Imaginary islands : the island archetype in the history of the novel

Abstract

Through this dissertation, I propose to trace the changing aspect of the island archetype as it moves through the history of the novel and to discuss its relation to the concept of an "ideal island'', with regard to four specific novels taken from different periods of the novel's history. In Chapter One, I will discuss Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, taking into consideration the possible reasons for the emergence of the island archetype at this point in history and discussing its special relevance to eighteenth and nineteenth-century culture, as well as its universal appeal. In Chapter Two I will discuss R.M. Ballantyne's The Coral Island and its significance as an idealised island in relation to the perceptions of British Imperialism In Chapter Three, I will look at William Golding' s Lord of the Flies and discuss its inversion of the perceptions inscribed in The Coral Island as a result of changing cultural factors such as the Second World War. Finally, in chapter four, I will discuss the contemporary islands in The Beach and Lost and their relation to perceptions of the contemporary world and reality. I will conclude with a discussion of the various islands as microcosms of the culture of their time in relation to the ideal island.