Pub Date : 2021-08-01DOI: 10.1177/09639470211023245
Victorina González-Díaz
Previous scholarship on Jane Austen has often commented on the moral overtones of her lexical choices; more specifically, the fact that “incorrect” lexical innovations and fashionable words (i.e. new usages) tend to be deployed as part of the idiolect of foolish, gullible or morally reprehensible characters. By contrast, ethically sound characters normally move within the limits of established (‘old’) usages and the “correct” Standard English repertoire. Taking the historical linguistic concept of subjectivisation as starting point, this case-study explores the use of two adjectives (lovely and nice) in Austen’s novels. The article (a) demonstrates that a straightforward socio-moral classification of ‘old’ and ‘new’ word-senses in Austen’s fiction is not fully adequate and (b) advocates, in line with recent scholarship, a more nuanced approach to the study of her fictional vocabulary, where old and new senses of a word (in this case, lovely and nice) move across the idiolect of different character-types for ironic, character- and plot-building purposes.
{"title":"‘A patient act of adjustment’: Subjectivisation, adjectives and Jane Austen","authors":"Victorina González-Díaz","doi":"10.1177/09639470211023245","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211023245","url":null,"abstract":"Previous scholarship on Jane Austen has often commented on the moral overtones of her lexical choices; more specifically, the fact that “incorrect” lexical innovations and fashionable words (i.e. new usages) tend to be deployed as part of the idiolect of foolish, gullible or morally reprehensible characters. By contrast, ethically sound characters normally move within the limits of established (‘old’) usages and the “correct” Standard English repertoire. Taking the historical linguistic concept of subjectivisation as starting point, this case-study explores the use of two adjectives (lovely and nice) in Austen’s novels. The article (a) demonstrates that a straightforward socio-moral classification of ‘old’ and ‘new’ word-senses in Austen’s fiction is not fully adequate and (b) advocates, in line with recent scholarship, a more nuanced approach to the study of her fictional vocabulary, where old and new senses of a word (in this case, lovely and nice) move across the idiolect of different character-types for ironic, character- and plot-building purposes.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-08-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211023245","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43266445","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-07-27DOI: 10.1177/09639470211034283
Lina Mourad
Joe Blann’s (2011) comic ‘Things We had’ is a complex and nuanced multimodal realisation of a tense interaction between a couple, rendered through the subtle interplay of narration, panel composition and dialogue. The tug of war and blame game the couple engage in are rife with instances of impoliteness. Drawing on Culpeper’s (2011a, 2015b) impoliteness framework and an integrative pragmatics approach, this article examines the sophisticated multimodal realisation of impoliteness and power dynamics, with a particular focus on the subtle forms of implicational impoliteness and intricate impoliteness patterning used in the fictional interaction. In doing so, it analyses the interplay between impoliteness and power dynamics in the exchange, highlighting the importance of impoliteness analysis in revealing the fluid relational power dynamics underlying the couple’s interaction. This is accompanied by an analysis of the key affective and interactional role of impoliteness in driving the exchange between the couple. Impoliteness, along with the evaluative negative affect it involves, is shown to be instrumental in the couple’s struggle for interactional power in the course of the interaction, and also more broadly, in their negotiation of relational power within the relationship.
乔·布兰(Joe Blann, 2011)的漫画《我们拥有的东西》(Things We had)是一对夫妇之间紧张互动的复杂而微妙的多模式实现，通过叙事、小组构图和对话的微妙相互作用来呈现。这对夫妇之间的拉锯战和相互指责充满了不礼貌的例子。借鉴Culpeper (2011a, 2015b)的不礼貌框架和综合语用学方法，本文研究了不礼貌和权力动力学的复杂多模态实现，特别关注了虚构互动中使用的隐含不礼貌的微妙形式和复杂的不礼貌模式。在此过程中，它分析了交换中不礼貌与权力动态之间的相互作用，强调了不礼貌分析在揭示夫妻互动背后的流动关系权力动态方面的重要性。本文还分析了不礼貌在推动夫妻之间交流中的关键情感和互动作用。不礼貌，连同它所包含的评价性负面影响，被证明是夫妻在互动过程中争夺互动权力的工具，更广泛地说，是他们在关系中谈判关系权力的工具。
{"title":"Impoliteness and power dynamics in intimate interactions: An analysis of Joe Blann’s ‘Things We Had’","authors":"Lina Mourad","doi":"10.1177/09639470211034283","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211034283","url":null,"abstract":"Joe Blann’s (2011) comic ‘Things We had’ is a complex and nuanced multimodal realisation of a tense interaction between a couple, rendered through the subtle interplay of narration, panel composition and dialogue. The tug of war and blame game the couple engage in are rife with instances of impoliteness. Drawing on Culpeper’s (2011a, 2015b) impoliteness framework and an integrative pragmatics approach, this article examines the sophisticated multimodal realisation of impoliteness and power dynamics, with a particular focus on the subtle forms of implicational impoliteness and intricate impoliteness patterning used in the fictional interaction. In doing so, it analyses the interplay between impoliteness and power dynamics in the exchange, highlighting the importance of impoliteness analysis in revealing the fluid relational power dynamics underlying the couple’s interaction. This is accompanied by an analysis of the key affective and interactional role of impoliteness in driving the exchange between the couple. Impoliteness, along with the evaluative negative affect it involves, is shown to be instrumental in the couple’s struggle for interactional power in the course of the interaction, and also more broadly, in their negotiation of relational power within the relationship.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-07-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211034283","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45314057","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-06DOI: 10.1177/09639470211012297
I. Cornelius, Eric Weiskott
The metrical theory devised by Eduard Sievers and refined by A. J. Bliss forms the basis for most current scholarship on Old English meter. A weakness of the Sievers–Bliss theory is that it occupies a middle ground between two levels of analytic description, distinguished by Roman Jakobson in an influential article as ‘verse instance’ and ‘verse design’. Metrists in the Sievers–Bliss tradition employ a concept of metrical position (a key component of verse design), yet the focus of attention usually remains on the contours of stress of individual verses. Important exceptions are the studies of Thomas Cable and Nicolay Yakovlev. The theoretical innovations of Cable and Yakovlev, among others, enable a more concise presentation of verse design than anyone writing on the subject has yet offered. The present essay attempts to show what such a presentation might look like, while also giving due acknowledgment to the complexities of position-count in this meter. We presume no prior knowledge of the Sieversian system. Illustrations are drawn principally from Cædmon’s Hymn and the Seafarer.
{"title":"The intricacies of counting to four in Old English poetry","authors":"I. Cornelius, Eric Weiskott","doi":"10.1177/09639470211012297","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211012297","url":null,"abstract":"The metrical theory devised by Eduard Sievers and refined by A. J. Bliss forms the basis for most current scholarship on Old English meter. A weakness of the Sievers–Bliss theory is that it occupies a middle ground between two levels of analytic description, distinguished by Roman Jakobson in an influential article as ‘verse instance’ and ‘verse design’. Metrists in the Sievers–Bliss tradition employ a concept of metrical position (a key component of verse design), yet the focus of attention usually remains on the contours of stress of individual verses. Important exceptions are the studies of Thomas Cable and Nicolay Yakovlev. The theoretical innovations of Cable and Yakovlev, among others, enable a more concise presentation of verse design than anyone writing on the subject has yet offered. The present essay attempts to show what such a presentation might look like, while also giving due acknowledgment to the complexities of position-count in this meter. We presume no prior knowledge of the Sieversian system. Illustrations are drawn principally from Cædmon’s Hymn and the Seafarer.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211012297","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43200593","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-01DOI: 10.1177/0963947020983202
A. Gibbons, S. Whiteley
This article examines direct address, or ‘breaking the fourth wall’, in the BBC TV series Fleabag. It applies Text World Theory to telecinematic discourse for the first time and, in doing so, contributes to developing cognitive approaches in the field of telecinematic stylistics. Text World Theory, originally a cognitive linguistic discourse processing framework, is used to examine how multimodal cues contribute to the creation of imagined worlds. We examine three examples of direct address in Fleabag, featuring actor gaze alongside use of the second-person you or actor gaze alone. Our analysis highlights the need to account for the different deictic referents of you, with the pronoun able to refer intra- and extradiegetically. We also explore viewers’ ontological positioning because ‘breaking the fourth wall’ in telecinematic discourse evokes an addressee who is not spatiotemporally co-present with the text-world character. We therefore propose the concept of the split text-world, which assists in accounting for the deictic pull that viewers may feel during direct address and its experiential impact. Our analysis suggests that telecinematic direct address is necessarily world-forming but can ontologically position the viewer differently in different narrative contexts. While some instances of direct address in Fleabag position the viewer as Fleabag’s narratee and confidant, there is increasing play with direct address in the show’s second series and a destabilisation of this narratee role, achieved through the suggestion that Fleabag’s addressee may be more psychologically interior than they first appear.
{"title":"Do worlds have (fourth) walls? A Text World Theory approach to direct address in Fleabag","authors":"A. Gibbons, S. Whiteley","doi":"10.1177/0963947020983202","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/0963947020983202","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines direct address, or ‘breaking the fourth wall’, in the BBC TV series Fleabag. It applies Text World Theory to telecinematic discourse for the first time and, in doing so, contributes to developing cognitive approaches in the field of telecinematic stylistics. Text World Theory, originally a cognitive linguistic discourse processing framework, is used to examine how multimodal cues contribute to the creation of imagined worlds. We examine three examples of direct address in Fleabag, featuring actor gaze alongside use of the second-person you or actor gaze alone. Our analysis highlights the need to account for the different deictic referents of you, with the pronoun able to refer intra- and extradiegetically. We also explore viewers’ ontological positioning because ‘breaking the fourth wall’ in telecinematic discourse evokes an addressee who is not spatiotemporally co-present with the text-world character. We therefore propose the concept of the split text-world, which assists in accounting for the deictic pull that viewers may feel during direct address and its experiential impact. Our analysis suggests that telecinematic direct address is necessarily world-forming but can ontologically position the viewer differently in different narrative contexts. While some instances of direct address in Fleabag position the viewer as Fleabag’s narratee and confidant, there is increasing play with direct address in the show’s second series and a destabilisation of this narratee role, achieved through the suggestion that Fleabag’s addressee may be more psychologically interior than they first appear.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/0963947020983202","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48898830","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-30DOI: 10.1177/09639470211015833
C. James
{"title":"Book Review: Poetry and Language: The Linguistics of Verse","authors":"C. James","doi":"10.1177/09639470211015833","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211015833","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211015833","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46451189","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-30DOI: 10.1177/09639470211015851
K. Wales
‘six word stories’ (stories told in six words), young adult fiction such as Twilight, literary classics such as Shakespearian plays, TV series like How I Met Your Mother, and other narratives such as the Marvel Universe, amongst others. This shows that the framework is adaptable to any narrative and is not exclusive to literature: it is up to the reader to connect those narratives through their ‘mental archives’. Therefore, Mason’s main objective with this book is indeed achieved.
{"title":"Book Review: What’s Your Pronoun? Beyond He & She","authors":"K. Wales","doi":"10.1177/09639470211015851","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211015851","url":null,"abstract":"‘six word stories’ (stories told in six words), young adult fiction such as Twilight, literary classics such as Shakespearian plays, TV series like How I Met Your Mother, and other narratives such as the Marvel Universe, amongst others. This shows that the framework is adaptable to any narrative and is not exclusive to literature: it is up to the reader to connect those narratives through their ‘mental archives’. Therefore, Mason’s main objective with this book is indeed achieved.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211015851","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49611145","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-30DOI: 10.1177/09639470211015849
Kimberley Pager-McClymont
Beardsley MC (1958) Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism. New York: Harcourt, Brace. Beardsley MC (1970) The Possibility of Criticism. Michigan: Wayne State University Press. Lakoff G and Johnson M (1980) Metaphors We Live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lakoff G and TurnerM (1989)More than Cool Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Paterson D (2018) The Poem: Lyric, Sign, Metre. London: Faber and Faber.
{"title":"Book Review: Intertextuality in Practice","authors":"Kimberley Pager-McClymont","doi":"10.1177/09639470211015849","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211015849","url":null,"abstract":"Beardsley MC (1958) Aesthetics: Problems in the Philosophy of Criticism. New York: Harcourt, Brace. Beardsley MC (1970) The Possibility of Criticism. Michigan: Wayne State University Press. Lakoff G and Johnson M (1980) Metaphors We Live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lakoff G and TurnerM (1989)More than Cool Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Paterson D (2018) The Poem: Lyric, Sign, Metre. London: Faber and Faber.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211015849","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43414272","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-23DOI: 10.1177/09639470211009734
Naomi Adam
Framed by cognitive-poetic and possible worlds theories, this article explores two 21st century novels by the British postmodernist author Ian McEwan. Building upon Ryan’s (1991) seminal conceptualisation of the theory in relation to literature and using the novels as case studies, possible worlds theory is used to explain the unique and destabilising stylistic effects at play in the texts, which result in a ‘duplicitous point of view’ and consequent disorientation for the reader. With reference to the stylistically deviant texts of McEwan, it is argued that revisions to current theoretical frameworks are warranted. Most significantly, the concepts of suppositious text-possible worlds and (total) frame readjustment are introduced. Further to this, neuropsychiatric research is applied to the novels, highlighting the potential for interdisciplinary overlap in the study of narrative focalisation. It is concluded that the duplicity integral to both novels’ themes and texture is effected through artful use of hypothetical focalisation and suppositious text-possible worlds.
{"title":"‘Your duplicitous point of view’: Delayed revelations of hypothetical focalisation in Ian McEwan’s Atonement and Sweet Tooth","authors":"Naomi Adam","doi":"10.1177/09639470211009734","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211009734","url":null,"abstract":"Framed by cognitive-poetic and possible worlds theories, this article explores two 21st century novels by the British postmodernist author Ian McEwan. Building upon Ryan’s (1991) seminal conceptualisation of the theory in relation to literature and using the novels as case studies, possible worlds theory is used to explain the unique and destabilising stylistic effects at play in the texts, which result in a ‘duplicitous point of view’ and consequent disorientation for the reader. With reference to the stylistically deviant texts of McEwan, it is argued that revisions to current theoretical frameworks are warranted. Most significantly, the concepts of suppositious text-possible worlds and (total) frame readjustment are introduced. Further to this, neuropsychiatric research is applied to the novels, highlighting the potential for interdisciplinary overlap in the study of narrative focalisation. It is concluded that the duplicity integral to both novels’ themes and texture is effected through artful use of hypothetical focalisation and suppositious text-possible worlds.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211009734","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45488249","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-18DOI: 10.1177/09639470211009672
D. Kellogg, Somaye Aghajani Kalkhoran
The late linguist M.A.K. Halliday described the last paragraph of Darwin’s Origin of Species, with its description of a tangled bank, as one of the most remarkable paragraphs in the whole of literature. Yet it appears marred by an obvious grammatical mistake. In this article, we seek to show that the apparent mistake is actually the vestige of a now extinct form of paragraph in which the structure we now reserve for a single sentence could be extended over a whole paragraph or even many paragraphs. We first zoom out to show that the final sentence makes sense in the context of the paragraph as a whole, and then zoom out again to show that the modern paragraph itself is still a work in progress. Finally, we use a comparison between English and Farsi to try to show that all such grammatical choices mediate between humans and their environment. This relationship too is a work in progress in which the grammar of a language has an important role to play.
{"title":"‘And that’: Halliday’s logogenesis, sociogenesis, and phylogenesis in Darwin’s tangled bank","authors":"D. Kellogg, Somaye Aghajani Kalkhoran","doi":"10.1177/09639470211009672","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211009672","url":null,"abstract":"The late linguist M.A.K. Halliday described the last paragraph of Darwin’s Origin of Species, with its description of a tangled bank, as one of the most remarkable paragraphs in the whole of literature. Yet it appears marred by an obvious grammatical mistake. In this article, we seek to show that the apparent mistake is actually the vestige of a now extinct form of paragraph in which the structure we now reserve for a single sentence could be extended over a whole paragraph or even many paragraphs. We first zoom out to show that the final sentence makes sense in the context of the paragraph as a whole, and then zoom out again to show that the modern paragraph itself is still a work in progress. Finally, we use a comparison between English and Farsi to try to show that all such grammatical choices mediate between humans and their environment. This relationship too is a work in progress in which the grammar of a language has an important role to play.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211009672","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"43302664","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-04-18DOI: 10.1177/09639470211009748
Ella Wydrzynska
This article furthers the somewhat underdeveloped area of research regarding the consideration of complex theoretical concepts such as postmodernism and metafiction in relation to children’s literature by concentrating on a stunningly complex—although by no means rare—experimental text aimed at 8–12 year-olds. Using The Secret Series by Pseudonymous Bosch as example, I examine how children’s literature can use such strategies to engage a child-reader and make them a tangible part of the construction of the novel. Drawing on elements of Text World Theory, diegetic narrative levels and the concept of the internal author, this study primarily explores the role of the interactive, visibly inventing, postmodern narrator, and, by extension, the dramatization of the reader as a part of the story. Framed against an academic background in which children’s literature was deemed unworthy of study or outright dismissed, this article illustrates why children’s literature is not only worthy of rigorous academic study in its own right but also that it often readily displays enough literary, linguistic, and narratological complexities to rival even the most sophisticated literature for adult readers.
{"title":"‘I shouldn’t even be telling you that I shouldn’t be telling you the story’: Pseudonymous Bosch and the postmodern narrator in children’s literature","authors":"Ella Wydrzynska","doi":"10.1177/09639470211009748","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09639470211009748","url":null,"abstract":"This article furthers the somewhat underdeveloped area of research regarding the consideration of complex theoretical concepts such as postmodernism and metafiction in relation to children’s literature by concentrating on a stunningly complex—although by no means rare—experimental text aimed at 8–12 year-olds. Using The Secret Series by Pseudonymous Bosch as example, I examine how children’s literature can use such strategies to engage a child-reader and make them a tangible part of the construction of the novel. Drawing on elements of Text World Theory, diegetic narrative levels and the concept of the internal author, this study primarily explores the role of the interactive, visibly inventing, postmodern narrator, and, by extension, the dramatization of the reader as a part of the story. Framed against an academic background in which children’s literature was deemed unworthy of study or outright dismissed, this article illustrates why children’s literature is not only worthy of rigorous academic study in its own right but also that it often readily displays enough literary, linguistic, and narratological complexities to rival even the most sophisticated literature for adult readers.","PeriodicalId":45849,"journal":{"name":"Language and Literature","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-04-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1177/09639470211009748","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49200555","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"文学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：