The changing social consciousness in South Africa during the twentieth century falls within a political-historical framework of events: amongst others, World Wars I and II; the institution of the Apartheid Laws in 1948; the declaration of a South African Republic in 1960; Nelson Mandela's release in 1992. The literary social consciousness of Abrahams, Paton, Mphahlele and Gordimer spans the time before and after 1948. Their novels reflect the changing reality of a country whose racial and social problems both pre-date and will outlive the apartheid ideology. These and other novelists' changing social consciousness is an indication of the development of attitudes and reactions to issues which have their roots in the human and in the economic spheres, as well as in the political, cultural and religious. Their work interprets the history and the change in the South African social consciousness, and also gives some indication of a possible future vision. / English Studies / M.A. (English)

Thesis (MA) -- Stellenbosch University, 1986. / No Abstract Avcailable

The American Projectivist verse of Jack Spicer, Charles Olson, and Robert Duncan contains within its poetics many epistemological assumptions shared by quantum physics. These assumptions exist in three broad categories: perception, process, and wholeness. In physics, the epistemology of perception has been profoundly altered by the Heisenberg Uncertainty Relation, which creates a symbiotic relationship between the observer and the observed. At least one photon of light is necessary to observe an electron; one photon is sufficient to alter the electron's momentum or position; therefore, a physicist affects an electron's "fate" in the act of observing it. Similarly, in Projectivist poetics, the perceptions of the reader are often enlisted to help "compose" the poem which is offered to him in "pieces," or, as in Robert Duncan's poetry especially, in self-reflexive segments. By "self-reflexive," we further mean that the Projectivist poem often "mirrors itself" as an electron "mirrors itself" as wave or as particle, while it is paradoxically both. A Projectivist poem may pause halfway through and "unravel" itself, i.e., study its own etymology. The reader thus must participate in "putting the poem back together," as the physicist participates in the phenomena he observes. The second epistemological model in physics and poetry stresses becoming, rather than being. Matter at the subatomic level has been defined as energy-in-flux. Similarly, the Projectivist poems of Charles Olson especially often exist as "fields" with no syntactical beginnings or endings. Moreover, the "I" of the Maximus Poems is often seen in a perpetual process of becoming the world of spacetime in the poems, creating a system similar to the being-and-becoming model of particle-and-field in quantum mechanics. Third, wholeness is a premise governing poetry and physics separately and together. Jack Spicer's thematics blend matter and consciousness, as "love and death matter/Matter as wave and particle." Similarly, Robert Duncan's poetics describes a "dancing organization between personal and cosmic identity." In physics, wholeness is seen primarily in an "implicate order" which attempts to overturn the old paradigms of fragmentation and connect matter and consciousness, including language, as interrelated systems of information.

Investigating elements of the creative process in the work of three poets: James Wright, Gjertrud Schnackenberg, and Pegeen Kelly. Each poet deploys a different method for access to those experiences that lie at the edge of accessible language. Each method is discussed and its deployment illustrated. Wright leads us from the sensory world to the supersensual. Schnackenberg makes use of the formal device of the fairy tale. Kelly immerses in the logic of dreams. Drawing on Elaine Scarry's theory of the imagination, the case is made that the poetic act is a dialectic between the poet and the sensory world, in which perception and imagination are equally important.

In this study of several novels each by Barbara Pym, Fay Weldon, and Margaret Atwood, I focus on two areas: the ways in which female protagonists break out of their victimization by individuals, by institutions, and by cultural tradition, and the ways in which each author uses a structural pattern in her novels to propel her characters to solve their dilemmas to the best of their abilities and according to each woman's personality and strengths.

The novels of Charles Dickens resonate with ancient and Christian moral messages: From plots and characters representative of Victorian ideals and concerns emerge themes that reflect centuries of moral, and, as I argue, specifically Augustinian, teaching. While the Christian overtones of Charles Dickens's novels are seldom denied, their Augustinian nature, their purpose, and Dickens's hopes for their effect are rarely given their proper due. In opposition to the postmodern idea of an increasing nihilism and despair in Dickens's message, I examine instead his steadfast fascination with and joy in the power of charitable friendships-friendships that embody goodness and the possibility for conversion, friendships that are especially noteworthy amid the societal darkness ushered in by the crises of faith that accompanied nineteenth-century industrialization, commercialization, and de-moralization. Preparing to highlight the undeniable moral value in both the rejected and realized friendships and conversions of Dickens's Martin Chuzzlewit, Bleak House, and Great Expectations, first I focus on true friendship as a necessary part of a soul's ascent developed in Plato's Symposium and Phaedrus, as well as in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics, illustrating how these classical texts anticipate the Augustinian notion of a soul's transformation from the earthly city to the city of God. With this literary continuum thus established, I contend that the Heavenly City as it is reflected in the Dickensian world relies on its virtuous citizens, those true friends who consistently manifest Christian charity, humility, and forgiveness. / by Jill A. Kriegel. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2010. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2010. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

The Sephardic ballad collection contains ballads of varying themes, many of which have been forgotten in Spain, where they were originally sung by Jews, Christians, and Muslims. A popular theme within this genre is that of women committing adultery and transgressions which in many of the ballads is punishable by death. A brief history of the Sephardic Jews and their literary and oral tradition is included. An emphasis is placed on women's role in ballad tradition and the importance of transculturation and mimesis within the oral tradition, both significant to the survival of a tradition that has been continued for over five centuries, encompassing various regions around the world. The analysis focuses on two ballads in particular ; the "Celestine Romance", which shares a similar plot to La Celestina, written by Fernando de Rojas, and the ballad of "The Adulteress", a popular ballad within several traditions. / by Inbal Mazar. / Abstract in English. / Signature page unsigned. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2008. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2008. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

The translation of Geny Vilas-Novas' novel Adeus, Rio Doce emphasizes the importance of promoting a literary exchange between Brazil and the Spanish-speaking world. This study analyses contemporary Brazilian literature and situates the author in the post-modern literary movement, stressing two post-colonial fundamental themes: emigration and feminine literature. Millions of undocumented emigrants from Latin America live nowadays in the United States displaced in the American society and leave suffering family members abandoned in their native countries. One of the roles of Latin- American women writers like Vilas-Novas is to reveal and denounce the subaltern conditions of this emigration movement in the globalization process, under the unusual perspective of those left behind. The linguistic and semantic challenges and difficulties faced during translation are a metaphor for the crossing of linguistic, cultural, social, and historical borders by Latin-Americans in search of better life opportunities. / by Clarisse Bandeira de Mello. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2008. / Includes bibliography. / Electronic reproduction. Boca Raton, Fla., 2008. Mode of access: World Wide Web.

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