scholarly journals Karen Bixen reads the Olaf Tryggvason saga: Reseption of the saga and narrative strategies in “The Bear and the Kiss”

2020 ◽  
Vol 18 (2) ◽  
pp. 323-337
Author(s):  
Anastasia Lomagina ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
The Other ◽  
Semantic Gap ◽  
Reception Theory ◽  
Narrative Strategies ◽  
Oral Storytelling ◽  
European Modernism

The article analyses the reception of the Norse sagas in Karen Blixen’s short story “The Bear and the Kiss” written in 1958 with the main focus on the “saga of Olaf Tryggvason”. Drawing on Wolfgang Iser’s reception theory, the article explores the hierarchy of the pre-texts that are traceable in the text of the considered story and suggests a system of markers that are meant to include interaction with the precedent texts. The typology of markers includes the characters’ names, metaphorical use of mythological or historical personas, the identified cited texts or stories, identical attributes (in this particular text — a glove thrown into a person’s face), the characters’ appearance, and similarity or contrast with the storyline of the other unidentified text. The analysis shows that there are two possible effects of the use of references: semantic compression and, conversely, symbolist and Neoplatonic circling around the event, which creates a semantic gap. The reader can either find himself aware of a riddle yet being unable to understand how the events or reactions fit into the plot or assume the role of an investigator creating his own interpretation of the storyline. The examined strategy of circling around the truth in order to indicate an idea or a fact by using metaphors, comparisons, and allusions in combination with Walter Benjamin’s and Edward Forster’s philosophy of oral storytelling allows Blixen’s short stories to fit neatly into the context of European modernism.

‘Forlorn on the Fringe of Life’: Exploring Working-Class Childhood in Katherine Mansfield’s Short Stories

2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Argha Kumar Banerjee
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Short Fiction ◽  
Verbal Abuse ◽  
The Other ◽  
Parental Rejection ◽  
Narrative Strategies ◽  
Childhood Experiences ◽  
The One

Abstract In Katherine Mansfield’s short story ‘Life of Ma Parker’, the old, widowed charwoman is plagued by ‘unbearable’ thoughts of her deceased grandson Lennie: ‘Why did he have to suffer so?’ Lennie’s unfortunate death in the story is not a solitary instance of tragic portrayal of working-class childhood in Mansfield’s short fiction. In several of her tales she empathetically explores the marginalized existence of such children, occasionally juxtaposing their deplorable existence with their elite counterparts’. From social exclusion, child labour, parental rejection, infant and child mortality on the one hand to physical and verbal abuse, bullying in the school and appalling living conditions on the other; Mansfield's exploration of the working-class childhood in her short fiction is not only psychologically complex but sociologically significant. Focusing on the relevant short stories in her oeuvre, this brief analysis intends to closely examine such depictions of marginalized childhood experiences, particularly in light of the oppressive societal conditions that validate their repressive alienation and sufferings. Tracing various biographical circumstances that may have fostered Mansfield’s deep empathy with the children’s’ predicament, this analysis also draws attention to her subtle oblique narrative strategies that effectively represent the plight of working-class children in a convincing and an ingeniously nuanced manner.

POLIVARIABILITY OF THE BASTARD MOTIF IN THE SHORT STORIES BY GUY DE MAUPASSANT: CHARACTER IN SEARCH OF SELF-IDENTIFICATION

2018 ◽  
pp. 20-27
Author(s):  
Oksana Galchuk
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Social Institutions ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Guy De Maupassant ◽  
Traditional Values ◽  
The Social ◽  
Role Of It ◽  
Structural Methods

The theme of illegitimacy Guy de Maupassant evolved in his works this article perceives as one of the factors of the author’s concept of a person and the plane of intersection of the most typical motifs of his short stories. The study of the author’s concept of a person through the prism of polivariability of the motif of a bastard is relevant in today’s revision of traditional values, transformation of the usual social institutions and search for identities, etc. The purpose of the study is to give a definition to the existence specifics of the bastard motif in the Maupassant’s short stories by using historical and literary, comparative, structural methods of analysis as dominant. To do this, I analyze the content, variability and the role of this motive in the formation of the Maupassant’s concept of a person, the author’s innovations in its interpretation from the point of view of literary diachrony. Maupassant interprets the bastard motif in the social, psychological and metaphorical-symbolic sense. For the short stories with the presentation of this motif, I suggest the typology based on the role of it in the structure of the work and the ideological and thematic content: the short stories with a motif-fragment, the ones with the bastard’s leitmotif and the group where the bastard motif becomes a central theme. The Maupassant’s interpretation of the bastard motif combines the general tendencies of its existence in the world’s literary tradition and individual reading. The latter is the result of the author’s understanding of the relevant for the era issues: the transformation of the family model, the interest in the theory of heredity, the strengthening of atheistic sentiments, the growth of frustration in the system of traditional social and moral values etc. This study sets the ground for a prospective analysis of the evolution the bastard motif in the short-story collections of different years or a comparative study of the motif in short stories and novels by Maupassant.

scholarly journals Edogawa Rampo’s short story Kagami Jigoku: A Structural Study

KIRYOKU ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-17
Author(s):  
Yuliani Rahmah
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Japanese Society ◽  
Modern Technology ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Other ◽  
Cultural Aspects ◽  
Analysis Process ◽  
Structural Methods ◽  
Modern Era

The purpose of this research is to analyze the intrinsic elements found in the short story Kagami Jigoku by Edogawa Rampo. By using structural methods the analysis process  find out the intrinsic elements which builds  the Kagami Jikoku short story. As a result it is known that the Kagami Jikoku is a short story with a mystery theme as the hallmark of Rampo as its author. The characteristic of this short story can be seen from the theme which raised the unusual obsession problem of the main characters. With the first person point of view which tells in unusual way from the other short stories, the regression plot in Kagami Jikoku is able to tell the unique phenomenon of Japanese society and its modern technology through elements of place, time and socio-cultural aspects of Japanese society in the modern era

scholarly journals TYPOLOGY AND STRATEGIES OF CREATIVE RECEPTION: A CASE STUDY OF ENGLISH POSTMODERNIST POETRY AND PROSE

2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 110-119
Author(s):  
Maria S. Sloistova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Reception Theory ◽  
Ivory Tower ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Literary Works

The paper focuses on complex research and description of creative reception theory and typology. There are provided definitions of such terms as reception, creative reception, creative reception strategies, and others. The author builds the typology of creative reception on the basis of works by E. V. Abramovskikh, S. Ye. Trunin, M. V. Zagidullina, V. I. Tyupa, and M. Naumann. This typology includes two types (or levels) of creative reception, defined as classic and postmodernist. Each of the types is characterized by a number of strategies, i. e. ways of representing an artistically received text in one’s own work. The classic type strategies (formal, authentic, neutral and antithetical) focus primarily on plot transformation. As for the postmodernist level, the author singles out two strategies: congenial and play. The theory and typology of creative reception is substantiated with some examples of reminiscences and allusions to English and world poetry. The examples under analysis are taken from the following prose works by the outstanding English postmodernist writer John Robert Fowles (1926–2005): the novel The French Lieutenant’s Woman (1969), the collection of long short stories The Ebony Tower (1974), the philosophic book The Aristos (1964), and also the lyric collection Selected Poems, published posthumously in 2012. The collection has not been translated into Russian yet. Therefore, the poem under analysis (Islanders) has been translated into Russian by the author of the present paper. The paper also deals with indirect Biblical reception which is found in the allusion to the ivory tower. The allusion gave the title The Ebony Tower both to Fowles’ long short story and collection as a whole. The author of the paper draws a conclusion about the dominant creative reception strategies in the literary works under analysis and also about the possible use of the presented creative reception typology in analyzing works by other writers.

How to put yourself in someone else’s shoes: The role of point-of-view in the interpretation of mixed messages

2019 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 219-238
Author(s):  
Nikos Vergis
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
The Other ◽  
Web Based ◽  
Affective Factors ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Mixed Messages ◽  
Communicative Role ◽  
The Way

AbstractDoes having a communicative role other than the speaker’s make a difference to the way pragmatic meaning is construed? Standard paradigms in interpersonal pragmatics have implicitly assumed a speaker-centric perspective over the years, however modern approaches have re-considered the role of listener evaluations. In the present study, I examine whether assuming different communicative roles (speaker, listener, observer) results in varying interpretations. A web-based experiment revealed that participants who took the perspective of different characters in short stories differed in the way they interpreted what the speaker meant. In most cases, participants in the role of the listener interpreted speaker meaning in more negative ways than participants in the other roles. The present study suggests that the directionality of the difference (negative inferences under the listener’s perspective) could be explained by taking into account affective factors.

scholarly journals MANIFESTAÇÕES DO DUPLO EM “PALHAÇO DA BOCA VERDE”

2008 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adilson dos Santos
Keyword(s):  
Key Words ◽  
Short Story ◽  
The Other ◽  
Complex Situation ◽  
Joao Guimaraes Rosa ◽  
Female Figures ◽  
Alter Ego ◽  
Love Triangle

RESUMO: O presente trabalho objetiva apresentar uma leitura de “Palhaço da boca verde”, do livro Tutaméia (Terceiras Estórias), sob a perspectiva do duplo. São três os artistas que fazem parte do enredo, compondo a complexa situação de um triângulo amoroso: Mema Verguedo, X. Ruysconcellos e Ona Pomona. Tais personagens – cada qual à sua maneira – são seres cindidos. No que se refere à X. Ruysconcellos, sob a pele do palhaço Ritripas, este procura fugir da realidade. No que diz respeito às figuras femininas, uma atua como o alter ego da outra. Embora X. Ruysconcellos demonstre inicial interesse por Ona Pomona, ao final da narrativa, ele descobre ser Mema Verguedo a sua metade faltante. Neste momento, cada um dos amantes reencontra a sua própria androginia. ABSTRACT: This essay analyses the short story “Palhaço da boca verde”, presented in the book Tutaméia (Terceiras Estórias), under the perspective of the double. Mema Verguedo, X. Ruysconcellos and Ona Pomona are the three artists who take part in the plot, composing a complex situation of a love triangle. These characters – each one in a different way – are divided beings. Regarding X. Ruysconcellos, by playing the role of the clown Ritripas, he tries to escape from reality. With reference to the female figures, one acts as the alter ego of the other. Although X. Ruysconcellos shows initial interest to Ona Pomona, at the end of the narrative, he discovers that Mema Verguedo is his missing half. In this moment, both lovers meet again their own androgyny. KEY-WORDS: João Guimarães Rosa – Short story – Double

scholarly journals Breaking the Rules: Innovation and Narrative Strategies in Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street and Ana Castillo's The Mixquiahuala Letters

2003 ◽  
Vol 26 (1) ◽  
pp. 108-120
Author(s):  
Carmen Haydée Rivera
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Sandra Cisneros ◽  
Narrative Strategies ◽  
Stream Of Consciousness ◽  
Story Line ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
Stage Direction ◽  
History Of ◽  
Considerable Length

Conventional approaches to literary genres conspicuously imply definition and classification. From the very beginning of our incursions into the literary world we learn to identify and differentiate a poem from a play, a short story from a novel. As readers we classify each written work into one of these neatly defined literary genres by following basic guidelines. Either we classify according to the structure of the work (stanza; stage direction/dialogue; narrative) or the length (short story; novelette; novel). What happens though when a reader encounters a work of considerable length made up of individual short pieces or vignettes that include rhythm and rhyme and is framed by an underlying, unifying story line linking the vignettes together? Is it a novel or a collection of short stories? Why does it sound and, at times, look like a poem? To further complicate classifications, what happens when a reader comes across an epistolary format with instructions on which letters to read first: letters made up of one-word lines, poetic stanzas, or italicized stream of consciousness; letters that narrate the history of two women's friendship? Is this a novel or a mere collection of letters?

Regionalist short fiction as humble fiction

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 161-172 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alda Correia
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Short Fiction ◽  
Spatial Context ◽  
Regional Literature ◽  
Aesthetic Value ◽  
The World ◽  
Cultural Connections

The representation of the world cannot be separated from its spatial context. Making the effort to understand how space and landscape influence short stories and their structure, and are represented in them, can help us to make sense of the role of this formerly underestimated subgenre, its social and cultural connections and dissonances, its relation to storytelling and popular narratives, and its alleged low importance. How does the short story genre relate to regional and landscape literature? Can we see it as humble fiction and, in this case, how does the humbleness of this subgenre play a part in the growth of the modernist short story? The oral, mythic and fantastic sources of the short story, together with the travel memoir tradition that brought the love for landscape description and the interest in the narration of brief and easily publishable episodes of local life, helped to consolidate a connection between the short story form and regional literature. ‘Humbleness’ is used here in association with the absence of complexity, plainness, simplicity of approach to a complex reality, straightforwardness. From this perspective, aesthetic value was usually absent from regionalist fiction as its only aim was to render the local truth faithfully. However, this ‘aesthetic humbleness’, which should not be used as a generalization, has been increasingly questioned in regard to modernism, postmodernism and postcolonialism and also when we consider specific works.

“Aleksei Alekseichi” of Bunin’s short stories: integration elements of an unassembled cycle

2021 ◽  
pp. 144-157
Author(s):  
Ya. V. Bazhenova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Central Element ◽  
Literary Field ◽  
Proper Name ◽  
Specific Theme ◽  
The One ◽  
Unique Ability ◽  
Experimental Attitude

The paper analyzes I. A. Bunin’s short story “Alexey Alekseich,” which is the central element of the unassembled cycle with a hero named Alexey Alekseevich. The cycle also includes short stories “The Archival File” and “Inscriptions.” A reconstruction of the writer’s strategy of composing the cycle expressed in Bunin’s metaposition towards literature as an aesthetic activity is carried out. Bunin actualizes the expressiveness of the authors’ proper noun (patronymic name) to hold a dialogue with his predecessors and intensify a debate with contemporaries in the literary field. On the one hand, in “Alexey Alekseich,” Bunin diminishes the role of a literary word in culture by parodying authoritative pretexts and polemics with them (L. N. Tolstoy). In this way, the writer invokes the specific theme of modernists – experimental attitude to the literary sign (Potekhin’s character). In addition, he introduces motifs of tomfoolery and oratorical behavior (with allusions to M. Gorky). On the other hand, comparing the different editions of “Alexey Alekseich” and its linkage with other two texts of the unassembled cycle shows that Bunin rehabilitates an artistic word and literary activity by applying onomatopoetic and narrative devices in the poetics of his short story. In this aspect, the role of the literary sign in culture is justified by its unique ability to confront death and oblivion. Thus, Bunin’s short story “Alexey Alekseich” reveals extensive use of the meaningforming possibilities of the proper name.

Kerima Polotan-Tuvera: An Analysis of Her Style and Craft as Reviewed from Her Short Stories The Virgin and the Sounds Of Sunday

2012 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Emeliza Torrento Estimo
Keyword(s):  
Short Stories ◽  
Short Story ◽  
Complex Structures ◽  
Writing Style ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Story Writer ◽  
Simple Sentences ◽  
Changing Role ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Methods

This study is an attempt at describing and analyzing Kerima Polotan-Tuvera’s style and craft as a short story writer. This attempt is anchored on the combined constructs of Short (1996), Hayes (1966) and Chapman (1973) which emphasize that analyzing text style must be done by examining linguistic choices which are intrinsically connected with meaning. This paper also borrows Hayes’ (1966) concept of writing style as a characteristic, habitual, and recurrent use of the apparatuses of language which must be amenable to statistical measurement in order to reveal the writer’s craft. Combining both quantitative and qualitative methods, the study revealed prevalent use of simple and complex structures where the use of simple sentences is more predominant and lengthened only by an extensive use of a variety of modifiers. Tuvera’s writing revealed a dominant use of single word adjectives or “true adjectives”---a term borrowed from Gibson (1966). Furthermore, her simple, natural, and spontaneous use of description was perceived to be used as a foregrounding device for characterization and theme-building, as a withholding technique, and as a strategy to imply meanings and to highlight the setting of the story. Further analysis of the stories revealed social realities during Tuvera’s time particularly on the changing role of women in the society.   Keywords - Kerima-Polotan Tuvera, short stories, The Virgin, Sounds of Sunday

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