Becknell, Thomas. “Implication Through Reading The
Damnation of Theron Ware.” American Literary Realism
24.1 (1991): 63-71.
Eggers, Paul. “By Whose Authority? Point of View in the
First Chapter of Harold Frederic’s The Damnation of
Theron Ware.” Style 31.1 (1997): 81-95.
Oehlschlaeger, Fritz. “Passion, Authority, and Faith in
The Damnation of Theron Ware.” American Literature
58.2 (1986): 238-55.
Becknell, Thomas. “Implication Through Reading The
Damnation of Theron Ware.” American Literary Realism
24.1 (1991): 63-71.
Becknell’s article is a reader-response essay based on
an extension of Randall Craig’s theory of a “hermeneutical
gap” between “intended and model readers” (63).
Becknell contends that thematic and hermeneutic gaps exist “between
the available authorities (which are discredited), and a valid
authority which Theron lacks” and between the authority
of the reader and the authority of the author (64). Borrowing
a term from Wolfgang Iser’s The Act of Reading,
Becknell argues that the “‘horizon’ against
which we view Theron’s awakening” is a “vast
no-man’s-land between authority and personal judgment”;
as readers, we want Theron Ware to be more than he is (65-66).
This desire is a result of the way we read and our inability to
“embrace all perspectives at once”; thus a problem
of “authority” confronts our judgment (68). The competing
authorities of Father Forbes, Dr. Ledsmar, and Celia Madden cloud
Theron Ware’s judgment. When Madden tells Ware, “We
find that you are a bore,” the “we” she refers
to includes the author (again referring to “author-ity”)
(70). Becknell asserts that we, as readers, forget the authority
of the author because we want to see The Damnation of Theron
Ware as a drama of lost faith and Theron Ware as a victim
of temptation. He claims that readers can be misguided because
they want to read the novel as a romance when they should be keying
in on the signals of realism. Like truth, concludes Becknell,
assumptions about authority begin with absolutes and end in relativity.
Eggers, Paul. “By Whose Authority? Point of View in the
First Chapter of Harold Frederic’s The Damnation of
Theron Ware.” Style 31.1 (1997): 81-95.
Eggers’ article combines reader-response and structural
criticism in an examination of Chapter 1 of The Damnation
of Theron Ware. Eggers argues that other critics who have
examined authority in this novel (Oehlschlaeger and Becknell)
have begun in Chapter 2, where the narrative focus and main characters
are established. He contends, however, “that the first chapter
both initiates and encapsulates the novel’s exploration
of authority through a perplexing usage of shifting points of
view.” Identification of these shifting points of view alternates
between clarity and ambiguity, not only implicating readers in
“‘unauthoritative’ readings” of the text
but also focusing on the “book’s concern with authority.”
The opening three paragraphs are traditional omniscient narration,
but one word in the third paragraph, “nay,” suggests
an “internal debate” that should give careful readers
pause. The narrator changes for paragraphs four through six to
an unnamed “observer.” The point of view appears to
shift again in paragraphs ten and eleven to the “venerable
Fathers” of the Methodist clergy. Their “sincerity”
is called into question if the judgments rendered are not the
implied author’s (as reported by the omniscient narrator).
Point of view clearly shifts back to the omniscient narrator in
paragraphs twelve through fifteen, influencing the reader’s
perceptions of Theron and Alice Ware in later paragraphs in contrast
to the proud Tecumseh congregation. Eggers’ analysis continues
along this line, scrutinizing each paragraph in turn. When Ware
is finally introduced to the reader, it is through the “objective”
tone of a limited-omniscient narrator who has just replaced the
“vitriolic tone of the parishioner-controlled narrative.”
Since the reader is predisposed to be sympathetic toward the seemingly
stoic and pious Reverend Ware, this impression influences the
reader well into the book. As Eggers demonstrates, “both
text and reader are rendered ‘unauthoritative’ through
the agency of point of view.” (Note: The above is from WilsonSelect,
an electronic database that does not include Style’s
page numbers.)
Oehlschlaeger, Fritz. “Passion, Authority, and Faith in
The Damnation of Theron Ware.” American Literature
58.2 (1986): 238-55.
Oehlschlaeger’s article combines reader response, feminist,
and psychological criticism in an analysis of authority in Frederic’s
novel. According to Oehlschlaeger, Frederic “systematically
discredits every authority figure in the novel while simultaneously
revealing Theron’s own search for authority.” He argues
that what Frederic’s novel presents “is not an innocent’s
fall into corrupt sexuality but a critique of the way corrupt
authority poisons sexuality,” a claim demonstrated in Theron
Ware’s relationships with his wife Alice Ware and Celia
Madden (239). Theron Ware becomes “progressively effeminized”
by the novel’s “proscription of female sexuality by
male authority” (244). All of the novel’s authority
figures—the Methodist trustees; Father Forbes; Dr. Ledsmar;
Sister Soulsby, perhaps the most complex authority figure; the
Catholic Church; and even Jeremiah Madden, “the book’s
most dignified figure”—are discredited by their words
or actions (254). Oehlschlaeger acknowledges that critics have
seen Sister Soulsby “either as a Satanic figure or as a
voice for Frederic’s own supposed pragmatism” (246);
however, he disagrees with both views. First, Sister Soulsby is
neither all good nor all bad, and her pragmatism is “inadequate
to deal with the highly irrational world that Frederic depicts,”
which undercuts her validity as an authority figure (247). Second,
Oehlschlaeger does not agree with critics who have pointed to
Sister Soulsby’s pragmatism as an indication of Frederic’s
personal views. In Oehlschlaeger’s opinion, Frederic’s
views are evident in his respect for “certain religious
values” represented by the venerable church elders and the
Christian idea of repentance (253).
