Theses - Department of English Language and Literature
Permanent URI for this community
Faculty of Humanities And Letters
Browse
Browsing Theses - Department of English Language and Literature by Title
Now showing 1 - 19 of 19
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item Open Access Alan Ayckbourn's theatricality and use of comedy in Woman in Mind, A Small Family Business and Henceforward: marriage, family, private-public and absence of standards(Bilkent University, 1994) Bayol, EbruThe aim of this dissertation is to focus on three of Alan Ayckbourn's recent plays, namely Woman in Mind, A Small Business and Henceforward in order to analyse how Ayckbourn employs visual elements and how he creates comedy while he writes about such themes as the destruction of marriage and its effects on children,the inseparable nature of private and public and the absence of standards.Item Open Access Ambivalence and ambiguity in Thackeray's attitude to his woman characters in Vanity Fair and Henry Esmond(Bilkent University, 1994) Babaloğlu, VicdanWilliam Makepeace Thackeray is ambivalent in his depiction of woman characters, which is primarily the result of the discrepancy in the attitude to women of the Victorian society· Like many of the contemporary novelists, he at once supports and questions the position of women and the double standards of his male-dominated society. His attitude to the Victorian concept of ideal womanhood is equally ambig^uous as that of the Victorian concept of the "fallen" woman. Thackeray portrays his female characters as contrasted pairs, usin^ the "bad" woman as a foil to the "g“ood" one. Such portrayal is in keeping' with the method of Victorian fiction; however, he questions the values of ideal woDianhood in the conventional novel. The ambivalence of Thackeray's attitude to his female characters makes it difficult for the reader to determine whether he prefers the good, submissive, but the boring parasite in the Amelia type or the bad, rebellious, yet attractive Becky type. Contributing to this ambivalence is Thackeray's irony as well as humor. Such ambivalence no doubt resulted from his contradictory attitude to his mother, wife, and the woman he loved. The ambivalence and ambiguity in his attitude is to be found in all of his novels, but most obviously in Vanity Fair and Henry Esmond. These are the two novels most memorable for their contrasted female characters. The pairs of women examined are Amelia Sedley and Becky Sharp of Vanity Fair and Rachel Castlewood and Beatrix Castlewood of Henry Esmond.Item Open Access The carnivalesque in Ben Jonson's three city comedies: Volpone, the Alchemist and Bartholomew Fair(Bilkent University, 1997) Kurtuluş, GülThe idea of carnival is explored in Rabelais and His World, in which Bakhtin shows that the carnival was an officially sanctioned period in which all dogmas and doctrines, as well as the fonns and ideologies of the dominant culture could temporaiily be overturned. This resulted in activities that could be seen as profane and heretical, such as the paiodies of religious rituals, or treasonous and socially subversive, such as the parodies of kingship, inversions of master-seiwant roles, and the like. Moreover, the phenomenon of carnival allowed the merging of categories that are kept separate by the ideologies of a certain culture; the serious and the ridiculous, the sacred and the profane, life and death, rulers and the mled, and so on. According to Bakhtin, the advantage of carnival was that it reminded of the athibutes of the dominant culture, the characteristics of the people at large, the divisions in the culture, of class distinctions, and of value judgments and differences. Bakhtin considers carnival as an actual socio-cultural phenomenon. In Bakhtin's analysis of carnival, symbolic polarities of high and low, official and unofficial, grotesque and classical are deformed and reconstructed. Ben Jonson's comedies deal with the symbolic extremities of the exalted and the base. In his comedies Jonson plumbs the depths of social classification, taking his characters from the lower strata of the underworld, as well as from the higher stiatum of the body politic; the advocates, masters, doctors, etc. Thus, Jonson comments on the political and the social changes in the first half of the seventeenth centuiy. In his plays the 'licensed release' of carnival is experienced, which is a kind of protest against the established order. Yet, the carnival Jonson depicts in his comedies is also intended to preserve and stiengthen the established order. It is a foim of social control of the low by the high. Although the world seems to be turned upside down and the roles change during the carnival, in fact the rulers who were chosen and crowned reaffinn the status quo. Therefore, the carnival spirit in Ben Jonson's comedies is a vehicle for social protest, but at the same time the method for disciplining that protest. Bakhtin's concept of camivalesque is highly significant in discussing the sociocultural and political content of Ben Jonson's comedies. His theoiy helps one see Jonson's comedies in an especially wide perspective. This dissertation aims to link Bakhtin's discovery of the importance of camivalesque with Ben Jonson's three best known comedies: Volpone, The Alchemist and Bartholomew Fair.Item Open Access Class hate into sexual hate in Look Back in Anger(Bilkent University, 1993) Öztürk, EmelThe purpose of this thesis is to consider John Osborne's Look Back in Anger from the point of view of the function of gender. This involves the playwright's depiction of gender contradiction which results from the need for the family members to re-adjust to the public and private roles they had before the war. In the play the male character's dilenmna lies in the fulfilment of expected social and sexual roles. He is the main focus of the play in a domestic setting where he can sublimate his sense of class hatred into sexual hatred. He is allowed enough space and tools to destroy his 'faninine' wife in an effort to rediscover his own potency. Thus, this thesis mainly focuses on the question of 'virility' along with the play's fundamental mysogynist and patriarchal nature which reflects the sexual hatred of the Angries generation and Osborne's sense of his time as a transition period, MLA style sheet has been followed throughout the thesis.Item Open Access Desire/Language/Truth: a study of power relations in Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four(Bilkent University, 1992) Koç, ErtuğrulAmong other things, Nineteen Eightv-Four has been described as an apocalyptic novel, and received as a warning for future generations since the power which totalitarian regimes enjoy, destroys man’s spiritual and physical existence. These approaches each have their value, but Orwell seems to be indicating something much more subtle. The theorist Michel Foucault claims that power is what shows itself most and so hides best. In this light Orwell’s text reveals what is hidden in the nature of society. The structures of power pervade the society of Oceania in all its dimensions, in particular, language, sexuality, and politics. An analysis of these dimensions is essential to understanding Orwell’s thesis; by exploring the relations between them, the novel reveals the inner structure of collective bodies, and throws into question the concept of individuality in society, as it is created and shaped by power relations. MLA style sheet has been followed throughout the thesis.Item Open Access Dystopia and Doppelgangers: the Gothic indictment(Bilkent University, 1997) Koç, ErtuğrulThe Gothic genre has been the victim of much misinterpretation: when not savaged for its grotesqueness, it has been praised only for its wilder flights of fancy. However, it was as much a product of the Augustan "Age of Progress" as its decorous counterpart. Sentimentalism. There are specific socio-historical reasons behind its emergence, and a surprising philosophical and theological depth to its indictment of the shortcomings of its age: even at its most fantastic, it shows the political, economic, religious, ethical and psychological dilemmas of eighteenth and nineteenth century British society and its individuals. In its ambiguous attitude towards the Middle Ages and Catholicism, its ludic use of archaic literary motifs, and its juxtaposition of supposedly irrational codes of belief with more modem positivistic post-Enlightenment doctrines, it holds nothing sacred: Gothic is as valuable a form of dystopian satire as it is a psychologically effective form of fantasy. This dissertation has grown out of an analysis of five Gothic novels: Horace Walpole's The Castle o f Otranto, Ann Radcliffe's The Mysteries o f Udolpho, Matthew Lewis's The Monk, Charles Maturin's Melmoth the Wanderer, and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. They best represent the way that Gothic strategies provide a sardonic reflection of bourgeois society and its unacknowledged inheritance; they best convey the tensions (some topical, some universal) which for the most part Gothic deliberately leaves unresolved.Item Open Access The environmental ethic in Wordsworth's poetry(Bilkent University, 1995) Çakırlar, Ali ÖzkanWordsworth's poetry, with its emphasis on the independent existence and consciousness of nature , has a distinctive place in the Romantic movement. His interest in the external world is not, of course, totally new and original. He prefers to take man, nature and society as the main sources and subjects of his poetry. However, the way Words worth handles his themes is revolutionary and unique. Nature, for him, is an in dependent and self - sufficient presence having its own consciousness and the ref ore it is treated exclusively in various parts of his poetry. Man, like other beings, belongs to the larger family of nature in terms of both his individual and social existence. In this context, Words worth's poetry functions as an insistent reminder that man ought to adapt himself as well as his society to the broader order of nature.Item Open Access Failure of love in TSEliot's poems: "Love Song of JAlfred Prufrock", "Portrait of a Lady", "La Figlia che piange", The Waste Land(Bilkent University, 1994) Özyurt, MineThis dissertation aims at pursuing the failure of love theme in T.S. Eliot's above mentioned poems. In the Introduction, poetry- of Eliot, who is one of the most outstanding figures of Modernist Poetry, ttnd the historical-social facts wEich influenced his poetry- are discussed. In the light of the phenomena, which appeared during the First World War and the industrialization, such as Iruman isolation, lack of communication, disbelief ai traditional beliefs and thoughts, how Eliot revealed the failure of love theme in his poems is studied. In the Conclusion, It is pointed out that Eliot's characters, each in his/her prison, are unable to speak and commLinicate; these silent characters hopelessly look tor love which does not exist anv more.Item Open Access Justice delays revenge-The Spanish Tragedy and revenge tradition(Bilkent University, 1991) Kükner, ErhanThe Spanish T r a g e d v . one of the best examples of English Renaissance drama, contributed towards the establishment of the revenge tragedy genre, which gained popularity in the years to come. Kyd in this play not only indicates that when the law is unjust, man will resort to revenge; but also demonstrates that a citizen should obey the ruler and regard revenge as a revolt against the state. Tl-is play tells the story of Hieronimo, who expects the murderer^ of his son to be punished. However, Hieronimo gradually discovers that the institutions of justice are useless and therefore takes revenge. His belief in justice and religious ban on revenge prevent him from taking his revenge. To emphasize this point this thesis will focus on the tradition of revenge; point out the connection between the k i n g ’s authority and revenge; and demonstrate how Hieronimo takes revenge.Item Open Access A kaleidoscope of Harold Pinter's plays(Bilkent University, 1992) Kurtuluş, GülCritics have tried to approach Pinter’s plays from a variety of changing perspectives, which emerge as a result of the playwright’s inventiveness. Pinter who aims at and achieves perhaps the most original innovations in dramatic form best exemplifies the range and diversity of the contemporary English drama. In consequence, he has created a distinctive personal style. Any attempt to make an exhaustive study of Harold Pinter at this stage would be futile; selection was inevitable. This dissertation will concentrate on eight plays by the playwright under discussion to demonstrate the refinement and development of his technique which was unprecedented and therefore shocked everybody in 1960s but is highly appreciated now.Item Open Access Narrative strategies in Ford Madox Ford's Parade's End and The Good Soldier(Bilkent University, 1996) Raw, Meltem KıranIn opposition to theories which gave the author pride of place as the creator of literary works embodying definite meanings, the French thinker Roland Barthes maintained that it was the reader, and not the author, who attached meanings to a text. According to Barthes, the major factor which enabled readers to interpret works of fiction, or to render them "intelligible," was their narrative structure. Following Barthes, the French critic Gérard Genette developed a comprehensive theory of narratives. In the light of Barthes’s views and Genette’s theory, this dissertation will analyse the English novelist Ford Madox Ford’s Parade’s End and The Good Soldier. Both works have narrators who undergo a process of identification with a major character. Through an analysis of the narrative strategies employed by the narrators, the dissertation aims to discuss the implications of this process in the interpretation of these works.Item Open Access Narrative techniques in Doris Lessing's stories and sketches(Bilkent University, 1996) Uzundemir, ÖzlemThe aim of this thesis is to analyze the themes of Doris Lessing's short stories and sketches, with particular reference to the narrative techniques developed mainly by the French Structuralists Roland Barthes and Gerard Genette. Following the introduction where these narrative strategies are discussed, the three developmental chapters of this research - the first dealing with a child or an adolescent's development, the second concerning an adult's experience and the third involving the observation of an outsider - try to prove how "form " clarifies "meaning". This study also tries to demonstrate how Lessing's style has changed from referential stories which have well-organized plot structures and developed characters to sketches having no story line or central characters to disclose the uncertainties of modern societies.Item Open Access Peter Shaffer's obsessional "myths/religions" : Amadeus, Equus and Yonadab from a psychoanalytic point of view(Bilkent University, 1992) Soleimani Ardekani, MaryamThe notion of religion in the western world seems to have undergone a radical change in the twentieth century; the individual, instead of cherishing an orthodox belief in God, has rather preferred to develop a "private myth" of his/her own, which is in fact engendered by the individual's obsessions. Peter Shaffer frequently displays such an obsession with myth/religion in his plays, especially in Amadeus. Equus and Yonadab. In these plays, Shaffer depicts the predicament one finds oneself in once the individual becomes an out cast, when this obsession becomes so eccentric as to make him/her unable to integrate with society.Item Open Access Power and gender in John Webster's tragedies(Bilkent University, 1991) Kıran, MeltemJohn Webster's tragedies The White Devil (1612) and The Duchess of Malfi (1612-13) primarily deal with the spread of corruption in society through the power-politics of the rulers. Every character, regardless of his/her social class, contributes to corruption wittingly or unwittingly, and is destroyed in the end regardless of the motivations -- whether morally good or evil -- on which he/she chooses to act. This dissertation analyses the ways in which the characters are affected by social corruption, but also suggests certain alternatives which may point towards change within the existing social system. In both plays, there are some characters who, by their enlightened view of the workings of corruption, can present a threat to this system. Especially women, who are determined to assert themselves despite the oppressive influence of their patriarchal society, can form potentially subversive alternatives. Webster analyses this through Vittoria in The White Devil and the Duchess in The Duchess of Malfi. This dissertation asserts that Webster proves himself to be a radical dramatist by subtly emphasising the subversive potential of women in society.Item Open Access The relation between the real and the ideal in the odes of John Keats(Bilkent University, 1994) Moghimi, ZöhrehThe great odes--"Ode to Psyche, " "Ode to a Nightingale, " "Ode on a Grecian Urn, " "Ode on Melancholy, " and "To Autumn"--were written in the year 1819, when Keats was approaching his imminent death from tuberculosis. In the odes, the poet presents conflicts, paradoxes, oxymorons, and dualities, the resolution of which is essential in approaching and understanding one of the main themes of the odes, the relation between the real and the Ideal. Once the conflicts are resolved, the reader would be able to understand the main ideas and views presented in each ode and would be able to trace Keats's development as a poet. Keats's early experiences play an important role in his choice of themes, and it is reasonable to associate the main themes--the transitoriness of life and beauty, the inevitability of change and death, and the relation between the physical and the spiritual--with the different events of the poet's childhood and adulthood. To cite an instance, the death of his parents, and later that of his brother, as well as his love relation with Fanny Brawne, influenced him deeply. To Keats, life is a series of complementary contradictions which are functions of each other; thus, he never overlooks the real in order to reach the ideal. In the earlier odes- "Ode to Psyche, " "Ode to a Nightingale, " and "Ode on a Grecian Urn"--the poet tries to combine the real and the ideal realms because one has liveliness and the other permanence. In the later odes--"Ode on Melancholy" and "To Autumn"--he accepts life and its process of change, and he presents death as a natural phenomenon. Keats's development as a poet can be traced when we consider the differences among the odes, but they are similar in spirit and quality. They all examine the real and the ideal through presenting striking images and sound effects, which are coupled with the rich tones of the ode form.Item Open Access Religious prejudices and economic interests in Christopher Marlowe's The Jew of Malta(Bilkent University, 1991-01) Çakırlar, Ali ÖzkanMarlowe's The Jew of Malta is a significant example in the transition from the Morality Plays to a period of more developed and mature drama in the Elizabethan period. The themes that Marlowe handles and the hero he presents in the play emerge as aspects of a distinctive approach to dramatic representation and to the concept of drama of that time. First of all, Marlowe throws light upon religious conflicts among different communities and emphasizes the raison d'etre lying behind the long standing 'holy' prejudices. Secondly he sees and interprets the world as a whole functioning through certain principles one of which is the inevitable priority of the economic interests. This theme is reflected through two channels: imperialism on a macrocosmic level and economic domination of the Jewish community in Malta on a microcosmic level. Finally, the hero, Barabas, is another original creation within the tradition of the Elizabethan drama with his vitality and multidimensionality. This thesis centers mainly on these three points and tries to show underlying interconnections among them. For this reason, there are supporting chapters as well as the fundamental ones designed to explore the relationships between religious enmity, Machiavellism, and economic interests in the Elizabethan time. MLA style sheet has been followed throughout the thesisItem Open Access The theme of divided consciousness in Ibsen's later plays(Bilkent University, 1994) Berk Küsmenoğlu, TubaIbsen employs several techniques in his plays and each of these serves an essential purpose— the examination of the nature of consciousness. Hence, an analysis of this theme is crucial to the better understanding of Ibsen's plays. This study is confined to Ibsen's later plays The Master Builder (1892), Little Evolf (1894), John Gabriel PQrKman (1896) and When We Dead Awaken (1899) which are closely related in their sub-group. These psychologically oriented plays exhibit the concept of 'disintegrated' and the 'split' personality. The 'divided vision of self' in these plays is revealed by the exploration of the concept of 'consciousness'.Item Open Access Which nightmare to choose? : A study of Heart of Darkness(Bilkent University, 1991) Tul, RuhicanThis sludy of Conrad’s lioarl of aims aL a close Lextual ¿inalysis of tlie relaLionship between Marlow and Kurtz, ttie two main cluiracters of the novel, and of the role civilisation plays in determining tlie fate of that relationship in the light Freudian theory sheds on the problems that arise from a reading of the novel. Chapter one is an examination of an introductory nature. Attention is focused on previous liteг¿ıгy criticism on He/yrt u£ Darkness, and on what Freud himself has to say on the nature of civilisation and the indiv idual.. Chapter two aims at a close textucil analysis of the novel, particular attention being given to Mcirlow, wlio, after embarking on a journey in need of an assertion of his individuality, experiences a curious transformation of liis feelings during tlie journey. Chapter three t.iikos up wliere Chapter l:wo leaves off. Attcnition is now focused; first on the identification between Marlow and Kurtz, secondly on Marlow’s rejection of wl)at Kurtz stands for, and lastly on his return to civilisat.ion. Chapter four is a discussion and a summary of what has been said of the relationship l)etween Miirlow and Kurtz, and of the effect of civilisation on that relationsliip.Item Open Access Women in Love as a polyphonic novel(Bilkent University, 1991) Uzundemir, ÖzlemLawrence’s critics have tended to analyse his novel Women in Love by explaining what the novel "means", and treating the author as an omniscient presence, who organises the plot and the characterisation. This type of approach cjm appear dogmatic; and fails to demonstrate the unique qualities of this novel. The purpose of this thesis is to show how Women in Love dispenses with the convention of the omniscient narrator; for this purpose, I shall use the theories of lamguage and novel advanced by the Russian formalist Mikhail Bakhtin. In Problems of Dostoevsky’s Poetics and The Dialogic Imagination Bakhtin outlines the characteristics of what he calls a "polyphonic" novel in which the protagonists reveal information pertaining to their history, personality, environment, etc. through dialogue, without the intervention of the author. This foregrounding of dialogue is what renders the novel polyphonic; as in everyday language the words of a character are directed to the words of another character. Although Bakhtin does not deal directly with Women in Love, his theories form an ideal basis for demonstrating its polyphonic qualities. This thesis will Concentrate on the plot, setting and characterisation in relation to Lawrence’s narrative technique, eind will show how the absence of authorial intervention forces the reader to take an active part in the process of interpreting the novel. Consequently, this thesis will also focus on the dialogic aspects of Women in Love, with specific reference to the language and speechpatterns of the characters.