Tremblay, M. Anthony2024-08-152024-08-1519861986https://hdl.handle.net/1828/19977This thesis addresses the essential problem inherent in the criticism of Maritime literature: while a distinguishable literary tradition certainly does exist in Maritime Canada, rarely have critics attempted to investigate that tradition. Consequently, few insights into writing "maritime" have been recorded. This lack of critical attention is particularly unfortunate at a time when postmodernism is becoming increasingly common as a form of narrative intertext in many Canadian regional literatures. Correspondingly, without a comprehensive understanding of the accepted myths and even the collective unconscious of a regional tradition (Northrop Frye, after all, espouses that an environment and a tradition affect a writer's imagination more than does a nation), an appreciation of the new phenomenon of postmodernism is virtually impossible. A preliminary investigation of the central myths of the Maritime literary tradition must, therefore, precede an introductory analysis of David Adams Richards, the Maritimes ' foremost postmodernist. Since there is a real lack of critical scrutiny into the archetypal and mythic base of the Maritime literary tradition, this study will examine the most fundamental parameters of Maritime literature. The introductory chapter, by identifying major writers and major literary trends, will establish the historical framework out of which that literary tradition evolved. Subsequent to the introduction, three chapters will isolate and identify the basal myths and archetypes attendant in the Maritime literary tradition: chapter two will identify representative fictional landscapes and examine the extent to which writers employ concepts of environmentalism; chapter three will analyze the traits and mannerisms that typify Maritime characters; and chapter four will isolate the two predominant patterns of recurring motifs that comprise the Maritime thematic tradition. Finally, the concluding chapter will show how David Adams Richards works within the archetypal framework of the Maritime literary tradition--a tradition Richards uses as a backdrop against which he illuminates the misfortune and hopelessness inherent in the Maritimes of his own experience. Although the conclusions to an eclectic study of varied authors and different historical eras are generally (and often sufficiently) manifest in the identification of recurring concepts, motifs, and sources, the major conclusion to this work goes beyond the recognition of particular concepts. Rather, this study reveals that the Maritime regional tradition ls predominantly comprised of a set of culturally distilled myths, adopted and perpetuated by writers who, whether consciously or not, either accept or reject the regional literary tradition and archetypal myths synonymous with the Maritimes. Whereas L.M. Montgomery, Charles G.D. Roberts, Ernest Buckler, Charles Bruce, and Alden Nowlan, at least on the surface, appear to have accepted the Maritime literary tradition as an authentic voice--all employing what Frye termed the mythic formulas concomitant with their literary tradition--David Adams Richards certainly has not accepted the regional tradition of his predecessors. This thesis will conclude with an investigation of the methods Richards uses to subvert the established mythic formulas of the Maritime tradition. Finally, this study will end with a possible reason for Richards' postmodern alternatives amidst a literary tradition wholly steeped in conventional regional myths, the most notable of which is the agrarian myth.139 pagesAvailable to the World Wide WebThesis