Tragic disruptions and subversive discourse in late victorian fiction : jude the obscure, the picture of dorian gray, and heart of darkness

Abstract

The main concern of this dissertation is a study of ideological subversion and containment in three late Victorian novels, i.e. in Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, and Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. This study shows how subversive thrusts are contained in three main scenes: social in Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure, cultural in Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray, and economic and political in Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. Our purpose is thus to bring out the tragic disruptions resulting from such discursive clash in the light of three poetics: Raymond Williams's theory of Cultural Materialism and his theory of Modern Tragedy, and Michael Bakhtin's theory of Dialogism. The theory of Cultural Materialism and that of Dialogism are mainly used to underpin discursive practices. Cultural Materialism helps us identify and assess the subversive strategies employed in these novels. The dialogues and events of the novels reveal the degree to which Victorian power is based on predation, deceit, and hypocrisy; however, this power is subject to undermining by dissident and subversive voices within Victorian society; yet this subversion is soon contained. The triumph of containment over the forces of subversion is more a mark of the late Victorian pessimism than a reinforcement of the Victorian power. The subversion-containment dialectic will show this at the level of themes, plot, and setting. Bakhtin's Dialogism will shed light on subversion at the level of language; in other words, the analysis of language in the light of Bakhtin's dialogism shows a subversive discourse which places the protagonists in a position of social antagonism to the Victorian power. As for the theory of Modern Tragedy, it is used to bring out how the containment of subversion is effected. Through characterization, we shall show the conflict of the tragic protagonists (anti-heroes) with their society. In the last analysis, the subversion of social issues in Jude the Obscure, of aesthetics in The Picture of Dorian Gray, and of politics in Heart of Darkness-whose initial aim is to effect drastic social changes-result in a consolidation of the Establishment's values at the expense of the pioneers of progress. Their ultimate failure takes on tragic tones