Background
Axton, William Fitch was born on September 24, 1926 in Louisville. Son of Edwin Dymond Senior and Blanche Thompson (Miller) Axton.
(Discusses the treatment of alcohol in the writings of Cha...)
Discusses the treatment of alcohol in the writings of Charles Dickens, describes the drinking customs of the Victorian era, and collects recipes for Victorian drinks.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0821407015/?tag=2022091-20
(This study explores the theater actually known and freque...)
This study explores the theater actually known and frequented by Dickens in order to show in terms of concrete structural analysis of his novels the nature of the predominantly "dramatic" or "theatrical" quality of his genius. Author William F. Axton finds that the three principal dramatic modes or "voices" that were characteristically Victorian were burlesquerie, grotesquerie, and the melodramatic, and that the novelist's vision of the world around him was drawn from ways of seeing transformed from those elements in the popular playhouse of his day―as revealed in the structure and theme of Sketches by Boz, Pickwick Papers, Oliver Twist, and other novels. The last half of the study analyzes representative passages from the novels to illustrate the way in which the principal modes of nineteenth-century theatrical style are transmuted into the three important "voices" of the novelist's prose style. The first two voices―the burlesque and the grotesque―are identified by their exploitation of the stylistic features of farce, extravaganza, and harlequinade, of incongruous likeness and deliberate confusion between realms. The melodramatic voice, on the other hand, seeks to exploit in prose the musically rhythmic and poetic resources of the theater for the purpose of atmosphere, moral commentary, and structural unity.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0006BP0US/?tag=2022091-20
Axton, William Fitch was born on September 24, 1926 in Louisville. Son of Edwin Dymond Senior and Blanche Thompson (Miller) Axton.
Bachelor in History, Yale University, 1948. Master of Arts in English, University Louisville, 1951. Doctor of Philosophy in English, Princeton University, 1961.
Instructor, Miami University, Oxford, Ohio., 1952-1953; instructor, Brown U., Providence, 1957-1961; from assistant professor to associate professor, U. Kentucky, Lexington, 1961-1967; from associate professor to professor, U. Louisville, 1967-1990; retired, U. Louisville, since 1990. Consultant many university presses and scholarly journals, since 1970.
(This study explores the theater actually known and freque...)
(Discusses the treatment of alcohol in the writings of Cha...)
President Northside Neighborhood Association, Lexington, 1962-1967, Dickens Society, 1971-1972. Board directors Cherokee Triangle Association, Louisville, 1990-1993. Lieutenant (junior grade) United States Naval Reserve, 1944-1946, 50-53.
Member Kentucky History Society, Victorian Society of America (board directors 1971-1975), Browning Society, Browning Institute, Jane Austen Society North America, Ruskin Society, Filson Club.
Married Joanne Virginia Lewis, June 24, 1951 (deceased 1965). Children: Blanche Miller, Lucy Riggs, Belle Sherlock. Married Anne Elizabeth Millard, August 5, 1967.
1 child, Samantha Elizabeth.