This thesis examines the potency of film dialogue as an articulator of fear in Robert Eggers’ The Witch (2015) and The Lighthouse (2019). Using extant studies on film dialogue as its groundwork,...Show moreThis thesis examines the potency of film dialogue as an articulator of fear in Robert Eggers’ The Witch (2015) and The Lighthouse (2019). Using extant studies on film dialogue as its groundwork, this thesis employs a close reading of the dialogue in Robert Eggers’ films. Ultimately, it argues that Eggers’ films utilise dialogue in order to articulate their contextual fears, rather than the visual language that predominates the horror genre.Show less
It is a widely known fact that monks practice abstinence. Yet, the monastic scribes of the Old English riddles had to copy lines about a man raising up clothing and thrusting with something stiff,...Show moreIt is a widely known fact that monks practice abstinence. Yet, the monastic scribes of the Old English riddles had to copy lines about a man raising up clothing and thrusting with something stiff, about a girl gripping a swollen and boneless thing, and about something by a man’s thigh that often fully fills the same hole. Unlike these lines might suggest, these riddles do not concern any unholy acts, but merely butter churning, a girl kneading dough, and a key unlocking a door. The power of riddles lies in their ability to change a mundane act or object in something so vastly different it is hardly recognisable, which makes them both a fun and mentally stimulating challenge. In Anglo-Saxon times, riddles circulated in Old English as well as in Anglo-Latin; the two Anglo-Saxon riddling traditions. The majority of current research on riddles claims that the two traditions are very similar in every aspect, except for the presence of sexual riddles. That particular subtype of riddles is said to only occur in the Old English tradition. Although the classroom, where the Anglo-Latin riddles are generally believed to be used, does not strike as a fitting place for crude jokes, some evidence of traces of possible sexual riddling have been found by Andy Orchard and Mercedes Salvador-Bello. Exploratory studies such as theirs leave room for future research, which inspired this thesis.Show less
This thesis examines how Ruth Ware's The Turn of the Key (2019), Floria Sigismondi's The Turning (2020) and Mike Flanagan's The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020) portray the governess as the true victim...Show moreThis thesis examines how Ruth Ware's The Turn of the Key (2019), Floria Sigismondi's The Turning (2020) and Mike Flanagan's The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020) portray the governess as the true victim of the story, instead of the children, as perhaps happens in Henry James's The Turn of the Screw (1898).Show less
Adaptations of alternate history scenarios allow for an exploration of contemporary issues and concerns in a distanced yet familiar world. Each chapter of this thesis covers a case study of a...Show moreAdaptations of alternate history scenarios allow for an exploration of contemporary issues and concerns in a distanced yet familiar world. Each chapter of this thesis covers a case study of a recent adaptation of such an alternate history narrative: The Man in the High Castle (2015-2019), The Plot Against America (2020) and Watchmen (2019). These case studies explore how the adaptation revises the original text in order to captivate a contemporary audience and expose present-day issues in America. Through these case studies, this thesis proposes that, rather than functioning as warnings, the alternate America settings in these adaptations function as a reflection of actual America in the late 2010s, which allows for an exploration and critique of American society’s response and susceptibility to ideological and populist movements in times of crisis, and an reconsideration of racial inequality as America’s defining issue.Show less
This thesis explores some of the different ways that scholars and authors have dealt with the Arthurian legends when working within different cultural contexts. The aim of this thesis is to analyze...Show moreThis thesis explores some of the different ways that scholars and authors have dealt with the Arthurian legends when working within different cultural contexts. The aim of this thesis is to analyze the use of Arthurian legends over time and to compare the relevance of those legends in cultures familiar with the story, such as America, and cultures less familiar with the story, such as Japan. The comparison will be aimed at shedding light on how differences in the interpretations of Arthurian legends between America and Japan reflect, or are caused by, differences in each culture’s familiarity with said legends.Show less
This thesis sheds light on Ancrene Wisse and its ties to the medieval bestiary tradition. The thesis focusses on the historical context and textual tradition of the bestiary and compares the...Show moreThis thesis sheds light on Ancrene Wisse and its ties to the medieval bestiary tradition. The thesis focusses on the historical context and textual tradition of the bestiary and compares the findings to Part Four of Ancrene Wisse, which includes the section on the beasts of sin. By comparing the portayal of animals in both Ancrene Wisse and various bestiaries, this thesis explores the extent to which the popular genre of bestiaries might have influenced the form and function of the beasts of sin found in Ancrene Wisse.Show less
In royal (self-)representation, one recurring symbol is that of the phoenix. Symbolizing eternal life and hermaphroditism, the phoenix is connected to the theories of the body politic and the body...Show moreIn royal (self-)representation, one recurring symbol is that of the phoenix. Symbolizing eternal life and hermaphroditism, the phoenix is connected to the theories of the body politic and the body theatrical. The phoenix was used as a symbol by both male monarchs, such as James VI & I (1566-1625), Louis XIII (1601-1643), and Louis XIV (1638-1715), and female monarchs such as Elizabeth I (1533-1603) and Christina of Sweden (1626-1689). Elizabeth I’s use of the phoenix symbol is generally understood to refer to perpetual renewal and eternity,1 whereas Christina of Sweden’s use of the phoenix symbol is interpreted as a reference to hermaphroditism and the dual-gendered body politic. Scholarship on the French kings connects the phoenix symbolism to contemporary (political) anxieties over monarchial succession. To date, no systematic study has been made of the phoenix symbol as an expression of monarchial succession anxiety in early modern English society. This is curious, since the English monarchy has seen quite a number of problematic successions since the death of Henry VIII in 1547 and throughout the seventeenth century. The last decades of the reign of Elizabeth I, who died childless in 1603, is known to have caused succession anxiety. Therefore, this thesis aims to fill this gap in scholarship by performing a quantitative as well as a qualitative analysis of the occurrence of phoenix symbolism in early modern English literature and art, with an emphasis on the symbol’s use as an expression of succession anxiety. For the study of the occurrence of the phoenix symbol in early modern English literature, the Early English Books Online (EEBO) database has been used. A search on EEBO for the keyword ‘phoenix’ yielded 5810 hits in 2768 records/documents. The search results were manually sorted, excluding documents referring to the Elizabethan frigat ‘Phoenix’ and the Phoenix Theatre in Drury Lane, London. Ultimately, 2474 documents containing phoenix symbolism were identified (listed in Appendix A), of which 270 documents directly refer to either a monarch or to royal succession (listed in Appendix B). These results have been visualized in the graphs depicted throughout this thesis in order to clarify my arguments. For the qualitative analysis the most interesting and noteworthy EEBO search results have been selected for analysis. The quantitative and qualitative analyses presented in this thesis reveal that the phoenix symbol can be considered an expression of anxieties over succession. The phoenix symbol is not only used as a universal symbol of the monarchy, but also often served to specifically invoke the memory of the persona ficta and the (posthumously mythologised) reign of Queen Elizabeth I. Instead of being a general symbol of royalty, the phoenix symbol in early modern English society was often used to signify Queen Elizabeth I or her reign, which was hailed as the Golden Age as part of the rhetoric of nostalgia as well as her posthumous memorial cult. This strong connection to Elizabeth I caused the use of the phoenix symbol to soar in the first half of the seventeenth century. Ironically, this strong connection is also the main reason for the symbol’s downfall at the end of the century. Moreover, the Scientific Revolution and the demythologisation of the monarchy caused royal symbolism in general to lose its significance and its meaning by the start of the eighteenth century. The rise and fall of the phoenix symbol, spanning from the mid-sixteenth until the early eighteenth century, mirrors these socio-political developments.Show less
