Contents

  A Introduction  3

  B 1 Masculinities and heroism  4

1.1  Outline of the term masculinities  4

1.2  Outline of the term heroism  5

1.3  The hero and his ambiguous relation to society  6

2.  Carlyle s considerations on heroism  7

3.  Representations of masculinities and heroism in literature  8

3.1  The Wanderer  8

3.1.1  Context  8

3.1.2  Evaluation of The Wanderer  9

3.2  Coriolanus  11

3.2.1  Context  11

3.2.2  Evaluation of Coriolanus  12

3.3  The Man of Feeling  15

3.3.1  Context  15

3.3.2  Evaluation of The Man of Feeling  16

3.4  About a Boy  18

3.4.1  Context  18

3.4.2  Evaluation of About a Boy  18

4.  Comparison of the representations of masculinities and heroism  21

  in literature  

  C Conclusion  23

A Introduction

Doubtless, the Greek epic poems Iliad and Odyssey, composed in the 8 th century BC, are two of the most renowned epics of Western culture. Dealing with the Greek struggle against Troy, the works depict the deeds of legendary heroes like Hector, Achilles or Ulysses. Be it for the defence of their country or for the acquisition of fame, these men battle, always teeming with power, strength, courage and bravery. Later on, the influences of these primary epics range from Virgil to Milton or Fielding and Dryden, above all culminating in the Homeric impact on the heroic poetry of the Renaissance period. In Britain, the mythological Celtic work about The Legend of King Arthur and his Round Table from the 5 th century BC upholds the tradition of the male warrior hero. The episodes concentrate on various heroic deeds, particularly on the conquest of the Holy Grail. Fascinated by the deeds of King Arthur and his knights, innumerable writers of various periods derive their own stories from this topic as for instance Sir Thomas Malory in Le Morte Darthur or the Arthurian cycle of Tennyson. Lately, with Troy and King Arthur Hollywood screened two blockbusters, substantiating the motif of the male warrior hero. These top-sellers prove that men still goes in for the epic stories about heroes and their heroic actions.

Indeed, people always have been attracted and nearly obsessed by the stories about outstanding figures, be it the Indian Mahabharata, the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf or the German Nibelungenlied. Even if the actions are not always conclusive they often foster a basis for collective identification and influence the behaviour of the community. Either society idealize the deeds of the hero, projecting their desires on him, or, as often as not, this man is rejected and feared. Nevertheless, this person sets himself against the meaningless and accepts his vices and virtues, eventually rising above the average man, due to his heroic powers. Although social connections and personal motivation have been changing continually during the last centuries, the hero still embodies universal characteristics and men like Paris, Agamemnon, Galahad or Lancelot reappear in literature continually, nourishing the image of the heroic warrior. This is a man’s world where masculinity is defined in the epic realm of the hero.

However, the latest movie about King Arthur pays heed to the figure of Guinevere as a female warrior and the book The Mists of Avalon also stresses the female perspective on the heroic character King Arthur. These stories are keen on depicting women as the driving forces behind strong men and as a consequence question the connection between masculinity and heroism. Women wage war against their traditionally subscribed roles, eventually posing the question about the importance of

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femininity and heroism. In order to solve this problem it seems helpful to illustrate how heroism and masculinity are traditionally linked. Continually altering circumstances, as for instance individual, cultural or historical conditions, show an impact on the concepts of masculinity and heroism. Additionally, due to the binary opposition of the gender terms, also attributes associated with femininity play a vital rol e for the analysis. Thus, interested in exploring the relationship of masculinities and heroism, I focus on representations of these concepts in literature. The first part of my paper will deal with a theoretical outline of the terms masculinities and heroism and continue with the theoretical literary work On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History by Thomas Carlyle. Subsequently, after having provided the necessary background information, I focus on the Old English poem The Wanderer, William Shakespeare’s Roman play Coriolanus from the Renaissance period, the Sentimental period and The Man of Feeling by Henry Mackenzie and eventually on the present-day work About a Boy by Nick Hornby. The centre of attention in this works will shift from the general context of the period to the depiction of masculinity and heroism in the literary work. This analysis is followed by the final part of the work, which expounds these different manifestations and also accounts for aspects of femininity. As far as I am concerned, the feminist view holds true that strong men are always inspired by women.

B 1. Masculinities and heroism

The conception of masculinity is developed out of the image of gender as “an achieved status which is a function of socialization and has social, cultural and psychological concepts.” 1 Gender identity is assessed by the interaction of the individual view or belief of belonging to a particular gender, called self-identification, and by social codes, considering a person to be masculine or feminine according to his or her behaviour, called others’ identification. Although the concept of masculinity is not inherent and prone to adjustments, “[m]asculinity has traditionally been seen as self- evident, natural, universal; above all as unitary and whole, not multiple or divided.” 2 Recent developments, on the contrary, indicate the rise of different forms of

1 Franklin, Clyde W, The Changing Definition of Masculinity (New York and London: Plenum Press,

1984) 2.

2 Buchbinder, David, Masculinities and Identities, (Carlton: Melbourne University Press1994) 1.

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masculinities according to influences like the two World Wars, the Sexual Revolution in the 1960ies or the Hippy Movement in the 1970ies, which contribute to a revolution of femininity. Besides, certain verbal expressions or experiences of society seem to foster the idea that various actions can contribute to the development of a boy into a man, suggesting that male behaviour does not come without help. “Indeed, we simply can’t say whether any particular kind of quality or aptitude is ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’. There is no way of telling. Most, if not all, of our behaviour is learned.” 3 Doubtless, different men have different experiences as man what leads to a continual modification of gender. Thus, “gender concepts […] depend rather on current cultural, political, social and historical determinants,” 4 questioning the clear definition of a universal masculinity.

1.2 Outline of the term heroism

First of all a limitation of the term hero seems inevitable, as it frequently is applied in a relatively broad sense. On the one hand many a person, occupying the main part of a literary work, is often referred to as hero. However, allusions to “the main character in a narrative or dramatic work” 5 are of no importance in this investigation. In such cases “[t]he more neutral term protagonist is often preferable, to avoid confusion with the usual sense of heroism as admirable courage and nobility, since in many works the leading character may not be morally or otherwise superior.” 6 Thus, on the other hand the term hero also can receive a more restricted meaning, alluding to classical virtues and ethical nobility, which characterize a heroic person. In literature, this person is determined as a narrative social construct, emerging out of a crisis or appearing by incidence, as things happen to him. Able to change the current situation by combining action and reflection and battling for the benefits of the community, he rises to heroism. Despite his vices and virtues, with which the hero has to struggle, certain universal characteristics obviously have eternal validity. Consequently, he functions as an ideal, representing the controlling ideas of the time. As these ideas are dynamic, being influenced by historical, individual, cultural or sociological features, a more general

3 Groombridge, Joy, His and Hers: An Examination of Masculinity and Femininity (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1971) 56.

4 Buchbinder 3.

5 Baldick, Chris, The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (Oxford and New York: Oxford UP, 1990) 98.

6 Baldick 98.

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definition of the term heroism seems problematic. The ideal of heroism undoubtedly is bound to various circumstances, like history or culture, and the average desirable expectations, projected upon the hero, are prone to change. Thus, it has to be renewed from epoch to epoch according to individual experiences or collective manifestations. These diverse representations of the hero and his heroism mainly originate in the acceptance of or the rejection by society.

1.3 The hero and his ambiguous relation to society

On the one hand the hero usually embodies a discourse of characteristics, which is highly estimated by a certain society at a certain time and which sets him apart from his fellows. Consequently, the examination of the hero-figure reveals the internal values of a society. “The hero is the traditional idol of man. He does the things we all wish we could do. He embodies the qualities that we wish we had.” 7 These characteristics seem to be true in a more general term, as the heroic archetype “revealed certain instinctive proclivities in the human being which transcended cultural differences.” 8 Being socially accepted, he functions as an ideal and gives advise how to react in certain situations. By contrast, however, the hero can also be restricted by social sanctions. Afraid of the heroic powers of a formerly ordinary man, society aims to distance the hero. This power is traced back to the origin of the hero himself. “The literary hero was first a hero in myth and fable. There he was part man, part god or demon.” 9 Although the divine figure is transformed into a mortal being, the supernatural forces remain, creating an extraordinary man with demonic features. As often as not, he is seen as a rebel or outlaw, facing misunderstandings, hostility and hatred, which leads to a conflict. Shocked and afraid by his mettle, they establish new boundaries to distance him and protect themselves. Although risking his life for the benefits of the community, the hero is often rewarded with suffering and depression and “[w]hat the hero wins is never what society will call success in conventional terms.” 10 Nevertheless, his defeat is not seen as a fall from favour but rather as a triumph in the cycle of life, giving his story an eternal character.

7 Benson, Lou, Images, Heroes, and Self-Perception: The Struggle for Identity - from Mask -Wearing to Authenticity (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc., 1974) 7.

8 Benson 8.

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Stanford, Raney Baynes, The Tradition of Heroism and the Modern Novel (Columbia University, 1965) 20.

10 Stanford 12.

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2. Carlyle’s considerations on heroism “History refuses to be a series of costume-changes worn by the same hero and, to his credit, Carlyle does not attempt to persist in such a simplification for long. The hero himself changes in fundamental ways as the time changes.” 11

Already during the Victorian Age Thomas Carlyle, on of the most influential writers on critical matters of his time , accounts for the constant modification of the concept of the hero. In his literary work On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History Carlyle determines the development and attributes of a hero. There he states that the hero is “a flowing light-fountain, as I say, of native original insight, of manhood and heroic nobleness” 12 and that “genuine sincerity is the first characteristic of all men in any way heroic.” 13 As history is seen as a repetitive concept, which can fall into thesis, antithesis and synthesis, the reconstruction of the historical process enables men to learn form the recurring pattern of the past. Although aware that different epochs, conditions and nations can change the manifestations of the hero, he adheres to the enduring nature of hero-worship, due to this continuity and permanence of history. Social dissatisfaction, for instance represented in riots, reflects the need of the community for a hero. Only by hero-worship can they escape from their despair and isolation. As a consequence, the hero reacts to the signs of time and rises from obscurity to heroism. Subsequently, he fights with his tragic fate, aiming to improve the current world order. Finally he is responsible for a change of history and Carlyle claims “all that we see standing accomplished in the world are properly the outer material result, the practical realization and embodiment, of Thoughts that dwelt in the Great Men sent into the world.” 14

3. Representations of masculinities and heroism in literature

11 Ousby, Ian, „Carlyle, Thackeray and Victorian Heroism“, The Yearbook of English Studies: Heroes and the Heroic (Leeds: W.S.Maney and Son Ltd., 1982) 158.

12 Carlyle, Thomas, On Heroes, Hero -Worship, and the Heroic in History, eds. Norman and Charlotte Strouse (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993) 4.

13 Carlyle (1993:5).

14 Ibid., 3.

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