Final thesis contents to hyperlink July 08

Possession weaves a complex set of relationships between the past and the present, 
the old and the new. It explores the bonds between living and dead minds, unravelling 
these connections through its central metaphor of possession. The novel’s genesis 
began with the title, when Byatt watched Coburn, a famous Coleridge scholar, at 
work, and thought: “does he possess her, or does she possess him?” (“Introduction” 
xi). Byatt began with a pale canvas of ideas that became more lurid as she explored 
the implicit connotations of the title. Dimensions of passion, jealousy and imaginary 
worlds were added (xii-xiv); each layer working together to produce a coherent, 
satisfying whole, like the composition of an oil painting that takes shape with each 
coat of paint. The extra dimensions added lively shades to the grey, cobwebby 
palimpsest of the original noveau roman of the novel’s first conception (xi). Without 
these multiple elements, the form of the postmodern novel is pale and drained of 
colour. Possession becomes exciting and intriguing due to its Gothic romantic plot 
that balances out its cerebral qualities.

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Possession uses different modes to tell the story of the present and the past as it 
explores the continuities and discontinuities between them. The present is narrated in 
a series of broken, awkward dialogues, while Roland and Maud’s inner thoughts are 
dominated by theories that concern even their private lives. Roland considers his 
definition of self: he “had learnt to see himself, theoretically, as a crossing place for a 
number of systems, all loosely connected. He had been trained to see his idea of his 
“self” as an illusion” (502). With their shadowy, abstract conception of identity, it 
takes a real effort for them to connect on any meaningful level with others. The Times 
Literary Supplement’s review of Possession describes these passages as some of the 
weakest in the novel, disliking their ‘forced’ quality (Jenkyns 213). The hesitant, dry 
dialogues between Maud and Roland are humorously flat and lifeless in comparison 
to the passionate exchanges between the Victorian lovers. These dull passages in an 
otherwise vibrant and exciting novel are self-consciously dull: Byatt is drawing 
attention to the potential weaknesses of postmodern self-reflexivity. 
2
Humorously, 
Fergus Wolff comments on his latest project of literary theory (the “right” field (19)): 
“the challenge was to deconstruct something that had apparently already 
deconstructed itself” (39). Possession draws attention to what Byatt regards as the 
absurdity and futility of poststructuralist academic enterprise.
In contrast, the past is a rich world of epic poems and passionate love letters, while its 
characters come to life for the reader to know and love them in a way that the 
postmodern scholars do not. The letters and poems “loom” (“Introduction” xiii) over 
the text, becoming the more real things in a text that is otherwise a patchwork, 
echoing pastiche. The scholars come to act as a lens through which to see the rich 
2
She is also negotiating her own sensibilities, where she must balance her academic mode of thinking 
and writing against her intention to produce a lighter, more pleasurable novel. 

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world of the past, remaining ‘flat’, sometimes two-dimensional characters whose 
personalities fail to captivate (Jenkyns 213). The text sympathetically portrays 
Roland, who is largely an outsider and a failure (in material terms) at the start of the 
text, but reaches some level of success by the time the story ends. Yet Roland’s 
textually nuanced reading of himself influences every aspect of his characterisation, 
so that he only really comes to life through the discovery of the past.