dissertation · SHAREOK (University of Oklahoma) · 2016
Braid
Choa-te, Donna
Cited by 0Open access
Abstract
James, they have no "pictorial sense" because "they are only clean and stiff and stupid" (957), merely mannequins.To be effective, flat characters must be "contrasted, confronted, juxtaposed" with "pictorial" characters such as the common London girl who lives in a hovel and the poorly clothed Italian with garlic on his breath.In "The Real Thing," Henry James stresses that beginning from the early germination of an idea, the writer must present a realistic picture.The entire fiction must be a picture or a series of pictures.James states, fiction "must illustrate something.God knows that's enough--if the thing does illustrate" (957).The Braid is a sequence of picturespictures that are not air brushed to conceal the stretch marks on Lily's stomach, or Sister Melvina's large bottom in its maroon jersey dress spread along the piano bench.My purpose in The Braid is, like Henry James' purpose, to provide "an intense illusion of reality."According to James, the mere illusion of reality is inadequate.Illusions of reality are innumerable.The writer-artist must make choices among the many illusions of reality, finding those that are worthy of being intensified (Booth 44).Well-chosen "illustrations" result in achieving an intensity of illusion that "genuine life has been presented" ( 44 ).Thus, in the illustration of the right pictures, intensity becomes magnified with the juxtaposition of common objects and dramatic situations .. One illusion of reality is "emotional reality."The writer desires the expression of emotions in his work for the purpose of closing the distance between the reader and the narrative.Consequently, the reader will identify with the narrator.The "objective correlative," or finding the right "set of objects, a situation, a chain of events," evokes an intensity of emotions, according to T. S. Eliot (qtd in Burroway 322).The desired specific emotional effects depend on the objects, situations, and events of a particular V work.The reality of the situation pictured in The Braid is the Quail Run Trailer Park with its stale mediocrity.It's the too-long plastic floral curtains dragging on the floor at the kitchen window, the glass-ringed stains on a cheap maple coffee table.The backdrop of the detailed mundane brings characters to life.How do they emotionally confront their socio-economic status, exemplified by Lily's careful counting of the money in the Mason jar, during this time period immediately before and during the Vietnam War in western Arkansas?Do they, like Norvin, complacently envision a lifetime of fried Spam, beer, and sprawling on the couch, although he later gets called to the front lines?Or do they, like Lily, cut off the bottoms of the sagging plastic curtains and make tiebacks?Pictures are not always beautiful, but the details in the pictures appear to be the truth.Concerning his use of the stream of consciousness technique as a method of presenting accurate and realistic characters, James Joyce states "the artist has no interest in making his works religious, moral, beautiful, or ideal; he wants only to make it truthful .... "(qtd in Ellman 49).The antiaesthetic must be included with the aesthetic to be true to human nature.In On Humor, Luigi Pirandello calls the writer of anti-aestheticism a humorist, stating that the humorist writer sees the king, normally viewed in all his splendor--"his crown, sceptre, and mantle of purple and ermine"-
Cite this paper
Choa-te, D. (2016). Braid. SHAREOK (University of Oklahoma).
Choa-te, Donna. “Braid.” SHAREOK (University of Oklahoma), 2016.
Choa-te, Donna. 2016. “Braid.” SHAREOK (University of Oklahoma).
Choa-te, D. (2016) ‘Braid’, SHAREOK (University of Oklahoma).
@phdthesis{choate2016braid,
title = {{Braid}},
author = {Choa-te, Donna},
school = {SHAREOK (University of Oklahoma)},
year = {2016}
}Made from the index record. Check names, capitalisation and page numbers against the paper. Need another style? AI for Research has over 10,000.