A Comparative Study on the Decline of Values in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s This Side of Paradise )1920) and Inaam Bioud's Houaria (2023(
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Date
2025
Authors
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Publisher
Université Mouloud Mammeri Tizi Ouzou
Abstract
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s This Side of Paradise (1920) and Inaam Bayoud’s Houaria (2023) provide profound insights into the societal transformations of post-war America and Algeria, capturing the erosion of traditional values amid modernization and post-traumatic recovery. Despite their distinct temporal and cultural contexts, the decline of values in these societies, particularly through the portrayal of women and the role of conservatism, remains underexplored in comparative literary studies. This study aims to compare how Fitzgerald and Bayoud depict this decline, focusing on gender roles and conservative ideologies as reflections of their eras’ social and cultural moods. Employing Aram Veeser’s New Historicism to contextualize the portrayal of women within historical and cultural dynamics, and Fundamentalism theory to analyze characters’ adherence to traditional values, this dissertation is divided into two chapters. The first chapter examines the portrayal of women in both novels through a New Historicist lens, exploring how gender roles reflect post-war societal anxieties. The second chapter analyzes conservatism in This Side of Paradise and Houaria, using Fundamentalism theory to assess how characters resist moral and cultural decline. The analysis reveals that both authors portray women as symbols of societal change, navigating patriarchal constraints, while conservatism serves as a response to post-war upheaval, highlighting shared anxieties across different eras. Through their characters’ journeys, Fitzgerald and Bayoud articulate the decline of values, underscoring the universal challenges of post-traumatic societies where tradition and modernity collide.
Description
73p. ; (+CD-Rom)
Keywords
Conservatism, Decline of Values, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Fundamentalism, Inaam Bayoud, New Historicism, Portrayal of Women, Post-War Societies
Citation
Literature and Interdisciplinary Approaches