The Use And Function Of The Setting z2h3e

4. The Use and Function of the Setting in British-American Fiction 1. Introduction ⋅ Thesis sentence: In most cases the author chooses a certain kind of setting deliberately, and in such cases its description is emphasised and detailed: the setting may be a very important part of a story because it may add further information and deeper meaning to the story with the help of symbols and it can also set an adequate mood. ⋅ Definition of setting: The overall background against which the action of a narrative takes place: the time, place, physical details, and circumstances in which a situation occurs; settings include the background, atmosphere or environment in which characters live and move, and usually include physical characteristics of the surroundings ⋅ difference between setting and locale: local refers only to the physical background of a story, setting also includes the way of life and general environment of the characters, and the time or period of history in which action takes place ⋅ Literature: Sir Orfeo, Poe – The Fall of the House of Usher 2. Use and Function ⋅ Setting: simple (ancient writings) or elaborate (today’s writings); sometimes relatively unimportant, but can be the most important part of understanding a story ⋅ Common genre specific settings: o Realist > actual places: cities, villages (usually named) o Fantasy > past medieval times, castles, forests, fictitious worlds (fairyland) o Science-fiction > future times/post-apocalyptic, space, planets Uses and function of setting: o The vivid description of a setting enables the reader to depict the story more easily and realistically. o As a shaper of events (in mystery or horror stories, esp.) In stories of men in conflict with nature, the setting (nature) often becomes a character, usually the antagonist (e.g. in Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea). o As an adjunct to the plot and characterizations. It shows important changes and developments. Moving from one place to another shows movement in action. o It adds an emotional quality to the work, an atmosphere or feel, a mood, or contrasts. The setting sets the mood and should put the reader into the right frame of mind to accept what then evolves in the plot. o As an external reflection of the internal state of the character o As a symbol related to the action and its deeper significance.  Symbols in settings: traditional (many of them are easily recognisable) or original (made up by the author > has to be part of the context of the story to take on meaning); symbols can be part of the setting > may be tied directly to the theme of the work; makes the reader understand more about the plot, theme, characters and events > careful readers notice the symbols > they are brought into a story more quickly; 1

[apart from places, the seasons of the year and weather can be symbolic of various meanings, e.g. autumn stands for dying, winter for death  spring for rebirth/new beginning; naming of places/characters can also be symbolic] 3. Relevant Literature a) Sir Orfeo Middle English romance, Breton lay, with Celtic elements In Sir Orfeo, a minstrel retells, this time with an English setting, the age-old story of the love of Orpheus for Eurydice (originally Greek setting), a love so strong that it overcame death. Celtic folklore: Set in a scene rich with Celtic folklore, the poem involves magic and enchantment, a King who loses everything only to regain it after years of suffering, fidelity to spouse and to lord, love, and music. The music of the harp was considered sacred by the Celts and represents harmony; its power is such that it can restore order, even overcoming the fairy King. Parallelism between Orfeo’s kingdom and wife (Heurodis) > he loses both of them, but recovers them in the end Direct parallels between Orfeo’s kingdom and fairyland (typically Celtic blending of reality and otherworld): o Description:  fairyland > “And showed me castles there, and towers, rivers, forests, woods with flowers”  Orfeo’s kingdom > “He, once the lord of castles, towers, rivers, forests, woods with flowers”  As opposed to the original story: Fairyland instead of Hades (+ happy ending) o Social hierarchy: king, queen, knights (even their numbers are the same: 1000), subjects Traditional symbolic setting: o Traciens: the kingdom of Sir Orfeo > ideal kingdom with an ideal ruler and subjects Sir Orfeo is directly derived from the classical myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Indeed, the poet tells in lines 47-49 of the poem that Thrace, the original setting of the Orpheus myth, was called Winchester in the time of (this) Orfeo, advising the reader that Sir Orfeo is a translation of the Greek original into the English language and culture. o Orchard (artificial, controlled) > sinister place > place of temptation (Eden – snake) > Heurodis is tempted and abducted by the fairies tree: magic tree; comes from Irish lore > trees open the door to other worlds/also to the underworld o Noon > Heurodis is sleeping and is visited by the fairies in her dream > noon, dream > negative aspect (suggests something bad will happen) 2

o Forest (wilderness, natural, uncontrolled) > represents Orfeo’s state of mind > his grief is uncontrollable + loneliness > maybe Sir Orfeo had to prove that he is worth his wife (he hadn’t fight on the battlefield but had to fight with the loneliness in the wilderness; Sir Orfeo and not King Orfeo > represented as a hero; no heir) o Rock > the place of Fairyland (F. is within the rock); Irish folk tale element, over the rock (the unknown place) anything can happen (~ sg like “az Üveghegyen túl” in the Hungarian folk tale tradition) o Fairyland In the Greek source, the story of Orpheus and Eurydice, music plays an essential role as Orpheus uses his skill on the lyre to lull Cerberus and the other obstacles of Hades. In the lay the underworld is replaced by the Celtic idea of a parallel world ruled by malevolent fairy creatures; however, the creator of Sir Orfeoretains music as a central theme. Celtic vision of fairyland > grotesque: beautiful (gold columns and arches, sumptuousness, precious stones, like a medieval castle put into F.), but has its dark side (the world of the dead and the taken > captured people – headless, pierced, hacked, choked, mad => everybody is represented at the point of their death > not an English hell > Irish folk tale element); time es differently > Heurodis has not aged and changed during her staying there (Orfeo has aged and changed in the forest) b) Poe – The Fall of the House of Usher ⋅ Typically gloomy/dark/Gothic atmosphere created right at the beginning (typical of Poe – macabre): “During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been ing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country ; and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not how it was - but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit.” ⋅ The symbols are rather straightforwardly expressed o The “haunted” house and the setting are a reflection of Roderick Usher: dilapidating house and tarn, whose signs of decay reflect the mental condition of Usher, which is rapidly deteriorating o The “House of Usher”: both the family and the family mansion > the Ushers (Roderick and Madeline) are ill – the mansion dilapidates > the Ushers die out – the mansion collapses The Gothic tradition in Poe’s writings Elements of Gothic writing: • Emphasis on setting (castle) • Exterior: landscape (dreary) • Interior: houses (haunted h.) • Castle-like architecture

• • • •

3

Characters are brooding, secretive Buried family secrets Long history of family tied to place Mysterious sickness

•

•

Doubled personality

Women in distress

Poe’s typical building as the representation of a state of mind • Location: set apart in a valley or a sea or a waste place  remoteness express the retreat of the poet’s mind from worldly consciousness into dream • Structure: tottery; crumbling or decomposing  the dreamer’s mind is moving toward a perfect freedom from his material self and the material world • Inside: dim and winding ages  indicate the state of reverie  waking life is dominated by reason (= daylight & straight lines) • Dream rooms: circle or oval  identified with the otherworldly imagination  angular forms identified with everyday reason • Furnishings: weird, magnificent, and suggestive of great wealth  the heroes are richly imaginative • Lighting: no windows, or the windows are blocked up or shuttered. The time is always night. Artificial lighting: flickering candles, wavering torches, censers, chandelier that hangs from a lofty ceiling by a long chain • Cellars or catacombs  the irrational part of the mind

Comparison btw. a building and a man in “The Haunted Palace” The Haunted Palace

A man

The House of Usher//Roderick Usher

Stanzas 1-4: a point-by-point comparison btw. a building and the head of a man The exterior of the palace The man’s physical features The interior of the palace The man’s mind  engaged in harmonious imaginative thought The two luminous windows of the The eyes of the man palace The yellow banners on the roof The man’s luxuriant blond hair The man’s mouth (red lips + pearly white teeth) The beautiful Echoes which issue The poetic utterances of the from the pearl and ruby door man’s harmonious imagination The angel-guarded valley in which the The man’s exclusive awareness palace stands, “the monarch of exalted and spiritual things Thought’s dominion” Stanzas 5-6: description of the physical and spiritual corruption of the palace and its domain The monarch is disrupted by civil war  everything alters for the worse The valley becomes barren

The body of R.U. The mind of R. U. “vacant eye-like windows” “hair of a more than web-like softness and tenuty”

The “pearl and ruby” door

The windows which have become “red-litten” The door has turned “pale” and through it come no sweet Echoes but wild laughter

“acute bodily illness […] a mental disorder which oppressed” R. U. the domain of Roderick Usher is also barren and deary The bloodshot eyes of a man “the now miraculous luster of or a drunkard [Roderick Usher’s] eye” Discordant mind “lips somewhat thin and very pallid” “ghastly pallor of the skin” “there was a species of mad hilarity in his eye”

4

4. Conclusion As I have demonstrated with the help of these two examples, setting plays as much of an important role in literature as characters or plot. Setting, which includes scenery, time period and moral or intellectual environment, creates the stage on which characters move and act. Therefore analyzing the setting in a piece of literature can produce a lot of information about its themes. In “Sir Orfeo”, we have seen that the loss of his wife was accompanied by the leaving of his kingdom. That is, we have seen how Sir Orfeo left his beautiful kingdom and chose the wilderness as a place, a setting more appropriate to his uncontrollable grief. As opposed to this usage of setting, the gloomy and dark setting in Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” represented a state of mind from the outset as it functions as the externalisation of Roderick Usher’s mind.

5