Social and cultural structures in English litterature: "Mikhael Bakhtin and Jude the Obscure"

Résumé du document

The Bakhtinian analysis of texts allows the reader to realize what an important part language plays in the understanding and interpretation of a novel. He explains how the different forces (centripetal and centrifugal) which drive the writer during his work may be recognized and how heteroglossia is used to convey different meanings to the novel. His particular way of reading texts paying attention to the different registers, and above all to dialogism between utterances highlights the connection between a novel and society. A triangular link is created between the written word, the reader, and society through the centuries. In order to put into practice Bakhtin's theories, we have chosen to study a passage from "Jude the Obscure? by Thomas Hardy dealing with the killing of a pig by Arabella and Jude (Part 1 Chapter X).

Extraits

[...] Every time, there is a negative connotation ; an idea that something is done in the wrong way with the terms lose and waste Thus the reader can feel that money is something very important and necessary for Arabella, for the uneducated class ; whereas Jude does not really care about it, this is a secondary concern for him. This is even clearer when she says : Poor folks must live (l.88). First, the use of the modal shows her personal commitment and the importance of money for her. Then, she highlights the fact that money is a concern of the lower classes. We could make a link between these ideas and the theories of Herbert Spencer and Charles Darwin. [...]

[...] In this passage, we are plunged into the agricultural world of the Victorian society. A couple want to kill their pig to earn money with its meat. We do not expect the protagonists to do it themselves as they do not expect it either ; thus at first, this entry in a more trivial environment also plunges Jude and Arabella in a situation young couples are not to experience. What's interesting here is the reversal of the protagonists' roles at a double level. [...]

[...] By the way, the gap between Arabella, an uneducated woman born in an agricultural world, and Jude is made clear by her when she says : What ignorance not to know that (l.13). Jude's environment has also been influenced by agriculture, yet he has tried very early to make his own education and get out of this world. What is striking in this passage is his humanism. He does not consider the pig as an ordinary animal but as a creature he fed with [his] own hands (l.35). [...]

[...] Later on, he depicts the pig's attitude talking about his look and even his feelings : his glazing eyes riveting themselves on Arabella with the eloquently keen reproach of a creature recognizing at last the treachery of those who had seemed his only friends. (l.57-60). The ambiguity here is clear. The pig is no more an animal, not quite a person. According to the narrator, he expresses his sorrow through his look and even had a consideration for Jude and his wife since he thought they were his friends. If this animal was only considered by the narrator as potential meat, he would not have made such an ambiguous description of the pig. [...]

[...] He does not belong to the agricultural world. He has always been a spectator of his environment : as he had seen the butchers do (l.49). Jude has a more humanist approach of the situation yet he does not totally reject it and feels like it is his duty : I'll do it since it must be done (l.19-20). He does not see the practical way of earning money as does Arabella. We could argue that the books he read gave him this sensitivity ; yet at the beginning of the novel, he refuses to throw pebbles on the birds flying above farmer Troutham's field. [...]