The Application of Derrida's Ideas of Mourning and deferral of meaning to Brontes's Shirley and Villette

Download

index.pdf

Date

2012

Author

Ronaghzadeh, Samindokht

Metadata

Show full item record

Item Usage Stats

194
views

73
downloads

This thesis will try to carry out a Derridean approach to Charlotte Brontë's two last, important, and mature novels: Shirley and Villette. From among all Derridean concepts, the idea of deferral of meaning and mourning are chosen to be investigated through close reading of the selected novels. The aim is to make clear the unexplored thoughts, meanings and feelings found in Brontë's texts, using Derrida's philosophical ideas as a tool. Many interpretations will be exposed for the progression of the stories in Shirley and Villette, and for the nature of the characters, both men and women. This process will demonstrate the endless deferral of meaning and the way the characters mourn for the eternal absence of those they love. The thesis is not just about the deferral of Brontë's intended meaning, but also about the deferral of the meanings of all words and concepts which ultimately make the meaning unattainable or always absent.

Subject Keywords

Mourning customs in literature.

URI

http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/12614845/index.pdf
https://hdl.handle.net/11511/21825

Collections

Graduate School of Social Sciences, Thesis

Suggestions

OpenMETU
Core

The changing portrayal of women in the novels of Anne Bronte, Charlotte Bronte, George Eliot and D.H. Lawrence Korkmaz, Ayşegül; Coşkunoğlu Bear, Ayten; Department of English Language Teaching (2009) This thesis analyses the women characters in four novels, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, Shirley, The Mill on the Floss and Sons and Lovers. The first chapter gives information on the historical background of the Victorian period and early 20th century in England in which the novels were written, on the biography of the authors of the novels and clarifies the aim and methodology of the study. The following chapters analyse the women charaters - Helen Huntingdon, Shirley Keeldar, Maggie Tulliver and Clara Dawe...
The relationship between the individual and nature in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poems Bal, Reyyan; Sönmez, Margaret Jeanne M.; Department of English Literature (2004) This thesis analyses the individual-nature relationship in Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poems. It begins with an overview of Coleridge's inconsistent views on the subject, as reflected in his prose writings, and explains the personal reasons behind such inconsistencies. The thesis then asserts that despite the inconsonant views expressed in his prose writings, Coleridge's poems display a consistent view of the individual-nature relationship. According to this view, the relationship is constituted of three cons...
The Use of Literary Metamorphosis in Clarice Lispector and Sevim Burak Yıldız Bağçe, Hülya (2019-06-01) This essay discusses two texts by two literary avant-garde women writers in terms of their use of literary metamorphosis. Although coming from different geographical, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds, interestingly, Turkish author Sevim Burak (1931-1983) and Brazilian author Clarice Lispector (1920-1977) share a common interest in their tendency towards the modernist aesthetic geared towards an experimental literary style. This essay aims to bring Lispector's experimental novel The Passion According to ...
Mythmaking in progress: plays by women on female writers and literary characters Uçar Özbirinci, Pürnur; Çileli, Fatma Meral; Department of English Literature (2007) This thesis analyzes the process of women’s mythmaking in the plays written by female playwrights. Through writing the lives of female writers and rewriting the literary characters, which have been created by male writers, the women playwrights assume the role of a mythmaker. A mythmaker possesses the power to use the ‘word,’ thereby possesses the power to control ‘reality.’ However, for centuries, women have been debarred from generating their own myths, naming their own experiences, and controlling their ...
The Construction of female identity in Timberlake Wertenbaker's The Grace of Mary Traverse and The Break of Day Öztürk, Gülüzar; Çileli, Fatma Meral; Department of Foreign Language Education (2012) This thesis aims to analyse the construction of female identity from the beginning of the feminist activism in Victorian era whose rationale was formed during the eighteenth century, to the contemporary times in terms of patriarchy and motherhood in Timberlake Wertenbaker’s The Grace of Mary Traverse and The Break of Day. This study is conducted with the historical development of the feminist movement that has had different agendas at different periods of history being taken into account. Fighting for women...

Citation Formats

S. Ronaghzadeh, “The Application of Derrida’s Ideas of Mourning and deferral of meaning to Brontes’s Shirley and Villette,” M.S. - Master of Science, Middle East Technical University, 2012.