Note 13 to Chapter 6 of the author's Pegasus in Harness: Victorian Publishing and W. M. Thackeray, which University Press of Virginia published in 1992. It has been included in the Victorian Web with the kind permission of the author, who of course retains copyright.
One could turn Miller's argument on himself, showing that his attempt to master Thackeray's unconscious agenda reveals Miller's, perhaps equally futile, attempts to master his own life. Instead, it seems more likely to me that both Thackeray and Miller were operating out of the assumption that absolutes are all illusory and unstable.
Last modified: 4 April 2001