This project sets out to frame and examine the theoretical and practical challenges involved in the process and effect of translating Holocaust testimony, which has been largely overlooked in Holocaust discourses. Research pertaining to the fields of Holocaust memorialisation, historiography, literary theory, and translation studies is drawn together, with a view to shedding light on what it means to write Holocaust testimony, what it means to read it, and how these often conflicting processes affect and are affected by translation. Using a canonical testimonial text by Elie Wiesel as a case study allows the exploration of these questions to be grounded in detailed and wide-ranging textual analysis, demonstrating the extent to which translation impacts Holocaust testimony. The Holocaust is an unparalleled event in the twentieth century and testimony to it is born of a unique desire to relate one’s experiences, coupled with a certainty that these experiences cannot be expressed. This dual set of challenges requires a distinctive approach to reading testimony, which is shaped through a range of textual and paratextual features. Furthermore, the reader’s perception of the author figure is argued here to have a discernible bearing on this reading process. Translation has the potential to unsettle this reading, by undermining the readers’ belief in the author figure and in the referential status of the text. The analysis of Wiesel’s La Nuit in translation demonstrates that translation not only has a marked effect on the content and nature of this piece of testimony, but that the way in which this effect is presented to the readership is a reflection of the text’s shifting target locale and strongly impacts the reading of testimonial texts.

The thesis posits that the radical transformation in Carol Shields's writing during the 1980s, moving from rather conservative realist fiction to postmodernist metafiction, was influenced by practices and theories which reject 'totalising' concepts of the self, of language and of empirical reality, instead favouring models of thought that point up the cultural constructedness of all three.

This thesis takes as its focus several works in the late period of Philip Roth’s writing and examines the way in which these particular texts address issues of American national experience since the Depression. In particular, this study looks at Roth’s assessment of a distinctly modern liberal vision that came to prominence during the 1930s and was to dominate American political and cultural life until the late 1960s. In thus covering the wider historical sweep of these novels, the research will draw attention to the way in which such broader matters of American cultural and political life intersect with more local issues of Jewish-American subjectivity and literary style that have been explored recurrently throughout Roth’s greater body of fiction. This study thus aims to show how the more recent ‘historical turn’ in Roth’s novelistic focus is in fact consistent with certain pivotal themes that have helped to define his overall development as a writer.

Bibliography: leaves 396-399 / 399 leaves ; 30 cm. / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of English Language and Literature, 1993

Living with Star Trek investigates the connections between Star Trek fandom and the Star Trek text. This study identifies and examines the American themes of utopia, community and self-improvement inherent within the fictional text which also form the thematic framework for letters written by fans to express their affection for the series. These letters represent a `network of support', whereby a community of fans is able to communicate with each other through written correspondence sent to producers, edited collections, and fan magazines. In talking about the series, fans confess and share intimate stories, often based around trauma or bereavement, and at the same time describe how Star Trek has played an important and inspirational part in their daily lives; Star Trek's utopian vision and communal spirit has given them the impetus to enact positive change. Drawing together the themes identified in the text and fan letters, the first half of the thesis examines Star Trek's use of history, narrative and myth to tell its futuristic stories. In particular, I examine how Star Trek has used the distinctive literary tradition of the Puritan American Jeremiad to create a didactic narrative that emphasises the attainment of utopia through communal effort and personal change. The second half of the thesis continues this inquiry by examining a range of letters that describe how fans are able to tap into the open nature of the Star Trek text and use it to fulfil needs and desires in their own daily lives. In particular, I stress how the letters are not just examples of fan affection but also represent a reciprocal relationship where fans can criticise and engage with the programme as well as use it as a form of motivation.

No abstract available / English Studies / M.A. (English)

No abstract available / English Studies / M.A. (English)

Le corps est une préoccupation constante chez Philip Roth, écrivain singulier dont la finesse d’observation n’a d’égal que la distance ironique. Corps biologique, corps social, corps monstrueux, corps abject, corps malade, constituent autant d’avatars de l’existence humaine individuelle et collective. De quoi relève cette présence presque obsessionnelle de la dimension corporelle dans les récits de Philip Roth ?Ce travail vise, dans le cadre d’une approche plurielle et transdisciplinaire, à retracer l’évolution du corps dans des textes qui mettent en lumière des crises existentielles et créatrices. Vue sous cet angle, l’œuvre fictionnelle rothienne semble se décliner en quatre mouvements : impasse existentielle, puis ouverture vers l’autre et vers le monde, ensuite tentative de se réinventer en toute impunité, et, enfin, prise de conscience de l’inévitabilité de la mort. Si le corps est d’abord perçu comme un fardeau, une prison, il n’est susceptible de s’alléger, de se libérer, qu’au travers d’une expérience de l’altérité. Le sujet n’advient à lui-même que dans l’espace de l’écriture où la chair se fait verbe. Cette lecture du corps dans le roman rothien s’achève sur l’analyse d’une dématérialisation progressive du corps charnel dans le corps textuel. / Philip Roth's fiction has always been preoccupied with the question of the body. In his novels, the body of flesh and blood, the social body, the monstrous body, the abject body, the sickened body, all become avatars of our individual and collective existence. How should one interpret this obsessive presence of the human body in Philip Roth’s fiction?This transdisciplinary dissertation studies the evolution of the body within the context of novels concerned with existential and creational crises. Philip Roth’s fiction may be divided into four stages: first, the insurgence of an existential impasse; second, the opening toward the other and the world, followed, thirdly, by an attempt at freely reinventing oneself, and ending with an awareness of the inevitability of death. While the body appears, at first, as a heavy burden to bear, true encounter with the Other becomes the only means of lightening its load. True freedom only materializes within the textual space where the verb replaces the flesh. This study of the body in Philip Roth’s novels traces, therefore, the gradual dematerialization of the body of flesh into the body of the text.

Entre 1950 et 1971, Matheson publie 89 nouvelles dont plusieurs ont constitué des jalons de la culture populaire, par exemple «Born of Man and Woman», «Nightmare at 20,000 Feet», «Steel» ou encore «Duel».Très versatile, il s'imprègne des attentes des magazines de science-fiction et de fantastique américains qui sont en plein bouleversement dans les années 1950. Cette thèse se propose d'étudier les caractéristiques génériques des nouvelles, qui se comprennent également au prisme de la société américaine d'après-guerre : traumatisme de l'utilisation de la bombe sur Hiroshima et Nagasaki, peurs liées à la menace nucléaire, rhétorique paranoïaque du Maccarthysme, développement des banlieues et de leur espace conformiste et attentes de la société vis-à-vis des hommes blancs de la classe moyenne. Les structures et thématiques de la littérature de l'imaginaire, l'aliénation, l'altérité (les monstres, les extraterrestres, les robots), la mécanisation et la robotisation du travail, les objets hantés, la possession, permettent de mettre en évidence les tendances de l'imaginaire mathesonien. Écrivain de la solitude, Matheson excelle à faire partager le point de vue du paranoïaque, du monstre, du robot, et plus largement du marginal qui ne parvient pas à donner un sens au monde qui l'entoure, et dont les interrogations ontologiques et métaphysiques représentent autant de mise-enabyme de récits de création du monde. Le solitaire trouve son paroxysme dans la figure du survivant, qui devient le paradigme de l'imaginaire de Matheson. / Between 1950 and 1971, Matheson published 89 short stories, among which several proved essential in popular culture, such as "Born of Man and Woman", "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet", "Steel", or "Duel". As a very versatile author, Matheson was also a pragmatic and he understood what the science fiction and fantasy magazines expected, especially in the 1950s when such magazines were undergoing deep changes. This study is an attempt to analyze the generic characteristics of Matheson's short fiction, also to be understood from a cultural point of view and through the main features of American society after the second world war: traumas after the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, fears of nuclear annihilation, paranoid style in politics and Maccarthyism, development of the suburbs and conformism, as well as social expectations for middleclass white males.Structures such as alienation, alterity (monsters, aliens, robots), mechanization of work, haunted objects, possession, that all highlight Matheson's recurrent themes.Matheson specialized in the writing of loneliness, excelling in making the reader share the character's point of view, that of the paranoid, the monster, the robot or more generally speaking, of the marginal who cannot make sense of their environment. Their metaphysical and ontological questioning create mise-en-abyme of narratives of world building and creation. The solitary character culminate into the character of the survivor, paradigmatic of Matheson's fiction.

This thesis examines epic impressions between two disparate literary genres, the classical Homeric epic and the science fiction novel, Frank Herbert's Dune in particular. This is done by applying Jung's archetypes and his notion of the collective unconscious to both literary works. This thesis argues that, through intertextual dialogue, continuities can be seen to exist between the Homeric epic and Dune and other science fiction texts of a similar nature. Chapter one examines epic impressions through a study of the classical heroic superhuman. This superhuman, his birth, divine attributes and heroic adventures shall be isolated and applied to both the classical hero and the hero of Herbert's narrative. Chapter two will examine the relationship between prescience ("hyperawareness") and the divine oracle of the classical epic. Chapter three will examine the archetype of the "Terrible Mother" and the masculine fear of feminine powers that works to keep the feminine subordinate. / English Studies / M.A. (English)