Affirmation of Tradition against the Ruptures of Modernity in Brideshead Revisited

Abstract

This thesis makes a study of Evelyn Wangh's Brideshead Revisited recontextualizing the novel against the emerging post-war discourses. It explores and analyzes the affirmation of tradition against the ruptures of modernity by defining the terms tradition and modernity and showing the relation between them. The novel, in fact, is an exploration of the story of a traditional catholic family and the changing function of the country house. The action of the novel describes providence, grace, and the redemption through suffering of a jaded, often hilarious modernism. It explores these themes in the memory of a fictional narrator, Charles Ryder.