Makala haya yanachanganua ishara na uashiriaji kama mbinu ya kimtindo ya kuwasilisha maana na kukuza uhusika na maudhui katika riwaya ya Nyuso za Mwanamke (2010) ya Said Ahmed Mohamed. Nimechanganua aina tatu za ishara ambazo ni ishara bia, ishara za kaida na ishara za kifasihi kama zinavyoainishwa na Frye na wenzake (1985). Lengo kuu ni kuchanganua na kubainisha jinsi ishara zinavyowasilisha maana na itikadi za jamii katika matini husika. Ishara hizi pia husaidia kukuza maudhui, ploti na kuongeza ujumi katika matini za kifasihi. / This article analyses symbols and symbolism as stylistic devices of communicating meaning and as a technique of characterisation and theme development in Nyuso za Mwanamke (The Faces of a Woman, 2010) written by Said Ahmed Mohamed. I analysed three types of symbols which are natural symbols, conventional symbols and literary symbols following Frye et al. (1985). This study aims at showing how symbols are used in literary works to communicate meaning and the ideology of the society depicted in the text. Symbols also help to build the theme, the plot and adding aesthetic value in literary texts.

The thesis presents an analysis of the themes of the city, the journey and the pilgrim in the well known danish novel Havoc by Tom Kristiensen. The introductory part of the thesis includes a brief summary of the changes in the image of the city in the 19th and 20th century works of art and literature. Furthermore, it also focuses on the man-city relationship and stresses its reciprocity and the important role of the city in the process of the formation of individual identity. The following part of the thesis analyses the theme of the city in Havoc and focuses mainly on the influence, which the main character's feeling of alientation has on the depiction of the city in the novel. Another discussed topic is the main character's decision to intentedly reach the bottom of his existence, which is interpreted as the result of the post-world war I. urge to question and reassess the foundations of the society and its principels and values. The thesis compares and contrasts the main character's deroute with other famous litterary journeys and pilgrimages. Furthemore, it also analyses the predominant patterns of the main charcter's movement through the city and interprets its spiral course as emblematic of the main charatcer's search of identity. The final part of the thesis explores the importance of the...

(in English) This thesis called Grave, Tombstone, Graveyard. The Range of Motifs of the Czech Painting of the 19th Century is based on the analysis of paintings, drawings and graphics made by Czech authors throughout the 19th century. Artists worked with funeral motifs in different ways and these will be presented in different case studies. Some painters were fascinated by these subjects and they turned their attention to them systematically and repeatedly throughout their career. Other artists worked with funeral motifs rarely, although significantly. Artists integrated motifs of graves, monuments and cemeteries to their pieces of art for different purposes; this was connected with the interest of Romanticism in aesthetic anomalies and mystery, with their personal experience and feelings. Artists were also interested in genre scenes that were situated in cemeteries. Funeral motifs can be found in illustrated journals as well. Their aim was to document the specific place and as to symbolically express the finality of the life. The pieces of art will be presented in the context of the burial rites and literature of the 19th century. This phenomenon was also reflected by foreign artists, some of them will be also mentioned in the thesis as an analogy to the Czech works.

The work focuses on the analysis of the poetics of Vladimir Nabokov's novel Invitation to a Beheading in terms of its cultural context. Specifically deals with its relation to the Soviet theatrical avant-garde, with mythopoetic symbolism and early avant-garde. We approach to the novel as a parody of the post-revolutionary avant-garde Soviet theater experiments. Special attention is paid to the fact that due to the theatralization of the text, i.e. assimilation of the novel space with the theatricals, diegesis of Invitation to a Beheading is divided into two equal opposing worlds, each of which represents particular poetics. World built around main character of Cincinnatus is comparable to symbolism, namely to the symbol and symbolistic perception of Andrei Bely. The central principle of this reality is semiotization of the world. The surrounding fictional world creates its opposite as it is shaped by the principle of desemiotization which - as a central aspect of formalistic-futuristic avant- garde - systematically dismantles hero's world. However neither of these worlds is winning. In the end it is the synthesis, which helps the hero get emancipated from the novel's world. The Invitation to a Beheading can therefore be interpreted as original artist's world manifesto which through presentation and...

Mgr. Magdalena Kučerová Dissertation work: Myth of Narcissus in French literature at the turn of the 20th century ABSTRACT: This dissertation thesis based on knowledge of French myth criticism deals with the issue of myths in literature, which is a specific manifestation of human symbolic imagination. In its most general level the work studies the definition of a myth and its social function as well as the matter of opposite notions regarding to the mythos and logos, which have gradually more and more differentiated along with the development of European thinking. The myth of Narcissus has probably been one of the oldest myths in European culture. In its most renowned and most comprehensive form, the myth first appeared in the third book of Metamorphoses by Ovid, which has served as an inspiration for remakes by many later authors. The story of a young man who fell in love with his own reflection on the surface of the water contains a great variety of semantically strong structures (mainly the motifs of a mirror, narcissistic love, passively superior character of a hero, or the final metamorphoses into a flower), which are analysed in this study. The author of this study outlines the interpretational evolution of the myth of Narcissus in French literary history...

St Vitus' Cathedral in Prague: Liturgy, Symbolism and Architectural Imitation in Medieval Bohemia In this thesis, the focus is put on the Wenceslas Chapel in St Vitus' Cathedral, the unusual design of which seems to have two levels of meanings: On the one hand, it was probably designed as a recreation of an earlier rotunda that had been founded by St Wenceslas. On the other hand, it seems that the intention was made the chapel and the whole cathedral would resemble the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, where the Calvary Chapel occupied the same position as the Wenceslas Chapel. This was most likely inspired by presence of the Imperial insignia containing the valuable Passion relics that Charles had acquired in 1350 and placed in the basilica, probably near the Wenceslas Chapel. Perhaps from that reason Charles had the new Gothic chapel decorated with semi-precious stones, because its red spots were associated with the blood of Christ and the Passion. The Wenceslas Chapel together with two Passion chapels at Karlstein Castle, containing Charles IV's private passion treasure, gave rise to the "Passion" architecture of the Luxembourg period. It included the church of St Margaret in the Cistercian monastery in Zlatá Koruna and the Resurrection Chapel attached to the church of SS Peter and Paul at...

The thesis attempts to describe the life and work of Jiří Karásek ze Lvovic through an analysis of his lifestyle, i.e. the way in which he organized, embellished and individualized his life. Karásek sought to shape his existence as an artwork, in accordance with the inspirational concepts of the contemporary and antecedent thinkers and artists (e.g. Oscar Wilde, Walter Pater and Maurice Maeterlinck). He accented its integrity and orientation towards beauty. In accord with his aesthetic vision (and his literary work) Karásek conditioned beauty with sadness and pain and attempted to emphasize melancholic beauty, unity in disunion. For that purpose he would accentuate particularly the disintegrative, critical elements, evoking the impression of unsuccessful, self-destructive endeavor to reach life's high ideal. This corresponded with his tragic concept of the artist immolating himself for his Art. I approach Karásek's lifestyle through the use of the terms youth and (eternal) boyhood, which Karásek himself employed as symbols of mournfully beautiful existence in his literary work. I define a youth - in accordance with the romantic and symbolist interpretation - as a person at odds with reality (contemporary truths, customs and rules), a solitary, unique being, trying to construct a new world - only...