Dickens and Thackeray: Punishment and ForgivenessAttitudes toward punishment and forgiveness in English society of the nineteenth century came, for the most part, out of Christianity. In actual experience the ideal was not often met, but in the literature of the time the model was important. For novelists attempting to tell exciting and dramatic stories, violent and criminal activities played an important role, and, according to convention, had to be corrected through poetic justice or human punishment. Both Dickens' and Thackeray's novels subscribed to the ideal, but dealt with the dilemma it presented in slightly different ways. At a time when a great deal of attention has been directed toward economic production and consumption as the bases for value, Reed's well-documented study reviving moral belief as a legitimate concern for the analysis of nineteenth-century English texts is particularly illuminating. |
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... behavior . He has fought Herbert Pocket and been spattered by his blood . “ The pale young gentleman's nose had stained my trousers , and I tried to wash out that evidence of my guilt in the dead of night . " Pip takes a practical , if ...
... behavior - as in a Steele or an Addison - he values the behavior itself , not the rank of the individual . Indeed , exalted as the individual may be , and as worthy of commendation for his achievements , Esmond cannot approve what he ...
... behavior should be . Prominent in that behavior is the capacity to forgive . And in the narrator's encompassing narration it is this tendency toward compassion , forgiveness , and patient effort to under- stand and excuse that ...
Contents
Attitudes Toward Punishment and Forgiveness | 3 |
Some of the contents of this study appeared elsewhere in different form Mate | 28 |
Education | 30 |
Copyright | |
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