1
Freedoms in The French Lieutenants Woman

• By Richard P. Lynch
• Twentieth Century Literature 48.1
• (Spring 2002) 50-76.
• Presented by
  Carol Chi

2
Three Kinds of Freedom (p.1)

• Social freedom
• For Fowles, these two
• 
  are similar.
• Existential Freedom
• Narrative Freedom

3
Social Freedom for Sarah (p.2)

• Lynch cites the definition socialization
  defined by Berger and Luckmann to indicate how
  Sarah fails to fit into this ideal.
• Socialization is the process by which the
  new individual internalizes that society, making
  it his or her reality, too.
• The individual can obtain a coherent
  identity in this socialization which is
  accomplished through the mediation of important
  others and the world he identifies.

4

• Sarahs socialization is not perfect.
• Lynch continues to suggest that Sarah is also a
  victim in terms of the society constructed in
  Thomas Carlyles Past and Present.
• Gruth in this book has no problem with
  his identity.
• Sarah pretends to be the French
  lieutenants woman to reject socialization, but
  later she finds her own role in society.

5
Social Freedom for Charles (p. 3)

• In the beginning, Charles likes to think himself
  as different from his contemporaries, but, in
  fact, his behavior corresponds to that of a
  Victorian gentleman.
• For Lynch, this novel shows the features of
  bildungsroman identified by Jerome Buckley, so we
  can interpret Charles as starting over.

6

• A. The loss of the father Charles V.S. his
• uncle
• B. The flight from a small town to a city
• Because the protagonist usually feels
• restricted in the country, he decides to go to
  a city like London, where liberate and corrupt
  him at the same time.
• C. The making of a gentleman This part is
  parodied. Charles is forced by Mr. Freeman to
  sign a document stating that he loses the
  qualification to be a gentleman.
• D. The love trial his love affair between
• Ernestina and Sarah.

7

• At the end of the bildungsroman, the protagonist
  will progress toward the undefined destination,
  with a new identity still in the process of
  forming, and that is the best description of
  Charles. Another kind of social freedom

8
Narrative Freedom (Pp. 4-5)

• It happens through Sarah, believing in the
  possible world she imagines.
• According to Eriugena, a ninth-century Irish
  scholar, the truth of a parable rests in its
  clear identification of itself as fiction.

9

• Sarah claims herself as a fiction, a work of
  art (a free character.)
• Her act of reducing herself to nothing is the
  only path to freedom.
• Charles s choice of nothingness differs from
  Sarahs. Instead, his determination to become
  nothingness is similar to Pip educated to be
  nothing in Great Expectations.

10

• Lynch does not think characters in this novel
  rebel against their author/narrator, for they are
  not aware of the existence of the narrator. (p.
  6)

11
Double Endings (p. 7)

• Many critics relate Charles with existential
  freedom together.
• Charles is defined roles for himself and Sarah in
  the first ending.
• A. He needs Sarah to free himself.
• B. he still has false assumptions
• about her.