Epistolary Elements and Their Role in the Process of Creating Psychological Portraits in Irwin Shaw’s Novel “Rich Man, Poor Man”

Abstract

Psychological portrait is considered to be the most complicated kind of portrait creating. Irwin Shaw's novels are popular, to a great extent, due to his ability of creating plausible psychological portraits, that's why Irwin Shaw's works offer good material for analysing means of creating psychological portraits in modern literature. The reason for writing a letter is often a person's desire to express his or her own individuality, that's why letters are often seen as a source of information about a person's inner world. All main characters of the investigated novel write letters, showing the feelings and features which they are not inclined to demonstrate in face-to-face communication. Unexpected sincerity can be observed in Rudolph's letters to his teacher of French whom he fell in love with. He writes love letters to her but doesn't dare to send them. It proves that Rudolph is not the one to be swayed by sentiment. He chooses good judgment. But the fact that he destroys his letters and writes them again and again testifies to the fact that he feels lonely and has nobody to share experiences with. Mary Jordache's letter addressed to her daughter Gretchen sounds especially honest and dramatic as she writes it as a suicide note though she does not commit suicide then. This destroyed letter reveals Mary's psychological complexes and her real attitude to all the members of her family -her repulsion of her husband, her estrangement from Gretchen and her disdain for her, her contempt for Tom and anxiety for his fate, her faith in Rudolph and her adoration of him. Thomas and Rudolph's characters are reflected in their letters to their sister. Gretchen's feelings and state of mind in the period of her living in Los Angeles are clear from her letter to Colin. All these letters give information about the characters' feelings, desires, state of mind, psychological complexes, self-esteem directly or indirectly, making great contribution to creating plausible psychological portraits. The character's personality is revealed in them not only due to frank acknowledgements, which