Literary Impressionism Decentering Plot Emphasizing Experience Impressionism in

Literary Impressionism { Decentering Plot, Emphasizing Experience

Impressionism in Art { The Nature of Perception

{ Perfect detail by photography { Limited vision controlled by conditions of observation The invention of photography diminished interest in perfect replication by painting.

Rapid change in the world disordered established ways of thinking, believing, and living.

Impressionist artists were interested in new science about the way { the brain processes what it sees.

The brain experiences a delay between intake of visual information and the much slower process { of understanding what is seen.

The Changing Effects of Light

{ Limited and ambiguous perception

{ Delayed coding of perception

Unstable, flickering, inconsistent Spontaneous, unfinished, inward

Light colors the perception of reality. What do we really see? What do we really know?

“Writing should be like painting, or music, the queen of the arts. ” { Joseph Conrad

Impressionism in Literature { The Nature of Perception

“We live as we dream – alone. ” Joseph Conrad It is difficult to escape from the private reality of personality.

It is possible, however, to change the way we see the world as a whole { by experiencing another individual’s perception.

{ What happens? Plot Events Linear Certainty Narrative Objective Didacticism Truth Plot { What do I think happened? Perception Consciousness Non-linear Uncertainty Contradictions Subjective Dialecticism Truths Experience

Literary impressionists create an experience, not a plot. The process of understanding is an active, not passive, reading experience. Conrad wants the reader to be confused at times.

Reading Conrad is a journey, a quest, an experience. Your personal experience of the perceptions, not the plot, matters. “Half of the book belongs to the writer. The other half belongs to the reader. ” Joseph Conrad

What is real? The surface of events can be different from what is really happening.

A literary artist suggests with images, using small brushstrokes and strong color. The reader experiences the gap between the impression and processing the message in the brain. THE PROCESS MATTERS. {

The process is the force of your own brain. If Conrad had wanted for you to simply read a summary, he would have written the summary himself. { Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad

Images Colors Allusions Memory Confusion Ambiguity Information Incompleteness { Irony Hypocrisy Surprise Shock Horror Pity Comprehension Explanation Delayed Decoding: deferred identification or understanding of perception

Spontaneous Fragmented Strong colors Observations under specific conditions Limited vision Revisions Simulation of light (vision) Changes in light (vision) Shadows & sunlight Ambiguity Distortion Small brush strokes (details leading to big picture Sketchlike exploring consciousness to discover how much we do not know and can never know, even if we are absolutely certain about what we think we know Reader’s participation in delayed decoding and working toward closure the haze or glow around the plot that matters more than plot Literary Impressionism

MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU.