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Article: Toward a cognitive theory of literary character: the dynamics of mental-model construction.
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- December 22, 2001
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CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2001 Northern Illinois University. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Miss Bronte was struck by the force or peculiarity of the character of some one she knew; she studied it, and analyzed it with subtle power; and having traced it to its germ, she took that germ as the nucleus of an imaginary character, and worked outwards;--thus reversing the process of analyzation, and unconsciously reproducing the same external development.
Elizabeth Gaskell on Bronte's Shirley in The Life of Charlotte Bronte (1857)
1. A Cognitive Perspective on Literary Character
Mrs. Gaskell's statement about Charlotte Bronte's method of creating characters hints at the double nature of literary characters: on the one hand, they are based ...