Thesis (M.A.)--The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, 2008. / Directed by Amy Vines; submitted to the Dept. of English. Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Jan. 28, 2010). Includes bibliographical references (p. 81-85).

George Eliot's fiction is filled with mentoring relationships which generally consist of a wise male mentor and a foolish, egotistic female mentee. The mentoring narratives relate the conversion of the mentee from narcissism to selfless devotion to the community. By retaining the Christian value of self-abnegation and the Christian tendency to devalue nature, Eliot, nominally a secular humanist who abandoned Christianity, reveals herself still to be a covert Christian. In Chapter 1 I introduce the moral mentoring theme and provide background material. Chapter 2 consists of an examination of Felix Holt, which clearly displays Eliot's crucial dichotomy: the moral is superior to the natural. In Chapter 3 I present a Freudian analysis of Gwendolen Harleth, the mentee most fully developed. In Chapter 4 I examine two early mentees, who differ from later mentees primarily in that they are not egotists and can be treated with sympathy. Chapter 5 covers three gender-modified relationships. These relationships show contrasting views of nature: in the Dinah Morris-Hetty Sorrel narrative, like most of the others, Eliot privileges the transcendence of nature. The other two, Mary Garth-Fred Vincy and Dolly Winthrop-Silas Marner, are exceptions as Eliot portrays in them a Wordsworthian reconciliation with nature. In Chapter 6 I focus on Maggie Tulliver, a mentee with three failed mentors and two antimentors. Maggie chooses regression over growth as symbolized by her drowning death in her brother's arms. In Chapter 7 I examine Middlemarch, whose lack of a successful standard mentoring relationship contributes to its dark vision. Chapter 8 contains a reading of Romola which interprets Romola, the only mentee whose story takes place outside nineteenth-century England, as a feminist fantasy for Eliot. Chapter 9 concludes the discussion, focusing primarily on the question why the mentoring theme was so compelling for George Eliot. In the Appendix I examine the relationships in Eliot's life in which she herself was a mentee or a mentor.

Works of art often refer to one another. Perhaps a closer examination of this relationship occurs if they are theoretically displaced from the sequence of events that contextualise them. Placed side-by-side, they may take on a fresh meaning that might identify artistic intention as universal — as a 'redemptive' statement of Being. Both Piero della Francesca and Stanley Spencer painted 'Resurrection' pictures. The five hundred years that separate them notwithstanding, the reasons for their so doing must bear some comparison. Each made a statement of belief in their depiction of a metaphysical world created primarily in the imagination but housed in cultural milieus that would identify them as 'visionary' amongst their peers. Yet, in many ways, one picture is the antithesis to the other, the first deeply religious, the second highly personal. Regardless of their differences, each work might perpetually and simultaneously strive toward 'the spiritual' in an individual and universal sense. As an artist whose work ostensibly denies any lofty 'spiritual' aspiration whatsoever, Frank Zappa's dismissal of authority, whether couched in religious, musical or sociological terms, marks a valid juxtaposition to current acceptance of artistic form. Not only was it legitimate to invite a musician into the affray, for me it was a vital continuation of my earlier exploration. Zappa seriously challenges the notion of 'feeling' as little more than a pre-set conditioned response to music. I hoped to establish that Zappa's own quest for musical perfection flew in the face of his notorious cynicism, proclaiming his output as 'redemptive' — alongside that of Piero della Francesca and Stanley Spencer. It is the main contention here that as the human predicament requires that the artist should attempt to re-present his vision in order to redefine reality for himself and his peers, the role of artist as 'visionary' is worthy of perennial consideration.

此論文探究詩人華茲華斯多種的靈感來源。他的靈感來源主要分為兩種：超自然以及人本的來源。一方面，詩人有古典和傳統的一面，依靠超自然的來源來維持寫作靈感，如異教神明，基督教的聖靈，新古典神祗。除了這些靈感來源以外，我提出，詩人還發明了人本的守護力量，反映了他能離開傳統，自成一格，依靠個人的天才和身邊的群體。 / 華大部份寫詩的靈感都來自大自然，因此第一章將考究自然如何成為為他帶來靈感的工具。十八世紀崇尚哲學，詩風也有此傾向。華受此詩風影響，對他來說，自然象徵著形而上的真理，是重要的寫作題材。因此，雖然他渴望像他妹妹桃樂西一樣如實描繪自然，最後卻比較著重自然的喻意，多於自然的原始美。 / 第二章以華的作品《意大利旅行回憶錄》和《歐洲大陸旅行回憶錄》為主，集中討論華詩裡的聖靈。此章宗旨是證明詩人在出外的時候特別依靠聖靈作靈感來源。雖然外地給他陌生的印象和感覺，但透過此靈感來源，他為自己製造了一個安穩的寫作空間。聖物、宗教建築、音樂和不同地方的歷史，觸手可及，為他帶來親切感。 / 第三章尋索華詩裡的新古典神明。論點是：詩人在詩裡祈求神明庇佑並賜與寫作靈感，是跟隨新古典詩人的傳統，為一種修辭法。新古典時期的代表作家有德萊頓、蒲柏、和詹森， 都是華尊敬的作家。雖然華曾跟隨他們的向神明祈求的修辭法，卻仍與他們這種尋求靈命的手法保持距離。這是因為華覺察到，這種以精英為重的詩，與他對低微農村居民持有的抱負背道而馳。 / 第四章介紹英國湖區的守護力量。這力量比較其他靈感來源，最得華心。原因是，他從小與湖區已建立起感官和情感上的親切感。即使身在異鄉，他也可透過想象親歷湖區之景，從中找到靈感寫作，所以湖區的力量很可靠。可惜，一個地方的景色，有可能隨著農村發展和工業化而改變甚至遭受破壞。華明白這一點，是以還是開始尋找更長久的靈感來源。 / 因此，華創造了歷史、文學和人物這三種人本的守護力量，代替前幾種的靈感來源。第五、第六、和第七章會分別討論這三種來源。歷史的守護力量來自華想象出來的一個群體， 這群體裡的人都是英國的人民，價值觀相似，所以特別珍視某些美德。就是這樣一個群體維持著華的靈感的。文學的守護力量也是華想象力的結晶，這群體是由一群作家組成，作家真有其人。華透過引用他們的詩句，在寫詩時找到靈感繼續創作下去。人物守護力量是第三個華透過想象組織的群體，以湖區的農民群體為範本。人物都有華所碰見過的人的影子，他們的生命力來自這群體的關愛和憐恤。這兩種美德也支持著華的創作。 / This thesis explores the different sources of inspiration in William Wordsworth’s poetry. These sources, I argue, can mainly be classified into two types: supernatural and human-oriented. The classical and traditional Wordsworth relies on supernatural sources, such as pagan spirits, the Christian spirit, and neo-classical spirits to sustain and inspire his poetry. In addition to these sources, I argue that he has invented human-oriented 'spirits of place', and that his use of these spirits reflects a Wordsworth who is independent of tradition and more reliant on his own genius and the human communities around him. / Because the inspiration of most of Wordsworth’s poems springs from nature, my first chapter will study how nature is instrumental in bringing about this inspiration. Nature is symbolic of those metaphysical truths which he considers important subjects for writing, under the influence of eighteenth-century expectations that poetry be philosophical. As a result, while longing to portray nature 'as it is', as his sister Dorothy does, he nevertheless resorts to the metaphorical meanings of nature rather than its beauty in its basic appearance. / My second chapter will focus on the Christian spirit in Wordsworth’s poetry, especially in Memorials of a Tour in Italy, and Memorials of a Tour on the Continent. It seeks to show how the poet, especially while abroad, depends on it for inspiration. He seems to be creating a safe environment for writing, when his surroundings look and feel foreign. He cultivates a feeling of familiarity through tangible things such as religious relics, architecture, and music, and the Christian history of the places. / My third chapter will investigate neo-classical spirits in Wordsworth’s poetry. I argue that his invocation of them is a rhetorical device employed as part of a tradition among neo-classical poets such as Dryden, Pope, and Johnson, whom Wordsworth highly respects as his poetic predecessors. There will also be a note on his critical stance against this method of obtaining inspiration, as he realises an elitist kind of poetry does not suit that responsibility for the rustic and lowly which he considers his. / My fourth chapter will introduce the genius loci of the Lake District, which to Wordsworth was a preferred source of inspiration, because of the physical and emotional intimacy that he cultivated with the place since childhood. I attempt also to show that the genius loci has sustained his poetry even when he is abroad and imaginatively revisits the place. Despite the strength of this source, he eventually longs for a more sustainable source, one that is not prone to be destroyed due to the possibility of a change of landscape in the locality due to rural development or industrialisation. / As a result of this, Wordsworth invents what I term 'historical', 'literary', and 'embodied' spirits of place, as alternative sources. These three kinds of spirit of place will be discussed in Chapters 5, 6, and 7 respectively. Historical spirits of place are a community imagined by Wordsworth, one in which people share the same valuation of certain virtues that are specific to the British nation. Literary spirits of place are a community in his mind, one that consists of literary figures who are supportive of or foundational for Wordsworth’s writing. He imagines receiving their support through quoting from their poems. Embodied spirits of place are also an imaginary community based on the rural one in the Lake District. They are characters that Wordsworth creates based on real rustic people, and their lives are sustained by the love and sympathy of the community, just as his own poetry is sustained by it. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Au Yeung, Viona. / Thesis (Ph.D.) Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2014. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 409-423). / Abstracts also in Chinese.

In his Dialogue on the State of a Christian Man (1597), William Perkins articulated the popular early-modern understanding that the individual is a "double person" organised under "spiritual" and "temporal" regiments. In the one, he is a person "under Christ" and must endeavour to become Christ-like; in the other, he is a person "in respect of" others and bound to fulfil his duties towards them. This early-modern self, governed by relationships and the obligations they entail, was profoundly vulnerable to the formative influence of speech, for relationships themselves were in part created and sustained through social dialogue. Similarly, the individual could hope to become "a person...under Christ" only by hearing spiritual speech - Scripture preached or read, or the "secret soule-whisperings" of the Spirit. The capacity of speech to effect real and lasting change in the auditor was a commonplace in seventeenth-century England: the conscious crafting of identity, dramatised by Stephen Greenblatt in Renaissance Self-Fashioning, occurred daily in domestic and social transactions, in the exchange of civilities, the use of apostrophe, and strategies of praise. It happened when friends or strangers met, when host greeted guest, or the signatory to a letter penned vocatives that defined his addressee. It lacked a sense of high drama but was nonetheless calculated and effective. Speaking Selves proposes that examining the impact of speech upon the "double person" not only contributes to our understanding of selfhood in the seventeenth century, but also, and more importantly, leads to new insights into some of that century�s greatest literary artefacts: Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes. The first chapter turns to conduct manuals and conversion narratives, to speech-act theory and discourse analysis, and draws out those verbal strategies that contributed to the organisation of social and spiritual selves. Chapter 2 turns to Paradise Lost and traces the Father�s gradual revelation to the Son, through apostrophe, how he is to reflect, how enact the divine being whose visible and verbal expression he is. Chapter 3 discusses advice on address behaviour in seventeenth-century marriage treatises; it reveals the positive contribution of generous apostrophe and verbal mirroring to Adam and Eve�s Edenic marriage. The conversational dyads in heaven and prelapsarian Eden enact positive identities for their collocutors. Satan, however, begetting himself by diabolical speech-act, discovers the ability of words to dismantle the identity of others. Chapter 4 traces the development of his deceptive strategies, drawing attention to his wilful misrepresentation of social identity as a means to pervert the spiritual identity of his collocutor. The final chapter explores the reorganisation of the complex social-spiritual person in the postlapsarian world. We watch the protagonist of Samson discriminate between the many voices that attempt to impose upon him their own understanding of selfhood. Drawing on spiritual autobiographies as structurally and thematically analogous to Milton�s drama, this final chapter traces the inward plot of Samson as its fallen hero redefines identity and rediscovers the "intimate impulse" of the Spirit that alone can complete the reorganisation of the spiritual self.

No description available.

The main purpose of this study is to prove that the view on the American Indians, as it is presented in the plays, is determined by two dissimilar sets of values: those related to Christianity and those associated with democracy. The Christian ideals of mercy and benevolence are counterbalanced by the democratic values of freedom and patriotism in such a way that secular ideals in many cases supersede the religious ones. To achieve the purpose of the dissertation, I sifted the plays for a list of notions related to Christianity and, using textual evidence, demonstrated that these notions were not confined to particular pieces but systematically appeared in a significant number of plays. This method allowed me to make a claim that the motif of Christianity was one of the leading ones, yet it was systematically set against another major recurrent subject—the values of democracy. I also established the types of clerical characters in the plays and discovered their common characteristic—the ultimate bankruptcy of their ideals. This finding supported the main conclusion of this study: in the plays under discussion, Christianity was presented as no longer the only valid system of beliefs and was strongly contested by the outlook of democracy.I discovered that the motif of Christianity in the American Indian plays reveals itself in three ways: in the superiority of Christian civilization over Indian lifestyle, in the characterization of Indians within the framework of Christian morality, and in the importance of Christian clergy in the plays. None of these three topics, however, gets an unequivocal interpretation. First, the notion of Christian corruption is distinctly manifest. Second, the Indian heroes and heroines demonstrate important civic virtues: desire for freedom and willingness to sacrifice themselves for their land. Third, since the representation of the clerics varies from saintliness to villainy, the only thing they have in common is the impracticability and incredulity of the ideas they preach. More fundamental truths, it is suggested, should be sought outside of Christianity, and the newly found values should be not so much of a "Christian" as of "democratic" quality. / Department of English

The purpose of this study is to explore a phenomenon which is both literary and social: the popularity of didactic Christian novels in twentieth-century American literature. Specifically, the study is restricted to a consideration of best-selling Christian novels and an examination of the attitudes of American readers over a time of extreme social change in America, 1918-1953. Nineteen such novels were best sellers over the thirty-five years encompassed by the study. One was popular between World War I and the Depression, five were best sellers between 1929 and 1939, and the remainder were best sellers between 1939 and 1953. The data suggest that within the period 1918-1953, public interest in Christian novels increased during times of national stress but waned in times of prosperity.The popular Christian novels mirrored the concerns of the reading public, for subject matter, theme, and characterization of the novels tend to reflect the era in which a given novel is published. The one novel popular between the end of World War I and the Depression was Ralph Connor's The Sky Pilot in No Man's Land (1919), an unabashedly anti-German propaganda novel incorporating elements of Christian thought. Between 1919 and 1929, Americans were preoccupied with social change and the prosperity of the times, and thus demonstrated little interest in fictional piety.In the Depression, five novels by Lloyd C. Douglas were immensely popular: Magnificent Obsession (1929), Forgive Us Our Trespasses (1932), Green Light (1935), White Banners (1936), and Disputed Passage (1939). All were contemporaneous in setting, and paradoxically stressed the practice of altruistic self-giving along with the promise of material rewards for the follower of Christianity. Clearly, Douglas appealed to the public because his works were optimistic and because they offered to the reader the hope that Christianity might provide relief from economic distress.From 1939 through 1953, thirteen Christian novels became best sellers. Seven were historical Christian novels: The Nazarene (1939), The Apostle (1943), and Mary (1949) by Sholem Asch; The Robe (1942) and The Big Fisherman (1948) by Lloyd C. Douglas; The Song of Bernadette (1942) by Franz Werfel; and The Silver Chalice (1953) by Thomas B. Costain. The historical novels tended to become more conservative and restrained than Douglas' novels of the Depression. Their popularity points to tendencies in Americans to look to the past and to ancient values in search of answers to contemporary problems.Six Christian novels published 1939-1953 were generally contemporaneous in setting. Significantly, four were either by or about Roman Catholics: A. J. Cronin's The Keys of the Kingdom (1941), Russell Janney's The Miracle of the Bells (1946), Henry Morton Robinson's The Cardinal (1950), and Francis Cardinal Spellman's The Foundling (1951). Two by Agnes Sligh Turnbull were Protestant: The Bishop's Mantle (1947) and The Gown of Glory (1952). Four of these novels depicted clergymen as protagonists. The popularity of these novels indicated widespread concern for religion and curiosity about churchmen. The acceptance of Roman Catholicism in popular fiction is of major significance, for no popular Christian novels before 1939 were distinctly pro-Catholic. A more tolerant mood is clearly indicated for the American novel-reading public.It is clear from this study that almost all popular Christian novels widely accepted between 1918 and 1953 advanced a simplistic and rewarding Christianity. Inevitably the theology is uncomplicated, and most of the works adapt Christianity to the needs of the day. Religious attitudes are emphatically this-worldly. Little eschatological content is apparent; readers and writers alike were apparently more concerned with a religious faith which provided strength and guidance for living well in the present, rather than providing a means of preparation for a heavenly afterlife.

In his Dialogue on the State of a Christian Man (1597), William Perkins articulated the popular early-modern understanding that the individual is a "double person" organised under "spiritual" and "temporal" regiments. In the one, he is a person "under Christ" and must endeavour to become Christ-like; in the other, he is a person "in respect of" others and bound to fulfil his duties towards them. This early-modern self, governed by relationships and the obligations they entail, was profoundly vulnerable to the formative influence of speech, for relationships themselves were in part created and sustained through social dialogue. Similarly, the individual could hope to become "a person...under Christ" only by hearing spiritual speech - Scripture preached or read, or the "secret soule-whisperings" of the Spirit. The capacity of speech to effect real and lasting change in the auditor was a commonplace in seventeenth-century England: the conscious crafting of identity, dramatised by Stephen Greenblatt in Renaissance Self-Fashioning, occurred daily in domestic and social transactions, in the exchange of civilities, the use of apostrophe, and strategies of praise. It happened when friends or strangers met, when host greeted guest, or the signatory to a letter penned vocatives that defined his addressee. It lacked a sense of high drama but was nonetheless calculated and effective. Speaking Selves proposes that examining the impact of speech upon the "double person" not only contributes to our understanding of selfhood in the seventeenth century, but also, and more importantly, leads to new insights into some of that century�s greatest literary artefacts: Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes. The first chapter turns to conduct manuals and conversion narratives, to speech-act theory and discourse analysis, and draws out those verbal strategies that contributed to the organisation of social and spiritual selves. Chapter 2 turns to Paradise Lost and traces the Father�s gradual revelation to the Son, through apostrophe, how he is to reflect, how enact the divine being whose visible and verbal expression he is. Chapter 3 discusses advice on address behaviour in seventeenth-century marriage treatises; it reveals the positive contribution of generous apostrophe and verbal mirroring to Adam and Eve�s Edenic marriage. The conversational dyads in heaven and prelapsarian Eden enact positive identities for their collocutors. Satan, however, begetting himself by diabolical speech-act, discovers the ability of words to dismantle the identity of others. Chapter 4 traces the development of his deceptive strategies, drawing attention to his wilful misrepresentation of social identity as a means to pervert the spiritual identity of his collocutor. The final chapter explores the reorganisation of the complex social-spiritual person in the postlapsarian world. We watch the protagonist of Samson discriminate between the many voices that attempt to impose upon him their own understanding of selfhood. Drawing on spiritual autobiographies as structurally and thematically analogous to Milton�s drama, this final chapter traces the inward plot of Samson as its fallen hero redefines identity and rediscovers the "intimate impulse" of the Spirit that alone can complete the reorganisation of the spiritual self.

Thesis (M.A.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of English, General Literature, and Rhetoric, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references.