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A Study of the Spy Genre in Recent Popular Literature

Ambrosetti, Ronald J.
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1555931250434351

Abstract Details

1973, Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, English.
The literature of espionage has roots which can be traced as far back as tales in the Old Testament. However, the secret agent and the spy genre remained waiting in the wings of the popular stage until well into the twentieth century before finally attracting a wide audience. This dissertation analyzed the spy genre as it reflected the era of the Cold War. The Damoclean Sword of the mid-twentieth century was truly the bleak vision of a world devastated by nuclear proliferation. Both Western and Communist "blocs" strove lustily in the pursuit of the ultimate push-button weapons. What passed as a balance of power, which allegedly forged a detente in the hostilities, was in effect a reign of a balance of terror. For every technological advance on one side, the other side countered. And into this complex arena of transistors and rocket fuels strode the secret agent. Just as the detective was able to calculate the design of a clock-work universe, the spy, armed with the modern gadgetry of espionage and clothed in the accoutrements of the organization man as hero, challenged a world of conflicting organizations, ideologies and technologies. On a microcosmic scale of literary criticism, this study traced the spy genre's accurate reflection of the macrocosmic pattern of Northrop Frye's continuum of fictional modes: the initial force of verisimilitude was generated by Eric Ambler's early realism; the movement toward myth in the technological romance of Ian Fleming; the tragic high-mimesis of John Le Carre and the subsequent devolution to low-mimesis in the spoof; and the final return to myth in religious affirmation and symbolism. This study concluded that the final accomplishment of the recent recrudescence of the spy genre lay in its narrowing of the traditional hiatus between "elitist" and popular literature. The achievement of the spy novel combined the traditions of popular formula and classical mimesis and myth.
Ray B. Browne (Advisor)
American Studies; Literature

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Ambrosetti, R. J. (1973). A Study of the Spy Genre in Recent Popular Literature [Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1555931250434351

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Ambrosetti, Ronald. A Study of the Spy Genre in Recent Popular Literature. 1973. Bowling Green State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1555931250434351.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Ambrosetti, Ronald. "A Study of the Spy Genre in Recent Popular Literature." Doctoral dissertation, Bowling Green State University, 1973. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1555931250434351

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

bgsu1555931250434351
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