To understand how an earlier text informs the reader’s understanding of a new one, I analyze the influence of Henry James's Washington Square on Hanya Yanagihara's To Paradise.
The emergence of HIV in Brazilian society challenged culturally-fundamental values, varying from institutional responses to discourses on identity politics. This paper introduces an intertextual...Show moreThe emergence of HIV in Brazilian society challenged culturally-fundamental values, varying from institutional responses to discourses on identity politics. This paper introduces an intertextual analysis of Rafael França’s enigmatic video work Prelude to an Announced Death, concluded two days prior to the artist’s own death. The artwork’s ambiguity seems to welcome potentialities of interpretations, such as that of the AIDS crisis in a 1990s Brazilian context. Considering the influence of the Catholic Church in Brazilian society, especially a Marxist strain that arose within the Church’s institution in opposition to Brazilian military dictatorship, the possibility of analysing the artwork through the lens of Catholic symbols brings attention to the practices that constituted the meaning of AIDS in 1990s Brazil. In addressing the practices that revolve around the virus, this text suggests that the (video-)text by Rafael França can be understood through a web of historical, cultural, social, amongst others, texts.Show less
Research master thesis | Asian Studies (research) (MA)
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This thesis focuses on a fluid genre of glorificatory literature called Māhātmya. I critically edit, translate, and analyze a selection of Sanskrit Māhātmyas to increase our understanding of how...Show moreThis thesis focuses on a fluid genre of glorificatory literature called Māhātmya. I critically edit, translate, and analyze a selection of Sanskrit Māhātmyas to increase our understanding of how these kinds of texts come to being and how we can understand their processes of composition and transmission. I use a fourfold typology – which in itself is a result of the research – to point out different aspects of intertextuality found in the selection of texts. Analyzing these Māhātmyas contributes to a more nuanced understanding regarding issues of textual reuse, and sheds light on the concept of authorship, especially regarding the authorless religious literature of Hinduism.Show less
In een artikel uit 1994 beschrijft de (Oost-)Duitse germanist en classicus Volker Riedel de receptie van de oudheid als “geradezu konstitutives Merkmal der Literatur […], die in der DDR entstanden...Show moreIn een artikel uit 1994 beschrijft de (Oost-)Duitse germanist en classicus Volker Riedel de receptie van de oudheid als “geradezu konstitutives Merkmal der Literatur […], die in der DDR entstanden war“: dankzij de receptie van de oudheid konden de DDR-auteurs problemen van hun eigen tijd behandelen “auf einer metaphorischen Abstraktionsebene”. In zijn artikel, waarin hij ook de ‘dood van de oudheidreceptie’ na de val van de Muur impliceert, verwijst Riedel bijna uitsluitend naar de herinterpretatie van klassieke Griekse mythen. Vooral in de jaren tachtig was er echter een ‘Romeinse tendens’ waarneembaar bij auteurs als Heiner Müller en Volker Braun: in plaats van het ‘umdeuten’ van Griekse mythen brachten deze auteurs in hun werk juist elementen uit de Romeinse oudheid naar voren. Aan de hand van voorbeelden uit het late werk van Heiner Müller en het vroege werk van Müllers bewonderaar Durs Grünbein probeert deze scriptie een antwoord te geven op de vraag naar de continuïteit van de oudheidreceptie in het werk van DDR-auteurs voor en na de val van de muur in 1989: waarom wenden Müller en Grünbein zich vooral tot de laat-Romeinse geschiedenis in een literaire omgeving waarin de receptie van Griekse mythen alomtegenwoordig is?Show less
This thesis discusses Ali Smith’s contemporary rewriting of Ovid’s Iphis myth. It will examine how the democratisation of the field of Greek and Roman classical scholarship, through an increase of...Show moreThis thesis discusses Ali Smith’s contemporary rewriting of Ovid’s Iphis myth. It will examine how the democratisation of the field of Greek and Roman classical scholarship, through an increase of female scholars working in this field and the application of concepts from feminist theory to classical texts, enabled Smith in her retelling of the Iphis myth by providing new interpretations for this myth. It will then be examined how Smith formed this new narrative by working within the scholarly framework of Judith Butler’s theories on gender and sexuality, illuminating and foregrounding the issues of gender ambiguity and same-sex relationships that are already present in the original myth. Finally, the importance of intertextuality and epigraphs in Smith’s work will also be taken into account by considering how she engages with the gender confusion and homoerotic tendencies present in Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, The Tempest, Cymbeline, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Lyly’s Gallathea, providing a literary context for her novel which she uses to support her own narrative and, sometimes, to change the cultural resonance of Elizabethan plays that deal with gender and same-sex relationships.Show less
Research master thesis | Literary Studies (research) (MA)
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Dutch Antillean writer Boeli van Leeuwen is strikingly absent in the study of Dutch postcolonial literature, despite his status as one of Dutch' most important Caribbean authors. Till this day,...Show moreDutch Antillean writer Boeli van Leeuwen is strikingly absent in the study of Dutch postcolonial literature, despite his status as one of Dutch' most important Caribbean authors. Till this day, only a few articles have been devoted to Van Leeuwen's oeuvre. In this thesis, I aim to formulate an answer to the question: in what way do Van Leeuwen's novels 'Schilden van leem' en 'Het teken van Jona' generate meaning? Why is it that 'plain facts' are insufficient to tackle these works? In my analysis I am proposing six possible readings that account for Van Leeuwen's novels that are overflowing with meaning. By studying their use of intertextuality, allegory, irony, Relation, metafiction and 'Caribbeanness,' I attempt to make the abundance productive that the reader encounters. In my conclusion I will argue that Van Leeuwen is ultimately reflecting on knowledge itself, since his writing constantly redirects the reader, without allowing a singular interpretation. The multiple voices, languages and traditions brought forth resist the monotonous and unambiguous discourse of the referential readings. Van Leeuwens fictional reality ultimately points towards itself and demonstrates the fiction hiding behind so-called plain facts.Show less
This thesis argues and explains how Blackstar and No Plan cleverly use intertextuality as a tool to explore and explain Bowie’s notions of mortality and resurrection.
This thesis explores the web-series Frankenstein, MD, an adaptation for YouTube of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein set in contemporary times. This provides the opportunity for a modern-day...Show moreThis thesis explores the web-series Frankenstein, MD, an adaptation for YouTube of Mary Shelley's Frankenstein set in contemporary times. This provides the opportunity for a modern-day interpretation of the story in which the themes of Shelley's critique on her society, the position of women in that society, the dangers of knowledge, and the idea of the 'monster' are still relevant. Although the series and its critique appears flawed, it shows that Shelley's story is still relevant today.Show less
