Building Paris : A Geocritical Approach to Ernest Hemingway’s A Movable Feast and George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London
Iiskola, Jouni (2021)
Iiskola, Jouni
2021
Englannin kielen ja kirjallisuuden maisteriohjelma - Master's Programme in English Language and Literature
Informaatioteknologian ja viestinnän tiedekunta - Faculty of Information Technology and Communication Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2021-05-24
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202105195213
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202105195213
Tiivistelmä
In this thesis, I will examine how Paris is represented in Ernest Hemingway’s A Movable Feast (1964) and George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London (1933). Both of the books are autobiographical accounts of the authors’ experiences in Paris during the 1920s, but the way the city is represented in them differs significantly. Hemingway’s Paris is a Paris of young love, quaint little cafes, and the expatriate artist community written from the perspective of the late 1950s, while Orwell’s Paris is one of dirty buildings, meaningless suffering, and people trying to survive in miserable conditions written in the context of the Great Depression. The aim of this paper is to explore differences and similarities in these representations and suggest possible reasons for them. The main theoretical method of analysis is geocriticism as it is presented by Bertrand Westphal in his book Geocriticism: Real and Fictional Spaces. Using Westphal’s categories, the analysis is divided into three sections that deal with the authors’ different positioning in space, different ways of seeing the flow of time and their own temporal position in it, and how the authors’ different yet similar cultural backgrounds affect the way they perceive and segment the city.
The main finding of the study is that even though the structural categories outlined above (space, time, and culture) do not determine the subject of observation in any ironclad manner, their effect is significant enough to produce almost completely different perception of the Parisian city space for the authors. In alignment with geocritical method’s main precepts, the study could be further expanded by the addition of new and different viewpoints on Paris like minority perspectives, women’s voices, different time periods, or alternative media formats.
The main finding of the study is that even though the structural categories outlined above (space, time, and culture) do not determine the subject of observation in any ironclad manner, their effect is significant enough to produce almost completely different perception of the Parisian city space for the authors. In alignment with geocritical method’s main precepts, the study could be further expanded by the addition of new and different viewpoints on Paris like minority perspectives, women’s voices, different time periods, or alternative media formats.