Thesis (M.A.)--York University, 2007. Graduate Programme in Interdisciplinary Studies. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 173-183). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:MR45924

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, Santa Cruz, 1997. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 136-147).

Thesis (M.A.)--York University, 2004. Graduate Programme in Études Francaises. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 93-100). Also available on the Internet. MODE OF ACCESS via web browser by entering the following URL: http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url%5Fver=Z39.88-2004&res%5Fdat=xri:pqdiss &rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:MR11865

This thesis discusses twentieth century children's fantasy fiction. The writers whose creative output is dealt with include Penelope Lively, Alan Garner, Susan Cooper, Pat O'Shea, Peter Dickinson, T.H.White, Lloyd Alexander and, to a lesser extent, C.S.Lewis and J.R.R.Tolkien. These authors have been chosen because their books, whilst being of a broadly similar nature, nevertheless have a sufficient diversity to illustrate well many different important aspects of children's fantasy. Chapter I examines the sources of modern fantasy, presents the attitudes of different authors towards borrowing from traditional sources and their reasons for doing so, and looks at the changing interpretation of myths. Chapter II talks about the presentation of the primary and secondary worlds and the ways in which they interact. It also discusses the characters' attitudes towards magic. Chapter III looks at the presentation of magic, examines the traditional fairy-tale conventions and their implementation in modern fantasies, and discusses the concepts of evil, time, and the laws governing fantasy worlds. Chapter IV deals with the methods of narration and the figure of the narrator. It presents briefly the prevailing plot patterns, discusses the use of different kinds of language, and the ideas of pan-determinism and prophecy. The concluding chapter considers the main subjects and aims of children's fantasy, the reasons why the genre is so popular, and its successes and failures.

Orientador: Maria de Lourdes Ortiz / Banca: João Batista Toledo Prado / Banca: Marcio Roberto do Prado / Resumo: Este trabalho se propõe inicialmente a investigar as características literárias que definem a ficção de Fantasia e os livros de Role Playing Games, para em seguida demonstrar o processo dialógico existente entre tais categorias discursivas. Para tanto, serão examinados livros da série de Role Playing Games nacionais intitulada "Tormenta", uma das peças mais exemplares na produção brasileira do gênero, bem como o romance de Fantasia "O Inimigo do Mundo", de Leonel Caldela, que representa a primeira incursão da literatura de Fantasia nacional pelos universos temáticos dos Role Playing Games. Pretende-se, com isso, demonstrar que mais do que se apropriar de temas e figuras da Fantasia, os Role Playing Games estabelecem com ela uma relação de troca e reciclagem, observação esta que será apoiada pelas teorias de Mikhail Bakhtin e seus principais comentadores brasileiros / Abstract: This work proposes initially to investigate the main literary features that define Fantasy literature and Role Playing Game books, in order to subsequently demonstrate the dialogic process involving them both. In order to better illustrate this relations, this work will focus on the series of brazilian Role Playing Game books named "Tormenta", one of the most exemplar works on national genre production, as well as the Fantasy novel "O Inimigo do Mundo", by Leonel Caldela, that represents the first attempt of incursion in the fields of RPG-based fiction by our literature. The intention is to demonstrate that, more than simply appropriating itself from literature's themes and figures, Role Playing Game books establish with them a complete relationship of Exchange and recycling, and this observations will here be understood under the lights of Mikhail Bakhtin's theories, as well as his main Brazilian researchers' / Mestre

This diploma thesis deals with the literary analysis of the theme of a labyrinth which appears in Anglo-American fantasy book series for young readers. The work is divided into two main parts. In the first, theoretical part, the author describes the main features of fantasy literature. The author also focuses on the assessment of the theme of a labyrinth in a wider literary-theoretical and historical context (mythology, Middle Ages literature, gothic novel, Romanticism, Modernism, Postmodernism). The second, practical part of the work, is represented by the author's literary analysis of the theme of a labyrinth appearing in these fantasy book series for young readers: Harry Potter, Hunger Games, Maze Runner, Percy Jackson, A Series of Unfortunate Events and Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children. The analysis mainly concentrates on the motifs of the monster, the experience of getting lost, fight and hideout.

Orientador: Cláudia Fernanda de Campos Mauro / Banca: Aparecido Donizete Rossi / Banca: Karin Volobuef / Banca: Andrea Peterle Figueiredo Santurbano / Banca: Marisa Martins Gama-Khalil / Resumo: Esta tese tem como objetivo principal demonstrar que o protagonista do livro O deserto dos Tártaros (1940), de Dino Buzzati, está inscrito como um dos heróis representantes do limiar entre o modernismo e o contemporâneo. Giovanni Drogo é o herói que, no momento seguinte em que veste seu uniforme de oficial, experimenta um vazio existencial que o faz, em resposta, replicar: "Que coisa sem sentido!". Tomado desse sentimento, muitas vezes a inércia será a única resposta possível deste protagonista frente aos requerimentos cotidianos. A partir dessa premissa, articulando teoria literária, filosofia e contexto, arvoramo-nos em identificar as razões que fundam a heroicidade de Drogo. Após o prefácio, segue-se o capitulo de introdução, no qual tecemos algumas considerações acerca da figura do herói, procurando evidenciar como, nos séculos XVIII e XIX, esse conceito passa por perceptível modificação, graças à ascensão e sedimentação do romance, tal como hoje o conhecemos. Entremeiam a introdução e o capítulo final, três capítulos centrais que formam, em conjunto, a demonstração da tese defendida: de que as razões de Drogo respondem, necessariamente, a uma nova forma de se relacionar e conhecer o mundo. Resignação, recusa e renúncia associam-se em cada um destes capítulos, os quais se iniciam sempre a partir de uma cena fundamental, seguida de sua avaliação. Chegamos ao capítulo final com a possibilidade de identificar, não apenas a posição de Drogo como herói - atendendo, como um pró... (Resumo completo, clicar acesso eletrônico abaixo) / Abstract: This thesis has as the main objective to show that the protagonist of the book The Tartar Steppe (1940), by Dino Buzzati, is registered as one of the representative heroes of the barrier between modernism and what would be considered contemporary. Giovanni Drogo is the hero that, right after he puts on his officer's uniform, experiments an existential emptiness that makes him, in response, state: "What a nonsense!". Taken by this feeling, often the inertia will be the only possible answer this protagonist will offer while facing daily requests. Starting from this premise, articulating literary theory, philosophy and context, we stand up to identify the reasons that establish the heroism of Drogo. After the preface, the introduction chapter follows, at which we develop some considerations about the image of the hero, trying to demonstrate how, during the 18th and 19th centuries, this concept goes through a noticeable modification, thanks to the ascension and sedimentation of the novel, as we know it today. Between the introduction and the final chapter are three main chapters that shape, together, the demonstration of the defended thesis: that the reasons of Drogo respond, necessarily, to a new way to connect and to discover the world. Resignation, refusal and renouncement connect to each of these chapters, which start always from a fundamental scene, followed by its examination. We reached the final chapter with the possibility of identifying not just the position o... (Complete abstract click electronic access below) / Doutor

This dissertation analyzes the ways in which monstrosity is articulated in fantastic literature, a genre or mode that is inherently devoted to the challenge of representing the unrepresentable. Through the readings of a number of nineteenth-century texts and the analysis of the fiction of two twentieth-century writers (H. P. Lovecraft and Tommaso Landolfi), I show how the intersection of the monstrous theme with the fantastic literary mode forces us to consider how a third term, that of language, intervenes in many guises in the negotiation of the relationship between humanity and monstrosity. I argue that fantastic texts engage with monstrosity as a linguistic problem, using it to explore the limits of discourse and constructing through it a specific language for the indescribable. The monster is framed as a bizarre, uninterpretable sign, whose disruptive presence in the text hints towards a critique of overconfident rational constructions of ‘reality’ and the self. The dissertation is divided into three main sections. The first reconstructs the critical debate surrounding fantastic literature – a decades-long effort of definition modeling the same tension staged by the literary fantastic; the second offers a focused reading of three short stories from the second half of the nineteenth century (“What Was It?,” 1859, by Fitz-James O’Brien, the second version of “Le Horla,” 1887, by Guy de Maupassant, and “The Damned Thing,” 1893, by Ambrose Bierce) in light of the organizing principle of apophasis; the last section investigates the notion of monstrous language in the fiction of H. P. Lovecraft and Tommaso Landolfi.

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Thesis (M.A.R.)--Emmanuel School of Religion, Johnson City, Tennessee, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 88-90).