Novel
(1) What is Novel?
Earlier novel meant a short story written and collected by Boccaccio (1313-
1375) in his “Decameron”. The shorter Oxford Dictionary (1700) explains that it
is
“A factious
prose narrative of considerable length, in which characters and actions represents
real life and are portrayed in a plot of more or less complexity”.
Today it is a story longer, more realistic and more complicated. At
present, novel is the most widely read of all kinds of literature.
(2) Plato’s objections to art/novel
Is reading a novel waste of time?
Many people seriously think that novel reading is a waste of time. There
are some reasons behind it.
(a) Influence of Plato:-
Plato (427-348 B.C) believed that almost
all literature is imaginative and therefore harmful. Literature leads people to
believe in lies. Shows both men and gods in a bad light and is useless. In
literature the truth is twice removed from reality, because reality presented
in it is not itself real but it is copy of something.
(b) Newness of novel:-
Novel is not as old form as traditional
epics or poetry. Novelist does not ennoble the world but presents it as it is,
with all meanness, dirt, and sexuality. To some people this is their feelings.
They think the novel is intelligent and attractive but has no history, no
tradition and is too ‘young’, too ‘modern’. There are people who think that
some novelists like Richardson and Dickenson were men of poor education, and
they knew not enough Greek or Latin and were not ‘gentlemen’. So their works
were considered as the kind of second.
(c) Few-examples of good Novels:
Today a growing number of novels are unfortunately simply sadistic or pornographic;
few serious novels are to be found. Publishers are interested in money as some
writers are. In doing so, many people are misled like the novel ‘Lady
Chatterley`s Lover’ by D. H. Lawrence.
(3) What novelists do?
The telling of a story remains the
important things in a novel. Novelists do it in different way.
1] The novelist is interested in
characters and motives as well as in events.
2] The novelist is often interested
in stating some moral or social problem and expressing own opinions about
it.
3] The novelist is sometimes more
interested in creating an atmosphere of expressing some kind of poetic feeling
than in telling a story.
4] The novelist wishes to take a much
wider view of man and the world than the simple storyteller does.
(4) Background of the novel:-
(a) Long Narrative Poems-
The history of English novel may be
said to start in 1740 with the publication of Richardson`s ‘Pamela’. It is considered the first novel of
English Literature. But before that many attempts were made. Chaucer`s ‘Troilus and Criseyde’ is a long story poem
misleading to call its description as of a novel. Thomas Malory`s ‘Morte d`
Arthur ’ has broad vision but not a single stretch of novel is seen.
(b)Romance:
In ‘Romance’, the adventures were very far away from real life. It was
written in a highly artificial kind of prose set against a classical or
pastoral background and people with heroes and heroin bearing Greek or Latin
names. Such books were intended for educated people. Sir Philip Sidney`s
‘Arcadia’ (1590), John Lily`s ‘Euphues’ (1578) and Robert Greene`s ‘Menaphon’
(1589) are such examples.
(c) Picaresque tradition:-
‘Picaro’ is a Spanish word meaning ‘a thief’ or ‘a rogue’. It was
applied to any long story in which a number of separate events, sometimes comic
and sometimes violent were joined together only by the fact that they happened
to the chief character. In this tradition, the hero generally is a ‘rough’, ‘a
Picaro’. Now far that ‘anti-hero’ that kind of phrase is used. The most famous among
them is Cervantes’s ‘Don Quixote’. Other examples are Fielding`s ‘Tom Jones’,
Smollett`s ‘Roderick Random’.
(5) Different methods for novels:-
The novelist can allow himself almost
unlimited time in which to build up his characters set his scene and tell his
story. If he wishes, he can also include long explanations of his own
philosophy and opinion. Therefore, we get long novels many times. In modern period,
the length is not attractive and considered. The novelists use different
methods to tell his story.
(a) Omniscient view (plain narration):
Plain narration is simple method of storytelling. He takes omniscient view.
It means he will not only describe the outward behaviour and action of his
characters but also their thoughts and feelings. In this respect, we have to
believe that the novelist knew everything.
(b) ‘I’ method:-
There is another method of telling a story in the first person singular
by a narrator. He himself refers as ‘I’. Using this method a writer may make
his story more realistic and more credible but he will not be able to look very
deeply into the minds and the motives of the other characters. ‘David
Copperfield’ by Dickens is fine example of this method.
(c) Narration by letters:-
Sometimes a novelist will choose to
tell his story through a series of letters. This method has advantages and
disadvantages both. Richardson`s ‘Pamela’ and ‘Clarissa Harlowe’ belong to it.
(d) Conversation:-
To advance the story, the novelist may
choose conversation between two characters. But for realistic conversation the
novelist should take too much care in hearing the poken language because
different characters speak different dialects.
(e) Stream of consciousness:-
Some modern novelist like James Joyce
and Virginia Woolf used this method. It is ‘interior monologue’. Psychology of
character is revealed. There may not be chronological order in events. Readers
may be puzzled ‘Ulysses’ by Joyce and ‘Light House’ by Virginia Woolf are best
examples.
(6) The novels in modern times:-
Modern novels are no better and no
worse than novels written in the past. Of course, we can say that one finds
numbers of novels and variety of subjects. In this sense, there are novels of
different kind and subject.
(a) War novels:-
In the history of our century, war and violence have been tragically
important. First and Second world wars gave new formula to the novels. In
England, Richard Aldington`s ‘Death of the Hero’ shows physical and mental
horror of the wars. During the second war Evelyn Waugh (1903-66) gave ‘The
Sword of Honour’ Outside England some novels were very famous e.g. E.M.
Remarque`s ‘All Quite on the Western Front’, Henri Barbusse`s ‘Under Fire’,
Norman Mailer`s ‘The Naked and the Dead’. Herman Wouk`s ‘The Caine Muting ’.
(b) River Novels
This kind of novel flows on and on through a number of books tracing the
history of a single character or a group of characters. Usually each part can
be enjoyed as a separate book ‘The Forsyte Saga’ a single novel consists of
three novels : ‘The Man of Property’,
‘In Chancery’ and ‘To let’.
Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) made
famous the historical novels. It can offer an escape from reality. The value of
a historical novel does not depend on its factual truth. Robert Graves is as
much a historian as a novelist. His work include ‘I’, ‘Claudius’, Claudius the
‘Good’, ‘Count Belisarius’. Henry Trace wrote number of the historical novels.
Evelyn Waugh`s ‘Helena’ and Golding`s ‘The Spire’ belong to this category.
(d) Allegorical Novels:
They are called as ‘visionary’, ‘apocalyptic ’or ‘Fanciful novels’. It
does not intend of reflect life as it actually is, but as it might be. Science
fiction, moral tables, is included in it. Anti-Utopia world becomes the setting
of a novel. H.G. Wells ‘Mr. Polly’ and ‘Kipps’, Huxley`s ‘Brave New World’,
Oewell`s ‘Nineteen Eighty Four’, Golding`s ‘Lord of the flies’ are such
examples are many great novelists. We shall remember them because in a line or
paragraph is not justifiable to novelists like D.H. Lawrence, Maugham, H.E.
Bates, C. Irewood, Iris Murdoch etc. There are also Dickens, Thackeray and the
four wheels of novels - Richardson, Fielding Sterne and Smallet. Graham Greene
and American novelists like Steinbeck, Faulkner and lots of others can not be
forgotten. They made novel ‘glorified’ and ‘attractive’.