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There are two parts to this thesis: a novel, Closing the Circle, and a critical commentary on the process of writing a novel from beginning to end. The novel tells the story of Natasha, a young, late twentieth century woman who searches for her "roots." It begins in southern Alberta and she eventually travels to Eastern Europe where she uncovers the voices in her dreams and from the past. It deals with the metaphysical question of a collective unconscious that houses past symbols pertinent to her search as well as the question as to the validity of dreams and memory in human life. The critical commentary addresses issues involved in writing a fiction vis a vis structure and other literary devices. It also addresses questions that come with taking personal familial historical events and writing them into "story." / 28 cm.

The decade 1940-1950 represents a decisive stage in the evolution of the relations between the Quebec literary scene and France. Whereas before the war, literary discourse keeps on upholding, in a dogmatic way, the superiority of French culture and literature, the next period is characterized, on the contrary, by a reassessment of this postulate. / The historical circumstances justify the setting up of exceptional institutional conditions. Some French writers and critics, in exile in North America, partake, to varying degrees, in the French Canadian literary scene. The backing of these intellectuals is not unrelated to the process of modernization and autonomization undertaken at that time by the major sectors of the Quebecer literary apparatus. / A conflict of interest in the publishing sector as well as ideological differences spark a controversy between Robert Carbonneau and some members of the Comite National des Ecrivains. This "quarrel", to quote Charbonneau, is an unprecedented example of direct confrontation between Quebecer and French literary agents. On this occasion, Robert Charbonneau redefines French Canadian literature outside of France's sphere of influence, France being a country whose status he wishes to limit to that of just one foreign reference among many. / This desire for autonomy can also be found in literary texts which, using means available to them, bear witness to an appreciable decline of the French literature. But whereas literary discourse attempts to resist annexation to French literature, the literary apparatus is subject, upon the Liberation, to a material and symbolic domination by the French authorities, a domination it cannot fight. In this respect, the conditions of literary production in the fifties are paradoxical since the text, while voicing its rejection of the French institution and its French Canadian identity, continues to receive its ultimate consecration from France.

The founding hypothesis of the study is that creative writers translate jazz music and performance into discourse by recourse to a number of figurative domains. These translations map existential, anthropological and political spaces and situate jazz within these. The first chapter concerns the representation of jazz in the construction of alterity, focussing on the evocation of the Dionysian spirit of jazz, the parallels between jazz and Bahktin's carnival and the strategic deployment of 'blackness' in configurations. The second chapter applies the notion of 'existential integration' in tracing some of the fluid boundaries between the music, the body of the instrument and the body of the performer in representations. The final chapter looks at the contrary tendency: the representation of mystical transcendence in the course of listening to or performing jazz. Underlying each of the three chapters is a concern with the emergence and propagation of oppositional identities in jazz writing. / English Studies / M.A. (English)

M.A. / In Afrikaans poetry, Nature is depicted in terms of the relationship existing among and / or inanimate organisms, i. e. an ecological mode. Man's influence on the environment, features strongly in the poetry of the eighties. The anthology, Groen (J. L. Marais), can be seen as a focal point of this involvement. Chapter one provides an overview of the ecological code in Afrikaans poetry, spanning the time from the First Afrikaans Language Movement up till the seventies. With regard to this period, the different approaches of the poets to Nature are being studied. During this era a decidedly dynamic approach to the subject existed. Nature was initially seen as the idyllic, soothing and was also used as a metaphor for beauty and purity. With time, Nature took on another dimension and came to represent destructive forces. In chapter two, the anthology Groen by J. L. Marais, under discussion in this work, concluding the eighties, Man is called to task, i. e. to protect and nurture the balance in the ecology. Man is made aware of both the threat to and the conservation of nature. These binary forces are discussed with reference to two semantic devices, cohesion and coherence. As binding factors they provide a semantic light on the above themes. Verweerde aardbol by J. L. Marais, is approached along the same lines in chapter three. The specific themes used in this anthology, serve as a classification aid. The poet's concern about the transience of nature comes to the fore, and Marais himself states that the time has come for writers to be called up in service to the environment without being apologetic about it (Marais 1993: 32). A clear paradigm shift is visible from the infant years of Afrikaans poetry to the poetry of the eighties. The "green"-awareness which inflamed / inspired the community, plays an important role in the eighties and is reflected in Afrikaans poetry. The dynamic power of the ecological code as theme, still has many untapped areas which can be explored in further studies.

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Based on Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of London, 2002. / Includes bibliographical references (p. [161]-170) and index. "List of recordings and websites": p. [171]-172.