John Banville, Kepler

Pietra Palazzolo (University of Essex)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.4: Irish Writing and Culture, 400-present.
Vol. editors: Paul Delaney (Trinity College Dublin), Anne Markey (Dublin City University), Ian Campbell Ross (Trinity College Dublin), Sinéad Sturgeon (Queen's University Belfast)

Dates

First circulation or publication 1981

Places

Ireland, Republic of (Eire) (Country of Origin)

Genres and Modes

Novel

Resources

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Kepler

(1981), Banville’s ninth novel, is the second book in the science tetralogy, the first being

Doctor Copernicus

(1976), and the last two books

The Newton Letter

(1982) and

Mefisto

(1986).

Kepler

is a stimulating interpretation of the astronomer’s painstaking search for cosmic harmony, in the face of the disorder and chaos that are the subject of this tetralogy. To a greater extent than in

Doctor Copernicus

, Kepler’s search is here presented in all its difficulties and contradictions, attentive, as it is, to the underlying importance of random events and imaginative leaps in the creative act. In this, Banville draws from Thomas Kuhn’s study on paradigm shift and the crucial function of “illuminations” in science. For Kuhn (1922-1996) science is not a progressive claim for…

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2830 words

Citation: Palazzolo, Pietra. "Kepler". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 02 November 2007 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4248, accessed 25 April 2024.]

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