"A PICAYUNE FRAGMENT OF THE POSSIBLE TOTAL": STONE ALLEGORIES IN SAROYAN'S LIFE-WRITING "UN FRAGMENTO INSIGNIFICANTE DEL POSIBLE TOTAL: ALEGORÍAS DE PIEDRA EN LA ESCRITURA AUTOBIOGRÁFICA DE WILLIAM SAROYAN (original) (raw)
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Metempsychosis and Individual Identity in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Black Cat"
Miscelánea: A Journal of English and American Studies, 2024
Pythagoras and Empedocles are not generally believed to have left an indelible imprint on Edgar Allan Poe’s oeuvre, despite the direct allusion to each of these Presocratic thinkers in the poet’s writings. It is also quite remarkable that “The Black Cat” (1843) has not typically been considered a tale of metempsychosis, even though this motif is clearly present in the story. Moreover, the fact that Poe allows transference to occur from one cat to another hints at his acceptance of the contentious Pythagorean premise that the transmigration of souls is not restricted to the human body. In addition, while a number of scholars have acknowledged the ambivalent nature of the daemon in other works by Poe, most studies of “The Black Cat” portray it as an unequivocally dark and malevolent entity. In contrast, this article conceives of the daemon as an ambiguous being that reemerges in feline form to inflict punishment on the protagonist for his vile acts. In this disturbing narrative, Poe once again explores a question that haunted him throughout his life —namely, whether individual identity can survive bodily death. Keywords: Edgar Allan Poe, Pythagoras, Empedocles, metempsychosis, daemon.
Truth is Held in Disrepute": O. Henry and the Dismantling of Paradigms
Miscelánea: A Journal of English and American Studies, 2008
Destabilization of principles and suspension of widely accepted beliefs pervade the conflicting ideological panorama of the Progressive Era. In a world dominated by the uprooting of long established traditions, O. Henry's short fiction becomes the site wherein Darwin-dictated principles, gender roles and genre rules are either dislocated or subverted. Following Boris M. Ejxenbaum's idea (1927) that the writer's use of parody lays bare the construction of his stories, I propose to demonstrate that an intentional breaking of generic expectations lies behind the narrator's use of multifarious literary formulas. Evolutionist axioms are also overruled, for dysgenic and not eugenic prevails over in the American society presented by the Southerner writer. Finally, by applying Veblen's sociological ideas (1899) to O. Henry's characters, I also aim to show that any attempt to classify them into types whose response can be predicted in the social contest is destined to...
Miscelanea, 2023
Facilitating oral skills through authentic materials such as music has been essential in language teaching. Nonetheless, a study whose core element is to foster adolescent English as a Foreign Language (EFL) learners' narrative skills through contemporary music with highly emotional lyrics is still non-existent. A questionnaire was administered to fifty-eight EFL learners to know their attitude towards the implementation of social issues and music in class. Additionally, both the themes and the structure of two hundred and sixteen songs which constitute the Corpus of Contemporary Country Songs (CCCS) were analysed. A possible connection between the narrative and linguistic elements of the songs in the corpus was also considered. The results show that there exists a narrative structure in contemporary country music songs and a wide range of themes towards which students have shown a positive attitude. Furthermore, a positive connection between the different narrative and linguistic criteria employed to analyse the songs included in the corpus was also detected. These results suggest that these song lyrics may serve to promote EFL students' narrative skills.
2023
This paper explores Kamin Mohammadi's position regarding the discourses of national belonging through the scrutiny of her circular route from England to Iran. Reflecting the interrelation between identity, home and the modern nation-state, The Cypress Tree: A Love Letter to Iran (2011) recounts the story of Mohammadi's journey back to Iran in search of a singular self. It recounts her story of growing up in Iran and England and the reason behind her displacement from both of these countries in 1979 and 1997. Indebted to Stuart Hall's take on the diaspora, Gaston Bachelard's reading of home and Homi Bhabha's notion of hybridity, this paper rejects the synonymy between home and home country as well as exclusive belonging intrinsic to nationalism. The aim of this paper is to read Mohammadi's ultimate choice to settle down in England as a challenge to the homogenizing forces of nationalism that inhibited her sense of belonging to Britain and drew her toward Iran. As she embraces a hybrid identity by telling her circular story, beginning and ending in London, her literary contribution is a way to dismantle the link between belonging and the nation-state, as well as a challenge to the alleged homogeneity of the nationstates to which she belongs.
Miscelánea: A Journal of English and American Studies, 2023
This paper considers Juan Antonio Bayona's 2018 film Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom as a Gothic film which disrupts the archetypal conventions of monster films, especially in relation to the antispeciesist conception of monsters-in this case, the genetically-engineered dinosaurs which feature in the Jurassic Park and Jurassic World sagas. Through an analysis of its cinematography, character construction, scenarios and plot development in the light of Gothic Studies, I will argue that this film is not just Gothic in appearance, but also in the sense that it breaks with contemporary anthropocentric conventions of normalcy, unity and species boundaries, and that it confirms the trend in filmic narratives that takes into account the monsters' perspectives in order to challenge human exceptionalism.
Miscelánea: A Journal of English and American Studies, 2023
Vocabulary learning is pivotal for language learning as it is a cross-sectional aspect related to both receptive and productive skills. L2 vocabulary learning has given way to a substantial body of research in which the role of implicit and explicit instruction has been central. Bearing in mind the importance of communicative tasks as sources for vocabulary learning, this study will explore how vocabulary presented with context and without context is retained. 39 undergraduate students were assigned to each of these conditions, and after performing a communicative task which included a warm-up activity with a set of 15 target words, they completed a word meaning test (post-test) and repeated the same test after two weeks. The data gathered was analyzed using a quantitative approach. Findings indicate that the type of vocabulary test with context-embedded words is more effective for vocabulary retention in the short term. Nevertheless, multi-word items were better identified with the no-context vocabulary test, a finding supported by previous research. The present study raises the possibility that different vocabulary strategies are used by EFL learners, and that warm-up activities may contribute to L2 vocabulary learning.
Saroyan's lonely fruitcakes, and other goofs: strategies of resistance to the culture of abundance
Journal of the Short Story in English. Les Cahiers de la nouvelle, 2009
Contrairement aux « grotesques » de Sherwood Anderson et aux « freaks » de Carson McCullers, condamnes a vivre dans l’isolement, malgre leurs vains efforts de communication, les fous excentriques de Saroyan poursuivent des reves absurdes, bravent regles et conventions, et se sentent bien fiers de leur identite insolite dans un monde homogene qui s’obstine a effacer les differences. Dans « Hosey Gorsey and the Frog » (1968), un conte pour enfants apparemment innocent, l’ecrivain centre sa critique sur la culture de l’abondance regnante (Susman 1980; Barnard 1995). Par une revision detaillee de ses romans, surtout de ceux publies pendant la Grande Depression, nous entendons montrer que l’œuvre breve de l’auteur, ou les heros sont des personnages extravagants et des idealistes surannes, peut etre envisagee comme une tentative pour contredire, pour bouleverser ou resister aux valeurs et aux institutions de la societe de consommation de masses: le mythe du succes et de la personnalite, l...