Traces of Scheherazade in Margaret Drabble’s The Red Queen: A Transcultural Intertextual Reading

This paper examines the transcultural intertextual influence of Scheherazade, the legendary queen and the storyteller of The Thousand and One Nights, on Drabble’s The Red Queen (2004), which has a subtitle, “A Transcultural Tragicomedy.” It discusses how an appropriation of Scheherazade was utilized by Margaret Drabble in writing, The Red Queen. “But appropriation is what novelists do,” Drabble writes in the “Prologue” of her novel, adding, “whatever we write is, knowingly or unknowingly, a borrowing. Nothing comes from nowhere.” This paper is a syncretic reading of The Red Queen to show the universality of womanhood and cross-cultural parallels. In this novel, which is based on the memoirs of an eighteenth-century Korean crown princess known as Lady Hong or Lady Hyegy?ng, the protagonist comes from the history of the East, just like Scheherazade, “to retell [her] story.” Also like Scheherazade who narrates stories in order to live, the Korean Princess uses storytelling as a strategy for survival. Moreover, the intentions of the novel can be seen in a feminist tradition of historiographic metafictional re-workings of the Orient and the Arabian Nights.

SEMANTICS OF PHRASEOLOGICAL UNITS WITH THE COMPONENT “TIME” IN THE NOVELS BY MARGARET DRABBLE

Введение. На материале текстов художественных произведений английской писательницы Маргарет Дрэббл прослеживается употребление фразеологических единиц с компонентом time. Цель – описать употребление фразеологических единиц современного английского языка с компонентом time в текстах романов М. Дрэббл, а также рассмотреть особенности авторского языка на отобранном материале. Материал и методы. Для выборки фразоупотреблений были взяты основные романы М. Дрэббл 1960–1970-х гг. и два современных романа: «Garrick Year» («Год Гарика», рус. пер. «Один летний сезон») (1964), «The Millstone» («Жернов») (1965), «Jerusalem the Golden» («Мой золотой Иерусалим») (1967), «The Needle’s Eye» («Игольное ушко») (1972), «The Realms of Gold» («Златые миры») (1975), «The Ice Age» («Ледниковый период») (1977), «The Sea Lady» («Морячка») (2006), «The Pure Gold Baby» («Золотой ребенок») (2013). Результаты и обсуждение. Подробно рассматриваются фразоупотребления относительно их семантики и стилистики. Отобранные фразеологические единицы можно сгруппировать по семантическому значению. Выделено семь групп устойчивых выражений со значением повторяемости, длительности, временного отрезка, временной точки, временных отношений, шкалы времени и субъективно оцениваемого времени. Внутри каждой группы идет дополнительное разделение по дифференциальной семе. Повторяемость: постоянно, часто, иногда, никогда. Длительность: долгая, очень долгая, короткая, очень короткая. Временной отрезок: определенного или неопределенного периода, характеризующийся деятельностью или состоянием. Временная точка: благоприятная, неблагоприятная. Временные отношения: начало / конец действия, одновременность, предшествование, последовательность, заблаговременность, своевременность и несвоевременность, почти поздно. Шкала времени: настоящее, прошлое, будущее. Субъективно оцениваемое время: долгое или короткое, приятное или неприятное. Заключение. Фразоупотребления встречаются в узуальной и окказиональной форме. Особенности авторского стиля особенно прослеживаются в окказиональных формах употребления. Результаты исследования могут применяться в преподавании такого особого аспекта, как использование устойчивых выражений современного английского языка в речи. Introduction. This article describes the use of phraseological units with the word component “time” on the basis of texts from the literary works of the English writer Margaret Drabble (1939). Aim and objectives. The article aims to describe the actual usage of modern English phraseological units with the component “time”. The author’s language within the scope of the chosen material is considered as well. Material and methods. The research material includes main novels of the author of the sixties and seventies of the twentieth century and two modern novels: “Garrick Year” (1964), “The Millstone” (1965) “Jerusalem the Golden” (1967), “The Needle’s Eye” (1972), “The Realms of Gold” (1975), “The Ice Age” (1977), “The Sea Lady” (2006), “The Pure Gold Baby” (2013). Results and discussion. The article considers phaseological contexts in detail concerning their semantics and style. Set expressions are distinguished by the following meaning: repeatability, duration, time interval, time point, time relations, time scale and subjectively estimated time. Within each group there is an additional separation by differential seme. Repeatability: constantly, often, sometimes, never. Duration: long, very long, short, very short. Time period: a certain or indefinite period, characterized by an activity or condition. Time point: favorable, unfavorable. Temporary relations: the beginning / end of an action, simultaneity, precedence, sequence, advance, at the time arranged, late and almost late. Timeline: present, past, future. Subjectively estimated time: long or short, pleasant or unpleasant. Conclusion. Phraseological contexts are found in normal and occasional forms. Features of the author’s style are especially evident in occasional forms of use. The actual material and conclusions of this work can be applied in teaching special aspects of phraseological stylistics and the use of modern English set expressions in speech.

Acosadores, violadores y maltratadores

Este artículo pretende dar respuestas, a través de ejemplos literarios, a la pregunta clave de por qué los poderes fácticos y la opinión pública reaccionan de manera tan tibia al acoso y maltrato ejercido por demasiados hombres sobre las mujeres. La razón básica es que la dependencia femenina sigue vigente en el imaginario colectivo universal y el discurso dominante se resiste a revisarla por miedo a los cambios sociales y económicos que tal revolución supondría. Es más útil contar los femicidios por miles que admitir razones lógicas incontrovertibles – ya Goya lo dejó inscrito artísticamente: “El sueño de la razón produce monstruos”. A estos monstruos, que nos rodean con apariencia ‘normal’, hemos de darles la denominación que se merecen y juzgarles por la Ley Antiterrorista. La literatura, de todas las nacionalidades y de todas las lenguas, deja amplia constancia de tales abusos a través del tiempo y del espacio. Aquí se analizan varios ejemplos en obras de Ruth Rendell, Louise Doughty, Judith Hermann, Nawal al-Saadawi, Roddy Doyle, Mohsin Hamid, Suniti Namjoshi y Margaret Drabble.

Genetics and the Literary Imagination

This book explores the impact of genetic and postgenomic science on British literary fiction over the last four decades, focusing on the challenge posed to novelists by gene-centric neo-Darwinism and examining the recent rapprochement between postgenomic perspectives and literary understandings of human nature. It assesses the rise to cultural prominence of neo-Darwinism in the form of sociobiology and evolutionary psychology, thought styles which were predicated on scientific reductionism and genetic determinism. It explores the ways in which the fiction of Doris Lessing, A.S. Byatt, and Ian McEwan critiques neo-Darwinism but also registers the extent to which these writers are persuaded by the neo-Darwinian view of human behaviour as driven by genetic self-interest. It goes on to consider the ‘new biology’ that emerged around the turn of the millennium, as gene-centrism was displaced by a more dynamic and holistic view of the development and function of living organisms. It reads the work of Eva Hoffman, Kazuo Ishiguro, Margaret Drabble, and Jackie Kay as converging with this shift in which the organism is reconfigured as agentic and self-organizing but caught up in complex co-dependencies with other organisms. The archetypal postgenomic science of epigenetics is crucial in facilitating this change, disclosing the ways in which the genome is constantly modified in response to environmental cues and sponsoring a view of identity in terms of plasticity and mutability, a view more congenial to many writers than the concept of genetic predetermination.

The Great Displacement: Reading Migration Fiction at the End of the World

This paper examines how contemporary works of fiction and nonfiction reflect on anticipated cases of climate dislocation. Building on existing research about migrant agency, climate fiction, and human rights, it traces the contours of climate migration discourse before analyzing how three twenty-first-century novels enable us to reimagine the “great displacement” beyond simplistic militarized and humanitarian frames. Zooming in on stories by Mohsin Hamid, John Lanchester, and Margaret Drabble that envision hypothetical calamities while responding to present-day refugee “crises”, this paper explains how these texts interrogate apocalyptic narratives by demilitarizing borderscapes, exploring survivalist mindsets, and interrogating shallow appeals to empathy.

The Plays of Margaret Drabble: A Critical Edition, edited by José Francisco Fernández

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CROSS-CULTURAL LITERATURE AND CULTURAL REPRODUCTION: THE CASE OF THE KOREAN AUTOBIOGRAPHY HANJUNGNOK

This paper is an investigation how cultural perception could be embedded in language and literature and how this helps different analyses on a same historical event. The article includes the comparison between a work of classical Korean literature, Hanjungnok (한중록), and an English-translated version of it, The Memoirs of Lady Hyekyŏng, translated by Kim-Haboush, and a work of a British novel, The Red Queen, written by Margaret Drabble. The comparison is to explore the language use regarding a perception of family relations and of gender in each version of writing. This paper concludes that authors’ and audience’s language and cultural background would influence on perceiving and analysing literature and its context so that each interpretation could be differentiated, even with the actual historical event.