What Radhika has tried to do in this work, I think. is to give a reading of the fictional works of a major British novelist of our time, namely Angus Wilson, in relation not only to his own evolution as a prac tising story-teller, but also to some important developments in the history of contemporary fiction. That Angus Wilson's eight novels lend themselves eminently to such a treatment is established here with remarkable lucidity.
Virtually every serious critical piece analysing the eight novels of Sir Angus Wilson (1913-1991) shows two tenden- cies One, it appreciatively notes the remarkable range and va- nety both of the topics Wilson handles and of their fictional treatment. The common comment is that he never repeats him- self. Two, it tries to superimpose the general pattern of the development of the novel form in England (from the 1950s to the 1980s) on Wilson's own evolutionary chart as a novelist.
Malcolm Bradbury, in his contribution "Coming Out of the Fifties" to the special issue of Twentieth Century Literature commemorating the seventieth birthday of Wilson (in 1983), points our attention to the "direction that was always present in but which has been constantly intensifying in Wilson's work, a work which now looks more like a bridge between the revived realism of the 1950s and the spirit of new fiction in the 1980s than once it seemed" (181, emphasis added) A similar observation is made by Kerry McSweeney in his work Four Contemporary Novelists (published in the same year): "Wilson is not only one of England's foremost contemporary novelists, he is also an exemplary figure whose development as a writer has been representative of some major changes that have taken place in the English novel since the war" (10, emphasis added).
No writer, not even a single work, can be said to exist in total isolation from the intellectual environment that has produced them. Whether the response to the times is marked by a tone of affirmation or of negation, there will be unmistakable evidence of their impact on both, if we do not press a too close and reductivist or simplistic correspondence. What Radhika has tried to do in this thesis, I think, is to give a reading of the fictional works of a major British novelist of our time, namely Angus Wilson, in relation not only to his own evolution as a practising story-teller, but also to some important developments in the history of contemporary fiction. That Angus Wilson's eight novels lend themselves eminently to such a treatment is established here with remarkable lucidity. In fact, the pattern of evolution Radhika has identified in the fictional preoccupations of Wilson, the structure of what she has chosen to call the Wilsonian canon, seems to hold the key to an understanding of contemporary world fiction in so far as it is prefigured in the writings of British novelists of Wilson's time. The three categories she has set up for classifying modern fiction, under the rubrics of documentation, exploration and vision, may not perhaps exhaust the possibilities in that direction, but they do reveal to us with precision and clarity the wide imaginative range and impressive outreach of the works of Wilson and his contemporaries. The reader becomes gradually aware of how the voice of the individual (1st) writer emerges from the pressures of his time and society, and how the tendencies and trends of the time get shaped by him even as he himself merges in them.
While one may legitimately draw inferences about the possible historical evolution of a particular genre in its linear dimension, it is but reasonable to assume that in a given span of time different styles and techniques might co-exist. The 18 century could easily accommodate Samuel Richardson, Henry Fielding and Laurence Sterne, and the three moved on parallel lines, creating the illusion of progress and development. And even in the 19 century, supposed to be the heyday of hard- headed realism, there were models as diverse as the novels of Jane Austen, Emily Bronte and Charles Dickens. One may find within the fold of realism, ever so many divergent ramifications that the distant cousins may not easily recognize one another. We know very well that the documentary novel, the exploratory novel and the visionary novel-the categories are not intended to be mutually exclusive or collectively exhaustive-will continue to be written even in the coming centuries as in our own. If creativity favours divergent tendencies, what is the value of this categorization at all? Well, for one thing, as Radhika shows in the case of Angus Wilson, a great writer is no slave to any of these tendencies. His freedom is enhanced, rather than curtailed, by the existence of differences. As long as the tastes of the reading public maintain diversity, no single, uniform technique of narration can completely replace the others, although at any given time in the works of a given author, one or the other of these might claim dominance True creativity resists the tyranny of a single dominant mode. The multiplicity of form is a condition of authorial initiative as well as of societal impact.
The publication of the present book marks the beginning of a new academic programme launched by the University of Kerala as part of its diamond jubilee celebrations This programme aims to select some of the outstanding Ph. D dissertations produced in the University in different disciplines and publish them on a priority basis. The financial assistance made available by the University Grants Commission for the publication of scholarly works will be utilized for the purpose.
A University wins recognition primarily by its research output and publications. The achievement of Kerala University in its Ph.D programmes so far has been remarkable While only one Ph. D was awarded in 1960, the number has gone up to an annual average of 150 in recent years The University has so far produced a total of more than 2000 Ph.D under different Faculties. The dissertations keep fairly high standards, to en- sure this, the University follows stringent norms of adjudication.
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