the childs interactions with the world.
book 4- to be complete we must in order complete we must make a loving and feeling being
book 5- refers to the education of Emiles wife and therefore the education of women
Rousseau Emile
-fundamental political and philosphical questions about the individual and society, particularly how an indivdiual might retain innate goodness and not be corrupted by collectivity
-came up with an eduaction system consitisting of 5 books that would enable a natural man to survive in a currupt society. These were considered the first bildingsroman noevls
-noble savage
Features of romanticism
-the romantic imagination
-nature and its devine power
-the sublime
-emotional intensity
- the solitary brooding indivdiual
-rejection of society
-the supernatural
-paradox, irony and the opposition of extremes
why mary shelly might use romantic literary form?
Mary shellys lufe was intersected with some of the most romantic thinkers and writers of the period. her mother, her father and her husabd and also Lord Byron who she was staying with when she was writing Frankenstein.
Sublime
a concept used by writers that while can be beautiful it can also be a force that inflicts overwhelming terror and respect.
Enlightenment vs the sublime
the enlightenment was 18th century and named ‘the age of reason’ it celebrated reasona nd science. It sued scientific method, critical thinking and logical reasoning to argue political and philosphical positions about an indviudal within soceity. Whereas romanticism was late 18th century and was a reaction to the enlightenemnet and industrial revolution. Celebrated the beauty if nature and put emphasis on the power of human emotions.
The enlightenment effect on religion
faith in god and organised religion degenerated amongtst the educated elite. thuis led to the ‘enlightements roblem’ the problem is to come up with a non religous account of what morality shoudl be.
what were the three reactions to the enlightenment problem
-social contact theroy-argued that morality was simply a set of rules that made living toether possible
-utalitarialism-morality on a non religous basis and pleasure have an intrinsic value.
keatisan ethics-no time for utalisatrism, we are rational beings that should respevt others
Religion in a handsmiad tale
the handsmaid tale is nir an attack on christianity it is an example of religion gone wrong. christian fanatiscm (religion being used for evil) during the final years if the Kingdom of Judan jerimiah asks ‘is there no balm in Gilead’ one of the properities is to expell metral flow
Gothic features
-wide landscapes
-religous settings
-sudden shifts in emotion
-excess and extremity
-the supernatural
-the darkness, shadow and decay
-the exotic and orintal
-horror and terror
-isoloation and loneliness
-sanity and insanity
-multiple narrators
-he arcane
-the outsider
-absolute power
when is the most effective?
when he appears in these dark and gloomy settings. the essence of the creatures horror is only complete in gothic nature.
Where are two notable episodes of the gothic in Frankenstein?
Chapter 6-retruns to the scene were his brother william was killed ‘i saw lightings playing’ ‘a flash of lighting illuminated the object’
chapter 9-when the monster makes a promise to victor ‘ i shall watch their progress with unutterable anxiety; and fear not but that when you are ready i shall appear’ the fact the creature is faithfull to his promise gives him an amnipresnec that makes him more terrifying.
Dystopia
a soceity that has failed its duty to its people, the handmaid tale is a feminsit response to the amous literary dyspoia 1984 by George Oswells
similarities between 1984 and a handsmaid tale?
-control of sex
-manipulation of language and writing
-non-heroic protagonist
-mass hysterorir (two minutes of hate and particution scene are similar)
Utopia
a soecity of perfection-an example of this would be Platos rebublic of mores was communits before communism existed
similarities between the rupublic and Mores and the handsmaid tale
-no unemployment
-each family own two slaves
-reproduction controlled by the state
ustopia
Margret Atwod cioned the term - the fact that utopias included elements that would be deemed horrific - commander ‘better always means worse for some’
Existentialism
phiolophical study- humans as an acting feeling and thinking individual. Charcterised by the ‘the existential attitude’ this is a sense of disorentation, dread and confusion in th fate if an apparently meaningless or absurd world.
existenialism and victor
victor feels the angusih as he talks about towards the rest of Mankind when making a personal decsion. Through his orginal decsion was made in selfish ambition
‘ had i a light of my own benefit to inflict this curse upon evelasting generations’
the creature and existentionalism
falls hort because he does not consider the rest of mankind in his decisions only his own suffering and desires
the uncanny
a pyschiological expeirnce of soemthing as strongly familar rather than something simply mysterious. It may describe incidentrs wjhere a familar thing or event encountered in an unsetting,eerie or taboo conetxt. The conspet of the unacnny was sgmun Freud that states that it is the strangness in the ordinary., It can lead to not being able to distingush between emotions and reality leading to anxiety.
Hetrotopoa
is a differnet form of utopoa and dystopia novels as it explores the issues due to the reversal of a perefctly regualted society. The handsmiad tale is a form of feminst hertrotopian novel that also reverse the divdion between utopia and dystopia to incoperable conflicting gender perspectives and concerns.
Eciture Femine
male writing according to cixous is singualra nd straight to the point while female writing is transgressive and shifts from subject to subject
Post modern novels
-all about making connections between texts and referencing one and another
-using a lot of palimpest
-intertextuality fdeeds into some big questions aboyt literature inclduing whether the reader or the author has full control of the test
-doesnt try to disguise the text as a construct.
