Academic literature on the topic '17th century adult fiction'

In the early modern Finland, the Catechisms were the only literature intended for children. Otherwise, the children from all classes had to read adults’ literature. Finland was a part of Sweden until 1809 and the reading of Swedish literature was possible especially among the upper classes and even the common people in the Swedish-speaking western coast. Three case studies of Finnish upper-class children from the 17th and the 18th centuries tell us about children’s reading habits, attitudes to reading and reading motivation in this situation. Richard M. Ryan’s & Edward L. Deci’s theory of self-determination has been used as a theoretical basis for this study. It highlights the combination of three basic psychological needs as means to motivation: autonomy, competence and relatedness. Autonomy was the most limited during the 17th century and emerged step by step towards the end of the 18th century. Relatedness would depend on circumstances in the family. If the family led an active social life, it would also reflect in the reading habits of the household members. All the children in this research belonged to the upper class, so they could read, and they studied diligently. Therefore, they felt competence. The relatives exhorted them in studying, which still increased their self-confidence. Motivation was mostly external at the beginning, but in some cases it gradually grew towards internal motivation. According to these cases, upper-class girls were freer to read what they liked than boys. Comparing to boys they were less educated, but at the same time they experienced less pressure to make progress in literary reading. If the domestic duties permitted, they would be able to use their free time for reading fiction. Boys had to concentrate on thinking about their future careers and subjects relevant to that.

The article considers the genre of Cyranoʼs novel «Another world», widely discussed in both domestic and foreign literary studies. It explores the elements of science fiction in contrast to those of the miraculous, as they appear in the 17th-century literature, and identifies the features of utopianism and the peculiarities of scientific forecasting in the work. Both parts of «Another world» are examined in their similarities and differences from one another, as well as combination of universalism and topical issues of the novel with narrative irony and burlesque.

The article is dedicated to the study of the most significant and popular Old Russian scribe – “Alphabetical”, written in the late 16th – early 17th century according to researchers. The assumption is made that it was replenished and adjusted over several decades, quickly responding to the demands of the times and reflecting the main processes that took place in Russian literature of the 16th and especially the 17th century. The scribe reflected the central feature of this period: the interaction of the traditional and the new, with an emphasis on the new. It demonstrates such new aspects of Russian literature of the 17th century as secularization, democratization, fiction, and individualization. It is rather telling that the vast majority of sample messages are private letters written for relatives and friends. Particularly noteworthy are the samples of ‘anti-friendly’ letters, some of which are parodies of friendly letters. They make up an organic part of the 17th century parodies, namely such satirical texts as Kalyazinsky Petition, The Dowry Document, The Tale of Ersh Ershovich, The Service of the Tavern. As it is known, parodies play a crucial role in the turning periods of literary development, which was the 17th century. In this era, first of all, the most stable and therefore most recognizable genres were parodied: business (petitions, dowry, court documents, etc.) and church (hagiographies, prayers, akathists, church services, etc.) writing. Quite noteworthy is the appearance along with these parodies of the parody of the epistolary genre, indicating that it had fully developed, and occupied a proper place in the system of literature genres, and was unmistakably recognized by authors and readers. Moreover, a new, ‘secular’ version had developed and was recognized: friendly letters, which were by no means educational, unlike those popular in Ancient Russian literature of previous centuries.

The article is dedicated to the study of the most significant and popular Old Russian scribe – “Alphabetical”, written in the late 16th – early 17th century according to researchers. The assumption is made that it was replenished and adjusted over several decades, quickly responding to the demands of the times and reflecting the main processes that took place in Russian literature of the 16th and especially the 17th century. The scribe reflected the central feature of this period: the interaction of the traditional and the new, with an emphasis on the new. It demonstrates such new aspects of Russian literature of the 17th century as secularization, democratization, fiction, and individualization. It is rather telling that the vast majority of sample messages are private letters written for relatives and friends. Particularly noteworthy are the samples of ‘anti-friendly’ letters, some of which are parodies of friendly letters. They make up an organic part of the 17th century parodies, namely such satirical texts as Kalyazinsky Petition, The Dowry Document, The Tale of Ersh Ershovich, The Service of the Tavern. As it is known, parodies play a crucial role in the turning periods of literary development, which was the 17th century. In this era, first of all, the most stable and therefore most recognizable genres were parodied: business (petitions, dowry, court documents, etc.) and church (hagiographies, prayers, akathists, church services, etc.) writing. Quite noteworthy is the appearance along with these parodies of the parody of the epistolary genre, indicating that it had fully developed, and occupied a proper place in the system of literature genres, and was unmistakably recognized by authors and readers. Moreover, a new, ‘secular’ version had developed and was recognized: friendly letters, which were by no means educational, unlike those popular in Ancient Russian literature of previous centuries.

Carpe Diem is considered to be an eternal theme in English literature. Being pervasively spread through all ages, it is indeed of universal significance, reflecting one of the important philosophical issues of human world. Albeit this phrase was first created by Horace in ancient Rome, it has greatly influenced the renaissance poetry and the metaphysical poetry of the 17th century. This paper sets out to analyze different representations of Carpe Diem or its variations in various literary forms, namely, poetry, fiction and even film. After these contemplations it is safe to say that the connotation of this theme is the concrete reflection of positive philosophy of life, rather than the seemingly negative ways of living life in common sense. Carpe Diem plays its due significance in the conflicts between human studies and theology, secularism and afterlife, feudalism and humanism in the history of human thoughts.

Anne Boleyn has been narrativized in Young Adult (YA) historical fiction since the nineteenth century. Since the popular Showtime series The Tudors (2007–2010) aired, teenage girls have shown increased interest in the story of Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII’s second and most infamous queen. This construction of Boleyn suggests that she was both celebrated and punished for her proto-feminist agency and forthright sexuality. A new subgenre of Boleyn historical fiction has also recently emerged—YA novels in which her story is rewritten as a contemporary high school drama. In this article, I consider several YA novels about Anne Boleyn in order to explore the relevance to contemporary teenage girls of a woman who lived and died 500 years ago.

AbstractThe anachronistic character of the loving relationship between Dido and Aeneas was widely and commonly discussed among commentators, critics, and writers in the early modern period. From the 16th century onwards, when the word »anachronism« appeared in vernacular languages, its definition was even inseparable from the example borrowed from the Aeneid. The purpose of this article is to interrelate early modern debates on anachronism, reflections on the status of fiction and the history of fiction.Starting with the hypothesis that anachronism is a form of counterfactual, the questions posed in this article are: did forms of counterfactuals exist before the 19th century, to what extent did they differ from contemporary alternative histories and, if so, why? The story of Dido and Aeneas in the Aeneid can be considered »counterfactual«, because this version of the narrative about the queen of Carthage was opposed to another, which was considered to be historical and which made Dido a privileged embodiment of female virtue and value.Several important shifts are highlighted in this article. With the exception of St. Augustine (who saw in Vergil’s anachronism confirmation of the inanity of fiction), before the 16th century indifference towards anachronism prevailed: the two versions of Dido’s story were often juxtaposed or combined. If Vergil’s version of Dido’s story was condemned, it was for moral reasons: the exemplary version, considered more historically accurate, was favored throughout the Middle Ages, notably by Petrarch and Boccaccio.From the 16th century onwards, however, increased acquaintance with Aristotle’s Poetics promoted greater demand for rationality and plausibility in fables. This coincided with the appearance of the word »chronology« and its development, which led to a new understanding of historical time. Anachronism then appeared to be a fault against verisimilitude, and as such was strongly condemned, for example by the commentator on Aristotle, Lodovico Castelvetro. At the same time, the argument of poetic license was also often invoked: it actually became the most common position on this issue. Vergil’s literary canonization, moreover, meant that the version of Dido’s life in the Aeneid was the only story that was known and cited, and from the 17th century onwards it totally supplanted the exemplary version. Strangely enough, permissiveness towards anachronism in treatises, prefaces, or comments on literary works was not accompanied by any development of counterfactual literature in early modern period. Indeed, in both narrative and theatrical genres fiction owed its development and legitimization to the triumph of the criterion of plausibility.This article, however, discusses several examples that illustrate how the affirmation of fiction in the early modern period was expressed through minor variations on anachronism: the counterfictional form of Ronsard’s epic, La Franciade, which represents an explicit deviation from the Iliad; the metaleptic meeting of Vergil and Dido in the Underworld in Fontenelle’s Le dialogue des morts; and the provocative proposal for a completely different version of Dido’s life, which was made in an early 17th century Venetian operatic work by an author who claimed to be anti-Aristotelian. This study thus intends to provide an aspect of the story of fiction. The change of perspective on anachronism marks a retreat from moral argument, with privilege given to aesthetic criteria and relative independence with regard to history – while still moderated by the criterion of verisimilitude, as underlined by the abbé d’Aubignac, as well as Corneille.

What do Greek children learn about the Turk-Other from children's literature, and how does this image of the enemy inform their national Self? Has the representation of the Turk-Other remained static or do recent publications demonstrate a change in its portrayal? This article explores such questions in the context of contemporary Greek texts for children and young adults. The image of the Turk-soldier has been and remains overwhelmingly negative. The Turk who represents the Ottoman Empire is the vicious victimiser and ruthless conqueror. The Turk-friend, however, features a more complex conglomeration of attributes, some degrading and others elevating. Fictional histories, that is narratives with a strong inclination towards historical accuracy, are less favourable to the Turk-Other, aiming to preserve a homogenised version of the nation and to justify the deeds of war heroes. These observations persist throughout the twentieth century and do not deviate from the patterns found in adult literature. Nonetheless, in more recent publications the image of the Turk-Other is slightly more positive due to two related factors: the foregrounding of the weaknesses of the national Self and the problematising of the historical representation. By juxtaposing negative portrayals of both Turkish and Greek behaviours and by questioning historical truisms, the image of the Turk is being re-humanised.

Danmei, aka Boys Love, is a salient transgressive genre of Chinese Internet literature. Since entering China’s niche market in 1990s, the danmei subculture, predominantly in the form of original fictional creation, has established an enormous fanbase and demonstrated significance via thought-provoking works and social functions. Nonetheless, the danmei genre is not an innovation in the digital age, in that its bipartite dichotomy between seme ‘top’ and uke ‘bottom’ roles bears similarities to the dyad in caizi-jiaren ‘scholar-beauty’ anecdotes featuring masculine and feminine ideals in literary representations of heterosexual love and courtship, which can be attested in the 17th century and earlier extant accounts. Furthermore, the feminisation of danmei characters is analogous to an androgynous ideal in late-imperial narratives concerning heterosexual relationships during late Ming and early Qing dynasties, and the depiction of semes being masculine while ukes being feminine is consistent with the orthodox, indigenous Chinese masculinity which is comprised of wen ‘cultural attainment’ epitomising feminine traits and wu ‘martial valour’ epitomising masculine traits. In terms of modern literature, danmei is parallel to the (online) genre yanqing ‘romance’ that is frequently characterised by ‘Mary Sue’ and cliché-ridden narration.

Abstract: This thesis investigates the origins of contemporary fictional constructions of childhood by examining the extent to which current literary representations of children and childhood have departed from their Victorian origins. I set out to test my intuition that many contemporary young adult novels perpetuate Victorian ideals and values in their constructions of childhood, despite the overt circumstantial modernity of the childhoods they represent. The question this thesis hopes to answer therefore is, how Victorian is contemporary young adult fiction? To gauge the degree of change that has taken place since the Victorian period, differences and points of continuity between representations of nineteenth century childhood and twentieth century childhood will be sought and examined in texts from both eras. The five aspects of fictional representation that I focus on are: notions of innocence; sexuality; the child as saviour; the use of discipline and punishment to create the ideal child; and the depiction of childhood and adulthood as separate worlds. The primary theoretical framework used derives from Michel Foucault’s concepts of the construction of subjectivity through discourse, discipline and punishment, and his treatment of repression and power, drawn mainly from The History of Sexuality vol. 1 (1976) and Discipline and Punish; the Birth of the Prison (1977). I have chosen to use Foucault primarily because of the affinity between his work on the social construction of knowledge and the argument that childhood is a constructed rather than essential category; and because Foucault’s work on Victorian sexuality exposes links with current thinking rather than perpetuating assumptions about sexual repression in this period.

Adolescence is an incredibly complex period of life. During this time young people are searching for and wanting to create their own unique identity, however being confronted with a plethora of roles and directions is challenging and confusing. These challenges are reflected in the vast array of young adult literature being presented to young people today. As a result young adult literature has the potential to function as scaffolding to assist teenagers in the struggles of adolescence by serving as an important source of information about the world and the people in it. Teenage novels also give young people the opportunity to try on different identities and vicariously experience consequences of actions while developing their own distinctive personality and character. As this study reveals, the Australian young adult novel has undergone considerable developments, with 1989 serving as a milestone year in which writers and publishers turned in new directions. In general, Australian young adult novels have changed from books set predominately in rural areas, incorporating major themes of child abuse, death, friendship and survival with introverted characters aged between twelve and sixteen in the early 1980s to novels with urban settings, a large increase in books about crime, dating, drugs and mental health and sexually active, extroverted characters aged between fourteen and eighteen in the late 1990s. To chart the progression of these changes and gain an understanding of the messages young adults receive from adolescent novels an evaluative framework was developed. The framework consists of two main sections. The first part applies to the work as a whole, obtaining data about the novel such as plot, style, setting, temporal context, use of humour, issues within the text and ending, while the second part collects information about character demographics including gender, age, occupational status, family type, sexual orientation, relationships with family and authority figures, personality traits and outlook for character. To qualitatively and quantitatively assess the construction of youth in Australian young adult literature a random selection of 20 per cent of Australian young adult books published in each year from 1980 to 2000 were analysed using the evaluative framework, with 186 novels being studied altogether. During the 1990s in particular, Australian young adult literature was heavily criticised for being too bleak, too dark, presenting a picture of life that was all gloom and doom. This research resoundingly dismisses this argument by showing that rather than being a negative influence on the lives of young people, Australian books for young people present a comprehensive portrayal of youth. They probe the entire gamut of teenage experiences, both the good and the bad, providing a wide range of scenarios, roles, relationships and characters for young people to explore. Therefore Australian young adult literature provides an important source of information and support for the psycho-social development of young people during the formative years of adolescence. This research is significant because it gives hard evidence to support the promotion of a representative selection of Australian young adult novels both in the classroom and in home, school and public libraries. By establishing the available range of contemporary Australian young adult literature through this study, young adult readers, teachers and librarians can be confident in the knowledge that appropriate titles are accessible which meet the needs and interests of young people. Consequently, the substantial amount of data gathered from this study will considerably add to the knowledge and understanding ofAustralian young adult novels to date and provide an excellent starting point for further research in the future.

Spanning the period from the early years of the Cold War to the early twenty-first century, Crossing Out argues that medical theories of gender variance which emerge in the middle of the twentieth century are bound by the Cold-War–era discursive limits within which they were articulated, and that the ideological content of those theories persists into late-century research and treatment protocols. I parallel these analyses with interrogations of literary representations of transgendered subjects. What emerges most powerfully from this analysis of literary works is their tendency to signify in excess of the medical foreclosures, even when they seem consistent with medical discourse. By reading these two discursive systems against each other, the dissertation demonstrates the ability of literary discourse to accommodate multifaceted subject positions which medical discourse is unable to articulate. Literature thus complicates the stories that medical culture tells, revealing complex and multivariate possibilities for transgendered identification absent from traditional medical accounts. In tracing these discursive intersections the dissertation draws on and extends Michel Foucault’s theory of subjugated knowledges and Judith Butler’s writings on the formation of gendered subjects. Chapter One establishes the Cold War context, and argues that there are significant continuities between 1950s theories of intersexuality and Cold War ideology. Chapter Two extends this analysis to take in theories of transsexualism that emerged in the same years, and analyzes the discursive excesses of a 1950s pulp novel representation of a transsexual. Chapter Three establishes that the ideological content of the medical theories remained virtually unchanged by the 1990s, and argues that multivalent literary representations of transgenderism from the same decade promise the emergence of unanticipated forms of gender identity that exceed medical norms. Chapter Four is concerned with transgendered children, as they are represented in medical writing and in young adult and children’s literature. Interrogating fiction which negotiates between established medical discourse and an emergent transgender discourse, the chapter argues that these works at once invite and subvert a pathologizing understanding of gender-variant children while simultaneously providing data that demands to be read through the lens of an emergent affirmative notion of trans-childhood.

This study is an examination of the differing and competing representations of the Scottish Covenanters that emerged from the signing of the National Covenant in 1638 to the publication in 1835 of The Tales of the Wars ofMontrose, by James Hogg. The disserttion researches representations of the Scottish Covenanters in thee centuies offictional and non-fictional texts, for example, seventeenth-centu sermons, eighteenth-centu chapbooks, and nineteenth-centu Scottish literatue, and it notes and examines the discordance in the various modes of literar discourse. The disserttion is aranged chronologically as the most logical method of tracing and demonstrating the discordance. An historical context is provided to each chapter and also within each chapter as necessar to explain and to situate the discourses under scrutiny within their contemporar climate. Chapter One examines representations of the Scottish Covenanters from the first signing of the National Covenant in 1638 to their disappearance from Scottish mainstream thing with the 'Glorious Revolution' in 1688-9. The chapter begins by examining the document known as the National Covenant and reveals how radically different it was from previous Scottish bonds of allance. The early Covenanters or 'Politick Chrstians' who attempted to promote and to live up to the spirtual and secular aims of the National Covenant were concerned to present a tre image of what it was to be a Covenanter. The Royalists and anti-Covenanters counteracted by detracting the movement though irony which revealed the inconsistencies of Covenanting priciples. The paper war of words included contemporar news sheets, privately circulated letters, broadsides and ballads. After 1660, when Episcopacy was reintroduced into Scotland literar representations of the Scottish Covenanters were, on the whole, denigratory as the Scottish Privy Council, with the full support of the English governent sought to prevent a repeat of the events of 1638. The satirical work of George Hickes is revealed as a crucial factor in the demise of the popularty of Covenanting. As the Covenanting movement became defensive rather than offensive the Covenanters counteracted with books and pamphlets such as Naphtali, that included declarations and 'last testimonies' of those convicted for treason after the Pentland Uprising in 1666. This chapter closely examines one of the published Covenanting sermons and reveals that it is inauthentic propagandist literatue. The representation of Scottish Covenanters in the crucial post-Bothwell/opish plotÆxclusion Crisis altered significantly. A comparison of the draft manifesto published by Royal Warant under the title, 'The Fanaticks New-Covenant', with a later document published by the 'United Societies' reveals that there were moderate Presbyterians after Bothwell Bridge who proposed upholding the Covenants. Their 'manifesto' was published alongside of the more violently rhetorical 'Sanquhair Declaration', which led to them being wrongly associated with the Cameronians. The final representation to be examined in this period is of the Cameronian historian, Alexander Shields. He portayed the Covenanters of the 1680s in apocalyptic tropes as a 'suffering remnant' in exile within their own countr. Chapter Two examines the discordant discourses of the eighteenth centu. The 'Revolution Settlement' of 1688-9 re-instated Presbytery and as the tables were tued, so the Episcopalian satirsts denigrated the Presbyterians by implying that all Covenanters were of a similar violent propensity as the Cameronians had theatened. The move towards Enlightenment away from the enthusiastic raptue of the seventeenth centu can be traced though these satircal representations which concentrated an accusation that Presbyterian preaching was ineffective and ridiculous. As Covenanting fell out of favour historians such as Robert Wodrow, and also the 'United Societies' as the Cameronians became known tued to apologia. Their accounts portayed the Covenanting movement of the later seventeenth-centu as entirely defensive. This was disputed by satirsts such as Pitcaire and Swift, and Enlightened historians such as David Hume. Towards the end of the eighteenth centu Reformed Presbyterians, as the Cameronians were now called, published major works which promoted positive images of the Covenanters. John Howie's Biographia Scoticana significantly altered the perspective of Covenanting. He depicted Covenanting as the natul successor of the Reformation in his hagiogrphical collection which begins with the mardom of Walter Mil in 1550. Overall, this chapter examines the way that representations of the Scottish Covenanters altered in the changing political, religious and intellectual climate of the eighteenth centu. Chapter Thee examines the literar representation of the Scottish Covenanters in the early nineteenth centu to 1807. Using Gerard Genett's Paratexts as a model the chapter examines the interplay between the text and the anotation in John Leyden's poetr and in his editing of John Wilson's poem entitled, Clyde, in the anotation and introductory material that Scott appended to five Covenanting ballads in the third volume of The Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, in the anotation to James Grahame's long reflective poem entitled, The Sabbath, and finally, to the imitation ballad entitled, 'Mess John' in James Hogg's collection of 'traditional' material entitled, The Mountain Bard. The chapter situates the subjective editing practices of Scott into the contemporar political climate of a heightened revolutionar atmosphere engendered by the threat of war between the United Kingdom, and France and Spain. This chapter offers a revision of the poet, James Grahame. A close reading of The Sabbath, that is taen in context with his earlier suppressed anti-clerical and anti-Enlightenment poetry reveals that it is an anti-Establishmentaan, as opposed to purely reflective poem. Finally, in this chapter the notion of James Hogg as Scott imitator is rejected. A close reading of his ballad, 'Mess John' indicates his move from imitator to independent author. Overall, this chapter reveals that Scott revised representations of the Scottish Covenanters though an appropriation of eighteenth-centu pseudo-Covenanting and anti-Covenanting works. Chapter Four is a study ofScott's series of novels entitled, Tales of My Landlord that he published between 1816 and 1819. The chapter begins with a close examination ofScott's satirical representation of Reformed Presbyterians and dissenters in his first novel entitled, Waverley. After establishing Scott's anti-Covenanting tropes the chapter then proceeds to an examination of the novels from the series which constituted his most intensively derogatory treatment of Covenanters and their descendats. Takg Par's study of Don Quixote as an exemplar the chapter discovers the extent of Scott' s anti-Covenanting satire. As in the previous two chapters the contemporar political and religious climate is also discussed. Chapter Five examines the literar response to Scott's anti-Covenanting satire, and to the subjective editing practices of Charles Kirkpatrck Share. It suggests that the battle over the documenta evidence of Covenanting material signified the battle for authorial control that became the central concerns ofHogg and GaIt. The prose fictions of James Hogg, John Galt, Allan Cuningham and John Wilson are compared and contrasted. This reveals that Hogg had developed an entirely new paradigm of positively representing the Covenanters by acknowledging their heroism and fortitude while rejecting their violence and wild rhetoric. John GaIt's anti-romantic novel Ringan vu Gilhaize offered an inovative interpretation of historical reconstrction that appears to have been deliberately aimed at counterig Scott.

This dissertation follows the development of the mentor figure from Frances Burney’s Evelina published in 1778 to Maria Edgeworth’s Belinda in 1801. The mentor becomes a key figure for exploring women’s revolutionary ideas on female education and women’s roles in society. My dissertation contributes to discussions on mentoring, development of the Gothic mode, and debates over sensibility and sentimental fiction. It considers how the female mentee paradoxically both desires and criticizes her male mentor and his authority. Each author under discussion employed the mentor figure in a way that addressed their contemporary society’s issues and prejudices toward the treatment of women and the power of sensibility. Much of this treatment was traced to a conversation of reforming female education from an accomplishment-based pedagogy to a moral, intellectual-based instruction that was more masculine in nature (emphasizing a balance between sensibility and reason). Frequently, the mentor provides general comments and recommendations about love to his female pupil, who is entering into the marriage market, but his advice often turns out to be wrong or misplaced since it does not fit the actual situation. He is a good spiritual guide but a poor romantic advisor. I assert that the mentor figure’s usual lack of romantic sentiment and his pupil’s ability to surpass him in matters of the heart reveal a tendency to subvert male authority. Throughout this discussion, questions related to gender arise. Women’s desire for their own agency and control over both their minds and bodies underpin much of women’s eighteenth-century fiction. My dissertation explores these complex relationships between male mentors and their female pupils.

Multicultural literature is a very important tool in today's classrooms because it enables teachers and students to learn about the practices, historical background for attitudes, norms and customs of other cultures and peoples.
Ph. D.

Cette thèse a pour objectif de déterminer quelques aspects des figurations du sujet au XVIIe siècle à travers une lecture conjointe des romans à la première personne et des textes philosophiques de cette période. Partant de questionnements proches, ces deux genres discursifs construisent une figure du sujet savant et itinérant : être animé d'un désir de connaissance et amené à repenser les conditions d'énonciation de son expérience particulière. Pour les auteurs du corpus, la vérité se découvre au fil d'expériences singulières si bien que dire le monde avec exactitude revient à l'énoncer à la première personne, à en rendre une perception d'abord subjective. Se pose alors le problème de la légitimation de l'énonciation personnelle, légitimation qui permet d'articuler la première personne à une altérité tout en conservant la singularité du sujet. Cette singularité se double toujours d'une dispersion des identités du sujet et des référents de la première personne. Mais narration, fiction et usages du corps figurent cette identité en constellation. Les deux premières exposent la diversité des visages du « je », leurs concordances ou leurs discordances, à la fois être passé et présent, homme réel et personnage imaginaire, narrateur et auteur. Dans les usages liés aux peines et aux plaisirs du corps se dessine une autre forme de rencontre possible entre la particularité du sujet et l'autre : celui qu'il désire, avec lequel il souffre, avec lequel il jouit, qui vit en lui. Par tous ces aspects, énonciatif, narratif, fictionnel, physique, la subjectivité construite par les textes est toujours et essentiellement une relation : récit raconté pour rejoindre autrui.
The objective of this thesis is to set out several aspects of the figuration of the subject in the 17th Century, through a joint reading of first person novels and philosophical texts from this period. Beginning with similar questions, these two discursive genres construct a figure of a knowing and itinerant subject, a subject animated by the desire to know and thus guided to rethink the conditions that articulate his particular experience. For the authors of these works, the truth is discovered through a series of singular experiences and experiments; the world more clearly announces itself in the first person, rendering a principally singular perception. This poses the problem of the legitimation of personal pronouncement, legitimation which allows for the articulation of the first person with an alterity, while conserving the singularity of the subject. This singularity always doubles as a dispersion of the identities and referents of the first person. Still, narration, fiction and corporal practice show this identity as constellation. The first two expose the diverse faces of the ‘I’, their agreements and disagreements, their being at the same time past and present, real persons and imaginary characters, narrator and author. From the practices tied to the pain and pleasure of the body is drawn another form of possible encounter between the particularity of a subject and an other: the one he desires, with whom he suffers and plays, the one who lives in him. Through all these aspects, enunciative, narrative, fictional, physical, the subjectivity that is inscribed in and described by these texts is always primarily relational: an account recounted to encounter the other.

Behaviouralists consider adolescence a time for developing autonomy, which accords with Michel Foucault‘s power/knowledge dynamic that recognises individuals‘ assertion of independence as a crucial element within society. Surprisingly, however, twentieth-century New Zealand Young Adult (YA) fiction tends to disempower adolescents, by portraying an adultist version of them as immature and unprepared for adult responsibilities. By depicting events through characters‘ eyes, a focalising device that encourages reader identification with the narratorial point-of-view, authors such as Esther Glen, Isabel Maud Peacocke, Joyce West, Phillis Garrard, Tessa Duder, Lisa Vasil, Margaret Mahy, William Taylor, Kate de Goldi, Paula Boock, David Hill, Jane Westaway, and Bernard Beckett stress the importance of conforming to adult authority. Rites of passage are rarely attained; protagonists respect their elders, and juvenile delinquents either repent or are punished for their misguided behaviours. ―Normal‖ expectations are established by the portrayal of single parents who behave ―like teenagers‖: an unnatural role reversal that demands a return to traditional hegemonic roles. Adolescents must forgive adults‘ failings within a discourse that rarely forgives theirs. Depictions of child abuse, while deploring the deed, tend to emphasise victims‘ forbearance rather than admitting perpetrators‘ culpability. As Foucault points out, adolescent sexuality both fascinates and alarms adult society. Within the texts, sex is strictly an adult prerogative, reserved for reproduction within marriage, with adolescent intimacy sanctioned only between couples who conform to the middle-class ideal of monogamy. On the other hand, teenagers who indulge in casual sex are invariably given cause to regret. Such presentations operate vicariously to protect readers from harm, but also create an idealised, steadfast sense of adultness in the process.

Mme de Murat témoigne incontestablement d’un intérêt pour la défense des femmes : n’en annonce-t-elle pas clairement le projet dans l’« Avertissement » de ses Mémoires, projet auquel semble faire écho son Épître « aux fées modernes » ? Cette préoccupation parcourt l’ensemble d’une œuvre qui se place résolument dans une tradition littéraire féminine et qui entend réagir à la domination patriarcale de la société d’Ancien Régime. Cependant l’ambition de l’auteur se situe bien au-delà du projet initial : il s’agit moins de défendre les femmes que de conquérir, par cette défense, une place, indépendamment de toute caractérisation sexuée. La définition de cette place se fait par une écriture qui permet à l’auteur de se distinguer, de se montrer et de consacrer ce qu’elle veut être sa propre supériorité.La quête de soi passe donc essentiellement par autrui, par ses regards et ses discours sur un je qui ne cesse de se mettre en scène. Les discours deviennent ainsi le lieu d’affrontement des pouvoirs, et notamment ceux que la société impose au je. La comtesse de Murat l’a bien compris, et s’attache à dévoiler les mécanismes de la crédulité qui entretiennent la doxa sur les femmes et sur lesquels reposerait plus généralement l’autorité sociale. L’auteur forme alors le projet à son tour de parvenir à la maîtrise des discours qui lui permettrait de détruire les discours oppressifs et de parvenir par la parole à l’affirmation libératoire du je
Madame de Murat is clearly interested in the defence of women: doesn’t she make her intent clear in the “Foreword” to her Mémoires, as echoed in her Epistle “to modern fairies”? This preoccupation runs throughout a body of work that resolutely belongs to the female literary tradition and that seeks to challenge patriarchal domination in Ancien Régime society. However, the writer’s ambition reaches far beyond her initial intent: it is not so much to defend women as to conquer a place in society through defending them, irrelevant of gender categories. The definition of this place is achieved through a writing that enables her to stand out, show herself to the world and promote what she sees as her own superiority. The quest for self is mediated essentially through the other and his or her looks and discourses as they impact the “I” being displayed. Discourses become the battlefields where the powers clash, especially those that society imposes on the “I”. The Comtesse de Murat is perfectly aware of this and endeavours to unveil the mechanisms of credulity that foster the doxa on women and which social authority supposedly rests on. Her goal is from then on to master the discourses that will help her destroy the oppressive discourses and achieve the liberating affirmation of the “I” through words

L’Astrée d’Honoré d’Urfé marqua à divers titres le roman de la première moitié du XVIIe siècle. Non seulement cette œuvre ouvrait la voie aux vastes fictions héroïques de Gomberville ou de Scudéry, mais elle apparaissait également comme un modèle de composition parvenant à unir, au sein d’un unique roman, une matière hétéroclite. La complexité de L’Astrée est donc tout autant thématique que structurelle :les traditions pastorale et chevaleresque s’entremêlent et le récit principal est sans cesse interrompu par des narrations secondes prises en charge par les personnages mêmes de la diégèse. Cependant, le récit n’en forme pas moins un ensemble unifié ;d’ailleurs, il fut d’emblée reçu comme un roman et non comme un recueil de nouvelles. C’est pourquoi, nous avons désiré étudier le « système » que l’auteur met en place afin d’unifier l’œuvre aussi bien au niveau de la forme qu’au niveau du contenu. Pour y parvenir, nous avons établi une description complète des structures narratives de L’Astrée via une observation narratologique qui s’attache tantôt à rechercher dans différentes traditions littéraires les éléments de structure faisant sens dans le roman d’Urfé, tantôt à cartographier la mécanique narrative qui régit la progression des nombreux fils du récit. Ensuite, d’un point de vue davantage thématique, nous avons souhaité mettre au jour divers mécanismes – dont les variations sur le thème de la perte et du regret – qui assurent au roman une unité quant à sa matière foisonnante. Par ces analyses, nous espérons éclairer le fonctionnement d’un roman-clé de l’histoire, qui posa les premiers jalons de la modernité romanesque.
Doctorat en Langues et lettres
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

Ferne Merrylees analyzes Julianna Baggott’s Pure and Marissa Meyer’s Cinder, concluding that both protagonists must accept their posthuman bodies, being organic and inorganic hybrids. Once Pressia and Cinder learn that embracing their Otherness makes them strong, they can move more freely in their dystopian worlds. Both novels narrate the ideological tensions between transhumanism and bioconservatism, as played out in the changing subjectivities of Pressia and Cinder. Neither position is privileged, as both stories illustrate how “technology is considered both the curse and the cure.” The struggles of Pressia and Cinder serve as analogues to 21^st century adolescent anxieties regarding body image.

This chapter examines representations of masculinity in contemporary young adult fiction and identifies four major trends within the genre. These trends suggest a recent shift in YA texts away from traditional gender binaries and toward a more open, fluid understanding of what it means to “be a man” in the twenty-first century. The chapter concludes with a set of recommendations for dealing with these changing gender norms in today’s classrooms by adopting a critical literacy stance when helping students read and discuss these texts.

Twenty-first-century werewolves (following vampires) have become humanised, as identity politics have become mainstream and the Other assimilated. Young Adult fiction and paranormal romance have proved to be where the most radical transformations of the theme have occurred. Two other, related, strands are to be found: ecology has shaped our understanding of creatures which oscillate between nature and culture, and the Ecogothic has generated more positive representations of hybridity and animality. There are now werewolf hauntings and sightings, and a revival of folkloric elements which posit the new werewolf as the spectre wolf. This chapter charts these recent shifts and manifestations. The focus throughout is on literature and contemporary urban myths involving werewolves in the media but similar incarnations of the new werewolf in film, TV, videogames and comics are also acknowledged.

The introduction lays out the scope and methodology of the book as a whole, while offering discussions of three additional cases that represent examples of texts that are relevant to the project but that represent lines of examination not pursued later in the book. The book deals with Anglo-American children’s and young adult fiction from the early twentieth century through the present that reuses and redeploys elements of the classical world. Having noticed in this relatively constrained body of literature the prevalence of place in structuring metaphors, these works are then grouped into five chapters according to the major topological metaphors that they rely on, as primarily palimpsest, map, or fractal texts. The major methodology on display throughout is a cognitive poetics approach. The sample exception texts, designed to highlight the advantages and disadvantages of our groupings and methodological approach, are Marilyn Singer’s Echo Echo: Reverso Poems about Greek Myths, David Elliott’s Bull, and Rosemary Sutcliff’s The Mark of the Horse Lord, which offer contrasting spatial metaphors of a type that are here briefly acknowledged: original/mirror, inside/outside, and straight lines/spirals.

Drawing on popular trends of zombies, magic, and superheroes in young adult fiction and blockbuster film franchises, author Daniel José Older presents Sierra Santiago, an Afro-Latina hero in Shadowshaper (2015) who combats local forces of cultural appropriation and gentrification in her Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. This chapter focuses on the critical role of street art in her analysis of Shadowshaper and, specifically, the community muralists that, in the late twentieth century, established urban spaces as Latina/o and Chicana/o barrios. By positioning Sierra at the center of community muralism, Older disrupts the absence of Latina/o artists and, particularly female artists, by foregrounding moments of artistic processes throughout the novel, including descriptions of Sierra’s stream of consciousness as she makes art that reflects Afro-Latinidad.