Comedy, Sincerity, and Hypocrisy in the Novel of Ideas

Taunton, Matthew ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9764-7809 (2024) Comedy, Sincerity, and Hypocrisy in the Novel of Ideas. In: The British Novel of Ideas. Cambridge University Press, pp. 341-360. ISBN 9781009086745

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Abstract

Critical discussions of the novel of ideas have often asked us to take seriously the ideas articulated by fictional characters, and assumed that these ideas are sincerely held by those characters. This is in fact a good description of the serious novel of ideas, whose formal dynamics can be mapped onto theories of tragedy by Hegel, Lukács, and David Scott. But often, comedy and hypocrisy disrupt the presumed continuity between public utterances and private convictions or behaviours. This also often involves disrupting essentialist conceptions of identity and group belonging. Through readings of novels by Rose Macaulay, Doris Lessing, Jonathan Coe and Jeanette Winterson, this chapter argues that comic novels of ideas thrive on such discontinuities, diffusing and deflating identity categories as well as tragic collisions, and offering a distinctive orientation towards discursive liberalism as the primary medium of politics.

Item Type:	Book Section
Faculty \ School:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of Literature, Drama and Creative Writing
UEA Research Groups:	Faculty of Arts and Humanities > Research Groups > Modern and Contemporary Writing Research Group
Depositing User:	LivePure Connector
Date Deposited:	13 Nov 2023 18:10
Last Modified:	18 Dec 2024 01:11
URI:	https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/93633
DOI:	10.1017/9781009086745.021

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