博士(国文学) / Doctor of Philosophy in Japanese Literature / 同志社大学 / Doshisha University

<p>  </p> <p>     When it comes to advisors in Arthurian legends, Merlin is likely the first name that quickly comes to mind. However, few have recognized that Merlin is more than a supplementary character. Far beyond simply giving counsel, the prophet-mage actually makes a huge contribution to creating and governing the so-called Arthurian world. This project aims to examine the creation and consolidation of the British Merlin’s identity in Arthurian literature (primarily from the twelfth to the fifteenth century), arguing that Merlin is more than a powerful counselor of King Arthur—the prophet-mage is occasionally depicted as a racial “Other” when contrasted with Arthur and his British subjects; at other times, he is a doppelgänger of the legendary monarch who rules the kingdom; and at still other times he is a prophetic builder constructing a future that he envisions in the name of God. The kaleidoscopic representations of Merlin and his identities in Arthurian literature during this period reflect how Others—racial and otherwise, especially those who make temporary appearances at the center of the power structure—are perceived, treated, and exploited to help the British audience establish their common identity as an independent social group living in Britain. This project analyzes and compares, primarily through the lens of critical race theory and analysis of identity construction (both individual and communal), Merlin-texts composed and circulated in Britain from the twelfth century to the fifteenth century. The findings are supported by textual evidence and analyses of contemporary historical, political, and cultural context.</p> <p>     The project begins with a review of current scholarship in Merlin studies and the application of critical race theory in medieval studies. It demonstrates that previous scholarship on Merlin has mostly focused on analyzing what his extraordinary powers represent in the texts and how his prophetic ability was used for various political purposes, such as uniting a fractured community and providing a hopeful outlook to people under oppression. However, no satisfactory attempt has been made to explain how and why such an important character as Merlin only makes limited appearances in Merlin-texts and how his importance is continuously—even more profoundly—felt after his early removal from such texts. The mage’s apparent characteristics of Otherness and his abrupt removal from many Merlin-texts have provided ample grounds for the application of critical race theory. This theoretical approach, though relatively new in medieval studies, allows us to recognize that Merlin, as a racial Other in the center of a power structure, is paradoxically crucial but undesirable for the dominant group that has always perceived him as an outsider.</p> <p>     To highlight Merlin-figures’ much overlooked identity as an outsider, Chapter 1 traces the identities of the pre-Galfridian Merlin-figures in two traditions: Merlinus Ambrosius and Merlinus Caledonius. It demonstrates that while these pre-Galfridian Merlin-figures make hopeful prophecies for a community, they are also estranged from that particular community in different aspects. Their varied outsider identities—like wild man in the forest, warrior in political exile, mad prophet, and mixed-raced child living in the margins of society—constitute fertile grounds for kaleidoscopic portrayals of Merlins to come.</p> <p>     Chapter 2 then focuses on the first Merlin(s) introduced by Geoffrey of Monmouth. Through the lens of critical race theory, this chapter argues that Geoffrey’s Merlin(s) is already racially nuanced in aspects like religion and social status. His newly acquired identity as the son of an incubus endows him and his clan with extraordinary qualities that gradually become essentialized traits marking their identity as racial Others. This paves the way for Merlin’s further alienation and dehumanization in later Merlin-texts in which the abstract quality of Otherness begins to be visually and physically apparent on Merlin’s body. </p> <p>     After establishing Merlin as a racial Other, Chapter 3 proceeds to read Merlin as a doppelgänger of King Arthur—mainly in the Vulgate <em>Estoire de Merlin</em>. Focusing on Merlin’s much debated roles of prophet and architect, this chapter explores how (unlike most prophets in Arthurian literature) Merlin is often heavily—and intimately—involved with the future that he foretells, which makes his prophetic words appear more like personal prophetic blueprints in which he envisions what his world <em>could</em> be like instead of what it <em>ought</em> to have been. Since Merlin and Arthur share almost all traits of their identity except their blood, and Arthur, in many Merlin-texts, could only rule by closely following Merlin’s instructions, texts featuring a powerful Merlin often function as commentaries concerning issues like kingship and political powers of racial Others who “officially” cannot be recognized as holding significant power in communities in which their identities construct them as marginal or secondary. This is manifest in episodes like the disaster of May babies in the Post-Vulgate <em>Suite du Merlin</em> and Thomas Malory’s <em>Morte</em>, in which Arthur takes the action but Merlin takes the blame.</p> <p>     Finally, Chapter 4 examines Thomas Malory’s consolidation of the identities of the English Merlin towards the end of the fifteenth century. Through comparing the different depictions of Merlin among Malory’s <em>Morte</em> and three Middle English Merlin-texts circulating in the English-speaking community during this period, this chapter argues that Malory’s omission of Merlin’s early history is a crucial factor that allows the author to make his Merlin more adaptable to the needs of his contemporary English audience. That is, Malory’s Merlin can be God’s mouthpiece, the son of a devil, a trusted mentor, and an incredulous dream-reader all in one text. By leaving out Merlin’s early history, Malory consolidates the various Merlins into a familiar yet foreign face in the English Arthuriad, a meme-like character that evolves each time we encounter him in the texts. </p>

The aim of this thesis is to map and analyse literature written by authors with a Hungarian-language background who moved to Sweden between 1945 and 2015, and who have published literary works in book format. From the perspective of the sociology of literature, this thesis focuses on publishing channels and possibilities, the authors’ and their works places in the literary value system and feed-back in the form of reviews, but also choice of language, theme, and genre. The approach of the research for this thesis is new in Hungarian and Swedish literary studies, as the literary works are analysed irrespective of the language in which they are written. The research corpus consists of both Hungarian and Swedish literary works and one book in English. The second chapter presents the research that Hungarian researchers have conducted on Hungarian migration literature and offers an overview of the questions and results arising from this research. The authors with a Hungarian-language background in Sweden were divided into four groups, based on the time of their migration to Sweden. Four chapters, which comprise the analytic part of the thesis, present and analyse the author groups and their literary activities regarding language, purpose of any code-switching, chosen theme, and genre. The first group consists of authors who migrated to Sweden during the decade after the Second World War (1945–1955). The second group came between 1956 and 1958 in the aftermath of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. The third group consists of Hungarians who moved to Sweden during the communist era, between 1959 and 1989. Finally, the fourth group came after the fall of communism (1990–2015). As many as half of the authors chose either Hungarian or Swedish as their language and there are surprisingly few authors working in both languages. The publishing channels depend on the literary works language and theme, and only half of the books have been published at established publishers. The literary works of these authors are categorized as Swedish-Hungarian migration literature. Literary history works until now have neglected these type of literatures, but it is imperative that the study of literature finds a way to acknowledge, include, position, and group them.

Both young adult literature and transnational literature occupy transitional spaces and defy simple classifications. Their commonalities naturally suit the two sets of literature for concurrent study. However, the field is underdeveloped, particularly in the United States. With a concentration on the exchanges taking place between the U.S. and Germany, this thesis addresses the need to assemble primary materials and pertinent critical commentary into a single place available to educators, scholars, and researchers to acquire background on transnational YAL themes. The thesis delineates methods used in conducting and compiling research on U.S.-German YAL exchange and highlights the translation and publication concerns associated with this process. It examines how prizes for translations are granted in each nation, identifying organizations that facilitate the process of exchange and describing transnational trends rising out of these circumstances. The concluding chapter visits concerns and complications raised during the investigation, posing questions for further study of the U.S.-German young adult literature relationship and advocating the pursuit of similar research in other world regions. The appendices provide sites for continued examination. They include lists of award-winning translations available in the U.S., novels by American authors that have been translated and published in Germany, and novels by German-language authors that have been translated and published in the U.S.

This thesis identifies continuities and disruptions within the tradition of literary allegory in Latin America and critically revisits the category of “national allegory” (Jameson 1986) in order to articulate an interpretative model suited to contemporary “transnational allegorical fiction”. Based on the analysis of seven Mexican novels that register the transition of neoliberalism from the political-economic order to a form of biopolitical control (Althusser, Foucault, Žižek), I identify the emergence of what I call a “transnational affective field”: a symbolic horizon, alternative to the nation, where the prospective function of foundational romances (Sommer) and the retrospective function of mourning akin to postdictatorial fiction (Avelar), converge. This ideological device negotiates power relations, facilitates the transfer of local/global meaning, promotes intercultural empathy and compromise, and denounces mechanisms of exclusion; thereby, reconfiguring the affective and political functions of allegory in Latin American fiction. Part One discusses critical approaches to allegorical fiction in both Latin American and World literatures. Part Two compares the representation of the binomial nation/world in three historiographic metafictions by Carmen Boullosa, Francisco Rebolledo and J.E. Pacheco through recent approaches in post-/de-colonial and memory studies. Part Three examines the depiction of the nation as simulacrum and the figuration of postmodern subjectivities in Jorge Volpi and Juan Villoro from a poststructuralist perspective. It also contends that Álvaro Enrigue’s and Valeria Luiselli’s novels are representative of an emergent meta-allegorical imagination that, in an ironic reversal of allegory (de Man), simultaneously constructs it as a mechanism of ideological control as well as a conscious strategy to resist commodification and symbolic violence (Bourdieu) in the contemporary world. The analysis demonstrates the vitality of Mexican transnational allegorical fiction as a socio-political and affective counter-hegemonic discourse that also functions as an effective strategy of recognition in the international literary field.

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<p>The term magical realism traces back to the German art critic Franz Roh, who in the early twentieth century applied it to (visual) art expressing the wondrousness of life. However, this definition has been eclipsed over time. Reorienting critical attention back to magical realism as the art of portraying wonder and wondering, I explore the magical realist novels of contemporary African American and Asian American women writers. Specifically, I examine Toni Morrison’s <em>Paradise</em> (1997), Jesmyn Ward’s <em>Sing, Unburied, Sing</em> (2017), Karen Tei Yamashita’s <em>Through the Arc of the Rain Forest</em> (1990), and Ruth Ozeki’s <em>A Tale for the Time Being</em> (2013). In wonder, all frames of reference at hand suddenly become inadequate. Simultaneously, the subject’s interest is heightened. As such, the act/experience of wondering may lead to humility and respect, the two attitudes at the base of any ethically flourishing life—a life that flourishes <em>with</em> others. For this reason, the Asian American woman writer and peace activist Maxine Hong Kingston espoused wondering. Affiliated with groups marginalized within the US, like Kingston my writers also promote wonder. I examine how these writers, through compelling use of both content and form, guide their readers toward a particular kind of wondering: wondering with an awareness of how the act/experience might lead to ethical flourishing.</p>

This dissertation examines lesbian and queer desire in texts in Catalan and Spanish written in Barcelona, Montevideo, and Buenos Aires from the 1960s to the present. In the texts, desire includes but is not limited to the erotic; it encompasses issues of queer textuality, relationality, and literary transmission. I focus on the works of three authors who have spent the majority of their lives in Barcelona. However, the city appears almost incidentally in their works; the genealogies that the authors trace are transnational. The texts combine literal movement (through exile or diaspora) and a metaphorical sense of being “out of place” that prompts writers to take refuge in writing. I demonstrate that despite depicting affinities beyond the family and nation, the works reveal the persistence of familial and national ties, albeit in spectral or queer ways. Rather than tracing continuous lines of descent that emphasise origins, the works are principally concerned with futurity and fragmentation, as in Michel Foucault’s reading of genealogy. Chapter One on Maria-Mercè Marçal’s La passió segons Renée Vivien (1994) traces a literary genealogy from Sappho to Renée Vivien in fin de siècle Paris to Marçal. The novel represents a merging of literary desire and erotic desire; Marçal’s search for symbolic mothers turns out to be a search for symbolic lovers that is oriented towards the present and future. In Chapter Two, I posit that in Cristina Peri Rossi’s La nave de los locos (1984) “happiness” consists of being open to chance and unpredictability unlike in conventional “happy” scripts in which a valuable life is believed to consist of (heterosexual) marriage, children, and property ownership. In Part II I argue that through fragmentation, allegory, and ambiguity, Peri Rossi’s El libro de mis primos (1969) contests authoritarian discourse without itself becoming a site of hegemonic meaning. In inviting the reader’s collaboration, it ensures authorial legacy. Part I of Chapter Three is an analysis of the temporality of obsession in Flavia Company’s Querida Nélida (1988). I propose that obsession and melancholia may point to a utopian future rather than signalling an entrapment in the past. My study of Melalcor (2000) in Part II suggests that queer forms of relationality that are not centred on procreation and monogamy offer ethical models of sociality. Part III focusses on Company’s return to biological family in Volver antes que ir (2012) and Por mis muertos (2014). The resurgence in these texts of family members who have died signals that just as the queer haunts the family, the family haunts the queer.