| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立彰化師範大學 === 英語學系 === 95 === This thesis intends to reconsider Aldous Huxley’s 1928 novel Point Counter Point in terms of Mikhail Mikhailovich Bakhtin’s notions of polyphonic novels. The thesis is divided into six chapters.
The first chapter generally introduces the special features of Point Counter Point, reviews the previous studies of the novel, and briefly describes the methodology, the motivation of the present study, and each chapter of the thesis.
Chapter Two is an elaboration of Bakhtin’s dialogism and notions of polyphonic novels. It contains three sections. The first section introduces Bakhtin’s fundamental concept of language as the basis of his dialogism. The second section is an elaboration of Bakhtin’s notions of the novel and the novelistic discourse. The third section is about Bakhtin’s notions of polyphony. According to Bakhtin, the polyphonic features of a novel can be examined in the dialogic relation in three aspects: characterization and the position of the author with regard to the character, the position of the idea, and the nature of the discourse.
The third chapter analyzes the characterization and the position of the author with regard to the character in Point Counter Point. The fourth chapter examines the special position of idea in Point Counter Point, including the inseparability of the idea and its carrier as well as the dialogic nature of the ideas. The fifth chapter investigates the discourse in Point Counter Point, focusing on the double-voiced discourse in Point Counter Point, in which the dialogic relationship between author and characters is revealed. The final chapter concludes that judging by the features discovered in the characterization, ideas, and discourse in Point Counter Point, the novel can be regarded as a polyphonic novel.
This discovery of the thesis helps to reevaluate Huxley’s arrangements of the idea in characterization and in plot construction as well as the multiplicity of viewpoints represented in the novelistic discourses. It may also helps to reaffirm Huxley’s right to be placed among the major novelists of the century, which has been questioned by some critics who held negative views of the special features in Point Counter Point.
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