Dickens' dream-representations: Image and character beyond mimesis

This dissertation focuses primarily on characterization in the novels of Charles Dickens as a way to theorize non-mimetic means of representation. The study of characterization usually revolves around mimesis---especially since highly influential structuralist theories tended to do away with the idea of character altogether---and nonmimetic representation is usually understood in traditional terms (for instance, as allegory). My dissertation, drawing on psychoanalytic and Marxist theory, develops various ways to conceive of non-mimetic characterization by foregrounding representation itself and theorizing the ways in which aesthetic, historical, and political ideologies express themselves in modes of representation. Since the influence of the visual arts on the novel is central for my argument, I give considerable critical attention to the illustrations of Dickens' novels by Hablot Browne (known as "Phiz") and to political caricatures by nineteenth century French artists.; Nearly every study of the historical context of Dickens' illustrated novels emphasizes the English tradition of Hogarth and Cruikshank, but Dickens and Phiz were inspired by the subversive and literally revolutionary artwork of the French caricaturists, Philipon, Daumier and Grandville, and my first chapter draws attention to this previously ignored source of inspiration. Framing the issue of characterization in terms of a historical tension in representation between, on the one hand, mimetic nineteenth century portraiture, and on the other, non-mimetic portrait-caricature, allows me to reveal the political ideologies associated with each. My second chapter explores Dickens' use of the effigy as a metaphor for the role of materiality in characterization throughout his work and the function of fetishes and imagos (masks, dolls, doubles, animated objects, etc.) to expose the reification of the subject under capitalism. In my final chapter, I explore Dickens' use of the materiality of language in his representation of character as a way to fragment and symbolize the body. My conclusion is that Dickens draws upon various means of counter-representation such as caricature, distortion, anamorphosis, and dreams in order to circumvent institutionalized means of representation coded with ideological images of the subject.