Indirect ethical communication in the novel : Henry Fielding's Tom Jones

Operating on the Platonic assumption that man possesses truth within, Fielding developed as aesthetic which allows the ethically committed author to act upon his reader to bring this ethical potential into his consciousness. Fielding shifts the focal point of reader attention away from the level of character and action to the narrator and the process of writing. He replaces empathetic involvement with awareness of response by employing deliberate artificialities of form. These (like Brecht's "Alienation-effects") interrupt the reader's involved attention, allowing him to see through the action to larger patterns of reality behind. Fielding's avowed enemy is affectation, which he ridicules wherever it's found, attempting to remove the mists of false knowledge from his reader's eyes. He attacks affectation in the reader, encouraging him to make stock responses to problems, then demonstrating the ethical inadequacy of such responses. Fielding's comic aesthetic encourages the reader to make an inward turning, to recognize his natural potnetial for good within.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts (M.A.)

Level thesis:degree_level

Master's

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

English

Grantor dc:publisher

Carleton University

Year dc:date.issued

1978

Author dc:creator

• Berland, Kevin Joel Holland

Statement dc:rights

• Copyright © 1978 the author(s). Theses may be used for non-commercial research, educational, or related academic purposes only. Such uses include personal study, research, scholarship, and teaching. Theses may only be shared by linking to Carleton University Institutional Repository and no part may be used without proper attribution to the author. No part may be used for commercial purposes directly or indirectly via a for-profit platform; no adaptation or derivative works are permitted without consent from the copyright owner.

Language dc:language.iso

en

DOI

10.22215/etd/1978-12315

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:carleton.scholaris.ca:20.500.14718/27349