The Novella in Arabic: a Study in Fictional Genres

1986 ◽  
Vol 18 (4) ◽  
pp. 473-484 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roger Allen

Before broaching the main topic of this study, there seem to me to be two general issues involving terms in the title which need to be addressed: The one concerns nomenclature, the other the question of genres. A certain vagueness colors most attempts at definition of the term “novella,” something which seems the result of both the way in which the term has developed and the considerable differences of opinion among critics. Thus theOxford English Dictionaryseems to reflect the relatively recent interest in the genre in the English-speaking world by not including the word at all in the main part of the dictionary and by defining it in the Supplement as “a short novel (as in the stories of Boccaccio'sDecameron).” As Howard Nemerov points out, however, “the term ‘short novel’ is descriptive only in the way that the term ‘Middle Ages’ is descriptive—that is, not at all, except with regard to the territory on either side.” The index to the English translation of Todorov'sPoetics of Prose lists: Novella, see Tale. Such entries as these do at least convey to us the notion that the novella operates somewhere along a fictional spectrum, the two poles of which are the novel and the short story, but that is all.

Author(s):  
Horace Walpole

‘Look, my lord! See heaven itself declares against your impious intentions’ The Castle of Otranto (1764) is the first supernatural English novel and one of the most influential works of Gothic fiction. It inaugurated a literary genre that will be forever associated with the effects that Walpole pioneered. Professing to be a translation of a mysterious Italian tale from the darkest Middle Ages, the novel tells of Manfred, prince of Otranto, whose fear of an ancient prophecy sets him on a course of destruction. After the grotesque death of his only son, Conrad, on his wedding day, Manfred determines to marry the bride–to–be. The virgin Isabella flees through a castle riddled with secret passages. Chilling coincidences, ghostly visitations, arcane revelations, and violent combat combine in a heady mix that terrified the novel's first readers. In this new edition Nick Groom examines the reasons for its extraordinary impact and the Gothic culture from which it sprang. The Castle of Otranto was a game-changer, and Walpole the writer who paved the way for modern horror exponents.


1882 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
pp. 312-343
Author(s):  
Isaac N. Arnold

The noblest inheritance we Americans derive from our British ancestors is the memory and example of the great and good men who adorn your history. They are as much appreciated and honoured on our side of the Atlantic as on this. In giving to the English-speaking world Washington and Lincoln we think we repay, in large part, our obligation. Their pre-eminence in American history is recognised, and the republic, which the one founded and the other preserved, has already crowned them as models for her children.


2000 ◽  
Vol 95 (2) ◽  
pp. 465
Author(s):  
Carolyn P. Collette ◽  
Marie-Francoise Alamichel ◽  
Derek Brewer ◽  
Leslie J. Workman ◽  
Kathleen Verduin

Author(s):  
Marina P. Abasheva ◽  
◽  
Mariya V. Kurilenko ◽  
◽  

The article studies the poetics of the contemporary writer Yuriy Buyda in the context of the contemporary Russian short story. The analysis of historically specific forms of Buyda’s cyclization is considered as part of the general tasks of historical poetics in studying the evolution of literary forms. Structural and semiotic analysis of the writer’s works reveals that his prose forms peculiar cycles-clusters, ‘archipelagos’, where a cycle of stories appears to be related to novels. This connection is primarily determined by the setting, but also by recurring heroes and a specific – cumulative rather than cyclical – plot that traces its origin to myth. Through the example of one such cluster of texts – the cycles Zhungli, Gates of Zhungli (Vrata Zhungley) (2011), Lions and Lilies (L’vy i Lilii) (2013), the novel Blue Blood (Sinyaya krov’) and related works – the paper investigates the nature and logic of the depicted world, the mechanisms of its intra-textual connections, as well as the genesis due to both the nature of the author’s artistic thinking and the social, historical and literary, biographical context. Thus, we can observe a tendency of transcending the genre boundaries of a story or novel in favor of hypertext rhizomatic formations – based on mythologizing strategies. These features correlate with the general interest of contemporary Russian literature in collections of short stories, on the one hand, and the contemporary novel’s leaning to disintegration of a single narrative and fragmentation, on the other. It is possible that the tendencies toward hypertext strategies for text generation are determined by the general properties of modern thinking and social communication since today the social morphology of society is built in the form of networks.


Author(s):  
James F. Puglisi

Several important works on the history and theology of ordination have been published in the English-speaking world, among the most recent of which is one by Dr. Paul F. Bradshaw.1 The questions touching on ministry are absolutely essential for the resolution of questions regarding the unity of the church. The mutual recognition of ministry among communities is fundamental if they are to recognize one another as authentic apostolic churches. Although ministry is not the only question for the apostolicity of the church, it is a fundamental one, given that ordination rituals articulate an effective structuring, as well as an auto-definition, of a church. This fact begs, therefore, an exploration of the theological meaning of the “process of ordination” as a whole, as well as careful consideration of the content of the ritual and prayers. The attempt to recognize theological equilibria, which are articulated through the relation of the lex orandi, lex credendi, and the Trinitarian dimension of the process of access to the ordained ministry, leads to an understanding of the originality of the ordained ministry in the context of a plurality of ministries in a church that is itself fully ministerial. Finally, the importance of ordination resides in the fact that it is a process that represents, in a demonstrative way, the structuring of each church, because the process is not only an ecclesial act but also a confessional, epicletic, and juridical one.


2015 ◽  
Vol 66 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerhard Regn

AbstractAn important characteristic of Italian minne-poetry in the late Middle Ages is the negotiation of the Sacred and the Profane. Nonetheless, Dante and Petrarch, the most important representatives of Italian minne-poetry, enter this negotiation in very different ways. Dante proposes to align mundane minne-poetry - as a form of minne-theology - with sacralization; with that, Dante seems to be in perfect harmony with his epoch, commonly referred to as Christian or theocentric Middle Ages. But looking more closely, Dante’s sacralization of courtly love reveals itself to be an outrageous provocation of Christian orthodoxy: Dante’s minne-poetry presents itself as a supplement to the Gospel’s promise of Salvation, and thus obviously competes with the institutionalized religion. Petrarch, very much concerned to be perceived as the one to overcome the ‘Dark Ages’ represented by Dante and from there as the founding authority of what we call Renaissance, quotes Dante’s sacralization of the courtly love in order to cancel demonstratively its claim to ontological substance. Different to Dante, Petrarch avoids all heretic appearance by presenting the divinization of the minne-lady as a mere phantasm which is finally recognized as the result of a morally erroneous conception of love. Therefore with Petrarch, Christian orthodoxy is not overtly contested. This paradoxically clears the way for a genuine worldly poetry in which art itself gains the aura of the sacred: thus with Petrarch, the will to balance religion and love becomes a driving force of secularization.


2013 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-66
Author(s):  
Carmen Martin

The essay “Monstruos y poder en El obsceno pájaro de la noche” studies the figure of the monster in the novel El obsceno pájaro de la noche by Chilean author José Donoso. Based on Michel Foucault’s definition of the monster developed in his work Los anormales, this analysis focuses on the way in which the figure of the monster, understood as a marginal entity, threatens social systems and structures by proposing a new discourse in which such conventions are denied, subverted and replaced. Therefore, the monster appears in essence as a transgressive figure, which can be understood as an attack on the establishment and furthermore as an allegory to those institutions and social values that frame modern societies and more specifically those established in Chile in the 1970s.


2020 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 15
Author(s):  
Jarosław Hetman

<p>The article explores the ancient notion of ekphrasis in an attempt to redefine it and to adjust it to the requirements of the contemporary literary and artistic landscape. An overview of the transformations in the world of art in the 20<sup>th</sup> century allows us to adjust our understanding of what art is today and to examine its existence within the literary context. In light of the above, I postulate a broadening of the definition of ekphrasis so as to include not only painting and sculpture on the one side, and poetry on the other, but also to open it up to less conventional forms of artistic expression, and allow for its use in reference to prose. In order to illustrate its relevance to the novel, I have conducted a study of three contemporary novels – John Banville’s <em>Athena</em>, Kurt Vonnegut’s <em>Bluebeard</em> and Don DeLillo’s <em>Mao II </em>– in order to uncover the innovative ways in which novelists nowadays use ekphrasis to reinvigorate long prose.</p>


Labyrinth ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 106-124
Author(s):  
Jin Wan

The Philosophical Tropism of Milan Kundera: The Novel in Search of the lost Definition The philosophical tropism of Milan Kundera is manifested in particular by his novels in search of lost definition. The creation and the redefinition of concepts in his novels aiming at elucidating the essence show his ambition to " make philosophy in the way of a novelist". We examine his processes in the invention of concepts and the definition of words, as well as the similarity between his works and phenomenology, particularly Merleau-Ponty's approach. Through the metaphoricity of language and the inseparability between definitions and characters in his novels, Kundera revives a missed rendezvous between philosophy and novel. The definition of concept is no longer the privilege of philosopher. By the tireless pursuit of defining "the indefinable", Kundera transforms the novel into a place of phenomenological description and a field of thought experimentation, despite his ambiguity about this rapprochement.


2002 ◽  
pp. 68-74
Author(s):  
K. Banek

Every year, an increasing number of scholarly and popular works on issues relating to the relationship between the fields of religion and politics appear around the world, especially in the English-speaking world. This shows, on the one hand, the growing importance and relevance of these problems, and on the other, the great interest of researchers in such issues. These works focus primarily on the connections and processes that take place in the world of Islam, in particular at the junction of the Islamic Christianity. Based on this, we can say that in our eyes a new scientific discipline is being created, which, on the model of existing religious disciplines (philosophy of religion, psychology of religion, sociology of religion and geography of religion), can be called the political science of religion.


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