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Christian Ethics and the Victorian Novel: The Child as a Christ Figure in Oliver Twist, Silas Marner, and The Master-Christian
Vítek, Jaroslav ; Beran, Zdeněk (advisor) ; Horová, Miroslava (referee)
This diploma thesis contributes to the evolving field of religious/postsecular and ethical studies. In the first chapter, I position my thesis in the context of the religious and ethical turn of the humanities and narrow the scope of my focus to the Victorian novel, whose critical accounts were frequently misconstrued due to the application of the secularisation thesis. I then focus on the transposition of Christianity and its ethical functions from institutional affiliations to Victorian literature and literary criticism. I interpret an orphaned child as a Christ figure in three Victorian novels, whose selection illustrates the progress of the transposition from the early Victorian period to the end of the 19th century. I establish an interpretative frame, which I apply to the following analyses of the orphan character in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist (1837- 1838), George Eliot's Silas Marner (1861), and Marie Corelli's The Master-Christian (1900). In the second chapter, I interpret the eponymous character of Oliver Twist as the Christ figure, who brings the possibility of redemption and salvation from the ineffectual government institutions and London underground. Furthermore, Oliver establishes a heavenly kingdom on earth represented as a pastoral idyll at the end of the novel. I also focus on...
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Writing Victorian London: The Representation of Nineteenth-Century Anxieties in The String of Pearls and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde
Vítek, Jaroslav ; Beran, Zdeněk (advisor) ; Znojemská, Helena (referee)
This thesis analyses the representation of Victorian anxieties in The String of Pearls (1846-1847) and Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886). The aim is to not look for identical anxieties in both texts but rather to point out how the two popular works of the Victorian era embody different anxieties in a similar manner although published forty years apart. Both texts stage London as a Gothic site accommodating anxieties initiated by monstrous characters, Sweeney Todd and Mr Hyde, in each text respectively. This thesis demonstrates how these anxieties become embodied in the architecture of London. Sweeney Todd and Dr Jekyll are both characters bearing traits of double appearance. Their duality mirrors in the city edifices which they own or inhabit. For example, the respectable house of Dr Jekyll and his hidden laboratory or Hyde's repugnant house embody anxieties concerning respectable gentlemen whose sexual scandals floated out in William Thomas Stead's "The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon" (July 1885). Similarly, Sweeney Todd's barbershop constitutes this double appearance of respectability, as he is deemed to be an honourable citizen by others, and criminality with the complex underground system where Todd stores the dead customers. Both Dr Jekyll and Sweeney Todd represent danger which...
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