The reading of selected literary texts in this thesis traces the changes from a divinely ordered world of stability (Thomas Mann's Bud<lenbrooks) to surroundings characterized by insecurity (William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury) to an unstable environment giving rise to largely futile attempts at finding answers to seemingly illogical questions (Thomas Pynchon's The Crying of Lot 49). As a product of the accelerated speed of technological progression and the information revolution in the twentieth century, man is more often than not incapable of adjusting to changed circumstances in a seemingly hostile environment. Indeed, instability and unpredictability are external factors determining the sense of insecurity and uncertainty characterising the 'world' depicted in the literary texts under consideration. For this reason judicious use will be made of philosophical and psychoanalytical concepts, based, amongst others, on Nietzschean and Freudian theories, to explain the disintegration of families, the anguish experienced by individuals or, indeed, the shifting identities informing the portrayal of character in selected literary texts. / Afrikaans and Theory of Literature / D.Litt. et Phil. (Theory of Literature)

Critical Theory, as posited by members of The Frankfurt School, was evaluated with the objective of attaching an implied ethical dimension. This was discovered in their privileging of a particular type of aesthetic, as evinced in their analysis of certain works of autonomous High Modernism. This implied ethic, which is one based around the concept of enlightenment as potential for emancipation, was then applied as a norm for the evaluation of art. This ethic, however, does not seek to impose a particular reading on (specifically) literary production: Rather, it seeks to impart the importance of a commitment by the literary critic in the use of an ethically based norm, an ethic, what is more, that is based and supported by a discussion of the concepts 'freedom' and Enlightenment. Finally, with this ethic firmly established, the discussion then attempted to distinguish between modernism and post-modernism, using this implied ethic as a guide to separation. / Afrikaans and Theory of Literature / M.A. (Theory of Literature)

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:29:49Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2013-02-27Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T19:27:01Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 monteiro_wwf_me_sjrp.pdf: 373415 bytes, checksum: 5537a3ae814918cd3e9a6b7ca54b6485 (MD5) / Esta dissertação busca realizar uma leitura dos textos Avalovara (1973), de Osman Lins, e O jogo da liberdade da alma (2003), de Maria Gabriela Llansol, tomando como ponto de partida procedimentos metaficcionais que aí se manifestam, com ênfase em apontamentos autoconscientes e autorreflexivos que possibilitam observar de que maneira cada um dos autores direciona o seu texto. Nesse sentido, focalizar-se-á a forma de composição das duas obras, realçando um espaço de escrita no qual personagens, no romance de Lins, e figuras, no texto de Llansol, se encontram, gerando um movimento que se expande em termos de linguagem, linguagem dinâmica que se desdobra em múltiplos caminhos, enveredando por frestas que levam o leitor a redimensionar sua perspectiva de visão sobre a própria literatura / This dissertation aims to read Avalovara (1973), by Osman Lins, and O jogo da liberdade da alma (2003), by Maria Gabriela Llansol, considering as a starting point the metafictional procedures which manifest in the two texts, with an emphasis on self-conscious and self-reflective notes that allow us to observe how each author guides his text. Therefore, the literary construction of both works will be focused since it highlights a writing space in which characters in Lins’s novel and figures in Llansol’s text find themselves in this space, creating a movement that expands in terms of language, a dynamic language that opens out to multiple paths and directs its steps to gaps that lead the reader to rethink his perspective on literature itself

Made available in DSpace on 2016-12-23T14:34:16Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Gloria_Legado_Goncalves_Mag.pdf: 326293 bytes, checksum: cdd3d267a6453471dbb885c1bfb65374 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2009-06-22 / This study concerns itself with the works of Gonçalves de Magalhães the usherer of romanticism in Brasil , the age in which he emerged and the criticism for and against the almost forgotten author. In the intention of investigating these, a common denominator was found in 3 principal works of the carioca author: the poem Carta ao meu amigo Dr. Candido Borges Monteiro , the article Ensaio sobre a História da Literatura Brasileira and the inaugural volume of poems in the Romantic Movement, Suspiros poéticos e saudades. This denominator the author in search of a justification for his creative activity is in exaggerations of reference to himself, and are exposed with total sincerity in works with little attraction, influencing generations of criticism to observe the figure of the author at the loss of his works / Este trabalho tem interesse pela obra de Gonçalves de Magalhães, o introdutor do romantismo no Brasil, pela época de sua inscrição e pela crítica construída contra e a favor desse escritor quase esquecido. Na intenção de investigá-las, levantou-se um denominador comum em três obras principais do autor carioca: o poema Carta ao meu amigo Dr. Candido Borges Monteiro , o artigo Ensaio sobre a História da Literatura Brasileira e o volume de poemas inaugurador do movimento romântico, os Suspiros poéticos e saudades. Tal denominador o escritor em busca de uma justificativa para sua atividade criadora dá-se pelo exagero das referências a si mesmo, e que reveladas com total franqueza em meio a uma obra pouco atraente, influenciou as gerações de crítica a observar a figura do autor em detrimento de suas produções