The Poetics of Moral Choice and Psychological Ambiguity in Odil Yoqubov And Henry James’s Novellas

This article examines Odil Yoqubov’s qissa-writing and Henry James’s novellas through the comparative categories of moral choice, inner conflict, narrative perspective and psychological ambiguity. The analysis concentrates mainly on Yoqubov’s Muqaddas and on James’s Daisy Miller, The Aspern Papers, The Turn of the Screw and The Beast in the Jungle. Although the two writers belong to different literary systems, their shorter prose reveals a comparable interest in the moment when a private decision becomes an ethical test. In Yoqubov’s prose, the moral problem is usually placed in a socially recognizable environment where conscience, love, honesty and personal responsibility are closely connected. In James’s novellas, the same problem is often dramatized through uncertain perception, indirect narration and the instability of judgment. The article argues that both writers use the compact form of the qissa or novella not merely to tell a reduced story but to intensify the moral and psychological pressure of the narrative. The comparative approach allows the study to show that Uzbek realist prose and Anglo-American psychological fiction can be read together productively when attention is given to the structure of ethical conflict rather than to external similarity alone.

Ҳали таржима қилинмаган