ABSTRACT

Reality is ultimately unknowable or non-existent apart from our mythical constructions of it, we will lose all power of action. If myth implies a metaphysics of presence,* textuality implies a metaphysics of absence, a void covered by a thin network of interpretations. There is little doubt that a third novel, The Arrow of Gold, is, indeed, an artistic failure, but it is an extremely interesting failure for the purpose of this study. If only because its dynamics are so inextricably linked with this failure of vision this is to be demonstrated. The first problem is the generic transition from the realistic mode of Part I to an allegorical mode which eventually seems to take over the rest of the work.