A Wold on the Bus

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (5) ◽  
pp. 45-59
Author(s):  
Matthew Wallace ◽  

What is the best way for those discriminated against to “change hearts and minds?” Should those discriminated against fight back or focus on helping others see the errors taking place? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the narrator is simply going about her life riding the bus home from work. A few stops later, a wolf gets on the bus, pays the bus ticket, and has a seat. The woman has heard about wolves and is apprehensive. At the next stop a few teenagers get on the bus. They see the wolf and immediately begin teasing it. The wolf refuses to fight back until, eventually, the narrator stands up for the wolf. The teenagers get off and the woman speaks to the wolf. Police, having been notified of a disturbance, get on the bus and begin the process of arresting the wolf based on the call received. The narrator, and the other bus patrons, stand up for the wolf and explain it was the teenagers who initiated the altercation. The police leave. The wolf explains to the narrator that if he defends himself, he will be confirming the stereotypes about wolves and that it is only through others standing up on his behalf, that opinions can change.

Author(s):  
Bairon Oswaldo Vélez

This paper comments on the first Spanish translation of João Guimarães Rosa's short story "Páramo", which narrates the exile of a Brazilian lost with mountain sickness in a cold and hostile Bogotá. This translation is briefly explained in the following pages, giving special emphasis to some prominent features of the original version, in addition to the cultural context, critical and theoretical readings and the translation strategy evident in the translator‘s intervention. Finally, it is made clear how a certain perspective of the other – present in the original version as well – passes through the translation process and indicates the conditions of its presentation in the target language. The original article is in Portuguese.


Public Voices ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Sophie Till

Three years ago Sophie Till started working with pianist Edna Golandsky, the leading exponent of the Taubman Piano Technique, an internationally acclaimed approach that is well known to pianists, on the one hand, for allowing pianists to attain a phenomenal level of virtuosity and on the other, for solving very serious piano-related injuries. Till, a violinist, quickly realized that here was a unique technical approach that could not only identify and itemize the minute movements that underlie a virtuoso technique but could show how these movements interact and go into music making at the highest level. Furthermore, through the work of the Golandsky Institute, she saw a pedagogical approach that had been developed to a remarkable depth and level of clarity. It was an approach that had the power to communicate in a way she had never seen before, despite her own first class violin training from the earliest age. While the geography and “look” on the violin are different from the piano, the laws governing coordinate motion specifically in playing the instrument are the same for pianists and violinists. As a result of Till’s work translating the technique for violin, a new pedagogical approach for violinists of all ages is emerging; the Taubman/Golandsky Approach to the Violin. In reflecting on these new developments, Edna Golandsky wrote, “I have been working with the Taubman Approach for more than 30 years and have worked regularly with other instrumentalists. However, Sophie Till was the first violinist who asked me to teach her with the same depth that I do with pianists. With her conceptual and intellectual agility as well as complete dedication to helping others, she has been the perfect partner to translate this body of knowledge for violinists. Through this collaboration, Sophie is helping develop a new ‘language’ for violinist that will prevent future problems, solve present ones and start beginners on the right road to becoming the best they can be. The implications of this new work for violinists are enormous.”


KIRYOKU ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 7-17
Author(s):  
Yuliani Rahmah

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


2011 ◽  
Vol 53 (4) ◽  
pp. 722-756
Author(s):  
Jon Adams ◽  
Edmund Ramsden

Nestled among E. M. Forster's careful studies of Edwardian social mores is a short story called “The Machine Stops.” Set many years in the future, it is a work of science fiction that imagines all humanity housed in giant high-density cities buried deep below a lifeless surface. With each citizen cocooned in an identical private chamber, all interaction is mediated through the workings of “the Machine,” a totalizing social system that controls every aspect of human life. Cultural variety has ceded to rigorous organization: everywhere is the same, everyone lives the same life. So hopelessly reliant is humanity upon the efficient operation of the Machine, that when the system begins to fail there is little the people can do, and so tightly ordered is the system that the failure spreads. At the story's conclusion, the collapse is total, and Forster's closing image offers a condemnation of the world they had built, and a hopeful glimpse of the world that might, in their absence, return: “The whole city was broken like a honeycomb. […] For a moment they saw the nations of the dead, and, before they joined them, scraps of the untainted sky” (2001: 123). In physically breaking apart the city, there is an extent to which Forster is literalizing the device of the broken society, but it is also the case that the infrastructure of the Machine is so inseparable from its social structure that the failure of one causes the failure of the other. The city has—in the vocabulary of present-day engineers—“failed badly.”


Author(s):  
Oleh Tyshchenko

The article considers performative speech acts (expressives, commissives, wishes, curses, threats, warnings, etc.) and generally exclamatory phraseology in the original and translation in terms of the function of the addressee, the specifics of the communicative situation, the symbolism and pragmatics of the cultural text. Through cultural and semiotic reconstruction of these units, their semantic and grammatical structure and features of motivation in several linguistic cultures were clarified. Collectively, these verbal acts, on the one hand, mark the semiotic structure of the narrative structure of the text, and on the other hand, indicate the idiostyle of a particular author or characterize the speech of the characters and the associated range of emotions (curses, invectives, cries of indignation, dissatisfaction, etc.). Several translated versions of M. Bulgakov’s novel «The Master and Margarita» (in Ukrainian, Polish, Slovak and English) and English translations of M. Kotsyubynsky’s novel «Fata Morgana» and Dovzhenko’s short story «Enchanted Desna» constitute the material for the study. The obtained results are essential for elucidating the specifics of the national conceptual sphere of a certain culture and revealing the types of inter lingual equivalents, idiomatic analogues in the transmission of common ethno-cultural content. This approach can be useful for a new understanding of domestication and adaptation in translation, translation of culturally marked units, onyms, mythological concepts, etc. as a specific translation practices. There was further developed the theory of phatic and performative-expressive speech acts in lingual cultural comprehension.


Think ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 12 (34) ◽  
pp. 33-56
Author(s):  
Matthew Carey Jordan

This essay is about liberal and conservative views of marriage. I'll begin by mentioning that I would really, really like to avoid use of the terms ‘liberal’ and ‘conservative’, but when push comes to shove, I know of no better labels for the positions that will be discussed in what follows. I would like to avoid these labels for a simple reason: many people strongly self-identify as liberals or as conservatives, and this can undermine our ability to investigate the topic in a sane, rational way. Politics, at least in the contemporary English-speaking world, functions a lot like the world of sports. Many people have a particular team to which their allegiance has been pledged, and the team's successes and failures on the field are shared in the hearts and minds of its loyal followers. In my own case – and here, I ask for your pity – I am a fan of the National Football League's Cleveland Browns. As much as I might wish things were otherwise, I rejoice in the Browns' (rare) triumphs and suffer when they lose (which happens frequently). I do not wait to see what happens in the game before I decide which team to cheer for; if it's an NFL game, and I see orange and brown, I know where my allegiance lies. Furthermore, I identify with my fellow Browns fans in a way that I cannot identify with followers of, say, the Pittsburgh Steelers. Clevelanders are my people. We share something, and what we share unites us in opposition to Steeler Nation. Their victories are our defeats. It is a zero-sum game: for one of us to win, the other must lose.


Author(s):  
Argha Kumar Banerjee

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.


2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 21
Author(s):  
Raymond J Petersen

“A Clean, Well-lighted Place,” was first published in Scribner’s Magazine, in 1933, and ever since has been a significant focus of the literary world, with few daring to risk their literary aspirations, in rebuttal of previously published assertions as the dark forebodings of a world bereft of faith or joy. One is left to ponder a literary profession that appears bereft of a critical examination of the work, or, may not being able to see the forest for the trees. Responding to the assertion by Robert Penn Warren, that Hemingway lived in a “world of violent action,” WB Bache preferred to see the writer as a representative of unique craft and insight, and that he should be seen as, “a creative artist.” This is why I too, found Hemingway an enigma, as someone with a unique literary style, but possessing too, a wicked side. In his art, as he was in life, a hard drinking, womanizing, errant joker, who I feel certain here, is having a laugh at us all, from the other side. Sam Bluefarb (1971) wrote of the “Need to break through to some transcendent purpose—esthetic or religious—without which life seems to have little or no meaning.” Indeed, the melancholia which pervades this literary offering drags the reader down, into its darkness and despair, its depths of the maudlin, the mundane. The pathos may be evident, but does the meaning of the story have to be so dark, and so bitter? The “illogical dialogue sequence,” Warren Bennett (1990) ascribed to the tale, appears to be too bad, too lacking substance, too illogical for words, and so devoid of natural development that it takes on an artificiality such that it could only be a frolic that Hemingway is having, at our expense. Hemingway was a disciple of misogyny, this brute found love so often, not with docile, “pleasant”, or amenable women, but independent, vibrant, aggressive, articulate, intelligent, and yes, “feisty.” None of them was just a decoration, all were treated abysmally, and yet they all loved him till they had no more love left to give, until he had drained them of their capacity to continue to love him. These relationships open the door to a less discussed possibility, that “A Clean Well-lighted Place,” was actually a metaphoric celebration of femininity, in praise of womanhood, an explanation of the clean illumination of our lives (places), without whom, we are dark and dull, and lifeless, much like the iconic short story.


Literator ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosemary A. Gray

This article illustrates the theme of the poetic in Ben Okri’s stokus from his Tales of freedom. It does this principally through an exploration of this new literary mode and its use of serendipity. As a sudden insight, serendipity becomes, in this Nigerian writer’s hands, a poetic device equivalent to illumination or an epiphanic moment. The introduction is an attempt to show the interrelationship between poetry and thought, on the one hand, and poetic experience, creative consciousness and serendipity, on the other. This is followed by a brief digression to outline the paucity of critical reception of this prose anthology, followed by a focused discussion of the storytelling form, in general, and the stoku, in particular. This elliptical form to which Ben Okri gives the name stoku is, as he states in Tales of freedom, ‘an amalgam of short story and haiku’. A comparison between the conventions inherent in the ancient Japanese art of tanka or haiku (short poems), also known as waku and displaying the poet’s imaginative wit (derived from the Anglo-Saxon witan [to know]), and those of Okri’s newer art form, the stoku, follows. The core of the article focuses on a brief analysis of a select number of Okri’s 13 rhapsodies in prose, showing how each stoku serves to illustrate a poetically rendered moment of insight, a vision or a paradox. In Okri’s Tales of freedom, the mythic conjunction between short story and haiku reveals hitherto hidden aspects of life. Through this innovative medium, akin to flash fiction, the subconscious can illuminate unknown worlds. This is akin to experiencing serendipity, linked to interiority, to inner vision. The argument concludes by pointing to the serendipities captured obliquely yet poetically in the stokus selected for discussion.Die pleidooi vir die digterlike in Ben Okri se stokus uit Tales of freedom (2009). Hierdie artikel illustreer die tema van die poëtiese in Ben Okri se stokus uit sy Tales of freedom. Dit ondersoek hierdie nuwe literêre vorm en die gelukkige (maar onbedoelde) saamval van denke en poësie (serendipiteit) daarin. As ‘n skielike insig, word serendipiteit in die Nigeriese skrywer se hande ‘n digterlike kunsgreep vergelykbaar met illuminasie of epifanie. Die inleiding is ‘n poging om die onderlinge verwantskap aan te dui tussen poësie en denke, enersyds, en digterlike ervaring, kreatiewe bewussyn en serendipiteit, andersyds. Daarna volg ‘n kort uitweiding oor die gebrek aan kritiese reaksie op hierdie prosaversameling, gevolg deur ‘n gefokusde bespreking van die vertelling in die algemeen, en die stoku, in die besonder. Hierdie elliptiese vorm, wat Ben Okri die stoku noem, is, soos hy sê in Tales of freedom sê, ‘n ‘amalgaam van kortverhaal en haikoe’. Daarop volg ‘n vergelyking tussen die konvensies van die antieke Japannese kunsvorm van die tanka of haikoe (kort gedigte), ook bekend as waku, waarin die digter sy kreatiewe geestigheid (Engels wit, afgelei van die Angel-Saksiese witan, ‘weet’) ten toon stel, en Okri se nuwer kunsvorm, die stoku. Die kern van die artikel is ‘n kort analise van ‘n aantal van Okri se 13 rapsodieë in prosa, wat aantoon dat elke stoku ‘n oomblik van insig, visie of ‘n paradoks digterlik vasvang. In Okri se Tales of freedom onthul die mitiese samevloeiing van kortverhaal en haikoe tot nog toe verborge aspekte van die lewe. Deur hierdie innoverende medium, verwant aan blitsstories, kan die onbewuste onbekende wêrelde belig. Dit is soortgelyk aan die ervaring van serendipiteit, verwant aan innerlikheid en innerlike visie. Ten slotte word die digterlike (maar indirekte) serendipiteit in die gekose stoku aangedui.Keyword: Ben Okri; haiku; literary humanities; new directions in the humanities; stoku; storytelling; Tales of Freedom


Humanities ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 150
Author(s):  
Jacqueline Couti ◽  
Jason C. Grant

The question of homosexuality in Francophone Caribbean literature is often overlooked. However, the ways in which the Haitian René Depestre’s Le mât de cocagne (The Festival of the Greasy Pole, 1979) and “Blues pour une tasse de thé vert” (“Blues for a Cup of Green Tea”), a short story from the collection Eros dans un train chinois (Eros on a Chinese Train, 1990) portray homoeroticism and homosexuality begs further study. In these texts, the study of the violence that surrounds the representation of sexuality reveals the sociopolitical implications of erotic and racial images in a French transatlantic world. Hence, the proposed essay “Man up!” interrogates a (Black) hegemonic masculinity inherited from colonialism and the homophobia it generates. This masculinity prescribes normative traits that frequently appear toxic as it thrives on hypersexuality and brute force. When these two traits become associated with violence and homoeroticism, however, they threaten this very masculinity. Initially, Depestre valorizes “solar eroticism,” a French Caribbean expression of a Black sexuality, free and joyful, and “geolibertinage,” its transnational and global expression. Namely, his novel and short story sing a hegemonic and polyamorous heterosexuality, respectively, in a postcolonial milieu (Haiti) and a diasporic space (Paris). The misadventures of his male characters suggest that eroticism in transatlantic spaces has more to do with Thanatos (death) than Eros (sex). Though Depestre formally explores the construction of the other and the mechanisms of racism and oppression in essays, he also tackles these themes in his fictional work. Applying Caribbean feminist and gendered lenses to his fiction bring to light the intricate bonds between racism, sexism and homophobia. Such a framework reveals the many facets of patriarchy and its mechanism of control.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document