The interjection of a new and dynamically different reading of Lawrence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy is imperative, if scholars want to clearly see many of the hidden facets of the novel that have gone unexamined because of out-dated scholarship. Ian Watt’s assumption that Sterne “would probably have been the supreme figure among eighteenth-century novelists” (291) if he had not tried to be so odd, and the conclusion that he draws, that “Tristram Shandy is not so much a novel as a parody of a novel” (291), is incorrect. Throughout the thesis, I argue that Sterne was not burlesquing other novelists, but instead, was engaging with themes that are now being examined by postmodern theories of Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and Jean François Lyotard: themes like the impenetrability of identity (“Don’t puzzle me” (TS 7.33.633)), the insufficiency of language (“Well might Locke write a chapter upon the imperfections of words” (5.6.429)), and the unavailability of permanence (“Time wastes too fast” (9.8.754)). I actively engage with their theories to deconstruct unexamined themes inside Tristram Shandy, and illuminate postmodern elements inside the novel. However, I do not argue that Tristram Shandy is postmodern. Instead, I argue that if the reader examines the novel outside of its usual context inside the eighteenth-century novel, there are themes that are apparent in the narrative which have gone unexamined because of the way it has been classified inside academia, and that postmodernist theory allows for these themes to be re-examined in the postmodern culture in which we now reside.

The theme of love in Malory¡¦s Le Morte Darthur has long been considered to be confusing and inconsistent. This thesis aims to analyze Malory¡¦s treatment of love in the two knights addressed as truest lovers: Launcelot and Tristram. Launcelot, as the central figure of the whole book, demonstrates well Malory¡¦s ideal about chivalry and about love, while the Tale of Tristram is neglected as an analogy which foreshadows Launcelot¡¦s adulterous relationship. I will survey these two knights¡¦ love stories with Malory¡¦s terms of ¡§virtuous love¡¨ and ¡§true lover,¡¨ and point out that although both of them are truest lover, their loves differ, so as to demonstrate the essence of love in Malory¡¦s work. Chapter one and two will focus on the love stories of Tristram and of Lancelot. Tristram, as a young knight, who first loves passionately, ¡§sone hote sone colde,¡¨ later establishes a stable relationship with la Beale Isode. The young couples, however fails to reconcile the conflict of love and moral and eventually die because of the jealousy husband, King Mark. On the contrary, Launcelot, as an elder knight, keeps faithful to Guinevere, his first and last love, refusing every suggestion of marriage with other worshipful ladies, truly repenting his sin after committing one. Chapter three will examine the definition of ¡§virtuous love¡¨ in May Passage, which reveal Malory¡¦s ideal of love, a long-lasting love, chaste and faithful, correspondent with Christian morality. Though having his ideal represented in the marriage love of Gareth, Malory understands well the possibility of imperfection and thus includes Launcelot as one form of true lover, who is unable to marry but maintains chaste and unites in heart, and Tristram as another form of true lover, whose ¡§love is free in himself.¡¨ This thesis will conclude that in his treatment of love Malory depicts various possibilities of human nature of love and points out different measures to achieve the ideal.

Thesis (M. Mus.)--University of Adelaide, 1984. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 60-62).

Being classified in the ¡§anti-tradition of unclassifiable books,¡¨ Laurence Sterne¡¦s The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gent. has fascinated generations of readers and critics with its seemingly chaotic richness. The narrator Tristram appears to hide his ultimate purpose and unity beneath a cloak of oddity and confusion, which defies any attempt on the reader¡¦s part to ever pinning it down, and thus opens ground for various debates and critiques. Taking Tristram¡¦s many futile efforts at tracing back the origin of his life as the starting point, this thesis attempts to explore the author-narrator¡¦s deliberate use of oddity and confusion. The impossibility of ever finding a coherent and definite beginning of one¡¦s life is read in my study as a metaphor of one¡¦s losing battle at pinning down the concept of self, the embodiment of the ungraspable subjectivity. Not even Locke¡¦s epistemology or the eighteenth-century knowledge of anthropology can serve as an adequate framework of reference for the account of one¡¦s life, if it is to be interpreted as subjectivity. The fact that men are different from one another arises from their individual hobbyhorse, the manifestation of subjectivity, which resists attempts to be defined exactly and thus makes itself unfathomable. This discovery is the very basis of my reading of Tristram Shandy. Since subjectivity refuses to be grasped, my thesis then proceeds to investigate the way in which Tristram represents this ungraspable subjectivity. The concept of staging is employed in this thesis to explore Sterne¡¦s deployment of subjectivity. On the stage where the many facets of each character¡¦s singular microcosm are presented, it is demonstrated that the reader is also drawn into Tristram¡¦s game play, only with the peculiar result that in discovering subjectivity (theirs and ours,) we trespass boundary and assume Tristram¡¦s subjectivity.

Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy is a novel consumed with conversation. The conversations that the characters have with each other and the ongoing conversation between Tristram and the reader all address the importance of communication. This study examines the theme of communication as Sterne presents it in his novel. The first chapter explores the personalities of Walter and Toby Shandy with the assumption that an understanding of their eccentricities will illustrate the reasons for the difficulties they encounter when trying to communicate with others. The relationships between the sexes are the subject for the second chapter. Sterne recognized the opportunity that the barrier of gender afforded him in the development of his theme, and he utilizes these relationships to illustrate the consequences of miscommunication. The final chapter focuses on Tristram’s role as the narrator. His personality and conversations with the reader also speak to the role of communication in the novel.

This project explores the effect eighteenth century reproductive theory had on Laurence Sterne�s use of satire in <i>The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman</i> (1759 - 1767). Particular focus will be on the impact of the paternal and maternal imagination on the developing fetus, sexual facts and misconceptions common to eighteenth-century readers, as well as the changes in the gender dynamic of the birthing process (the man-midwife debate). There has been a lack of critical attention specifically on Tristram Shandy and its textual debt to medical treatises, midwifery texts, and folkloric medical tracts. Beyond this, I believe that the visual images also published in these works to be of great value in understanding the socio-historic background to sex and reproduction in the eighteenth century. I propose that the reader should look beyond the child-like antics of Walter and instead focus on Elizabeth as patient and Tristram as �experiment� within the historical-medical context of their contemporary culture. By expanding the context of relevant cultural materials that would have been available to Sterne, it is possible to read certain portions of the novel as a timeline of pregnancy through conception, gestation, and ultimately birth. I wish to examine the physical development not only of Tristram the character but also Tristram the novel, as the parallels between its creation and birth are obvious to even the most casual reader. Images of the autonomous fetus were quite well disseminated at this time and could be used to understand Tristram as a pseudo-fetal narrator, an author trapped somewhere in between a self-reliant free embryo writing and a grown man imprisoned by the calamities that befell him in-utero.

The usefulness of a detailed examination of the fictional world of a novel is demonstrated in a study of Laurence Sterne's The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman.Analysis of the fictional world of Tristram Shandy, reveals a binary world which is created by the novel's narrative technique. Distinct outlines of the two fictional worlds of Tristram (TW) and the Shandy Brothers (SBW) can be established, and-the examination of these worlds provides new insights for explicating the structure, coherence, unity, and completeness of Sterne's novel.The duality of fictional worlds in the novel is not merely the reflection of movement between the two time frames of Tristram's present and his past. There are distinguishing differences not only of time, characters, and events, but also of place and quality of experience. As one views these worlds alternately but consistently throughout the novel, the bifocal perspective which emerges creates the depth perception necessary not only to see Tristram as he is, but also to comprehend a composite universe in which the attitudes, conflicts, and complications of the present world of Tristramn both mirror and complement those of the world of the Shandy family.Just as the juxtaposition of two fictional worlds augments the reader's perception of Tristram's character, life, and opinions, so also does it alter significantly the perception of the book he is writing. For it is by means of Tristram's narrative stance, his self-conscious role as author busily attempting to chronicle the events occurring in both worlds, and the perspective created by his dual narration of these events, that the reader comes to see and appreciate his book as an artifact watched in the process of its creation. As the artifact which Tristram is struggling to create, the book itself assumes a fictional role as an object in Tristram's world.In the process of his virtuoso performance in entertaining the reader while failing in the attempt to complete his autobiography, Tristram unwittingly succeeds in disclosing in his present world as much of his spirit and character as a reader requires in order to know him well. The ultimate success, of course, is that of Sterne, who has created a remarkably involuted, complex, and transparent structure of fiction by means of (1) Tristram's intrusive and digressive narration, in which the two fictional worlds emerge simultaneously; (2) the plot of Tristram attempting to write his Life; and (3) the unfolding character of Tristram. Taken together these elements interact and combine to produce a novel which is artful, ingenious, and a structure of paradox and irony.

Thesis (M.A.)--Trinity International University, 2007. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 151-155).

Thesis (M.A.)--Trinity International University, 2007. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 151-155).

Thesis (M.A.)--Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 75-77).