Literary Interpretation

This paper is about W. Somerset Maugham’s short story The Taipan. I identify two ideas that the story seems to be based on, some related strengths, but also a slight weakness.

I observe that the aim and method of a Victorian text within Shakespeare criticism overlaps significantly with deconstruction.

Why was Raymond Tallis’s book Not Saussure largely ignored by literary critics? Here I present one response to this question: he does not offer a novel alternative system for literary interpretation. And I consider whether the situation is any different in other fields, introducing a rival to Simon Baron-Cohen’s empathizing-systematizing theory of gender differences when doing so.

This paper responds to a piece of dialogue from Flora Nwapa’s novel Women are Different, in which Comfort mockingly says, “They took up the job voluntarily. Now you will soon tell us that they are celibate because of us.” There are two different interpretations of the use of “because,” and the claim is obviously false on only one of these.

This paper presents an obvious explanation for why Oedipus even attempted to solve the Sphinx’s riddle, given the high cost of failure.

I compare Rosamond’s relationship with her husband in Middlemarch with Rosamond’s marital relationship in L.A.G. Strong’s short story “The Seal.” I interpret the latter fiction as addressing the unpleasant question: what sort of decent man can suppress Rosamond?

Martha Kuhlman criticizes Milan Kundera for repeatedly depicting crowds in a negative light, contrasting his impressions with that of another novelist and observer of crowds. But how do we define the concept of a crowd? In this slightly light-hearted paper, I propose a definition and then note a problem with it and then propose another definition.

This paper introduces an obvious interpretation of what Milan Kundera is “saying” about his characters the students Gabrielle and Michelle: don’t be like this. It contrasts the satirical way of developing character with a Tompkins’ paradox situation. I also raise a rather subtle question about the translation.

This paper presents an alternative interpretation of what Milan Kundera tells us about the contents of the ostriches’ speech, which does not involve a satirical puncturing of the ominous atmosphere. Their talk sounds like human talk earlier in the book because they are being turned into parrots.

Is Rosamond from Middlemarch one of the clever? Well, the description comes across as ironic today. We are encouraged to think of her in that way at points, but various features of the novel undermine the impression of cleverness.

This paper proposes that there is common ground between H.J. Rose’s A Handbook of Greek Mythology and Robert Graves’s The Greek Myths, in that both seem to think that it is a bad idea to meet a certain demand: to provide a handbook that is reliable, easy to consult, and suitable for students of certain literary tastes.

This paper tries to make sense of a piece of dialogue from Flora Nwapa’s novel Women are Different. I clarify the conclusion drawn by one of the characters, which enables a solution.

This paper considers two explanations for why the main character of Flora Nwapa’s novel One is Enough does not answer the question of how many times her mother-in-law has visited. One of these is a variation on the surprise exam paradox.

There is a puzzle over why some literary works which are less esteemed are subject to more commentary and some literary works which are more esteemed are subject to less. By examining Max Beerbohm’s pastiche of Joseph Conrad, I propose an answer regarding pastiches.

This paper proposes that before the opening of Sophocles’ play Oedipus the King, the “hero” had to solve a lot of riddles.

In this paper, I try to define literary pastiche and present five uses of the practice. The appendix briefly presents a response I anticipate from Davidsonians to Michael Morris on alternative conceptual schemes.

This paper is written as a pastiche of a notable European novelist, and essayist – it is the essayist who is being imitated, my first effort at this. I make some notes on a paragraph from a well-crafted fiction by Stacy Aumonier. I use the pastiche mode not just for fun but because readers may prefer the bolder and less qualified style, despite some information loss.

I present two interpretations of Max Beerbohm’s pastiche “The Feast.” Both interpretations seem as if they cannot survive forceful questioning, which asks, “Why should we think that?” And yet we, or at least I, find them worth attending to. Why? I propose an answer.

This brief paper raises a puzzle, or half-puzzle, about Flora Nwapa’s ethnic identity in light of sentences in her novel Women are Different and presents two solutions.

R.K. Narayan has been criticized as “indifferent to the wider canon of English fiction.” I think the best explanation for certain convergences between the contents of some of his short stories and William Blake’s poem The Tyger is that he is responding to it, although the response may be somewhat mocking.

I distinguish two senses of the word “deconstruction.” Then I quote a passage by a critic from the 1860s which, together with trends of that time, gives rise to the question of whether deconstructive interpretation existed in the nineteenth century.

This paper examines another criticism of Milan Kundera apart from the familiar charge of sexism: that his representations of crowds are overly negative. It is made in a paper by Martha Kuhlman. I agree that Kundera generally depicts crowds in a negative light, but I also observe that there are major and puzzling differences between novels when it comes to details, which I believe is intentional.

What is R.K. Narayan’s position in relation to his story “Such perfection”? It is natural to interpret him as conveying a message similar to one Western readers are familiar with from ancient Greek myths: fear perfection; it offends the gods. But there is room for a more complicated interpretation.

This paper responds to a European novel presenting the development of a poet. The novelist depicts a stage in which the poet seeks to escape from his mother, but I show that there are textual resources for an alternative interpretation of why.

A well-known theory about under which circumstances a statement is true in a fiction is The Reality Principle, which originate in the work of David Lewis: (RP) Where p1... pn are the primary fictional truths of a fiction F , it is true in F that q iff the following holds: were p1 ... pn the case, q would have been the case (Walton 1990: 44). RP has been subjected to a number of counterexamples, up to a point where, in (...) the words of Stacie Friend “it is widely recognized that the Reality Principle […] cannot be a universal inference rule for implied story-truths” (Friend 2017: 33). This chapter argues that the strength of these counterexamples is widely overestimated, and that they do not, on closer scrutiny, constitute reasons for rejecting RP. (shrink)

The topic of exemplarity has attracted considerable interest in philosophy, legal theory, literary studies and art recently. There is broad consensus that exemplary cases mediate between singular instances and general concepts or norms. The aim of this article is to provide an additional perspective on the logic of exemplarity. First, inspired by Jacques Derrida’s discussion of exemplarity, I shall argue that there is a kind of différance between (singular) examples and (general) exemplars. What an example exemplifies, the exemplarity of the (...) example, eludes any fixed identity and follows a logic of supplement. Second, I shall present the so-called logic of exemplarity. The received paraconsistent view has it that the exemplar of X is an X and, at the same time, is not an X. Inspired by Ludwig Wittgenstein’s discussion of the standard metre, I would like to present an alternative paracomplete view whereby we can say of an exemplar of X neither that it is an X nor that it is not an X. (shrink)

I argue that in Sheridan Hough's book Kierkegaard's Dancing Tax Collector, the distinctive and novelistic literary form is not a playful, whimsical, or otherwise contingent feature, but a structure that's needed to convey the account of Kierkegaardian faith as practical in nature.

This chapter is divided into three sections. In the first, I identify the mentions of Schopenhauer in À la recherche du temps perdu. I use an implicit reference to Schopenhauer by Swann to open a discussion of Schopenhauer’s theory of music. I attempt to downplay its identification, suggested by some commentators, with both the views about music expressed in the novel and the form of the novel itself. In the second section, I discuss Proust’s references to Schopenhauer in his essay (...) on reading. I confirm that Proust well understood Schopenhauer’s relationship with his own erudition and suggest that Schopenhauer’s influence on Proust may take the form of an incitement to think for oneself. In the third and final section, I consider several potential points of convergence between Proust and Schopenhauer concerning states of the will. However, in all cases I find, as I do throughout the chapter, that below the surface Proust and Schopenhauer often part ways. (shrink)

Stefano Arduini es catedrático de Lingüística en la Universidad de Roma Link Campus, donde es Presidente del Departamento de Licenciatura en Artes, Música y Artes Escénicas y Prorector para la Tercera Misión. Ha enseñado Lingüística General y Teoría de la Traducción en la Universidad de Urbino; Lingüística en la Universidad de Estudios Internacionales de Roma y en la Universidad de Módena; y Literatura Comparada en la Universidad de Alicante y en la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. Desde 2005 es profesor honorario (...) de la Universidad Nacional San Marcos de Lima (Perú). A su vez, es miembro del Nida Institute for Biblical Scholarship de Filadelfia, del Comité de Política de Traducción (COTP) de las Sociedades Bíblicas Unidas y del Sodalizio Glottologico Milanese. En 2012, a propuesta de la Junta Directiva, fue nombrado Miembro Honorario de la Asociación Latinoamericana de Retórica. Por otro lado, ha impartido cursos y seminarios en Bélgica, España, Estados Unidos, Francia, Gran Bretaña, Grecia, Holanda, Perú, Portugal, Rusia y Turquía, y es uno de los fundadores de la revista Translation. A Transdisciplnary Journal. Tiene en su haber más de un centenar de publicaciones, entre las que destacan: Prolegómenos a una teoría general de las figuras, Murcia University Press 2000; La Ragione retorica, Guaraldi 2004, Metaphors, Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura 2007; Manuale di traduzione, Carocci 2007; Paradoxes, Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura 2011; Con gli occhi dell’altro. Tradurre, Jaca Book 2020 (traducción al ruso 2021, traducción al inglés en curso); Traduzioni in cerca di un originale. La Bibbia e i suoi traduttori, Jaca Book 2021. Traductor de Juan de la Cruz, comenzó con Qohelet, la traducción de las Cinco Meguilot (Qohelet, Rut, Cantar de los Cantares, Lamentaciones, Ester). (shrink)

Esta entrevista se hizo a uno de los miembros de la Academia Hondureña de la Lengua, Víctor Manuel Ramos. Entre los aportes que el académico expresó, fue su contribución a la comunidad intelectual a través de estudios lingüísticos y literarios. En concreto, estos se apreciaron en el Diccionario de las Lenguas de Honduras; Literatura y su producción literaria de índole infantil. Para que ello fuera posible, el entrevistado comentó cómo fue su proceso de formación, el cual fue un tanto complejo, (...) ya que tuvo que descartar algunas filiaciones y presuntas voliciones, tales como las que pretendía hallar desde la Medicina. Finalmente, lo que se concluye de esta conversación es el logro que se puede conseguir para la sociedad después de que uno se prepara concienzudamente, sin obviar el aprendizaje que se deriva de la experiencia personal. (shrink)

Este artículo sistematiza las temáticas abordadas desde la novela policial peruana en el período de los años 1990 hasta el 2013, siendo la violencia social la que más destaca. Para fundamentar esa recurrencia, el autor se basa en fuentes afines que distinguen el corpus según su clasificación. Sociológicamente, se hallan los postulados teóricos como el de posmodernidad de Fredric Jameson y Mario Vargas Llosa, junto con el de criminalidad de Luis Rodríguez Manzanera. En el Perú no se evidencia una taxonomía (...) hegemónica que se tome como referente de la misma. Una de las causas es la escasa documentación acerca de temas policiales, judiciales, históricos y culturales que maneja el propio autor sobre sus obras. Esto se demuestra en el transcurso de este trabajo a través de la recepción crítica, que comprende tres tópicos insoslayables: la demanda del lector con respecto a este género literario, las limitaciones que conllevan el rechazo inconsciente a todo producto valorativo y la implicancia del mercado de la cultura de masas. (shrink)

Esta entrevista se realizó de forma virtual y audiovisual el 3 de julio de 2021.

Este trabajo tiene la finalidad de fundamentar las razones que conducen al personaje Juan Pablo Castel de la novela de Ernesto Sabato El túnel (1948) a la psicosis, entendida esta como una estrategia involuntaria para interpretar la realidad y actuar en función de la cosmovisión que le genera. Para explicar esa adopción identitaria, retomo la taxonomía elaborada por Donald Shaw con respecto al contexto influyente del boom latinoamericano (que repercute negativamente en la psicología social) y la epistemología psicoanalítica de Jacques (...) Lacan al hacer referencia a nociones afines que configuran al protagonista como una entidad desligada del mundo real y que cuenta con un potencial saber infundado hacia la destrucción del ser. (shrink)

Although the character of the “lady detective”is a staple of the cozy mystery genre, we contend that there are no great lady detectives to rival Holmes or Poirot. This is not because there are no clever or interesting lady detective characters, but ratherbecause the concept of greatness is sociallyconstructed and, like coolness, depends on public acclaim and perception. We explore the mechanics of genre formation, arguing that the very structure of cozy mysteries precludes female greatness. To create a “great”character,theauthor cannot (...) just endowher with certain attributes; she must actively work to overcome her audience’s tendency to import structures of oppression into the story, and she must wrestle against the conventions of the genre. In doing so, however, authors risk setting their stories in a wholly different genre. (shrink)

As artefacts, the worlds of digital games are designed and developed to fulfil certain expressive, functional, and experiential objectives. During play, players infer these purposes and aspirations from various aspects of their engagement with the gameworld. Influenced by their sociocultural backgrounds, sensitivities, gameplay preferences, and familiarity with game conventions, players construct a subjective interpretation of the intentions with which they believe the digital game in question was created. By analogy with the narratological notion of the implied author, we call the (...) figure to which players ascribe these intentions ‘the implied designer’. In this article, we introduce the notion of the implied designer and present an initial account of how appreciators ascribe meaning to interactive, fictional gameworlds and act within them based on what they perceive to be the designer’s intentions. (shrink)

This thesis is a sceptical investigation into the notion that the metaphorical wave-particle binary of Virginia Woolf's To the Lighthouse is related to quantum physics. Indeed, the field of literature and science has employed conceptual similarities as the main means of connecting quantum concepts to novels, however, this has led to a host of scholarly difficulties, prompting the need for a re-examination of analogical linkages. Woolf is the model candidate for such a re-examination, given her historical and philosophical proximity with (...) the developments of quantum mechanics. To the Lighthouse, in particular, was written between 1925 and 1927: precisely when quantum physicists were attempting to resolve the wave-particle duality, leading to Niels Bohr's complementarity. This parallel has been noted by researchers as relevant to the novel, as it too displays a general binary that can be read as wave-particle-like, which the author also attempts to resolve along similar philosophical lines. Nevertheless, other than proximity and similarity, there are no reasons to affirm that the science is related to the novel; hence, it is an ideal case study to examine in order to ascertain the value of conceptual similarities in literature and science. To do so, To the Lighthouse's binary and its resolution are interpreted in a thesis-long close reading, in order to compare aspects of it firstly to Woolf's personal thought, and secondly to various non-quantum intellectual contexts that preceded and surrounded her. In doing so, it becomes clear not only that invoking quantum physics serves no clear purpose in better understanding the novel, but also that the notion of resolving wave- particle-like binaries was a widespread philosophical procedure at the turn of the century, decades before Bohr's concept. This negative conclusion interrogates what the scholarly value of interpreting similarities is, though a hypothetical solution can be found in conceptual metaphor theory. (shrink)

Convergindo para uma existência em si irredutível às condições histórico-culturais e aos seus limites, ao ser humano em sua infância enquanto arquétipo refém do sonho e senhor da solidão se impõe o devaneio que envolve o transcendente como telos em uma experiência de “iluminação” cujo caráter dizível, na rememoração enquanto vivência do fenômeno primordial, somente se torna possível nas fronteiras mítico-poéticas e na correspondência dialética envolvendo memória e imaginação em uma construção epistêmico-simbólico-existencial que encerra como fundamento a concepção baseada na (...) perspectiva de Gaston Bachelard de que “um excesso de infância é um germe de poema”. Implicando o transcendente como telos na autoafirmação que perpassa desde o outrora até o “por-vir”, o devaneio constitui o locus da consciência da liberdade em um movimento de auto-expressão que guarda raízes no fundo da memória e na inata beleza da infância enquanto impulso vital que se sobrepõe ao paradoxo da existência enquanto acontecimento passível de produção volitiva e domínio intelectual, convergindo para a experiência epistêmico-simbólico-existencial envolvendo a condição humana de habitat de uma infância enquanto infância potencial em um processo irredutível a sua realidade concreta histórico-cultural que no onírico como modus essendi dialoga com o tópos autobiográfico e mítico-poético, guardando-se no “entre” que acena com as fronteiras do intra-histórico e intra-lendário. Nesta perspectiva, baseado na noção envolvendo infância potencial em um movimento epistêmico-simbólico-existencial que converge para as fronteiras que encerram como paradigma hermenêutico o Começo Primordial, Munguengue se torna o nome do devaneio na construção mítico-poética do Professor-Pesquisador Luiz Carlos Mariano Da Rosa em um processo irredutível a sua realidade concreta histórico-cultural que envolve o transcendente como telos na autoafirmação que perpassa desde o outrora até o “por-vir”. Implicando a iluminação enquanto instante de existência mítico-poética, Munguengue se sobrepõe ás idealizações das recordações da infância e à relação de causa e efeito do processo, encerrando um núcleo de infância que perdura na alma enquanto fenômeno que escapa às fronteiras da hermenêutica lógico-racional da realidade prático-objetiva e converge para a realidade subjetivo-existencial e o seu caráter vital de um animus indômito em um movimento que dialoga com o tópos autobiográfico e mítico-poético, guardando-se no “entre” que acena com as fronteiras do intra-histórico e intra-lendário. (shrink)

OBJETIVO: establecer una taxonomía a partir de las mujeres que se plasman en La ciudad y los perros. Asimismo, se explicará cuál es el rol de cada tipología hallada que se involucra en el desarrollo de los cadetes. MÉTODO: se confrontará con la teoría sociológica y los estudios críticos que se han hecho sobre la obra literaria para determinar en qué medida los personajes aludidos están en una correspondencia ineludible con las mujeres. RESULTADOS: se consiguió clasificar el propósito de los (...) tipos de mujeres que se presentan en el texto y que son fundamentales para los personajes de esa institución castrense. CONCLUSIÓN: se comprobó que la inclusión de las experiencias con mujeres en los adolescentes de la novela de Mario Vargas Llosa era fundamental para su desarrollo humano. (shrink)

Este trabajo se enfoca en examinar el espacio de la Plaza de Cajamarca (Perú) para someterlo al análisis semiótico que propone el autor Jacques Fontanille. Este abordaje permitirá designar la correspondencia que existe entre la historia colonial que se halla documentada en el texto Verdadera relación de la Conquista del Perú (1534) de Francisco de Xerez con su valor simbólico (sacralización), que se obtiene al efectuar la interpretación adecuada de los conceptos de Mircea Eliade al referirse a lo sagrado, en (...) oposición a lo profano. El objetivo de este artículo está orientado a fundamentar los principios por los cuales ese monumento cultural pervive en los registros nacionales de la Historia y la Literatura. (shrink)

María José Rincón González nació en Sevilla (España) y reside en República Dominicana desde 1992. Es miembro de número de la Academia Dominicana de la Lengua (ADL) desde el 2011 y directora del Instituto Guzmán Ariza de Lexicografía. Asimismo, es miembro correspondiente de la Real Academia Española (RAE) y miembro del consejo asesor de Fundéu Guzmán Ariza. Con respecto a su formación superior, es doctora en Filología por la Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED) y máster en Lexicografía por (...) la Universidad de Sevilla y la UNED. Ha participado en congresos internacionales y ha contribuido en las ediciones de diccionarios del idioma español. Entre sus publicaciones de artículos, se encuentran las que pertenecen al Diario Libre y el Boletín de la Academia Dominicana de la Lengua, entre otros textos, tales como “La antroponimia femenina dominicana (1945-1995)” (2002), “El Diccionario de la lengua” (2013), “Presentación del Diccionario de americanismos de la ASALE” (2013), “Variantes dialectales del léxico dominicano en el Diccionario de americanismos” (2016), “La lematización de variantes gráficas en el Diccionario del español dominicano” (2017) y “El Diccionario de criollismos, primer diccionario dominicano” (2020). De igual modo, ha publicado en libros y capítulos de libros. Entre ellos se encuentran el Diccionario del español dominicano (2013), “El nacimiento de un nuevo diccionario: el Diccionario del español dominicano” (2017) y De la eñe a la zeta (2019). (shrink)

Este artículo tiene como objetivo comprobar que en Trilce es inconcluso delimitar el campo retórico. Este concepto desarrollado por Stefano Arduini comprende la labor de establecer de forma organizada y perlocutiva el entorno y las influencias que propiciaron la creación del poemario. En ese sentido, ese trabajo es de utilidad para fijar los parámetros y el contexto que servirán para erigir la ideología o la poética de un determinado escritor, así como si se piensa realizar un análisis posterior de cualquiera (...) de sus textos. No obstante, se demostrará que esa taxonomía resulta insuficiente por el mismo lenguaje del autor. (shrink)

Este artículo tiene como propósito corroborar la cosmovisión de Octavio Paz, a partir de la inacción de la sociedad cotidiana, que es notoria en un fragmento del poema “Máscaras del alba” de La estación violenta (1958). Su crítica contra el sistema por la ausencia de compromiso social y político revela dos conceptos que fundamenta Mijaíl Bajtín en Estética de la creación verbal: su intencionalidad como autor y la expresión concomitante en función del género discursivo empleado. Para comprobar estas dos premisas, (...) incluiré como instrumento metodológico los campos figurativos o las provincias figurales que aborda Stefano Arduini, que comprenden los tropos de la metáfora, la metonimia, la sinécdoque, la metonimia, la elipsis, la antítesis y la repetición, además de sus variaciones. (shrink)

Decamerón ha causado una reacción convulsa por su contenido social y la burla a patrones adscritos a la religión y la moral medievales en Italia. Por ello, se propone fundamentar esas razones que acarrearon el asombro de la obra literaria de Giovanni Boccaccio. Se retoma el concepto de la función social de la ironía, que a la vez parte de tres principios básicos desarrollados por Bergson. Una situación cómica requiere inteligencia, insensibilidad y crítica social. Con ello es posible explicar que (...) la ironía se encuentra condicionada a la cosmovisión del autor. (shrink)

Esta entrevista fue realizada a Ricardo Pallares, miembro de la Academia Nacional de Letras de Uruguay. Uno de los objetivos medulares de este encuentro fue que el académico brindara un panorama de cómo se percibe la Literatura en sus manifestaciones heterogéneas, ya sea a nivel local o internacional. Para ello, el referente de esta entrevista hizo una apreciación en torno a algunas áreas donde se desenvuelve esta disciplina, tales como en el ámbito educativo, la sociedad, los concursos literarios y las (...) producciones que pretenden alcanzar un espacio en la canonización de la Literatura. Con todas estas propuestas, Ricardo Pallares explica con entusiasmo y pormenores aquellas experiencias que le permitieron asegurar que lo literario es un componente fundamental para la vida de los ciudadanos y que no deja de ser neurálgico en las actividades culturales y académicas. (shrink)