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  • About
  • The Global ETD Search service is a free service for researchers to find electronic theses and dissertations. This service is provided by the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations.
    Our metadata is collected from universities around the world. If you manage a university/consortium/country archive and want to be added, details can be found on the NDLTD website.
31

Seething Cauldron of Crime: Criminals and Detectives in Historical and Fictional London

Kleffner, Katherine 20 April 2015 (has links)
No description available.
32

Holmes och Watson – Ett Queerläsningsäventyr : En undersökning av maskulinitet och sexualitet i Sir Arthur Conan Doyles The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes / Holmes and Watson, a queer-reading adventure : an investigation of masculinity and sexuality in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes

Åström, Josephine January 2014 (has links)
This thesis is a queer masculinity reading of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s short story collection The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894). The analysis focuses on the dissonances, tensions and queerness that reside within the text itself. This has been done from my problem statement: How is Sherlock Holmes and John Watson’s sexuality and masculinity portrayed within the boundary of the text? What is being said, what is hidden, and what is dealt with silently? To reveal these queer parts this analysis has been focused around five themes: the late Victorian male, the Woman, countertypes and decadence, the homosocial sphere and sexuality. The thesis has two major theoretical perspectives: masculinity theory, and queer theory. For the masculine analysis I have used Jørgen Lorentzen and Claes Ekenstam’s concept of manly/unmanly, character, and the citizen from the book Män i Norden: Manlighet och modernitet 1840-1940 and George L. Mosse’s countertype. For the queer theoretical I have used a queer resistant reading combined with Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick’s concept of homosexual panic, and Judith Butler’s gender melancholia. Professor Joseph A. Kestner’s Sherlock’s Men has guided the reading of the short story collection. This thesis aims at showing that the improbable might well reside within the text, not least in the relationship between the two main characters Holmes and Watson. At first glimpse this world of Holmes’s seems devoid of desire, but in a closer reading cracks appear. There are silences, and unnecessary explanations, which have little to do with the adventures themselves, not to mention silent looks, and the association with the domestic. These threaten to effeminize their masculinity, especially Holmes who is a bachelor and suffers from repeated nervousness. Disease of the nerves was associated with effeminacy and homosexuality during the Victorian era. Also, the relationship between Holmes and Watson do at times parody the heterosexual. It’s hard however to find any conclusive evidence of any sexuality in the text, least of all homoerotic, which is hardly surprising considering the forbidding laws that were in place.
33

”There is Nothing More Deceptive than an Obvious Fact” : A Feminist Study of the Detective Work by Miss Marple and Sherlock Holmes

Winterkvist, Frida January 2020 (has links)
This comparative study focuses on the detective genre and is conducted through literary analysis with a feminist critical perspective of two of its most iconic protagonists, Sherlock Holmes and Miss Marple, created by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in 1887 and Agatha Christie in 1930 respectively. The purpose is to attempt to establish the effect of the gender differences on these two protagonists. Both Holmes and Miss Marple are deemed as iconic in the detective genre, but the protagonists do not have similar experiences and are created by authors of different genders. Thus, the focus is to explore how gender differences are represented in the literary texts A Study in Scarlet (1887), “A Scandal in Bohemia” (1891), and The Murder at the Vicarage (1930) when it comes to their work as detectives. By using a feminist critical perspective and with the help of previous research, the differences in three central issues, that is, work methods, attitudes and method of disguise, are established. The most prominent result from the analysis is that Miss Marple has to work independently from the police force and trust another character, Leonard Clement, with what she knows hoping that Clement will use her observations to make the case move forward. By contrast, Holmes is approached by clients and even assists the police force in investigations, while Miss Marple is dismissed because of gender discrimination and ageism when she reaches out to the police force. Miss Marple is clearly a victim of gender discrimination and ageism, while Holmes is seen as eccentric but fully competent as a detective. Holmes is even described as having “extraordinary powers” while Miss Marple is described as an “old pussy” in a derogatory manner. Therefore, the results are that there is a significant difference in attitude where Holmes as a man encounters more positive attitudes and Miss Marple as a woman encounters more negative attitudes, all because of gender discrimination and ageism. These results are of great importance as it reveals what gender differences Holmes and Miss Marple encounter in their literary texts. It opens up the opportunity for more research in gender differences and gender discrimination in comparisons between protagonists. That Miss Marple is successful in the end, however, functions as a feminist statement.
34

Holmes, Alice, and Ezeulu: Western Rationality in the Context of British Colonialism and Western Modernity

Schultz, Andrew B. 19 July 2007 (has links) (PDF)
This thesis examines Western rationality, contextualizing that subject in British colonialism and Western modernity. Using Scott Lash's description of academic characterizations of modernity, I explore the “high" modernity of the social sciences represented in the books Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll and The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle. I then explore the cultural studies critique of that characterization of modernity in the book Arrow of God by Chinua Achebe. Using the theory of Jean Francois Lyotard, Martin Heidegger, and Theodor Adorno, I look at Western rationality through its manifestation in British colonialism. I argue that colonialism is a site where rationality's negative legacy is manifest, and that the paradoxical representations of rationality in the books by Carroll and Doyle indicate a problem with the assumption that Western rationality was a universal epistemology. Contrary to the British's own ideas of their rationality, I find that Western rationality is ultimately a culturally-grounded discourse. Using Chinua Achebe's Arrow of God, I examine the intersection between Western rationality and other forms of cultural knowledge, an intersection that occurred through British colonialism. Achebe argues against the universal model of Western rationality and posits instead a relative valuing of each culture's methods of arriving at truth. I use his novel to illustrate the limits of Western rationality and its claim to universality.
35

Manning the Empire: The Pedagogical Function of Sherlock Holmes and Phileas Fogg in the Late Victorian Period

Eberly, Naomi 05 December 2014 (has links)
No description available.
36

Cognitive rationality and indeterminism in the contemporary detective novel, with special reference to the work of Umberto Eco, Carlo Emilio Gadda and Stanislaw Lem

Van der Linde, G. P. L. (Gerhardus Philippus Leonardus) 06 1900 (has links)
The study examines cognitive rationality as to()l for problemsolving within the context of a movement from determinism and monolithic universal Reason towards indeterminism and plurality. It is contended that theories of literature do not provide an adequate conceptual framework, and therefore, extensive use is made of pluralist fallibilism (Popper, Helmut Spinner) and chaos theory. The philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche is viewed as a decisive influence in the shift towards plurality and scepticism. In chapter 2, Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, a novel by Agatha Christie and Gaston Leroux's Le mystere de Ia chambre jaune are discussed as examples of optimistic rationalism. Chapter 3 indicates that Eco's II nome della rosa emphasizes the conjectural nature of truth and objective knowledge, underpinned by a 'soft' rationalism which amounts to monopolistic pluralism. Chapter 4 analyses the defeat of cognitive rationality by the complex interaction of a multiplicity of independent causal series. The detectives' relationship with the feminine exemplifies the interpenetration of rationality and the instinctual, while the mystery of the feminine is a metaphor for impenetrable complexity. Chapter 5 shows that hypotheses concerning random complex systems remain inconclusive. However, as the trajectory of a complex system can be regulated, so reason can be viewed as the underlying regulative pattern (strange attractorl for an infinite proliferation of hypotheses. Thus, despite .shifting conceptions of rationality and order, all the detectives in the study accept objective truth as regulative principle and are involved in a search for objective knowledge / Afrikaans & Theory of Literature / D.Litt. et Phil. (Theory of literature)
37

Detecting Masculinity: The Positive Masculine Qualities of Fictional Detectives.

Griswold, Amy Herring 08 1900 (has links)
Detective fiction highlights those qualities of masculinity that are most valuable to a contemporary culture. In mysteries a cultural context is more thoroughly revealed than in any other genre of literature. Through the crimes, an audience can understand not only the fears of a particular society but also the level of calumny that society assigns to a crime. As each generation has needed a particular set of qualities in its defense, so the detective has provided them. Through the detective's response to particular crimes, the reader can learn the delineation of forgivable and unforgivable acts. These detectives illustrate positive masculinity, proving that fiction has more uses than mere entertainment. In this paper, I trace four detectives, each from a different era. Sherlock Holmes lives to solve problems. His primary function is to solve a riddle. Lord Peter Wimsey takes on the moral question of why anyone should detect at all. His stories involve the difficulty of justifying putting oneself in the morally superior position of judge. The Mike Hammer stories treat the difficulty of dealing with criminals who use the law to protect themselves. They have perverted the protections of society, and Hammer must find a way to bring them to justice outside of the law. The Kate Martinelli stories focus more on the victims of crime than on the criminals. Martinelli discovers the motivations that draw a criminal toward a specific victim and explains what it is about certain victims that makes villains want to harm them. All of these detectives display the traditional traits of the Western male. They are hunters; they protect society as a whole. Yet each detective fulfills a certain cultural role that speaks to the specific problems of his or her era, proving that masculinity is a more fluid role than many have previously credited.
38

Cognitive rationality and indeterminism in the contemporary detective novel, with special reference to the work of Umberto Eco, Carlo Emilio Gadda and Stanislaw Lem

Van der Linde, G. P. L. (Gerhardus Philippus Leonardus) 06 1900 (has links)
The study examines cognitive rationality as to()l for problemsolving within the context of a movement from determinism and monolithic universal Reason towards indeterminism and plurality. It is contended that theories of literature do not provide an adequate conceptual framework, and therefore, extensive use is made of pluralist fallibilism (Popper, Helmut Spinner) and chaos theory. The philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche is viewed as a decisive influence in the shift towards plurality and scepticism. In chapter 2, Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, a novel by Agatha Christie and Gaston Leroux's Le mystere de Ia chambre jaune are discussed as examples of optimistic rationalism. Chapter 3 indicates that Eco's II nome della rosa emphasizes the conjectural nature of truth and objective knowledge, underpinned by a 'soft' rationalism which amounts to monopolistic pluralism. Chapter 4 analyses the defeat of cognitive rationality by the complex interaction of a multiplicity of independent causal series. The detectives' relationship with the feminine exemplifies the interpenetration of rationality and the instinctual, while the mystery of the feminine is a metaphor for impenetrable complexity. Chapter 5 shows that hypotheses concerning random complex systems remain inconclusive. However, as the trajectory of a complex system can be regulated, so reason can be viewed as the underlying regulative pattern (strange attractorl for an infinite proliferation of hypotheses. Thus, despite .shifting conceptions of rationality and order, all the detectives in the study accept objective truth as regulative principle and are involved in a search for objective knowledge / Afrikaans and Theory of Literature / D.Litt. et Phil. (Theory of literature)
39

Smart Characters: Psychometrics and the Twentieth-Century Novel

Michalowicz, Naomi January 2023 (has links)
This dissertation examines how the trait of intelligence is portrayed in novels of twentieth-century Britain, and how this portrayal grapples with the quantitative revolution in the conception of intelligence, brought on by the invention of IQ testing in the 1900s. I trace the construction of characters’ intelligence across different genres, starting with Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories, through the modernist Bildungsromane of Henry James, James Joyce, and Virginia Woolf, to Iris Murdoch’s realism, and finally to Lee Child’s late twentieth- century serial thrillers featuring Jack Reacher. I posit that the IQ model of intelligence as abstracted, quantified, and statistically measurable is profoundly at odds with the novelistic investment in the unique individual subject. This project traces the narratological strategies of characterization through which intelligence—or cleverness, or smartness, or brightness—are conveyed to the reader. Novels, generally speaking, do not provide the IQ scores of their characters; and though we might occasionally encounter an explicit narratorial characterization of some fictional being or other as “remarkably clever,” most often we must rely on perceptions of behavior, speech, and thought in order to assess characters’ intelligence, much as we do in real life. As the psychometric paradigm gained prominence in the psychological circles in the United States, England, and Europe, and as more people were exposed—and subjected—to intelligence testing, its values and assumptions gained more cultural traction. Attributes like mathematical facility, logical and systemic thinking, or a large vocabulary, are likely to yield a high score on an IQ test, as well as a favorable judgment in an informal, casual assessment, such as that of a date or a new acquaintance at a party. This dissertation, therefore, explores how this permeation of the psychometric paradigm into general culture affect the novelistic construction of smartness. Ultimately, I argue that against the IQ model, the novels I am reading construct a conception of intelligence as a coherent set of cognitive abilities, remarkably consistent across genres, which overlaps, yet reconfigures, the priorities and epistemological frameworks of psychometrics. This model centers on the notion of observation, i.e., a mix of sensory susceptibility to impressions and the cognitive skill of taking notice of the world and of other people. It is both anchored to the body by connoting a sensory experience, and divorced from it in conveying a more purely cognitive process, one of directing attention and processing information, thus renegotiating psychometric assumptions regarding embodiment and sensory experience—as well as the relationship between the individual’s intelligence, the world, and the minds of others.
40

Confronting eternity : strange (im)mortalities, and states of undying in popular fiction.

Bacon, Edwin Bruce January 2014 (has links)
When the meritless scrabble for the bauble of deity, they ironically set their human lives at the “pin’s fee” to which Shakespeare’s Hamlet refers. This thesis focuses on these undeserving individuals in premillennial and postmillennial fiction, who seek immortality at the expense of both their humanities, and their natural mortalities. I will analyse an array of popular modern characters, paying particular attention to the precursors of immortal personages. I will inaugurate these analyses with an examination of fan favourite series

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