The recently awakened academic interest in the multilingual character of the written culture of the Baltic region in more distant times calls for fresh attention to and reassessment of the poetry of the ethnic minorities that have inhabited the territory of Estonia. One such minority was the Estonian Swedes who dwelt in western Estonia up to 1944. This paper mainly focuses on the lifecourse, as reflected in his poems, of Estonian Swedish native skald Mats Ekman, who wrote in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since his work and the whole topic of Estonian Swedish culture are largely unknown in Estonia and everywhere else, except for the direct descendants of that minority, the paper offers the necessary background information, while also applying the method of close reading to a few of the author’s poems in the original Swedish dialect and in English. Parallels are drawn with the major classical authors of neighbouring Nordic countries, such as Esaias Tegnér of Sweden and Aleksis Kivi of Finland, authors who can be seen as models not only for Ekman, but also for a number of significant ethnic Estonian poets who wrote in Estonian, such as Juhan Liiv and Ernst Enno.
{"title":"Romantic Poets in Epic Form of Nordic Countries and Estonia’s Classical Dialect Poetry","authors":"Lauri Pilter","doi":"10.12697/il.2023.28.1.7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2023.28.1.7","url":null,"abstract":"The recently awakened academic interest in the multilingual character of the written culture of the Baltic region in more distant times calls for fresh attention to and reassessment of the poetry of the ethnic minorities that have inhabited the territory of Estonia. One such minority was the Estonian Swedes who dwelt in western Estonia up to 1944. This paper mainly focuses on the lifecourse, as reflected in his poems, of Estonian Swedish native skald Mats Ekman, who wrote in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Since his work and the whole topic of Estonian Swedish culture are largely unknown in Estonia and everywhere else, except for the direct descendants of that minority, the paper offers the necessary background information, while also applying the method of close reading to a few of the author’s poems in the original Swedish dialect and in English. Parallels are drawn with the major classical authors of neighbouring Nordic countries, such as Esaias Tegnér of Sweden and Aleksis Kivi of Finland, authors who can be seen as models not only for Ekman, but also for a number of significant ethnic Estonian poets who wrote in Estonian, such as Juhan Liiv and Ernst Enno.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2023-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48627191","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-10DOI: 10.12697/il.2023.28.1.12
Miriam McIlfatrick-Ksenofontov
This article continues the author’s research into the creative process of writing and translating poetry. It is preparatory work for translating the poetry of one of Estonia’s most widely read and appreciated poets, Juhan Viiding (1948–1995), who wrote under the pseudonym Jüri Üdi until 1978. It proposes that an understanding of Viiding’s work is enhanced when viewed in the wider human perspective of distributed cognition, as elaborated by neuroanthropologist Merlin Donald. In contrast to traditional approaches that look to socio-historical background to contextualise literature and translation research, the distributed cognition model places greater emphasis on the creative processes in culture that take place outside individual minds and focuses less on the capacities and talents of the author as the unique source of creativity. This approach is helpful for the translator of Viiding’s poetry who aspires to produce translated poems that do in another language what the original poems do in their language, for it entails thinking through language to access the working of the individual and the collective minds in the text. The significant role that social connections and public reception play in Viiding’s creative work is illustrated by an essay by Elo Viiding, a poet and Juhan Viiding’s daughter, in which she describes nine types of reader of Juhan Viiding’s poetry, each of which creates their own distinct ‘Juhan Viiding’. Drawing on poet and literary critic Hasso Krull’s study of Viiding’s poetry, Elo Viiding analyses Juhan Viiding’s method of negation as essential to his creative work and engagement with his audience. In this article the author lays theoretical groundwork for the translation of Juhan Viiding’s poetry into English.
{"title":"An Attempt to Account for Distributed Cognition in Translating the Poetry of Juhan Viiding","authors":"Miriam McIlfatrick-Ksenofontov","doi":"10.12697/il.2023.28.1.12","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2023.28.1.12","url":null,"abstract":"This article continues the author’s research into the creative process of writing and translating poetry. It is preparatory work for translating the poetry of one of Estonia’s most widely read and appreciated poets, Juhan Viiding (1948–1995), who wrote under the pseudonym Jüri Üdi until 1978. It proposes that an understanding of Viiding’s work is enhanced when viewed in the wider human perspective of distributed cognition, as elaborated by neuroanthropologist Merlin Donald. In contrast to traditional approaches that look to socio-historical background to contextualise literature and translation research, the distributed cognition model places greater emphasis on the creative processes in culture that take place outside individual minds and focuses less on the capacities and talents of the author as the unique source of creativity. This approach is helpful for the translator of Viiding’s poetry who aspires to produce translated poems that do in another language what the original poems do in their language, for it entails thinking through language to access the working of the individual and the collective minds in the text. The significant role that social connections and public reception play in Viiding’s creative work is illustrated by an essay by Elo Viiding, a poet and Juhan Viiding’s daughter, in which she describes nine types of reader of Juhan Viiding’s poetry, each of which creates their own distinct ‘Juhan Viiding’. Drawing on poet and literary critic Hasso Krull’s study of Viiding’s poetry, Elo Viiding analyses Juhan Viiding’s method of negation as essential to his creative work and engagement with his audience. In this article the author lays theoretical groundwork for the translation of Juhan Viiding’s poetry into English.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2023-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48105427","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Tom Waits, through his poetry, his poetic and public personae, has become the father of the desperate failures of society, those who lay down and fill the background with disillusionment. No-direction-homers flock together and become the majority of Waits’ main characters. As an artist, he gives a voice and a name to those who, otherwise, would remain invisible, endowing them with corporeality. Waits, through the projection of his public persona, illumines the lives of the weak, who strive to survive in a world that has always fed upon those below. There is something honourable about the people who struggle the most, trying to find their path in the darkest of places, and Waits, through his career as an entertainer, has always prioritised his respect for these people, praising their many faults and poor decisions, merging them with the tormented collective and thus becoming one with their sadness and horror. This paper will focus on how Tom Waits constructs his personae through an identification with the disappointments of society: the underdog, and, more particularly, the alcoholic underdog. I intend to focus mainly on the lyrical content of his albums Rain Dogs and Small Change, together with their respective representations in other art forms, specifically interviews, lives, artistry, etc. This section will also include Tom Waits’ depiction of some characters as grotesques, as they form the limits of societal acceptance. In the last section, I will examine the presence and construction of these grotesques in his album Alice (2002), while comparing the lyrical content to its other cultural manifestations.
{"title":"‘We’re All Mad Here’: Alienation, Madness, and Crafting Tom Waits","authors":"Nadia López-Peláez Akalay","doi":"10.12697/il.2023.28.1.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2023.28.1.4","url":null,"abstract":"Tom Waits, through his poetry, his poetic and public personae, has become the father of the desperate failures of society, those who lay down and fill the background with disillusionment. No-direction-homers flock together and become the majority of Waits’ main characters. As an artist, he gives a voice and a name to those who, otherwise, would remain invisible, endowing them with corporeality. Waits, through the projection of his public persona, illumines the lives of the weak, who strive to survive in a world that has always fed upon those below. There is something honourable about the people who struggle the most, trying to find their path in the darkest of places, and Waits, through his career as an entertainer, has always prioritised his respect for these people, praising their many faults and poor decisions, merging them with the tormented collective and thus becoming one with their sadness and horror. \u0000This paper will focus on how Tom Waits constructs his personae through an identification with the disappointments of society: the underdog, and, more particularly, the alcoholic underdog. I intend to focus mainly on the lyrical content of his albums Rain Dogs and Small Change, together with their respective representations in other art forms, specifically interviews, lives, artistry, etc. This section will also include Tom Waits’ depiction of some characters as grotesques, as they form the limits of societal acceptance. In the last section, I will examine the presence and construction of these grotesques in his album Alice (2002), while comparing the lyrical content to its other cultural manifestations.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2023-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47159085","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2023-08-10DOI: 10.12697/il.2023.28.1.11
L. Lukas
In 1944, on the cusp of one occupying power replacing another in Estonia, the beloved Estonian poet Heiti Talvik translated Goethe’s poetry and was filled with admiration: “What a youthful abundance of life in every detail! Yes, to delve into Goethe’s work is to rinse your eyes in a miracle wellspring capable of renewing your fading vision.” By then, the Estonian language and Estonian poetry had already been drawing from this miracle wellspring for more than a century. In this presentation, I will be discussing the significance of Goethe’s poetry in Estonian literature and comparing it to that of small and large literatures of neighbouring countries. Based on research, I conducted with my co-authors Vahur Aabrams and Susanna Rennik for our recently published book Goethe’s Poetry in Estonian (University of Tartu Press, 2021), I will show the dynamics of the reception and translation of Goethe’s poetry in Estonia and in the wider Baltic cultural space, and I will explore the local socio-cultural and more general aesthetic and ideological factors that influenced this reception.
{"title":"“In a Miracle Wellspring” of Goethe’s Poetry: Comments on the Role of Translated Poetry in a Small Literature","authors":"L. Lukas","doi":"10.12697/il.2023.28.1.11","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2023.28.1.11","url":null,"abstract":"In 1944, on the cusp of one occupying power replacing another in Estonia, the beloved Estonian poet Heiti Talvik translated Goethe’s poetry and was filled with admiration: “What a youthful abundance of life in every detail! Yes, to delve into Goethe’s work is to rinse your eyes in a miracle wellspring capable of renewing your fading vision.” By then, the Estonian language and Estonian poetry had already been drawing from this miracle wellspring for more than a century. In this presentation, I will be discussing the significance of Goethe’s poetry in Estonian literature and comparing it to that of small and large literatures of neighbouring countries. Based on research, I conducted with my co-authors Vahur Aabrams and Susanna Rennik for our recently published book Goethe’s Poetry in Estonian (University of Tartu Press, 2021), I will show the dynamics of the reception and translation of Goethe’s poetry in Estonia and in the wider Baltic cultural space, and I will explore the local socio-cultural and more general aesthetic and ideological factors that influenced this reception.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2023-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43460627","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The stereotypical image of Hungary transmitted by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez. This study focuses on stereotyped images and topics relating to Hungary and the Hungarians, as presented by the Spanish writer Vicente Blasco Ibáñez in his travel book Oriente (The Orient), written in 1907 en route to the Ottoman Empire. Two chapters from part one of the book are about a stage in his journey that was a boat trip along the Danube, starting in Vienna and finishing in Budapest. This section of the book deals with the Hungarian Kingdom within the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In these chapters the author displays a rudimentary knowledge of Hungarian history, and interprets the political and social reality of the country in a simplistic, topical, distorted way. The author describes the landscape and the historic monuments, as well as making a political analysis of the ambitions of Hungarians within the Empire. He compensates for his his lack of knowledge by offering his readers stereotyped images of what, in his time, would be seen as typically Hungarian. Nevertheless, he succeeds in foretelling the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and suggests this would happen as a consequence of an armed conflict, even though he cannot imagine how near in time it actually was, or the circumstances surrounding it.
{"title":"La imagen estereotipada de Hungría transmitida por Vicente Blasco Ibáñez","authors":"Salustio Alvarado, Renáta Bojničanová","doi":"10.12697/il.2022.27.2.7","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2022.27.2.7","url":null,"abstract":"The stereotypical image of Hungary transmitted by Vicente Blasco Ibáñez. This study focuses on stereotyped images and topics relating to Hungary and the Hungarians, as presented by the Spanish writer Vicente Blasco Ibáñez in his travel book Oriente (The Orient), written in 1907 en route to the Ottoman Empire. Two chapters from part one of the book are about a stage in his journey that was a boat trip along the Danube, starting in Vienna and finishing in Budapest. This section of the book deals with the Hungarian Kingdom within the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In these chapters the author displays a rudimentary knowledge of Hungarian history, and interprets the political and social reality of the country in a simplistic, topical, distorted way. The author describes the landscape and the historic monuments, as well as making a political analysis of the ambitions of Hungarians within the Empire. He compensates for his his lack of knowledge by offering his readers stereotyped images of what, in his time, would be seen as typically Hungarian. Nevertheless, he succeeds in foretelling the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and suggests this would happen as a consequence of an armed conflict, even though he cannot imagine how near in time it actually was, or the circumstances surrounding it.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48392782","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The Implicit in Translation: A Case Study of Récifs by Romesh Gunesekera. Translating Sri Lankan Culture to French. This article aims to shed light on how the translator of Reef, a novel written by the Sri Lankan author Romesh Gunesekera, has dealt with culture-specific lexis originating from the Sri Lankan context. We chose this novel because it contains many references to Sri Lankan culture. The terms referring to Sri Lankan realities appear in names of Sinhala or sometimes Tamil origin. First, we will assess whether the French translation utilised a source-oriented or target-oriented translation approach. Secondly, we will work on the strategy of literal translation, focusing on translating the implicit. Thirdly, we will see the use of the Sri Lankan English language as it appears in the original novel. The author of the novel voluntarily chose the ‘Sri Lankan English’ register to remain in the local context. Are there traces of these linguistic nuances in the French translation or did the translator decide to choose the register of contemporary standard French? Our findings suggest that the translation of Reef follows a source oriented approach and succeeds in referring to local realities of Sri Lanka, maintaining specific Sri Lankan terms, which in most cases become comprehensible in the context.
{"title":"L’implicite dans la traduction : une étude de cas portant sur Récifs de Romesh Gunesekera. La traduction de la culture sri lankaise en français","authors":"Niroshini Gunasekera, Merilyn Meristo","doi":"10.12697/il.2022.27.2.6","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2022.27.2.6","url":null,"abstract":"The Implicit in Translation: A Case Study of Récifs by Romesh Gunesekera. Translating Sri Lankan Culture to French. This article aims to shed light on how the translator of Reef, a novel written by the Sri Lankan author Romesh Gunesekera, has dealt with culture-specific lexis originating from the Sri Lankan context. We chose this novel because it contains many references to Sri Lankan culture. The terms referring to Sri Lankan realities appear in names of Sinhala or sometimes Tamil origin. First, we will assess whether the French translation utilised a source-oriented or target-oriented translation approach. Secondly, we will work on the strategy of literal translation, focusing on translating the implicit. Thirdly, we will see the use of the Sri Lankan English language as it appears in the original novel. The author of the novel voluntarily chose the ‘Sri Lankan English’ register to remain in the local context. Are there traces of these linguistic nuances in the French translation or did the translator decide to choose the register of contemporary standard French? Our findings suggest that the translation of Reef follows a source oriented approach and succeeds in referring to local realities of Sri Lanka, maintaining specific Sri Lankan terms, which in most cases become comprehensible in the context.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45461287","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-31DOI: 10.12697/il.2022.27.2.11
Anna Swoboda
Between Senegalese tradition and French neo-colonialism: Systematic oppression of young girls in La nuit est tombée sur Dakar by Aminata Zaaria. The purpose of this article is to examine the systematic, intercultural oppression of young girls in La nuit est tombée sur Dakar, a 2004 novel by the Senegalese author Aminata Zaaria. Her female protagonists, two seventeenyear- olds, subject themselves to sexual exploitation by white men in order to escape poverty. In their birthplace, the village of Lëndëm (‘darkness’ in Wolof, the most commonly spoken language in Senegal), the girls are forced into traditional gender roles from a very young age, i.e. their sexuality is strictly controlled by men. This environment is, however, influenced by the Western way of life: on TV and in glossy magazines, Europe is presented as a paradise on earth. Dakar, viewed by the elder inhabitants of Lëndëm as a “cursed city”, is a place where white men have all the power and, just as in colonial times, they use it in order to sexually abuse African women. By analysing traditional society from a sociological perspective (based on the works of Abdoulaye Bara Diop and Rosalie Aduyai Diop), as well as by applying the postcolonial and psychological theoretical framework to the dynamics presented in the text, this paper strives to demonstrate that it is difficult to speak of “freedom of choice” in the case of a vulnerable, traumatised subject. For both protagonists, this “disguised prostitution” is a survival strategy, going beyond a simple materialism: they are led to believe that it is a small price to pay for a better life. The article presents intercultural oppression as a double-edged sword in that in every environment, young girls are treated as mere objects, expected to silently play their roles.
在塞内加尔传统与法国新殖民主义之间:在达喀尔的La nuit est tomb sur Dakar, Aminata Zaaria对年轻女孩的系统压迫。本文的目的是研究塞内加尔作家Aminata Zaaria在2004年出版的小说《La nuit est tomb sur Dakar》中对年轻女孩的系统性跨文化压迫。她的两个女主人公,两个17岁的女孩,为了摆脱贫困而遭受白人的性剥削。在她们的出生地Lëndëm (Wolof语中的“黑暗”,塞内加尔最常用的语言)村,女孩们从很小的时候就被迫扮演传统的性别角色,也就是说,她们的性行为受到男性的严格控制。然而,这种环境受到西方生活方式的影响:在电视和时尚杂志上,欧洲被描绘成地球上的天堂。达喀尔被Lëndëm的老居民视为“被诅咒的城市”,是一个白人男性拥有所有权力的地方,就像在殖民时期一样,他们利用这种权力对非洲妇女进行性虐待。通过从社会学的角度分析传统社会(基于Abdoulaye Bara Diop和Rosalie Aduyai Diop的作品),以及将后殖民和心理学理论框架应用于文本中呈现的动态,本文努力证明,在一个脆弱的、受到创伤的主体的情况下,很难谈论“选择自由”。对于两位主角来说,这种“变相卖淫”是一种生存策略,超越了简单的物质主义:他们被引导相信,这是为更好的生活付出的小代价。这篇文章认为跨文化压迫是一把双刃剑,在任何环境中,年轻女孩都被视为纯粹的对象,被期望默默地扮演自己的角色。
{"title":"Entre la tradition sénégalaise et le néo-colonialisme français : l’oppression systématique des jeunes filles dans La nuit est tombée sur Dakar d’Aminata Zaaria","authors":"Anna Swoboda","doi":"10.12697/il.2022.27.2.11","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2022.27.2.11","url":null,"abstract":"Between Senegalese tradition and French neo-colonialism: Systematic oppression of young girls in La nuit est tombée sur Dakar by Aminata Zaaria. The purpose of this article is to examine the systematic, intercultural oppression of young girls in La nuit est tombée sur Dakar, a 2004 novel by the Senegalese author Aminata Zaaria. Her female protagonists, two seventeenyear- olds, subject themselves to sexual exploitation by white men in order to escape poverty. In their birthplace, the village of Lëndëm (‘darkness’ in Wolof, the most commonly spoken language in Senegal), the girls are forced into traditional gender roles from a very young age, i.e. their sexuality is strictly controlled by men. This environment is, however, influenced by the Western way of life: on TV and in glossy magazines, Europe is presented as a paradise on earth. Dakar, viewed by the elder inhabitants of Lëndëm as a “cursed city”, is a place where white men have all the power and, just as in colonial times, they use it in order to sexually abuse African women. By analysing traditional society from a sociological perspective (based on the works of Abdoulaye Bara Diop and Rosalie Aduyai Diop), as well as by applying the postcolonial and psychological theoretical framework to the dynamics presented in the text, this paper strives to demonstrate that it is difficult to speak of “freedom of choice” in the case of a vulnerable, traumatised subject. For both protagonists, this “disguised prostitution” is a survival strategy, going beyond a simple materialism: they are led to believe that it is a small price to pay for a better life. The article presents intercultural oppression as a double-edged sword in that in every environment, young girls are treated as mere objects, expected to silently play their roles.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49019878","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-12-31DOI: 10.12697/il.2022.27.2.10
Per Bauhn, F. F. Tepe
Historically speaking, fairy tales have been powerful instruments in the education of children and in the transmission of moral standards from one generation to the next, from the dominant class to less powerful groups. As they make certain ways of life or ideals appear attractive and others repellent, fairy tales also contribute to form normative identities in their young readers. A normative identity combines a descriptive account of who one is with a normative account of what one ought to do. Such identities can be empowering or disempowering. Fairy tales can be seen as using a technique of narrative persuasion to impose normative identities on their audiences, making certain ideals and ways of life appear natural and self-evident. To deconstruct a disempowering normative identity imposed by a fairy tale involves separating its descriptive and normative components and making vivid the problematic aspects of the norms, values, and ideals involved. In this article, we analyse Angela Carter’s deconstruction of a disempowering normative identity imposed on women by the Ashputtle fairy tale, as told by the Grimm brothers. In our analysis, based on close reading and philosophical criticism, we reveal how Carter herself makes use of the fairy-tale technique of narrative persuasion in her deconstructive work, vividly bringing out certain appalling consequences of the ideals of submission and self-sacrifice implied by the Grimm version of the Ashputtle story, thereby also subverting that version.
{"title":"Deconstructing a Disempowering Normative Identity: Angela Carter’s Adaptations of the Ashputtle Story","authors":"Per Bauhn, F. F. Tepe","doi":"10.12697/il.2022.27.2.10","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2022.27.2.10","url":null,"abstract":"Historically speaking, fairy tales have been powerful instruments in the education of children and in the transmission of moral standards from one generation to the next, from the dominant class to less powerful groups. As they make certain ways of life or ideals appear attractive and others repellent, fairy tales also contribute to form normative identities in their young readers. A normative identity combines a descriptive account of who one is with a normative account of what one ought to do. Such identities can be empowering or disempowering. Fairy tales can be seen as using a technique of narrative persuasion to impose normative identities on their audiences, making certain ideals and ways of life appear natural and self-evident. To deconstruct a disempowering normative identity imposed by a fairy tale involves separating its descriptive and normative components and making vivid the problematic aspects of the norms, values, and ideals involved. In this article, we analyse Angela Carter’s deconstruction of a disempowering normative identity imposed on women by the Ashputtle fairy tale, as told by the Grimm brothers. In our analysis, based on close reading and philosophical criticism, we reveal how Carter herself makes use of the fairy-tale technique of narrative persuasion in her deconstructive work, vividly bringing out certain appalling consequences of the ideals of submission and self-sacrifice implied by the Grimm version of the Ashputtle story, thereby also subverting that version.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"41632230","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In the last decades, there has been a gradual shift in memory studies to approach traumatic events from the perpetrator’s view, rather than the victim’s. While this has been possible in some contexts – such as that of World War II – due to the availability of incriminatory material, it has been unfeasible in others because of its inexistence. In Chile, for example, the testimony of the dictatorship’s top authority Augusto Pinochet is unavailable because of his denial to accept responsibility in the country’s genocide, an aspect that has hindered victims from understanding his criminal motivations. When such is the case, we argue that fictional narratives may become a suitable way to recreate unknown events and thus facilitate a more coherent narrative of the past. We aim to demonstrate this by analysing the articulation of fictional dialogues uttered by Pinochet in the novel Tengo miedo torero (2001) by Chilean writer Pedro Lemebel.
{"title":"Unveiling the Perpetrator’s Gaze in Pedro Lemebel’s Novel Tengo miedo torero","authors":"Julio Uribe Ugalde","doi":"10.12697/il.2022.27.2.4","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.12697/il.2022.27.2.4","url":null,"abstract":"In the last decades, there has been a gradual shift in memory studies to approach traumatic events from the perpetrator’s view, rather than the victim’s. While this has been possible in some contexts – such as that of World War II – due to the availability of incriminatory material, it has been unfeasible in others because of its inexistence. In Chile, for example, the testimony of the dictatorship’s top authority Augusto Pinochet is unavailable because of his denial to accept responsibility in the country’s genocide, an aspect that has hindered victims from understanding his criminal motivations. When such is the case, we argue that fictional narratives may become a suitable way to recreate unknown events and thus facilitate a more coherent narrative of the past. We aim to demonstrate this by analysing the articulation of fictional dialogues uttered by Pinochet in the novel Tengo miedo torero (2001) by Chilean writer Pedro Lemebel.","PeriodicalId":41069,"journal":{"name":"Interlitteraria","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.1,"publicationDate":"2022-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44310988","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}