Text in the Natural World: Topics of Evolutionary Theory of Literature

The study of literature has expanded to include an evolutionary perspective. Its premise is that the literary text and literature as an overarching institution came into existence as a product of the same evolutionary process that gave rise to the human species. In this view, literature is an evolutionary adaptation that functions as any other adaptation does, as a means of enhancing survivability and also promoting benefits for the individual and society. Text in the Natural World is an introduction to the theory and a survey of topics pertinent to the evolutionary view of literature. After a polemical, prefatory chapter and an overview of the pertinent aspects of evolutionary theory itself, the book examines integral building blocks of literature and literary expression as effects of evolutionary development. This includes chapters on moral sense, symbolic thought, literary aesthetics in general, literary ontology, the broad topic of form, function and device in literature, a last theoretical chapter on narrative, and a chapter on literary themes. The concluding chapter builds on the preceding one as an illustration of evolutionary thematic study in practice, in a study of the fauna in the fiction of Maupassant. This text is designed to be of interest to those who read and think about things literary, as well as to those who have interest in the extension of Darwin’s great idea across the horizon of human culture. It tries to bridge the gulf that has separated the humanities from the sciences, and would be a helpful text for courses taught in both literary theory and interdisciplinary approaches to literature and philosophy.https://cupola.gettysburg.edu/books/1125/thumbnail.jp

Writing beyond the pale : literature, literary theory, and the law of genre

It has sometimes been claimed that certain texts written by literary theorists defy categorisation. Neither critique nor fiction, and not even identifiable as a hybrid of both, such texts resist efforts to identify their generic affiliation. These texts might have been allowed to stand merely as indicators of their creators' whimsy were it not for the fact that their content and form, not to mention their problematic relationship with what literary theorists profess elsewhere, represent a provocation to literary criticism's established approaches and procedures. This paper reviews one such text, namely Jacques Derrida 's The Post Card, and more particularly the section entitled "Envois", in the light of his essay "The Law of Genre". It asks whether texts like "Envois" repay critical scrutiny which speaks of a-genericity and multi-genericity, and assesses their implications for the future of literature and literary criticism.peer-reviewe

The Implications of New Historicism for Evangelical Bible Interpretation: An Evaluation

The twentieth century has seen a rise in recognizing the Bible not only as historical or theological work but also as a piece of literature, and the natural progression of this idea is to apply the same methods used for literary texts to the biblical text. However, many movements in literary studies seem antithetical to evangelical ideas of interpretation, as the goal of evangelical interpretation is always to find God’s intended meaning for the text. This thesis will explore the features of one literary theory, New Historicism, as presented in Practicing New Historicism, and ask if this theory can be made compatible with evangelical presuppositions, or even offer any unique insights for biblical interpretation

HUNGER AND WAITING IN THIRD WORLD LITERATURE

Using colonial discourse and post-colonial theory as a point of reference, this article takes a look at colonialism as experienced in the so-called third world and see how the experience has helped shaped the literary production of the countries and people so colonized. The study examines the British idea of 'Empire' and the colonial enterprise in a selected range of 20th-century texts, in an attempt to understand how imperialism affected literary texts produced in some former colonies particularly those in Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America. Texts to be considered in this study include: Marquez’s No One Writes to the Colonel, Enroll John’s Moon on a Rainbow Shawl and Marechera’s House of Hunger. The study will be viewing a literature characterized by elements of the fantastic woven into the story. A literature that scrutinizes society to its basis by examining the postcolonial hangover, a literary trend that separates the literature of the “subject” from the literature of the “other

Kundera and Ionesco on the Unmistakable Awareness of Being Minor

Deleuze and Guattari’s 1975 text, Kafka, pour une littérature mineure, posited a theory concerning some groups of literary texts including those of Franz Kafka. Their theory was nevertheless highly connected to their own historical and geographical context in France, and much less so with that of Kafka who had himself previously attempted to theorize small literatures. By looking at the context of Kafka and of two other writers who might be considered as belonging to minor literary contexts, I argue that theorists of minor literature tend to view minor literature in a positive way when their own cultural context is further from nation-state building. On the other hand, those writers who are writing from inside nation-building contexts tend to emphasize minor literature’s limits on literary production. Interestingly, Milan Kundera and Eugene Ionesco who had first-hand experience of nation-building contexts, but then moved to France and wrote in French, take more nuanced views of minor literatures as they are further removed in time and space from their original minor contexts

\u3cem\u3eFrankenstein\u3c/em\u3e, Feminism, and Literary Theory

Cave ab homine unius libri, as the Latin epigram warns us: beware the author of one book. Frankenstein has so overshadowed Mary Shelley\u27s other books in the popular imagination that many readers believe - erroneously - that she is a one-book author. While this is decidedly not the case, Frankenstein has figured more importantly in the development of feminist literary theory than perhaps any other novel, with the possible exception of Charlotte Bronte\u27s Jane Eyre. This essay will discuss the major feminist literary interpretations of the novel, beginning with Ellen Moers\u27s landmark reading in Literary Women and then move to the more recent approaches taken by critics engaged in post-colonial theory, cultural studies, queer theory, and disability studies. In the process we will explore the provocative claim made by Fred Botting, who noted, Frankenstein is a product of criticism, not a work of literature

BOOK REVIEW OF ONE NIGHT WITH PRINCE CHARMING WRITTEN BY ANNA DEPALO

According to Wellek and Warren (1976: 94) in Theory of Literature, literature represents life and life is, in large measure, a social reality, even though the natural word and the inner or subjective world of the individual have also been objects of literary ‘imitation'. Novel is very popular among literature enthusiasts. The story within a novel usually reflects human life, so the readers will understand the moral message behind the story