| dc.description.abstract | I have chosen to compare Laurence Sterne's Book 7 of Tristram Shandy and A Sentimental Journey because I found it challenging that several critics have referred to the two texts as quite similar, even to the extent that the first could be seen as a draft and the latter an elaboration of the first. There is no doubt that Sterne s second and last novel is built on or inspired by Book 7, but there are nevertheless in my opinion important differences that clearly make the two projects two distinct works of art. So my main purpose with comparing and contrasting the two texts is to reveal the differences. The obvious difference is of course that Book 7 of Tristram Shandy is part of a larger whole, consisting of nine volumes, whereas A Sentimental Journey is a novel of its own. But first to why much seems to be the same.
Both books' protagonists, Tristram and Yorick, are middle-aged men who travel alone from Dover to the south of France. They follow very much the same route, and they see themselves as different from the average English traveller; they are open-minded and unprejudiced. It is not the usual tourist vivenda that interest the two men, but rather encounters with people, and women in particular. Both men have a sense of humour, an eye for a jest, and an ability to grasp opportunities, and they are men who are able to see themselves and their own weaknesses. But underneath this surface there are important differences that clearly separate the two.
Tristram faces death personified at the beginning of Book 7 and must flee for his life. His journey is therefore an unnerving escape from death at high speed, whereas Yorick s is a slow drift in pursuit of feeling. Tristram and Yorick are two different narrators and their reasons for embarking on a journey do naturally influence what they see and experience, and this again influences the language of the narration. I have chosen to touch upon several themes as I saw a wide perspective as the best way to portray similarities, and not least differences. The themes of death, love, time and writing do naturally touch, but I have anyway tried to give them separate space, while making no effort to weigh them equally. Death is prevalent in Book 7 of Tristram Shandy, whereas love is so in A Sentimental Journey. Time and writing are important themes in the books (which are both meta-novels), but they are also important in seeing clearly how Book 7 is part of a larger whole. Apart from the themes given unequal weight, I think what more than anything separates the two works is Sterne s turn towards sentimentalism in his last novel.
The Age of Sensibility was not only about benevolence and feeling for others, it was also an age in which manners, gestures, dress and outer physical signs should ideally reflect something deeper, primarily among the middle and upper classes. Even if many people of his age took Sterne s turn towards sentimentalism seriously and praised his talent for pathos, I argue that I have problems seeing the author being serious about it. Sterne was the master of burlesque humour, and the more superficial side to the age naturally gave a man with his eye for a jest a lot to play on. But however serious Sterne was about the pathetic passages in his last novel, the turn towards sentimentalism nevertheless influenced both language and plot. And the influence would be an aspect which clearly made, and makes, A Sentimental Journey stand out from Book 7 of Tristram Shandy. | nor |