Diss.--Siegen--Univ., 1999. / Index.

Diss. Stockholm : Stockholms universitet, 2006.

Thesis (B.A.)--Haverford College, Dept. of English, 2009. / Includes bibliographical references.

The main thesis of this study is that John Banville's fictional scientific tetralogy makes an aesthetically challenging attempt to fuse renewed popular notions of science and scientific figures with renewed artistic forms. Banville is most interested in the creative mind of the scientist, astronomer, or mathematician, his life and times in Doctor Copernicus (1976) and Kepler (1981), and his modern day influence in The Newton Letter (1982) and Mefisto (1986). The novelist's writing is a movement of the subjective into what has normally been regarded as the objective domain of science. Chapter one gives a critical overview of the present state of Banville scholarship. It reveals that despite his focus on scientists, the novelist rarely invites more than narrow literary approaches. Chapter two discusses the cultural context of relations between science and literature. The theories of Gerald Holton on scientific history, of Arthur Koestler on creativity, and of Thomas Kuhn on paradigm change are shown to be germane to Banville's tetralogy. These theories support the general methodology throughout the dissertation. Chapter three examines the creation of the scientific genius Doctor Copernicus. In particular, the following areas are examined: the scientist's boyhood; the influences of his family, friends and colleagues; the link between science and public policy; the scientist's living and working conditions; and the scientist's thematic presuppositions. Chapter four continues the exploration of the social and artistic process of science with regard to the astronomer Kepler. This chapter's discussion of the brotherhood of science, astrology, physicalization, religion and dreams inevitably raises questions about the role of the scientist in society and how his ideas are developed. Chapter five reveals the importance of the extra—scientific factors that go into the composition of any purportedly objective science. In The Newton Letter, both the great English scientist and his Irish biographer seem to suffer from similar paradigm shifts. Chapter six on Mefisto argues that recent scientific theory, including the science of chaos, informs the work, particularly with regard to the notions of symmetry and asymmetry. Chapter seven concludes by advancing the argument that Banville's work is a much needed contribution to Irish culture, which has tended to ignore the social potential of science. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

Translation of the author's thesis written in Portuguese (doctoral)--University of São Paulo, Brazil, 1995. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [163]-177) and index.

Tesis-Universidad de Valladolid (inédita). / Incluye referencias bibliográficas e índice.

This dissertation examines the trope of filiation in novels by three contemporary British writers: John Banville, Ian McEwan, and Kazuo Ishiguro. The trope of filiation and the related theme of inheritance has long been central to the concerns of the British novel, but it took on a new significance in the twentieth century, as the novel responded both thematically and formally to the aftermath of the two world wars. This study demonstrates the ways in which Banville, McEwan, and Ishiguro each situate their work in relation to this legacy, by means of an analogy between the inheritance structures figured within their novels and the inheritance performed by their engagement with the genre itself. This study relies on an instructive analogy to similar treatments of the larger problem of cultural filiation by the theorists Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida. Levinas exposes in his work the ethical and political problems of modernist temporality by critiquing modernity’s rejection of filiation, a rejection modeled also in the lost children, and barren and celibate men and women of modernist novels. Derrida meanwhile provides a way forward with his representation and performance of inheritance as a critical and transformative act, which is characterised on one hand by an ethical injunction, and on the other, by a filtering or a differentiation which changes the tradition even as it reaffirms it.

This dissertation examines the trope of filiation in novels by three contemporary British writers: John Banville, Ian McEwan, and Kazuo Ishiguro. The trope of filiation and the related theme of inheritance has long been central to the concerns of the British novel, but it took on a new significance in the twentieth century, as the novel responded both thematically and formally to the aftermath of the two world wars. This study demonstrates the ways in which Banville, McEwan, and Ishiguro each situate their work in relation to this legacy, by means of an analogy between the inheritance structures figured within their novels and the inheritance performed by their engagement with the genre itself. This study relies on an instructive analogy to similar treatments of the larger problem of cultural filiation by the theorists Emmanuel Levinas and Jacques Derrida. Levinas exposes in his work the ethical and political problems of modernist temporality by critiquing modernity’s rejection of filiation, a rejection modeled also in the lost children, and barren and celibate men and women of modernist novels. Derrida meanwhile provides a way forward with his representation and performance of inheritance as a critical and transformative act, which is characterised on one hand by an ethical injunction, and on the other, by a filtering or a differentiation which changes the tradition even as it reaffirms it.

M.A. (English) / This dissertation hinges on the exploration of three contemporary Irish novels, namely The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry, The Gathering by Anne Enright, and The Sea by John Banville. What the three works have in common, besides their nationality, is a preoccupation with what exceeds their grasp: that is, their inspiration is also their limitation. All three set themselves the task of capturing and representing a past. The first two position themselves as rehabilitators of portions of Ireland’s history that have been occluded from official versions thereof. (Banville’s novel attempts to skirt as many limitations as possible, including a national one, in order to grapple, as unhindered as possible, with what narrative can achieve). Fictional rehabilitations of what occurred in a phenomenal reality are inevitably fraught because of their form’s limited grasp. However, this study seeks to trace each work’s fitful engagement with what it cannot encapsulate in order to ascertain the capabilities of narrative, in spite of its inherent limitations. I employ a broadly post-structuralist theoretical framework in order to engage with novels that incorporate into their content an awareness of the parameters within which they are obliged to function. Ultimately, I draw conclusions (which are necessarily limited themselves) as to the gesture each novel attempts to make beyond its bounds.