The algebraic solvability of the novel lamplighter puzzle

ICGA Journal ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-23
Author(s):  
Connor Gregor ◽  
Daniel Ashlock ◽  
Allan R. Willms

In this study, the group of finite cyclic lamplighter states is reinterpreted as the novel lamplighter puzzle. The rules of the puzzle are outlined and related back to properties of the lamplighter group with specific interest placed upon the discussion of which puzzle instances are solvable. The paper shows that, through the use of algebra, many puzzle instances can be identified as solvable without the use of an exhaustive search algorithm. Solvability depends upon the creation of irregular generating sets for subgroups of the finite cyclic lamplighter group and the cosets formed by these subgroups. Further possible generalizations of the lamplighter puzzle are also discussed in closing.

Author(s):  
Andrew Kahn

The Short Story: A Very Short Introduction charts the rise of the short story from its original appearance in magazines and newspapers. For much of the 19th century, tales were written for the press, and the form’s history is marked by engagement with popular fiction. The short story then earned a reputation for its skilful use of plot design and character study distinct from the novel. This VSI considers the continuity and variation in key structures and techniques such as the beginning, the creation of voice, the ironic turn or plot twist, and how writers manage endings. Throughout, it draws on examples from an international and flourishing corpus of work.


2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 323-344
Author(s):  
Jonathan Brent

Kazuo Ishiguro has suggested that his work of medieval fantasy, The Buried Giant (2015), draws on a “quasi-historical” King Arthur, in contrast to the Arthur of legend. This article reads Ishiguro’s novel against the medieval work that codified the notion of an historical King Arthur, Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain (c. 1139). Geoffrey’s History offered a largely fictive account of the British past that became the most successful historiographical phenomenon of the English Middle Ages. The Buried Giant offers an interrogation of memory that calls such “useful” constructions of history into question. The novel deploys material deriving from Geoffrey’s work while laying bear its methodology; the two texts speak to each other in ways sometimes complementary, sometimes deconstructive. That Ishiguro’s critique can be applied to Geoffrey’s History points to recurrent strategies of history-making, past and present, whereby violence serves as a mechanism for the creation of historical form.


Author(s):  
Taïeb Berrada

In his novel Le jour du Roi Abdellah Taïa explores the theme of alterity in its relation to two political and symbolic forces: expressing one’s self in the language of the Other and narrating homo-erotic and homosexual relationships in Morocco under the dictatorship of Hassan II. It is the translation of these two aspects that leads to the creation of a new narrative about homosexual Franco-Moroccan identity. This narrative, in turn, reveals the instability of a model of identification subjected to a normalizing sexual apparatus controlling bodies and minds in a place where homosexuality is still punishable by law. This renders the identification process for the two main characters of the novel particularly problematic as they can no longer sustain it without going back to the sources of foundational myths and more particularly to the original murder in Islam. This article argues that the killing of one character by the other goes back to the original murder of Abel by Cain, a model which becomes emancipated from the Western Oedipal complex, translating a new conception of a love relation between two male characters. By so doing, it calls for a reevaluation of the normativity imposed by the king who is using his power based on a patriarchal interpretation of religious legitimacy in view of political gain.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 20-28
Author(s):  
V. L. Martynov ◽  
◽  
I. L. Skripnik ◽  
Y. G. Ksenofontov ◽  
M. S. Shimanskaya ◽  
...  

The intensive development of autonomous underwater robotic complexes is very important for the development of the World Ocean. One of the main problems of using underwater robotic complexes is an increase searching efficiency of underwater devices based on the integration of the capabilities of onboard radio-electronic systems of obtaining information in various physical fields. Analyzing the physical basis of the search, including the consideration of the environment of its conduct, objects, as well as detection tools, it can be noted that the result of the search operations of the same objects in the same water areas for various underwater robotic complexes depends on what means of detection they are equipped. The presence of a certain set of the technical means will specify the development of the optimal sequence of actions of the search algorithm. The creation of such algorithms in relation to the task of increasing the search potential of underwater robotics will determine the direction of the research that ensures the formation of an optimal system of underwater search. Efficient use of search resources substantiates the conclusion that radio-electronic means of submersibles forming the system of underwater search, include the number of devices functionally interconnected for its effective conduct. The specified combination is aimed at the formation of the so-called integrated search system, which provides an exchange of information between different channels of searching devices about all objects detected. The article provides proposals for the creation of integrated search systems taking into account practical experiments and experience in designing underwater vehicles capable to implement the optimal system of underwater search using laser technologies.


Author(s):  
Joel J. Janicki

This article attempts to identify and examine some of the factors and sources that led to the creation of a largely forgotten prose work of English fiction titled Thaddeus of Warsaw (1803) which became an immediate and extraordinary success. Jane Porter’s novel deals with a fictitious Polish patriot Thaddeus Sobieski, who is modelled on the Polish national hero Tadeusz Kosciuszko. The novel presents an excellent illustration of the cultural links between Great Britain and Poland towards the end of the 18th century and constitutes a cautionary tale for Porter’s English readers, one that creates a basis for moral reform and political engagement.


2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (5) ◽  
pp. 116
Author(s):  
Ildar Ch. Safin ◽  
Elena I. Kolosova ◽  
Tatyana A. Gimranova

<p> This article is the verbal lexicon analysis based on the text of the novel "The Big Green Tent" by L. Ulitskaya. The creative manner of the contemporary writer attracts the attention of researchers, her writings describe the emotional experiences of the heroes and also give a generalized image of time full of historical details and features. The language of her stories and short stories is characterized by a special style in the description of time realities. A verb in the text allows the author to express the events and the circumstances that characterize an action in its dynamics due to the fact that verbal categories reflect the real reality in our consciousness. The method of linguistic cultural analysis of verbal lexicon in the novel "The Big Green Tent" made it possible to single out exactly those language units that the writer carefully selects for the creation and interpretation of the era. A special emphasis in the study is made on the creation of an expressive-emotional style of narration using the stylistic capabilities of the Russian verb. The individual author's methods of narration expressiveness creation are singled out: synonymous series, euphemisms, colloquial lexicon, etc. The conducted study and a careful analysis of the selected factual material testifies that, recreating an epoch, the master of the word invariably uses that language arsenal that brightly and fully conveys the color of time. L. Ulitskaya is able to be not only an indifferent witness of the epoch, but also her tenacious observer and interpreter. The analyzed factual material and the main points of this research can be used in the courses on stylistics and linguistic culturology, and also as an illustrative material during the classes on the linguistic analysis of a literary text.</p>


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Piotr Zwierzchowski

Zwierzchowski Piotr, Kino, czytelnik i czytający. O Geniuszu Michaela Grandage’a [The Cinema and Two Types of Readers. About Michael Grandage’s Genius]. „Przestrzenie Teorii” 32. Poznań 2019, Adam Mickiewicz University Press, pp. 371–381. ISSN 1644-6763. DOI 10.14746/pt.2019.32.20. In Genius (2016) by Michael Grandage books are present in many ways. The main characters are William ‘Max’ Perkins, an editor of the Charles Scribner’s Sons publishing house and Thomas Wolfe, a writer starting out at the time. The film is concerned with their relationship and the creation of the novel. The book functions as both a work and an artefact (also as typescript). Literature is a conversation topic and a way of living. One of the most important spaces is the publishing house building. Piotr Zwierzchowski, however, analyses Genius primarily as a contribution to reflections on the act of reading and its film visualization, referring to the distinction introduced by Alberto Manguel(modelled on Barthes’ écrivain and écrivant) between the reader as someone who reads “with no ulterior motive” and one “for whom the text is a vehicle towards another function”.


2021 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 106-109
Author(s):  
Marina A. Kozlova

The paper is devoted to the peculiarities of the creation of the personified image of the city in the novel “The Dead [City of] Bruges” by Georges Raymond Constantin Rodenbach, which, according to the author himself, represents not only the protagonist, but also its organising force. The Belgian author draws on an earlier literary tradition, according to which the city appears to the poet's mind in the form of a woman. The image of the city is built on the combination and interaction of different elements, among which those that are considered in the article: the theme of duality, the motif of reflection, which becomes the main constructional principle of the image system of the novel, as well as references to mythological and literary archetypes. The theme of duplicity is directly connected with the category of correspondence or analogy, which is central to Rodenbach's oeuvre and forms a peculiar poetics of reflection and determines the choice of expressive means. Dualism is associated with a hostile, dark and demonic force, contrasted with the "holy" and infallible feminine ideal, embodied in the image of the perished beloved, who is also a prototype of the city. The poeticised image of the city is related to archetypical figures that are typical of European symbolism – first of all, Ophelia, but also Orpheus and Narcissus, all this through an appeal to the symbolism of water and the otherworld, then through the main character's attempt to overcome the border between worlds and create a new myth about love that defeats death.


2021 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 85-91
Author(s):  
Chen Xinheng ◽  

The article is devoted to the history of the creation of the ballet "The White-Haired Girl", which was included among the "exemplary productions" during the Chinese Cultural Revolution. The plot of the ballet, based on class contradictions between landowners and peasants, has folklore origins: first it appeared in the novel, then the first national Chinese opera was created, later adapted for cinema and became the basis for the ballet. The ballet "The White-Haired Girl" was commissioned by Chinese leadership. It includes the historical facts of the class struggle and shows the formation of a personality ready to resist exploitation and fight for freedom for all. The ballet's music, composed by Yan Jinxuan, also includes revolutionary folk songs and numbers taken from the opera of the same name. Compared to the opera, the ballet enhances revolutionary features in the characters. The choreography harmoniously combines classical ballet pas with the characteristics of Chinese folk dance and martial arts. The ballet "The White-Haired Girl" is performed with ongoing success since its inception in 1965 to the present day and is rightly considered a "red classic" with a high ideology and artistry.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document