No description available.

Thesis (M. Phil.)--University of Hong Kong, 1989.

Thesis (M.A.)--State University of New York at Binghamton, Department of English, General Literature and Rhetoric, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Rhode Island, 2006. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 107-116).

This essay investigates experienced intensity through character description and development in Stephen King’s Cell. The thesis of the essay is that a deliberately produced narrative indeterminacy, used mainly on the level of character descriptions, is what produces intensity by holding the readers of Cell in suspense, i.e., in a state of uncertainty. While King might stretch the fundamentals of the classic horror genre, he does not abandon them, experimenting with a genre that makes the readers wonder what to expect next, thereby creating suspenseful questions. Since the focus of the essay is the readers’ reactions on character descriptions, I apply reader response theory and the works of Norman Holland, David Bleich and Yvonne Leffler. The result of the investigation shows that narrative techniques, such as placing brief descriptions of characters in the course of events in the narrative together with altered norms and normality allow the readers to experience heightened emotions and feelings. King alters norms and normality, and presents character descriptions in a fashion that is unexpected; thus the readers do not know exactly how to relate to these character descriptions.

No description available.

An American author who is regarded as being a masterful storyteller when it comes to the struggle with immigrant identity is Jhumpa Lahiri. Those who have read her work would most likely agree with me that her texts provide the reader with an intimate and realistic insight into what it is like living between two or several cultures. How does she create this intimacy and feeling of first-hand immigrant experience? One defining feature of Lahiri’s writing is that she leaves many questions unanswered. In other words, there is an endless amount of “gaps” in her texts that it is up to the reader to fill with meaning. This is, from my point of view, an experience very true to life as there are many questions in life we can begin to attempt to answer. Along the journey towards finding an answer, you realize that you have simply ended up with even more questions unanswered. As Lahiri’s writing contains so much ambiguity, the text invites the reader to actively search for alternative interpretations, which is also a feature of this essay.

Abstract As a novel always deemed eccentric and chaotic, Laurence Sterne¡¦s Tristram Shandy has constantly drawn attention of the reading public but has also incurred multitudinous attacks by the critics for its apparent disorderliness. Exteriorly, the novel indeed exhibits chaotic features, whether by its digressions or interludes; however, after a close and meticulous analysis we could actually find harmony and unity within all the confusions and irregularities. Since the author utilizes the eccentricity of the novel to camouflage harmony within, we could assume that a force of some kind is surreptitiously in motion to conduct all the exterior chaos into harmony. Thus my objective in this thesis is to indicate and analyze the ¡§force¡¨ which can trample down all the external irrationalities and enables harmony and order to reveal themselves once again. The thesis will analyze the novel in three main aspects. Formally, the digressions of the novel will be mainly investigated. All the seemingly irrelevant opinionative and explanative digressions will be discussed and examined in close analysis. In dealing with digressions, the ideas of the Russian Formalist Victor Shklovsky will be referred to. Reciprocally, Sterne¡¦s demand for his reader¡¦s participation (interaction) is another distinguishing feature of the work. This part of the thesis will examine the balancing force while it exhibits itself when readers act as active agents bestowing meanings through interaction and Wolfgang Iser¡¦s Reader-Response theory will applied. The closing section of the thesis endeavors to analyze the content of the novel by inspecting the discrepancies and exemplify how Sterne attempts to liberate his reader¡¦s imagination. The thesis will end with the analysis of the author¡¦s philosophical attitude towards life as I realign the novel in strict time-order and trace the causality of the events within. Key words: Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy, Russian Formalism, reader response, interaction, digressions, harmony, chaos, discrepancy, causality

Thesis (M.A.)--Catholic Theological Union at Chicago, 2000. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 137-142).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1987.