The Characters’ Spiritual Predicament In The Power And The Glory

Graham Greene(1904-1991)is a famous British writer.As one of his notable Catholic tetralogy,The Power and the Glory(1940)narrates the escape of the last clergy,the whisky priest in Tabasco under religious persecution based on Greene’s visit to Mexico in 1938.Since its publication,this novel has invited critics’ comments and discussions mainly on narrative techniques,themes,and other aspects.With the emergence of spatial narrative,the unique spatial features and expressive skills attract great attention and provide a new perspective to interpret the spiritual predicament of modern people.Employing the spatial narrative theory of Gabriel Zoran,this thesis aims to study the art of spatial narrative from three aspects,topographical space,chronotopic space,and textual space,in the hope to address the following questions: 1.How the spatial narrative in this novel is constructed? 2.What are the specific representations of the characters’ spiritual predicament in different spaces? 3.How the author’s thoughts on the social reality are reflected in different types of spatial narrative?Except for the Introduction and Conclusion,this thesis includes three chapters.Firstly,this thesis focuses on the existing manners of those characters in topographical space.Topographical space is perceived as a relatively self-existent spatial structure,cutting off from any structure imposed by verbal text and the plot.Greene displays the different ways of escape of the characters in three pairs of topographical spaces covering towns and villages,the capital and the border,Mexico and Britain through the direct description,highlighting the universality of kinds of characters’ passive escape.Secondly,this thesis discusses the state and action of the characters in chronotopic space.This space is formed by events and movements including synchronic and diachronic relations.In synchronic relation,the whisky priest and the lieutenant are “motional” in any narrative location,while Padre José is relatively “static” in the background.In diachronic relation,the dynamic changes of the whisky priest and the lieutenant project two different tracks.By virtue of the plot,this space displays the motional and static changes of priests and the lieutenant,and their different tracks of movement run through the whole story and set off the ordinary’s spiritual emptiness.This thesis finally explores the concrete representations of the characters’ spiritual predicament in textual space which is a spatial structure formed by verbal text,most closely related to the text.In textual space,Greene not only narrates selectively to show the visible and invisible desperation of the characters and breaks the traditional linear narration to collage five scenes and two plotlines,but also connects the individual with the social and historical background of Mexico.The employment of narrative techniques forms the spatial effect of collage narrative,and discloses the blackness of Mexican society,which draws the portrait of a group of characters in The Power and the Glory and the universal predicament of the existence of human beings.Through the above analysis,this thesis draws the following conclusions.In The Power and the Glory,Greene digs out the existing condition and spiritual world of modern people and shows the characters’ manner of passive escape and their reasons,and the existing state of spiritual emptiness and ultimate result overwhelmed by despair through the construction of three layers of spaces.Furthermore,the multi-dimensional spatial narrative structure also reflects Greene’s deep concern over the spiritual condition of modern people and provides readers with special insight to inspect modern society.