"Goo-Prone And Generally Pathetic": Empathy And Irony In David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest,
2017
Georgia Southern University
"Goo-Prone And Generally Pathetic": Empathy And Irony In David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, Benjamin L. Peyton
College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations
Critical considerations of David Foster Wallace’s work have tended, on the whole, to use the framework that the author himself established in his essay “E Unibus Pluram” and in his interview with Larry McCaffery. Following his own lead, the critical consensus is that Wallace succeeds in overcoming the limits of postmodern irony. If we examine the formal trappings of his writing, however, we find that the critical assertion that Wallace manages to transcend the paralytic irony of his postmodern predecessors is made in the face of his frequent employment of postmodern techniques and devices. Thus, there arises a contradiction between …
The American Pastoral Tradition And The Stories Of Breece D'J Pancake,
2017
Georgia Southern University
The American Pastoral Tradition And The Stories Of Breece D'J Pancake, Christopher Blackburn
College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations
In the late twentieth century, Breece Pancake carried on the American pastoral tradition by both featuring and modifying characteristics of early American pastoral literature. Breece Pancake does not directly imitate his predecessors, but instead brings the spirit of the nearly 200-year-old tradition in which he participates to a twentieth-century audience. Part of the enduring relevance of the literature in the American pastoral tradition, including The Stories of Breece D’J Pancake, is that at the heart of these stories is a theme that has defined and continues to shape the American experience: the struggle with living in liminal spaces.
Pecan Grove Review Volume 18,
2017
St. Mary's University
Pecan Grove Review Volume 18, St. Mary's University
Pecan Grove Review
Creative writings by students, faculty, and staff of the St. Mary's University community.
(Re)Mediating The Spirit: Evangelical Christian Young Adult Media,
2017
Virginia Commonwealth University
(Re)Mediating The Spirit: Evangelical Christian Young Adult Media, Tamara Watkins
Theses and Dissertations
"We are in the world, but not of the world," a maxim frequently spoken in evangelical Christian culture, provides insight into how these individuals view their relationship with secular culture. They presume to share the same temporal plane with secular culture, but do not participate in it. In this dissertation, I explore whether the division between evangelical Christian culture and secular culture is as clear as this aphorism implies. To facilitate this investigation, I examine media Christian content creators created for an American evangelical Christian young adult audience in the early twenty-first century, specifically focusing on novel-length fiction, comics and …
Theatrical Texts And Contexts: Poe And Hawthorne’S Fictional Women,
2017
Virginia Commonwealth University
Theatrical Texts And Contexts: Poe And Hawthorne’S Fictional Women, Savannah M. Singletary
Theses and Dissertations
Edgar Allen Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne are arguably two of the most highly read and heavily debated nineteenth-century antebellum authors in America. Their writings fascinate readers, while their character depictions, particularly their characterizations of fictional women, prompt intense academic debate. This thesis examines the previously less-studied historical developments surrounding Poe and Hawthorne in the antebellum era that shaped their approach to writing fiction. In particular, this study scrutinizes the effects of the development of a newly popular art form, ballet, the ascendency of female authorship, and the impact of American theatrical reform upon antebellum authors’ authorial faculties, especially Hawthorne and …
Narrative Pleasures And Feminist Politics: Popular Women’S Historical Fiction, 1990-2015,
2017
Wilfrid Laurier University
Narrative Pleasures And Feminist Politics: Popular Women’S Historical Fiction, 1990-2015, Victoria Kennedy
Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)
This dissertation contributes to a developing body of work on women’s historical fiction and its significance to feminist discourse. Building from Diana Wallace’s 2005 study The Woman’s Historical Novel: British Women Writers, 1900-2000, I offer a modified definition of “the woman’s historical novel” and a transatlantic consideration of several of the most popular titles in the contemporary period, including The Other Boleyn Girl (2001), Outlander (1991), A Great and Terrible Beauty (2003), and Scarlett (1991). Several studies have followed Wallace’s, notably Ann Heilmann and Mark Llewellyn’s Metafiction and Metahistory in Contemporary Women’s Writing (2007) and Katherine Cooper and Emma …
Authorship In Burroughs's Red Night Trilogy And Bowles's Translation Of Moroccan Storytellers,
2016
National Chung Cheng University
Authorship In Burroughs's Red Night Trilogy And Bowles's Translation Of Moroccan Storytellers, Benjamin J. Heal
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
In his article "Authorship in Burroughs's Red Night Trilogy and Bowles's Translation of Moroccan Storytellers" Benjamin J. Heal discusses Paul Bowles's and William S. Burroughs's varying interrogation of the constructed nature of authorship. In his study Heal focuses on the publication history of Burroughs's Cities of the Red Night (1981), which was written with considerable collaborative influence and Bowles's translation of illiterate Moroccan storytellers, where his influence over the production and editing of the texts is blurred as are the roles of author and translator. Through an examination of Bowles's and Burroughs's authorship strategies in parallel with an explication of …
Burroughs's Postcolonial Visions In The Yage Letters,
2016
Independent Scholar
Burroughs's Postcolonial Visions In The Yage Letters, Melanie Keomany
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
In her article "Burroughs's Postcolonial Visions in The Yage Letters" Melanie Keomany discusses the contents of William S. Burroughs and Allen Ginsberg's The Yage Letters which could be dismissed as openly bigoted and racist. Keomany posits that the text reveals valuable connections between the colonial expansion of the eighteenth century and 1950s USA and Latin America. By re-shaping Burroughs's lived experiences in the Amazon into a text where the narrator William Lee mimics sardonically and parodically the colonial scientific explorer, The Yage Letters provides valuable insight into the complex postcolonial context of the mid-twentieth century.
Bowles's Up Above The World As Beatnik Murder Mystery,
2016
Fukuoka University
Bowles's Up Above The World As Beatnik Murder Mystery, Greg Bevan
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
In his article "Bowles's Up Above the World as Beatnik Murder Mystery" Greg Bevan discusses Paul Bowles's fourth and final novel, which at the time of its publication was met with mixed reactions from reviewers and its creator alike, and has seen relatively scanty critical attention in the years since. Gena Dagel Caponi perceives in the novel a reflection of Bowles's struggle for control, during the time of its writing, in the face of his wife Jane's terminal illness. Building on this insight, the current essay notes the same tension in the writings of the Beats—a movement with which Bowles …
Burroughs's Folios As An Archival Machine For Artistic Creation,
2016
Martin-Luther-Universität
Burroughs's Folios As An Archival Machine For Artistic Creation, Tomasz D. Stompor
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
In his article "Burroughs's Folios as an Archival Machine for Artistic Creation" Tomasz D. Stompor discusses the significance of archival material as a scholarly resource for the analysis of William S. Burroughs's cut-up experiments. Stompor retraces the history of the author's filing system as both a referential repository and a device for documentation and investigates its function as an eperimental machine for the production of cut-up texts and layouts
Severing Ties: A Lacanian Reading Of Motherhood In Joyce Carol Oates’S Short Stories "The Children" And "Feral",
2016
University of Belgrade
Severing Ties: A Lacanian Reading Of Motherhood In Joyce Carol Oates’S Short Stories "The Children" And "Feral", Uroš Tomić
Bearing Witness: Joyce Carol Oates Studies
This paper approaches two of Joyce Carol Oates’s short stories (“The Children” and “Feral”) from a Lacanian perspective on the tripartite structure of personality in an attempt to analyze questions of motherhood and the parent-child separation process. Although published 35 years apart both stories deal with mothers who have trouble containing their maternal attitude and children who become elusive entities for their parents. Utilizing as well the concept of what Oates has termed “realistic allegory” in the analysis of characters situated within highly specific settings and circumstances, the paper aims to shed light on Oates’s vision of the workings of …
Witness: Reflections On Detention In Joyce Carol Oates's Work,
2016
CRILA, Université d'Angers
Witness: Reflections On Detention In Joyce Carol Oates's Work, Tanya L. Tromble
Bearing Witness: Joyce Carol Oates Studies
Throughout her career, Joyce Carol Oates has resisted the urge of others to label her a feminist writer, insisting that she be considered a writer, independent of biological gender. As America’s “chronicler of the middle class,” she has given voice to countless invisible female character types, but this is only one concern among many. Oates is incredibly active, but rather than to actively incite, she uses her prolific pen to create testimonies to contemporary American life, seeking particularly to give voice to the voiceless among us. In spite of the notions of crime and justice being central to her fiction …
Teaching Place: Heritage, Home And Community, The Heart Of Education,
2016
University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Teaching Place: Heritage, Home And Community, The Heart Of Education, Judy Kay Lorenzen
Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research
This dissertation examines the implementation of a Place-conscious pedagogy as a means to teach heritage and sense of place. This pedagogy is framed upon the premise that trying to understand our heritage and place—ourselves—are crucial elements in our ability to live well as individuals who are connected school/community members, who help our schools/communities thrive, becoming Place-conscious citizens. I argue that in teaching in such a culturally diverse community, tensions rise as immigration has become a main focus. Our school/community has experienced many ethnic groups with vast social differences for which Place-conscious education offers practical solutions. These students have a great …
Exploring Psychological Territoriality Through The Domestic Gothic In Beloved And Mama Day,
2016
University of Texas at Tyler
Exploring Psychological Territoriality Through The Domestic Gothic In Beloved And Mama Day, Lori L. Cook
English Department Theses
The novels, Beloved, by Toni Morrison, and Mama Day, by Gloria Naylor, contain narratives of families with a history of slavery that explore how their female protagonists claim their identities within the new boundaries of freedom. Using a framework of the Domestic Gothic, this paper explores how formerly enslaved female characters claim new psychological territory in bounded domestic spaces by using the chores they were forced to perform during their times of slavery as a means to independence. Domestic duties such as cooking and gardening along with magical and religious ceremonies and acts of violence are passed down through the …
“The Indians Gaping Before Us”: Anxieties Of Consumption In Mary White Rowlandson’S Sovereignty And Goodness Of God,
2016
Seton Hall University
“The Indians Gaping Before Us”: Anxieties Of Consumption In Mary White Rowlandson’S Sovereignty And Goodness Of God, Samantha Woodington
Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)
This paper traces the theme of consumption throughout Mary White Rowlandson’s captivity narrative The Sovereignty and Goodness of God. From Rowlandson’s fear of actual cannibalism at the outset of the work, her obsession with recording the strange foods she consumes, her status as a consumer of Algonquin culture, and lastly, the consumption of the novel by both contemporary and modern readers alike, consumption becomes the leitmotif of the text. A closer analysis elucidates that the fear of consumption truly belies a fear of colonialism and the cultural exchanges taking place at the frontier.
The Poet And The Polemist: Demystifying The Natural Law Theory Of John Milton,
2016
CUNY Hunter College
The Poet And The Polemist: Demystifying The Natural Law Theory Of John Milton, John J. Mazola
Theses and Dissertations
A summation of the influences behind Milton's Natural Law theory as found in the works of Aristotle, Grotius, Hobbes, and Thomas Aquinas. The essay's intent is to uncover this important thread that runs through both Milton's Poetic Verse as well as his Polemic tracts.
The Great Radical Dualism: Locating Margaret Fuller’S Feminism In Nathaniel Hawthorne’S Fiction,
2016
University of New Orleans
The Great Radical Dualism: Locating Margaret Fuller’S Feminism In Nathaniel Hawthorne’S Fiction, Renee Michele Vincent
Senior Honors Theses
The purpose of this thesis is to establish a foundation built on the congruencies between Margaret Fuller’s feminist theory and Nathaniel Hawthorne’s fiction, with the aim of addressing two major points: first, the implications of universalizing gender in the context of identity politics; and second, to show how gender universality is challenged within Hawthorne’s fiction and Fuller’s prose. Given that Nathaniel Hawthorne’s characters depict a range of personal variability, the act of synthesizing Margaret Fuller’s feminist theory with Hawthorne’s fiction functions to link the personal with the political. The overall goal of this study is to substantiate both writers within …
Introduction To New Work On Immigration And Identity In Contemporary France, Québec, And Ireland,
2016
Saint Patrick's College
Introduction To New Work On Immigration And Identity In Contemporary France, Québec, And Ireland, Dervila Cooke
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
No abstract provided for the introduction.
Thematic Bibliography To New Work On Immigration And Identity In Contemporary France, Québec, And Ireland,
2016
Saint Patrick's College
Thematic Bibliography To New Work On Immigration And Identity In Contemporary France, Québec, And Ireland, Dervila Cooke
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture
No abstract provided.
Ecological Approaches To Modernism, The U.S. South, And 20th Century American Literature,
2016
University of Arkansas, Fayetteville
Ecological Approaches To Modernism, The U.S. South, And 20th Century American Literature, Justin Ford Tinsley
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
This project seeks to draw from the insights of the emerging scholarly discipline known as ecocritism, study of the relationship between human and nonhuman in all arts and in all diverse forms, and apply them to the study of a specific regional art, that of the U.S. South. As an interrogation of the human / nonhuman binary, ecocriticism is intrinsically intertwined with the concept of place. Southern studies—having long explored the diversity (in terms of both human experience and geographical terrain) characterizing the region—offers ecocriticism a ripe testing ground for theoretical mergers and analytic applications. Both fields celebrate hybridity, multiplicity, …
