Browsing by Subject "Self in literature"

Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
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    Complex Unity: “Self” and Deliberation in Homer’s Odyssey and Iliad
    (2008) Lebowitz, Willy
    My thesis concerns scenes of deliberation in the Homeric epics. The language of psychological motivation that Homer employs is vastly different from our own. The goal of this thesis is to attempt to understand the complex nature of the Homeric "self" (if there is such a thing) and to remove years of philosophical misinterpretations from our analysis of the Homeric corpus.
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    Ecstasis of Ekphrasis: Dialectically (De)framing Self in John Banville’s The Book of Evidence
    (2009) Montalbano, Kathryn; Sherman, Debora
    John Banville's "The Book of Evidence" posits a tension between the narrator’s conception of language as that which is incapable of fully conveying the "evidence" of the text and his desire to acquire a unity of subjectivity and objectivity through a means outside of the insufficient signification system of language. Relinquishing his desire to stabilize his presence through painting signifiers that parallel the linguistic fallacy of unity, the narrator turns towards windows as a subliminal space neither inside nor outside edifice, a structure that attempts to demarcate a binary between the “natural” exterior world and the “artificial” interior realm of humanity.
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    Hunt for Self: A Wild Woman's Journey to Wholeness
    (2009) Woldeyesus, Rahwa; Zwarg, Christina, 1949-
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    Poetic Objectivity and the Disappearance of Self in 'The Waste Land'
    (2005) O'Keefe, Daniel C.; Finley, C. Stephen
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    The Serpent and the Self: Identity and Self Discovery in Haruki Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle and the Story of Dōjōji
    (2013) Harder, Alicia K.
    Dōjōji and the Kegon engi Emaki are two stores that are often studied with a psychoanalytical approach. The transformation and resolution of these tales are often interpreted as men reconciling this inherent fear that they have of women and the power they possess. This is misogyny is also seen as a reflection on the role of women within a greater Buddhist context, which offered little opportunities for female enlightenment. This paper sets out to look that these narratives in a different light by exploring the relationship between the portrayals of female transformation in these stories and its applications to Haruki Murakami’s novel The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle. At first glance the two narratives might share little in common, there are similarities. Throughout Murakami’s novels he has a clearly defined concept of the self as divided into two parts. There is the self that we know to be ourselves and then there is the other self, the self that observes. Although this unknown self may seem unimportant, given our own unawareness, disrupting these two selves is something that has drastic consequences. As we see in Murakami’s novels, his characters must go on a journey in order to resolve this defiled self. This portrayal of the self is similarly reflected in these stories of female transformation, where this disruption can be seen as the transformation itself. Not only do both narratives follow a similar arc of disruption, journey, and resolution but there are also shared themes of sexuality as well as a similar relationship between the physical versus metaphysical world. Although taking a psychoanalytical approach is certainly an interesting way of looking at the story of female transformation in the Kegon engi Emaki and Dōjōji, it is also possible to see Murakami’s sense of self at play throughout these narratives of female transformation. In both cases this unconscious self is brought into the open and there is a resulting transformation in an attempt to achieve resolution.
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    Time and the Self in Seneca’s De Brevitate Vitae
    (2013) Walter, Benjamin Z.; Baertschi, Annette M.
    This paper attempts to find the relationship between the self and time in De Brevitate Vitae. It is argued that Seneca’s advice to his addressee to withdrawal from public office in order to avoid the “brevity of life” is, following Stoic reasoning, an actual and not merely rhetorical extension of life. The Introduction explains why the self is relevant in Senecan scholarship, using the Letters as well as brief analysis by Long and Edwards. A definition of the Stoic self is constructed using relevant scholarship by Gill, Inwood, and Long. This definition is contrasted with at least one modern definition of the self. The definition put forward is that the Senecan self is unified, self-reflexive, goal-oriented, and rational. De Brevitate Vitae is examined and the conclusion is drawn that Seneca suggests that reclusion from public life can actually extend time and cure the “brevity of life”. This statement is shown to be explicable only in light of the active participation of the Stoic self. Reclusion from politics signifies philosophical and moral development (i.e. the development of the self). Life is defined as the amount of time one owns. The principle metaphor of time in the dialogue is that of time as a spendable commodity. The fact that time is spendable implies the ownership of the self over life (the specific amount of time that we own). It is argued that only a developed self has the ability to control the flow of time. The consequence of this is that life is extended. Therefore, using the logic of Seneca’s Stoicism, the withdrawal from public affairs actually lengthens life. The conclusion contains a brief overlook of the possible historical and political context surrounding the dialogue, as well as a summary of the broader implications of the dialogue.