Acts Of Reading And Affect In Mister Pip

In his acclaimed novel Mister Pip,Lloyd Jones uses Dickens's Great Expectations as an object of reading and listening in the story world.Jones creates an intertextual relationship in narrative structure between these two novels,which makes Mister Pip the representation of the contemporary revisionary fictions of Dickensian works and attracts much attention among critics concerned with postcolonial rewriting.Compared with the researches about intertextuality,the acts of reading and listening that give thematic significance to the characters' identity formation have not been given sufficient attention.The thesis reveals how reading and listening affect the characters' identity formation through their responses to Great Expectations.It emphasizes that reading the canonical text has an affective power on readers' emotional state and identity.The thesis analyzes this revisionary fiction from three aspects--the affective power of Dickens's story,readers' emotional responses,and the transcultural identity.It argues that Great Expectations is embodied in Jones' text as an affective site where acts of reading happen;so characters' understanding of the story becomes the central event in the novel,affecting the following plots revolving around their identity formation.In different ways,these acts of reading and re-reading(through repeated readings in class)evoke sympathy and empathy in the story world among characters,which,in turn transform the character-narrator's attitude toward people around her.With sympathy and empathy,Mister Watts and Matilda emotionally and psychologically identify with those who suffer from different forms of oppression and exploitation.On the other hand,resorting to characters' repeated acts of re-reading Dickens's text,the novel reveals that stories of misery and their narrative techniques universally evoke sympathy and affect readers of different ages.Watts's in-class reading echoes the way Dickens serialized Great Expectations,increasing listeners' anticipation of the new installment.Recalling her transformation from a common reader of Great Expectations to a critical reader from the island wracked by neo-colonialism,Matilda recognizes her previous misreading and decides to find her way home.