Thesis (Ph.D.)--Boston University

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Carlyle was much, more popular and influential in the nineteenth century than he is in the twentieth. Many critics "believe that he exerted an influence over Tennyson, but there is very little direct evidence to support such an opinion. However, circumstantial evidence shows that Tennyson must have been interested in what Carlyle had to offer; that Carlyle and Tennyson were personal friends; and that there are many parallels between the works of Carlyle and Tennyson. Carlyle is essentially a romantic. His attitude toward art is ambivalent, a fact which is indicative of the conflict between Carlyle's longing for beauty, goodness, and truth on the one hand, and, on the other, his realization of the difficulty in reaffirming these absolutes within the spirit of his age. This ambivalence is related to the post-Kantian conflict between "Mere Reason" and "Understanding". Carlyle describes that conflict as the result of a process of ever-increasing self-consciousness of both the individual and society. Tennyson's early poetry is determined by the same "romantic" conflict, "but whereas in Carlyle's writings this conflict is philosophically resolved, Tennyson's early poems lack this resolution. One may say that these poems represent Tennyson's "Everlasting No." Carlyle and Tennyson met first in 18J8 and soon became personal friends. Although during the forties their friendship was at times very intimate, it seems that Carlyle took Tennyson not very seriously, and that Tennyson was sometimes annoyed over Carlyle's blustering manner. But on the whole, Tennyson regarded Carlyle very highly. In In Memoriam, many sections of which were written after Tennyson had become acquainted with Carlyle, Tennyson arrives at an "Everlasting Yea," i.e., at a reconciliation of "Mere Reason" and "Understanding" through renunciation (Selbsttötung). In addition, the poem displays many similarities with Sartor Hesartus. But whereas in Carlyle's writings the resolution of the "basic romantic polarity" is mainly rational, it becomes an intense emotional experience in Tennyson's poem. "Locksley Hall" displays many similarities with Sartor Resartus in general, and with Book II in particular. These similarities have led William D. Templeman to maintain that "Locksley Hall" is a dramatization of Book II of Sartor. But apart from parallels "between the two works, there is no evidence to support this view. After 1850, when Tennyson received the laureateship and founded a family, he became more self-reliant. His meetings with Carlyle became less frequent and more formal. However, there are many indications that both men held each other in high esteem, despite the fact that Carlyle often criticised Tennyson. The plot and the characters in Maud resemble Book II of Sartor Resartus. In addition, there are several other parallels between Maud and some of Carlyle’s works. In one instance it appears likely that Tennyson has used an image from Past and Present. Furthermore, the hero in Maud undergoes a progression from an "Everlasting No" to an "Everlasting Yea," but there is little evidence to prove that such parallels reflect influences. After 1855, the friendship between Carlyle and Tennyson may be described as a "friendly companionship between two equals, neither ignoring the other, but each enjoying full intellectual independence." After a temporary estrangement, probably caused by Carlyle's overbearing manner, Tennyson appears to have taken the initiative in reviving the friendship (1865). Although Carlyle's criticism of Tennyson continued to be unfair and destructive, Tennyson often indicated that he had an affectionate regard for Carlyle. "Locksley Hall Sixty Years After" suggests that Tennyson agreed closely with Carlyle's political views. Because Carlyle and Tennyson were interested in the same intellectual problems; because Carlyle formulated solutions to these problems much earlier than Tennyson; because Tennyson appears to have accepted these solutions after he had met Carlyle; because the two men were personal friends; and because there are many parallels between their works, it appears likely that Carlyle has exerted some influence over Tennyson, although the extent of such influence cannot be determined. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate

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Thomas Carlyle’s History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, called Frederick the Great was published in six volumes between 1858 and 1865 and was his last major work. Carlyle had a specific purpose in mind when he began writing Frederick. He believed that contemporary events had left Europe in disarray and the British nation fragmented. In his view, the nation needed to function as a family unit, with the older, more experienced members of the group instructing and educating the young. Carlyle’s attempt to address the situation with the publication of his Latter-Day Pamphlets in 1850 had failed, largely due to their aggressive tone. He adopted an entirely different approach when it came to writing Frederick. Chapter one explores Carlyle’s vacillation over his choice of Frederick as a suitable subject for his history and investigates his soul-searching over whether or not to proceed with the project. It examines the three-way relationship which Carlyle created between himself, Frederick and the reader and explores the various language techniques that Carlyle used to create and maintain this relationship. In chapter two, Carlyle’s style of writing in Frederick is investigated. It argues that Carlyle was engaged in the act of storytelling and explores the various literary techniques that he used to achieve this. Chapter three consists of an in-depth examination of Carlyle’s use of oral techniques in Frederick, investigating the variety of oral devices he employed in order to ‘speak’ to his readers and create a unified readership. Chapters four and five focus on Carlyle’s research methods. They examine the texts which Carlyle used for his research—original manuscripts, printed texts, letters, histories and biographies—investigating how these were incorporated into Frederick and evaluating whether or not Carlyle was true to his source material. Carlyle’s two trips to Germany in order to research material are also investigated. In Chapters six and seven, the contemporary reception of Frederick is explored. Chapter six focuses on the reaction to the first two volumes which were published together in 1858, whilst chapter seven investigates the response to the later volumes, exploring the ways in which the completed work influenced the public’s perception of Carlyle as a historian and ending by examining both Carlyle’s and Frederick’s places in posterity. Despite Carlyle’s labours on Frederick it never received the acclaim of his earlier productions but was regarded by many as a marker which signalled the end of Carlyle’s long and illustrious literary career.

Texte remanié de: Th. Ph. D.--New Haven (Conn.)--Yale university. / Notes bibliogr. Index.

Thesis (M.A.)--Kutztown University of Pennsylvania, 2001. / Source: Masters Abstracts International, Volume: 45-06, page: 2824. Typescript. Abstract appears on leaf [2]. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 80-84).

Thesis (M.A.)--Acadia University, 1999. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 136-139). Also available on the Internet via the World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1984. / Typescript. Vita. eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Bibliography: leaves 222-225.

This paper explores and interrogates late Victorian anxieties concerning the issues of masculinity and labor, taking Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure as a key text in this discourse. I argue that Hardy, drawing upon his own experiences, offers a meditation on the differing Victorian modes of masculinity outlined and embodied in the thought of John Henry Newman and Thomas Carlyle, and in doing so, constructs a dialectical tension between already outmoded, yet remarkably persistent, answers to the questions and pressures of modernity. Through the use of one of the text’s central images—that of Christminster and its accompanying Gothic architecture—Hardy creates an opposition between an idealized intellectual labor and the earthy reality of manual labor. Both forms—figured in either the heroic and organic terms of Carlyle or the reserved, tradition-bound reaction of Newman—represent the ideal that allows Jude to live, but also the force that leads to his death. Therefore, in the clash between the ideal and real, the dialectic fails to deliver a possible synthesis, and instead spirals restlessly in the darkened gaps of self-negation. At the same time, because the specter of a crude social and biological Darwinism consciously haunts the edges of the story, the dialectic never stops demanding a synthesis if Jude is to discover the grounding for a fully integrated identity or ethics. The central question for Hardy thus becomes one of form: For a modern masculine subjectivity to take hold, external social forms must have a connective vitality with interior dispositions, a proposition that Hardy views as a near impossibility. / text