Recent Brontë theses

Some recently presented Brontë theses:

Dwelling and the woman artist in Anne Brontë's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall
By Rebecca Lynn Lupold
The University of Montana, Missoula, MT, Spring 2008

This thesis addresses the Heideggerean notion of dwelling in Anne Brontë’s The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by analyzing the different ways the novel’s protagonist, Helen Huntingdon, adapts to the harsh, sublime landscape of Wildfell Hall and the subsequent relationship that develops between her and Gilbert Markham. Escaping her violent and abusive husband, Helen flees to Wildfell Hall and uses her skills as an artist to support both herself and her son. In the first chapter, late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth century aesthetics of the sublime and the picturesque are evaluated in relation to the aesthetic spaces of the novel. Helen enjoys an intimate connection to the landscape both at Grassdale and Wildfell Hall, and she finds solace and freedom in nature. But the aesthetics of the picturesque both provide a space for Helen and confine her. In the second chapter, these confines will be explored more fully. Helen remains under the gaze of those around her, both the individual males who wish to control her and the community members who try to judge her. The domestic sphere also confines her; the home becomes a site of imprisonment rather than the safe, nurturing space upheld by Victorian society. The second chapter also develops Helen’s role as a sublime heroine, which is analyzed more fully in the third chapter, which primarily focuses on how Helen challenges the norms of the Victorian heroine. Gilbert also challenges the norms for the Victorian hero. Their roles in the novel emphasize reciprocal relationships, both with human beings as well as with the land and animals. The narrative structure of the novel suggests this sort of relationality as well and an analysis of its significance will form a part of the concluding chapter of the thesis.

"Mere Shadows Of Human Forms": Intersections Of Body And Adaptation Theories In Six Screen Versions Of Jane Eyre
by Katharine Zimolzak
Dr. Nancy West, Thesis Director
University of Missouri-Columbia

ABSTRACT
Current scholars of cinematic embodiment recognize limitations in psychoanalytic theories of spectatorship, but their works are still too dependent on theories of the domineering male gaze. These scholars should seek new ways to theorize the female body: we cannot challenge preexisting models if we do not propose new ones. From my work in literature, I have found that body theory intersects with adaptation studies; this conflation has not been widely explored in current scholarship. In this intersection between the two fields of criticism lies a new model for theorizing the body. Filmic bodies transcend the gaze because they are not corporeal, but they are also not static images; they are transient symbols that elude the viewer’s control. In my model, screen bodies represent cultural conflicts of what it means to be a woman, both in the society that produces the adaptation and in the society that produced the adapted text.
I will use Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre for this project because scholars have made much of the novel’s concern with femininity and self-control. However, none of these works addresses how literary bodies have been translated to the screen. I find that conflicts arise not only between written and visual bodies, but also between written and visual media. I argue that body theories resistant to the gaze lie within these conflicts.

Directors as readers and directors as writers: Representations of Heathcliff and Catherine in the full-screen adaptations of Emily Brontë's "Wuthering Heights" (Režissöörid lugejate ja kirjanikena: Heatcliff’i ja Catherine’i tegelaskujud Emily Brontë „Vihurimäe” inglisekeelsetes ekraniseeringutes)
By Anissimova, Olga

Issue Date: 26-Aug-2008
Tartu Ülikool, Estonia

The present thesis offers a framework for studying screen versions of literary works. I propose to look at adaptation as a process during which the director (seen as a collective designation for the film's crew) shapes the novel's raw material (its characters and incidents detached from their linguistic embodiment) not only in a new form, but also into a new content. The latter task has to do with the director's role as a "reader" of the source text and involves the creation of mental character models; the former has to do with his/her function as the "writer" of his/her own cinematic version and involves the expression of mental models through various cinematic means and devices. The value of this framework lies in the fact that it allows to regard every adaptation as a separate work of art and helps avoid the tackling of fidelity issues. I am going to demonstrate the usefulness of this approach by employing it in an analysis of three big-screen English-speaking versions of Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights directed by William Wyler (1939), Robert Fuest (1970) and Peter Kosminsky (1993).
The thesis consists of an introduction, three chapters and teh conclusion. Introduction accommodates an overview of some basic terms, notions and ideas connected witht he theory of adaptation in general. Chapter 1 provides an outline of a number of writer-centered and reader-centered approaches to the category of character in literary theory and suggests ways how these could be adjusted to the discussion of adapted personae created by the director in both his/her capacities. Basing itself on the director's role as a reader, Chapter 2 discusses how each of the screen versions of Wuthering Heights interprets the protagonistic couple of Heathcliff and Catherine and what contexts facilitate such interpretations. Basing itself on the director's function as a writer. Chapter 3 explores how each of the three adaptations constructs the characters of Heathcliff and Catherine through medium-specific means and devices on the screen. The final results of the thesis are presented in the Conclusion.

Categories: Scholar