As E. D. Hirsch has said, "Every possible sphere of interpretation" reflects an "element of uncertainty." While this "gap" is "the defining feature of interpretation," it is the critic's primary task either to narrow that break as much as possible or to show how its gulf is unbridgeable. Eighty years of often disparate and sometimes diametrically opposed views has characterized the criticism of Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier, especially with regard to two issues--the disposition of the narrator, John Dowell, and the nature of his narrative. Is Ford's work unbridgeable, or can a critical inquiry which maintains the initial impressions of a first-read tell us something about the narrator and his "saddest story"? It is the purview of this study to answer that question. Because it is predicated on the centrality of the reader in literary interpretation, it begins with what Hans Jauss calls a "progressive" reading, proceeds with two "retrospective" readings, the last following the examination of issues related to Ford. What this process has concluded is that The Good Soldier is the product of several conflicting approaches and modes of thinking reflective of Ford's Janusian mentality. It is a three-dimensional novel, the result of Ford's appeal to three levels of readers. To fascinate his "l'homme moyen sensuel," Ford creates a passionate tale of subterfuge; to delight his critics, he incorporates the psychological machinations of the unstable mind using Impressionism as his conveyor; to appeal to his fellow artists, Ford creates a new genre which transcends mere Story or mere revolutionary artifact which would have dispensed with the tradition he knew and loved. The Good Soldier fuses traditional, Impressionistic, and Vorticist legacies, the first highlighting Story, specifically, the mystery genre, the second featuring technique, and the third inciting the innovative commingling of both. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 56-02, Section: A, page: 0557. / Major Professor: Hunt Hawkins. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Florida State University, 1994.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:fsu.edu/oai:fsu.digital.flvc.org:fsu_77356 |
| Contributors | Crawn, Claudia Colleen., Florida State University |
| Source Sets | Florida State University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Text |
| Format | 413 p. |
| Rights | On campus use only. |
| Relation | Dissertation Abstracts International |
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