Reimagining the Mughal Emperors Akbar and Aurangzeb in the 21st Century

The paper focuses on the reigns and policies of the two Mughal Emperors, Akbar and Aurangzeb, and analyses how they have been remembered in the wider social memory. While Akbar is glorified as a 'secular' and 'liberal' leader, Aurangzeb is often dismissed and ridiculed as a 'religious bigot', who tried to impose the Shari'ah law in diversified India. The paper traces and evaluates the construction of these two grand narratives which were initially formed by the British historians in colonial India and then continued by specific nationalist historians of India and Pakistan, after the independence of the two nation-states. By citing some of the most popular misconceptions surrounding the two Mughal Emperors, this study attempts to understand the policies of these two emperors in a wider socio-political narrative and attempts to deconstruct these ‘convenient’ misinterpretations. Concluding the analysis of how these two emperors are viewed differently in both India and Pakistan, the paper asserts the importance of leaving behind the modern concepts of 'liberal versus conservative' while understanding these emperors and reinforces the practice to understand these historical figures on their own terms.

O zakopiańskich rezydentkach

The residents of Zakopane are the group of permanent inhabitants who were not born in the Podhale region, but it was their choice to connect themselves to it. The formation of this group is the result of the social-demographic changes in the Tatra mountains at the beginning of the 20th century and in the interwar period. It is a group that is diversified and therefore difficult to define. It figures as a link between the highlanders who are ingrained into the space of Podhale and those who treat it in a pragmatic and utilitarian way. The residents constitute the cultural phenomenon present in literary works as well as in the cultural life of Zakopane during the end of 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. The main subject of the article is a portrayal of the residents — historical figures and literary heroines — taking into account their functions in the society of Zakopane of those times: the groups which have been highlighted are schoolgirls, the women who provide accommodation to the tourists, and the organizers of literary saloons.

The Past as an Exponent of the Present in Modern Tamil Literature: Story-(re)-Telling and Telling History in Selected Works of Indira Parthasarathy

Indira Parthasarathy is the author of many works that touch upon historical issues but are in fact reflections on contemporary India. Although the narrative of some of them takes place in the past, they cannot be called historical literature. While the author is not really interested in describing the past per se, as is also often the case with other contemporary Tamil writers, clear references to the past and history help him showcase contemporary issues, current problems, and life as it is here and now. The article briefly discusses two plays, whose protagonists are historical figures; a novel based on a contemporary event that has become an integral part of the history of Tamil Nadu; and two other works which came to be written on the basis of writer’s own life experience in Poland and are in a way related to the history of that country.

Personagens, espaço e níveis narrativos em Os Memoráveis de Lídia Jorge / Characters, space and narrative levels in Os Memoráveis by Lídia Jorge

Resumo: Dentro do universo ficcional do romance Os Memoráveis de Lídia Jorge, as personagens estabelecem ligações dinâmicas entre elas de acordo com o jogo ficcional implicado nas intrigas, as quais se configuram diferentes níveis narrativos. Este estudo tem como objetivo analisar as relações das personagens entre si, o jogo de perspetivas utilizado e a complexidade da estrutura narrativa onde se inserem. Investigar-se-á o modo como as personagens perseguem os seus propósitos, a composição dos níveis narrativos relacionada com o agenciamento das intrigas (de acordo com a investigação de Raphael Baroni) e, ainda, a importância da ambientação, do cenário e dos enquadramentos para a constituição da representatividade simbólica das figuras históricas representadas no romance. Palavras-chave: personagem, espaço, ficção, narrativa, Lídia Jorge.Abstract: Within the fictional universe of the novel Os Memoráveis, by Lídia Jorge, characters establish dynamic connections between them according to the fictional games involved in the plots, which configure different narrative levels. This study aims to analyze the relationships of the characters with each other, the interplay of perspectives employed and the complexity of narrative structure where they are inserted. It will be investigated the way characters try to achieve their purposes, the composition related with agency of narrative levels (according to the research presented by Raphael Baroni) and also the importance of ambience and setting for the drawing up of symbolic representativeness of the fictionalized historical figures of the novel.Keywords: character, space, fiction, narrativa, Lídia Jorge.

Historical Names in Slovenian Tourism Texts

Local language variants of personal names are commonly acknowledged for a few categories of people (e.g., popes and royalty), but such variation is also frequent for other historical figures. Translators of all text types, including tourism texts, must grapple with such names. Indeed, tourism texts eagerly cite figures associated with a locale’s history to help bring its character alive. This article comments on Slovenian practice in this matter and presents principles that can be used as guidelines for translators dealing with such name variants. This is followed by an examination of several examples of such names appearing in English tourism texts or related material about Slovenia, commenting on whether the solutions chosen by the translators are appropriate. It concludes by reiterating the need to consider a variety of factors when handling names of historical persons in translation in general, emphasizing the need for a principled approach to the problem.

Poetic Frameworks and Narrative Procedures of Bosnia and Herzegovina Novels about Kulin Ban

This paperwork presents the literary constructions of Kulin Ban's personality in contemporary Bosnian literature on the example of three novels: Zlatko Topčić Kulin (1994), Mirsad Sinanović Kulin (2007), and Irfan Hrozović Sokolarov sonnet (2016). The themes of these novels are real historical events and historical figures, and we try to present the way(s) of narration and shape the image of the past and the way the past-history-literature triangle works. Documentary discourse is often involved in the relationship between faction and fiction in the novel. Yet, as can be seen from all three novels, it is a subjective discourse on the perception of Kulin Ban today and the period of his reign, a period that could be characterized as a mimetic time in which great, sudden, and radical changes take place. If the poetic extremes of postmodernist prose are on the one hand flirting with trivia, and on the other sophisticated meta- and intertextual prose, then the Bosnian-Herzegovinian romance of the personality of Kulina Ban fully confirms just such a range of stylistic-narrative tendencies of narrative texts of today's era.

Trynitarna koncepcja historiozoficzna Joachima z Fiore

Nowadays people are more and more concerned about the future and the end of the world. The vision of the End of Times in Joachim of Fiore’s apocalyptic conception presents one of the most interesting interpretations of the end of the world in relation to events and historical figures and presents an attempt to look into the future made by the 12th-century Calabyan Abbot Joachim of Fiore on the basis of the book of the Holy Bible, especially the Apocalypse of Saint John. The purpos of the thesis is to introduce the reader to the very form of the medieval exeget – Joachim of Fiore as well as the concept of tripartite and interpretation of history in the Trinitarian context created by him. In the light of the concept mentioned above, the vision of the Calabyan Abbot was presented regarding the end of times, preceded by an explanation of exegetical methods used by the abbot (especially biblical typology and the principle of compatibility of both Testaments in relation to the entire history of the Chosen People and Christianity). The thesis also presents a comparison of the convergent historiosophic concepts of Joachim of Fiore and Saint Augustine of Hippo. The thesis contains both Latin fragments of Joachim’s manuscripts and translations of them into Polish. Annex show translated testament of Joachim of Fiore, proving his faithfulness to the authority of the Catholic Church.

"An Evening at Kantemir’s" (1816)

Konstantin Batiushkov’s “An Evening at Kantemir’s” (Vecher u Kantemira, 1816) is unique as a work of literature, a document of Russian intellectual history, and a cultural and artistic manifesto. The “Evening” takes its cue from the popular Enlightenment genre of “dialogues with the dead,” although Batiushkov brings together people who were contemporaries rather than widely separated historical figures, as was usual. In it, the poet Antiokh Kantemir (1708-44) challenges Montesquieu’s argument from The Spirit of Laws that Russia’s harsh climate has resulted in its alleged lack of civilization. Batiushkov was rewriting history with hindsight, and one of the charming aspects of the work is its slightly humorous and lightly ironic play with anachronism, as Batiushkov presents Kantemir as marvelously prophetic of the later successes of Russian literature. Typical is his interlocutor’s statement that “It is easier to believe that the Russians will storm Paris” than that Russia could produce a Lomonosov. Batiushkov himself was with the troops that took Paris in 1814, and the recent Russian victory was surely on readers’ minds as they read this piece. “An Evening at Kantemir’s” attempted to integrate the “new” Russian literature with the eighteenth-century “classicist” literary and Enlightenment tradition. It also illustrates Batiushkov’s faith in poetry as a fundamental way to advance the cause of national progress.

THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD AND THE QURAN

Based on an independent analysis of artifacts, ancestral tree and astronomical phenomena related to the deeds, life and death of the Prophet Muhammad, as well as historical evidence of the first appearance and legal use of the Quran in the life of Muslims, the author drew conclusions about the integration of several historical figures of the VII and XII centuries into the personality of the Prophet Muhammad. They became Khagan Kubrat, aka Emperor Heraclius, the Arabian Prophet or Caliph of the Rashidun Caliphs and the true Prophet Muhammad, who lived in 1090–1052. The Quran was created in 1130–1152. The proposed interpretation does not undermine the canons of the faith of Islam, but establishes the truth.

Paul among the Fluent in Corinth

This article foregrounds the importance of Paul’s letters for studying the experiences and perceptions of persons who stutter in antiquity. It analyzes Paul’s speech alongside the biographies of two other historical figures from antiquity who suffered from speech dysfluency: the great Athenian orator, Demosthenes, and the emperor Claudius. Accounts of Demosthenes’, Claudius’, and Paul’s speech inconsistencies, silences, incomprehensible utterances, oratory weaknesses—and their critics’ accusations that they suffered from madness—are interpreted in light of research on adults who stutter in the contemporary context, as well as studies on listener experiences and stereotypes. In introducing Paul into the study of ancient dysfluency, the article revisits Paul’s conflict with rival teachers in Corinth as it is in responding to these critics’ accusations that Paul is most revealing of his own dysfluency.