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The Ecological Temporalities of Things in James Joyce's Ulysses and Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts

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2016, MA, Kent State University, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of English.
This thesis argues that modernist authors James Joyce and Virginia Woolf experimented with representing both the passage of time and nonhuman materialities and things in their works in order to present a more accurate and complete vision of life at the beginning of the twentieth century. Their literary experiments in representing quotidian life prompted these authors to thoughtfully consider how nonhuman materialities punctuate and structure the flow of modern life. The works of Joyce and Woolf respond to the historical event of the standardization of time in 1884, as local and private experiences of the passage of time continued to be superseded by global standardized time throughout the beginning of the twentieth century. Joyce and Woolf ultimately structure the the temporality of their works around an ecological temporality of things, effectively subverting a standardized structure of temporality, to demonstrate that the passage of time is not experienced uniformly by all materialities. Their works not only advocate for a continued legitimacy and value of alternate human experiences and understandings of the passage of time, but they also illuminate how nonhuman materialities exist and endure through time. Drawing from the work of new materialist scholars, this thesis investigates how Joyce’s Ulysses and Woolf’s To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts represent the nonhuman and the material in the modern world, as well as how the nonhuman and the human experience a multiplicity of temporalities.
Ryan Hediger, Ph.D. (Advisor)
Kevin Floyd, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Tammy Clewell, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
82 p.

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Lostoski, L. J. (2016). The Ecological Temporalities of Things in James Joyce's Ulysses and Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts [Master's thesis, Kent State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1461258067

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Lostoski, Leanna. The Ecological Temporalities of Things in James Joyce's Ulysses and Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts. 2016. Kent State University, Master's thesis. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1461258067.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Lostoski, Leanna. "The Ecological Temporalities of Things in James Joyce's Ulysses and Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse and Between the Acts." Master's thesis, Kent State University, 2016. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1461258067

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)