Kylee-Anne Hingston
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781789620757
- eISBN:
- 9781789629491
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Liverpool University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3828/liverpool/9781789620757.003.0002
- Subject:
- Literature, 19th-century Literature and Romanticism
This chapter argues that Victor Hugo’s historical Gothic novel Notre-Dame de Paris (1831)—especially in its popular English translation, Hunchback of Notre Dame (1833)—set a precedent in Victorian ...
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This chapter argues that Victor Hugo’s historical Gothic novel Notre-Dame de Paris (1831)—especially in its popular English translation, Hunchback of Notre Dame (1833)—set a precedent in Victorian fiction for investigating the disabled body through narrative form and focalization. The chapter shows how Hugo uses external focalization from a perspective outside the narrative action to portray the disabled body as grotesque and thus inherently deviant but uses strategic internal focalization through characters inside the narrative to destabilize the boundaries between normalcy and abnormality. In particular, focalizing externally on Quasimodo, Hugo separates reader empathy from him and dehumanizes his body; but focalizing through Quasimodo forces readers to share his embodiment, removing the distinction between self and other. Moreover, the chapter contends that the novel’s structural hybridity, which combines disparate genres, enables the dialogic conflict of these two opposing voices and so provides a structural prototype whereby Victorian novels approached disability.Less
This chapter argues that Victor Hugo’s historical Gothic novel Notre-Dame de Paris (1831)—especially in its popular English translation, Hunchback of Notre Dame (1833)—set a precedent in Victorian fiction for investigating the disabled body through narrative form and focalization. The chapter shows how Hugo uses external focalization from a perspective outside the narrative action to portray the disabled body as grotesque and thus inherently deviant but uses strategic internal focalization through characters inside the narrative to destabilize the boundaries between normalcy and abnormality. In particular, focalizing externally on Quasimodo, Hugo separates reader empathy from him and dehumanizes his body; but focalizing through Quasimodo forces readers to share his embodiment, removing the distinction between self and other. Moreover, the chapter contends that the novel’s structural hybridity, which combines disparate genres, enables the dialogic conflict of these two opposing voices and so provides a structural prototype whereby Victorian novels approached disability.
Gabriel Miller
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780813142098
- eISBN:
- 9780813142371
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Kentucky
- DOI:
- 10.5810/kentucky/9780813142098.003.0002
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter summarizes Wyler's early years in silent films, noting his work as a “gofer” on The Hunchback of Notre Dame (with Lon Chaney) and as an assistant director on the silent version of ...
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This chapter summarizes Wyler's early years in silent films, noting his work as a “gofer” on The Hunchback of Notre Dame (with Lon Chaney) and as an assistant director on the silent version of Ben-Hur. The chapter also touches on the various two-reel and five-reel silent westerns he directed. Wyler's themes and versatility are examined in two late silent works, The Shakedown, an early example of the gangster film, and The Love Trap, a social comedy with feminist and societal overtones that touches on unemployment, class, and the exploitation of women. Most of the chapter concentrates, however, on Wyler's first important works, Hell's Heroes and A House Divided. The first was Universal's first all-sound film and was made almost entirely on location. Based on the popular novel, The Three Godfathers, Wyler's version minimizes the original's sentimental and religious overtones to fashion a grim story about sacrifice, suffering, and death. A House Divided, a variation on O’Neill's Desire Under the Elms, is Wyler's first thematic examination of a love triangle. Both films feature early signs of Wyler's patented visual style — both are stark, grim, and realistic.Less
This chapter summarizes Wyler's early years in silent films, noting his work as a “gofer” on The Hunchback of Notre Dame (with Lon Chaney) and as an assistant director on the silent version of Ben-Hur. The chapter also touches on the various two-reel and five-reel silent westerns he directed. Wyler's themes and versatility are examined in two late silent works, The Shakedown, an early example of the gangster film, and The Love Trap, a social comedy with feminist and societal overtones that touches on unemployment, class, and the exploitation of women. Most of the chapter concentrates, however, on Wyler's first important works, Hell's Heroes and A House Divided. The first was Universal's first all-sound film and was made almost entirely on location. Based on the popular novel, The Three Godfathers, Wyler's version minimizes the original's sentimental and religious overtones to fashion a grim story about sacrifice, suffering, and death. A House Divided, a variation on O’Neill's Desire Under the Elms, is Wyler's first thematic examination of a love triangle. Both films feature early signs of Wyler's patented visual style — both are stark, grim, and realistic.
