Koo, Crystal. 2023. Small empires (novel) and Large-scale representations of humanity and the fantastic mode (critical commentary). Doctoral thesis, Goldsmiths, University of London [Thesis]

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Abstract or Description

This thesis is comprised of a novel, Small Empires, and a critical commentary. The novel is a set of interlinked narratives set largely in contemporary East and Southeast Asia, tied together by a modern incarnation of the Chinese mythical figure White Snake. Caught between her lover and her divinity, she struggles to reconcile the finitude inherent in making a choice with the impermanence of human love.
The critical commentary introduces the concept of scale in literary representations of human totality across large swathes of space and time, focusing on the misguided tendency to universalise or to collapse the differences between individual-scale realities and the totality. The commentary then argues for the use of a non-realistic, fantastic mode of writing to portray the ‘otherness’ of larger realities in relation to the individual human. The first chapter is an analysis of David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas, criticising its use of a fantastic motif to project a vision of collective human morality to which its individual characters march in lockstep, undercutting the human diversity the novel attempts to represent. In contrast, the second chapter examines how Jeanette Winterson’s The Stone Gods uses the fantastic mode to create an otherworldly, unrecognisable portrayal of human totality while preserving the individuality and finitude of the novel’s characters. Similarly, the third chapter details how Small Empires uses the figure of White Snake to present the different realities of a large-scale view and a small-scale view while exploring the dissonance of going back and forth between different scales.

Item Type:	Thesis (Doctoral)
Identification Number (DOI):	https://doi.org/10.25602/GOLD.00033331
Keywords:	Small Empires, multiple narratives, novel, interlinked, multiple settings, Asia, Southeast Asia, East Asia, love, food, myth, romance, fantasy, snake, spirit, white snake, immortality, divine, contemporary, scale theory, global, globalism, humanity, Anthropocene, large scale, Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell, The Stone Gods, Jeanette Winterson, creative writing, creative-critical, postcolonialism, impermanence, mortality, otherness, universalism, scale, otherness, fantastic, totality
Departments, Centres and Research Units:	English and Comparative Literature
Date:	28 February 2023
Item ID:	33331
Date Deposited:	31 Mar 2023 13:44
Last Modified:	09 May 2023 15:36
URI:	https://research.gold.ac.uk/id/eprint/33331

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