Indeterminate relationship between Sterne, Tristram and readers.doc

1、1Indeterminate relationship between Sterne, Tristram and readersAbstract. This paper will analyze the identities of Sterne, his two spokesmen ? Tristram and Yorick, and the reader of this novel to show their indeterminate identities and the indeterminate relationship between them. Keywords: Sterne,

2、Tristram Shandy, Indereminate 1. Laurence Sterne and His Novel ? Tristram Shandy Laurence Sterne was a prophet. Like most prophets he has appeared before the traditional critics in the appearance of madness. To some of his madness has seemed to share in the imagined divinity of the poet. To others i

3、t has partaken of satanic confusion and chaos. Surely many would agree that his vision has been achieved in our own time, but even they must agree that the validity of the vision has still to be conformed. Tristram Shandy can be seen as the Finnegans Wake of the eighteenth century, and it remains as

4、 paradoxical to its sympathizers and as distasteful to the traditional critics as it was at the time of its publication in 1759. The paradox begins, not unsuitably, in that very area to 2which the critic frequently turns first: the attitude, the personality, the life, of the author. Laurence Sterne

5、is not the least unknown of his own creations, and to differentiate between the man and the creation is a different task. Sterne never created a more successful paradox than that indeterminate image of himself which he constantly transmuted in the distorting mirror of his art. Like the wise fool, th

6、e fascinating court jester, Sterne lives curiously without a private life, the quality of his interior self only implied by his public statements. He is acceptable as a social critic because he confronts society as a criticized, eccentric and solitary, without place or investment. It is not surprisi

7、ng, then, that Sterne presents his own personae, Tristram and Yorick, as jester figures. They are the proper spokesman for he idea that “everything in the world is big with jest, - and has wit in it, and instruction too, if we can but find it out.” (p.275) It is as jester that Tristram speaks when h

8、e explains, “I sat down to write my life for the amusement of the world, and my opinions for its instruction” (p.152). To instruct and to amuse: these are the jesters functions. But Sterne, Tristram, and the jester all knew that it would be not enough to amuse alone, intolerable to instruct 3directl

9、y. They could only instruct by amusing and to do this they had to lead their audiences into contradiction, force them to participate with insults, riddles, ambiguity, cajolery, and love. They had to set problems for which there might be no single answer. All of life, Sterne seems to say, is an irony

10、; each man who lives it is an ironist ? his functioning largely unconscious ? for he constructs the mysteries of those appearances which are extensions of himself. But each man is therefore his own enemy, victim of the ironist within, alienated as he attempts to uncover the secret of his own identit

11、y as well as the identities of others. To write as Sterne does is to consciously imitate life while standing apart from it. It is because the ironist as jester, not totally part of society, not completely human. Sterne creates Tristram, who stands between the writer and the reader, the creator and t

12、he interpreter, ironist and the victim. In him, on a human and unreliable level, both partial selves come together, living and writing are joined in the same mysterious function. Tristram Shandy is, then, a surprising reflection of reality, of its discontinuity as well as its coherence. It is an ela

13、borately formed complex of interrelated ironic patterns which belong to the fundamental ironic concept. The purpose of 4this study of Sternes indeterminate writing method is to consider the sources of Sternes vision and his expression through the novels forms, characters, and themes. But the final w

14、ord will belong to the creator rather than to the interpreter. It is for him to point to the final truth: “But Tristram Shandy, my friend, was made and formed to baffle all criticism ? and I will venture to rest the book on this ground, - that it is either above the power or beneath the attention of

15、 any critic or hyper-critic whatsoever.”25 2. Relationship shared by Sterne, Tristram and readers The complicated relationship shared by Sterne, Tristram and the reader is a primary source of the novels ambiguity. It is also the basic source of its brilliance. Sterne constructed this relationship so

16、 that it would allow him to comment upon the possibilities of rhetorical and artistic expression. He constructed it in such a way that it would demonstrate the nearly insurmountable difficulties of communication while allowing him to come over these difficulties himself by the power of his art. Ster

17、ne plays three roles. As psychological novelist he interests himself in the uniqueness of the individuals behavior and mode of communication. As satirist he is concerned 5both with the patterns of social behavior and the forms of social thought. Finally, as philosopher he measures the reality agains

18、t the ideal. The psychologist offers his “why”: the motivation, the cause, the compulsion. The satirist ironically describes the “is” while implying the “ought to be.” The philosopher undercuts both with a radical query: what are the limitations of men when compared with limitations of man? Tristram

19、 is Sternes partial spokesman. His acknowledged purpose is to tell his own life and opinions. He addresses himself critically to the attitudes and eccentricities of society and, therefore, shares Sternes satirical purpose. As autobiographer he is a character in Sternes novel. As both man-as-artist a

20、nd social critic in search of himself, as the exposer of false forms and the would-be creator of order, he is caught in the empiricist trap, sharing some of Sternes insights and purposes, but without Sternes ideas. By giving us a narrator whose unreliability is developed on various levels, Sterne cr

21、eates an image of multiplicity, contradiction, and confusion, a sense of human illusion and self-decent. There is, first of all, Tristrams own awareness of the division between himself as fictional character and himself as writer: “was not that my OPINIONS will be the 6death of me, I perceive I shal

22、l lead a fine life of it out of this self-same life of mine; or, in other words, shall lead a couple of fine lives together” (p.202). The illusion of immediacy and reality which is flawed by the division of roles is flawed still further by the fact that Tristram does not remain consistently on a sin

23、gle level of explanation and perception. His idea varies. He speaks with changing degrees of intensity. His responses are at time emotional, repeatedly ironic. When he reports events that do not directly influence his own life, he does not always attempt to justify his knowledge but accepts without

24、question the poison of omniscient author. While it is possible to find these inconsistencies in Sternes failure to detach himself adequately from his persona, they can also be seen, and are indeed felt, as an appropriate part of a generally eccentric personality. Tristrams personal inconsistencies a

25、re a force for order because his major difficulty (that he is an undefined and unknown fragment of an undefinable and unknowable universe) allows for the subsumption of all paradox. Nor is it astonished that Tristrams work should partake of this same confusion ? defying eluding understanding and cla

26、ssification. He is able neither to decide upon the aesthetic values he would be like 7his novel to embody, nor to choose an image of himself suitable for presentation to the reader. His search and his art for self-knowledge are mutually dependent: creation and discovery of reciprocal conditions. In

27、the empiricists world, which has as its center the eccentric, unique, and flawed consciousness of each observer, there can be no absolutes. It is natural that Tristram sees himself at the same time as pitiful victim of his circumstances and the careful master of his art. He can create the illusion o

28、f control. He can exercise the techniques of art and the methods of self-analysis, but at every moment he is crossed by the ungovernable fact of multiplicity. There can be no question as to the nature of the person with whom Tristram must cope. He is representative of the imperceptive critic who is

29、responsible for the uneasy path which Tristram must follow as a novelist. He is representative of the society which is satirically judged in Tristrams “opinions.” He is representative also of unintentional but blamable offenders who, by the very nature of their own prejudices and peculiarities, have

30、 been the causes of Tristrams eccentricities and inabilities. “Madam” and “Sir” are the “unlearned reader” who, it is taken for granted, can not recognize a reference to Rabelais. They are the unimaginative readers, interested in the 8simple facts and descriptions of Tristrams Grant Tour. They are t

31、he completely egocentric readers who, with Tristrams mother, have only one point of reference against which to measure the world. 3. Another spokesman of Sterne ? Yorick Yorick is the village parson and a friend of the Shandy family. He is an oddly humorous man, with many eccentricities. Yoricks unf

32、ortunate wit makes many enemies. It is important to note that Yorick is often identified as Sternes self-portrayal or, more exactly, the public figure of Sterne as a clergyman, while Tristram would be Sterne, the personality. Yorick is a humorous character, who does not care for gravity and seriousn

33、ess. He mocks serious individuals only to anger his enemies. Although he never accepts that a joke can bring hostility, revenge of those who held grudges delivered him to an early death. Yoricks odd behavior, and the tale of his pathetic horse, gives a Cervantic suggestion. Actually, in his telling

34、of Yoricks story, Sterne makes many allusions to Don Quixote and his horse, Rocinante. Furthermore, Yorick is also the name of the dead jester in Shakespeares Hamlet. Upon going to London, Sterne assumed Yoricks name and behavior. 9It is through his identities of both Tristram and Yorick with the fi

35、gure of jester that Sterne draws the closest parallel between them. As jesters they share a love of laughter, as sense of the absurd, a dislike of all that is not honest, a verbal dexterity and lively wit, and recognition of individual eccentricity and social affectation. Further, both are brought t

36、o a level of tragic-comic seriousness and given universal reference by their closeness to death: the association of Yorick with Hamlets fool, who is himself a symbol of the impermanence of human values; Tristrams omnipresent sense of a fatal illness and, therefore, of the transitory. There is an imp

37、ortant difference here, however, for Tristram and Yorick are both types of the wise fool whose mockery covers sense. Tristram alone is victimized by his own wit. Yorick shares Tristrams critical awareness, his understanding of paradox, his psychological talent. But he is not limited by Tristrams obs

38、essive concern with ambiguity. His style and his associations are controlled and direct. Therefore, he cannot, like the brothers Shandy, he betrayed by the subjectivity within, by a difference between his aspirations and his means of achieving them. It is for this reason that Yorick has no need of a

39、 hobbyhorse; his mount is real, although pathetic. 10Instead, he is betrayed by the subjectivity without ? a victim of the relativity and unreliability of opinion and judgment. Although Yorick can meaningfully organize his own ideas, these have not effect on the behavior of others. For the majority,

40、 appearance (variously perceived) is real. It is Yoricks understanding of the values that covers appearance that is cause of his separation from the community which he would serve. References 1 Anderson, Howard. Tristram Shandy: An Authoritative Text, the Author on the Novel, Criticism. New York: W.

41、 W. Norton & Co., 1980. 2 Bagehot, Walter. Literary Studies. London: Dent, 1891. 3 Cross, Wilbur L. The Life and Times of Laurence Sterne. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1929. 4 Erickson, Robert A. Mother Midnight: Birth, Sex and Fate in Eighteenth Century Fictions. New York: AMS Press, Inc., 1986. 5 Locke, John. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. London: Printed for Thomas Tegg, 1825. 6 Sterne, Laurence. A Sentimental Journey. Paris: Printed for ANT. AUG. Renouard, 1802.