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The Ego At An Impasse: Aesthetic Empathy And The Abject D’Art In Fin De Siècle Supernatural Fiction, Leandra E. Binder
The Ego At An Impasse: Aesthetic Empathy And The Abject D’Art In Fin De Siècle Supernatural Fiction, Leandra E. Binder
English Language and Literature ETDs
This dissertation examines the symbol of an art object which represents a corpse or dead person’s identity, what I call the abject d’art, as it appears in fin de siècle supernatural fiction by Vernon Lee (Violet Paget) to identify late Victorian notions of Kristevan abjection, avant la lettre. Lee’s aesthetic philosophy informs her use of the abject d’art, especially her examination of the empathetic process as part of aesthetics to explain how individuals represent and respond to objects mentally and emotionally. Through her analysis of empathy, Lee identifies the ego as a fallible moderator of an individual’s …
The Magic Of Love: Love Magic In Medieval Romance, Dalicia Raymond
The Magic Of Love: Love Magic In Medieval Romance, Dalicia Raymond
English Language and Literature ETDs
This project examines authorial representations of the morality of three functions of love magic: to induce, to disrupt, and to facilitate love in twelfth- through fifteenth-century Middle High German, Old French, and Middle English romances. Using a cultural studies approach with close textual analysis and informed by gender studies, it investigates medieval romance authors’ discomfort with love inducing magic and asserts that this discomfort is a response to the magic’s violation of free will, a central tenet of medieval theology. I find that authors condemn love inducing magic but mark specific instances acceptable through explicit clarification of divine approval. Love …