Tesis sobre el tema "French Literature – 17th Century – History and crit"

Consacrée à « La réception dix-septièmiste des Fables de La Fontaine. Entre histoire, critiques et théories », la thèse réalisée s'articule autour d'une réflexion tâchant, au-delà de l'analyse de la réception historique de l'œuvre, d'effectuer, dans le cadre d'une présentation thématiquement organisée, la synthèse des discours tenus par les différents spécialistes de l'auteur s'étant, jusqu'à présent, intéressés au cas d'une réception hors norme. Après être revenue en détail sur la manière dont les Fables se sont édifiées comme chef d'œuvre et comment celles-ci ont d'emblée été construites comme monumentales par leur propre époque (1668-1700), nos travaux considèrent les différentes théories développées concernant leur réception en fonction des grands objets qui ont, jusqu'à présent, retenu l'attention de la recherche contemporaine. Pour ce faire, nous avons colligé un très grand nombre d'observations et de théories éparses que nous avons pris soin d'organiser en fonction de différents aperçus thématiques s'attachant à reprendre et à faire méthodiquement dialoguer chacune des réponses critiques apportées aux principaux questionnements que l'œuvre semble poser du point de sa réception. En revenant sur les principales découvertes de la critique dix-septièmiste concernant cette réception, nous voulions, dans le cadre d'une réflexion thématiquement problématisée autour de cette notion, offrir au lecteur un aperçu synthétique lui permettant de faire le point sur les principaux acquis de la recherche contemporaine. Pensé comme un véritable usuel de la critique lafontainienne, notre thèse se donne donc pour vocation d'enquêter sur la réception historique de l'œuvre tout en tâchant d'élargir la perspective dans le cadre d'une synthèse nuancée se plaisant à suivre, une à une, les grandes voies ouvertes par une critique qui, face à un extraordinaire succès, s'est, à bien des égards, attelée à poser la question de la réception et de la lecture de l'œuvre avant de tenter d'y apporter quelques réponses
Dedicated to “The seventeenth-century reception of La Fontaine's Fables: history, criticism and theories”, this thesis will partly aim to analyze the historical reception of the work during the seventeenth-century. Nonetheless, the dissertation will mainly try, in the form of a thematically organized presentation, to do the synthesis of various speeches suggested by specialists of the author, interested in the case of an unusual reception. To this end, this work will, first of all, comment on how the Fables were built, by their own time (1668-1700), as a masterpiece. But, then, it will mainly consider the different theories developed regarding their reception. For this purpose, we collected a large number of scattered observations and theories that we then took care to organize according to different thematic overviews, trying to methodically create a dialogue between each of the critical answers given to the main questions that the Fables seem to ask from the point of their reception. By considering the main discoveries of the seventeenth-century critics concerning the Fables‘ reception, we wanted, in the form of a thematically problematized reflection, to provide the reader with a brief overview of the main achievements of contemporary research. In summary, this thesis, thought as a basic reference of the La Fontaine's critic, will aim to investigate the historical reception of the work while trying to broaden the perspective to a nuanced synthesis considering, one by one, the broad lines opened by a critic who, in the face of an extraordinary success, has, in many ways, endeavored to ask the question of the work's reception before trying to provide some answers. According to this project, the analyze will be conducted based on the large objects that have, until now, held the attention of contemporary research

During the 17th and 18th centuries, the French garden history witnesses the triumph and then the decline of the French formal garden, to which succeeds the fashion of landscape gardening of foreign inspiration. Integrating and nourishing this debate, the literary texts of that period enable to grasp the stakes that it brings up. The garden notably lends itself to the expression of an emerging sentiment of nature, as well it also serves that of a political thought enlightened by new ideas. Effectively, the treatment that these texts give to the garden is a witness to the revival that installs itself in the way of conceiving nature, and the relation that nature holds with man and the art of the gardens. The garden's topic and scenography are a testimony of changes that in turn affect its imaginary and that of the walk. Finally, the critical discourse exploits the analogy that establishes itself between the art of the gardens and the exercise of power, polarizing the debate around the political metaphor.

This thesis explores the first English translations of Molière's works published between 1663 and 1732 by writers that include John Dryden, Edward Ravenscroft, Aphra Behn, and Henry Fielding. It challenges the idea that the translators straightforwardly plagiarized the French plays and instead argues that their work demonstrates engagement with the dramatic impact and satirical drive of the source texts. It asks how far the process of anglicization required careful examination of the plays' initial French national context. The first part of the thesis presents three fundamental angles of interrogation addressing how the translators dealt with the form of the dramatic works according to theoretical and practical principles. It considers translators' responses to conventions of plot formation, translation methods, and prosody. The chapters are underpinned by comparative assessments of contextual theoretical writings in French and English in order to examine the plays in the light of the evolving theatrical tastes and literary practices occasioned by cross-Channel communication. The second part takes an alternative approach to assessing the earliest translations of Molière. Its four chapters are based on close analysis of culturally significant lexical terms which evoke comically contentious social themes. This enquiry charts the changes in translation-choices over the decades covered by the thesis corpus. The themes addressed, however, were relevant throughout the period in both France and England: marital discord caused by anxieties surrounding cuckoldry and gallantry, the problems of zealous religious ostentation, the dubious professional standing of medical practitioners, and bourgeois social pretension. This part assesses how the key terms in translation were chosen to resonate within the new semantic fields in English, a target language which was coming into close contact with new French terms.

Three original stories are the basis for our study of rewriting during the French Ancien Regime: the story of Thibaud de la Jacquiere, that of the "sorcier Gaufridy" and that of the Marquise de Ganges, which Sade will rewrite as a novel. Having all originated from a "canard", they appear in the 1679 edition of the Histoires tragiques of Francois de Rosset, and two of them can also be found in Francois Gayot de Pitaval's Causes celebres. Each of these stories was rewritten by different authors at least three times. Using Gerard Genette's theory of the narrative, we will analyse the processes of transformation that the rewriting operates in the text, as well as the changes it imposes to its original meaning. The number of rewritings of each text---up to five for the Marquise de Gange---is a testament to the importance of textual reappropriation as much as it shows the relevance of a study which brings to light the role of rewriting in the survival of these stories.

Orientador: Carlos Eduardo Ornelas Berriel
Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem
Made available in DSpace on 2018-10-02T19:50:58Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Ribeiro_AnaClaudiaRomano_D.pdf: 462497191 bytes, checksum: 95a1bcb4a0a455fe962de04edb99c491 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2010
Conteudo: v.1. Estudo ; v.2. Tradução
Resumo: Analisar e traduzir La Terre Australe connue são os objetivos desta tese de doutorado. Segundo "G. de F", narrador do prefácio, La Terre Australe connue é a tradução do relato da viagem de Nicolas Sadeur ao último continente ainda desconhecido no século XVII, chamado nos mapas da época de terra australis incógnita, um lugar aprazível, habitado e totalmente planejado - em todos os seus aspectos - por hermafroditas perfeitamente racionais. Este pseudodocumento é uma utopia literária que foi, em realidade, escrita por Gabriel de Foigny e publicada em Genebra, em 1676, sob falso nome de editor e de cidade. O trabalho está dividido em dois volumes. O volume 1 é dedicado à análise da obra e contém dois capítulos principais. O primeiro trata da definição da utopia como gênero literário partindo do texto paradigmático de Thomas Morus, A Utopia. No segundo capítulo, apresento uma biografia de Gabriel de Foigny, faço uma revisão bibliográfica da crítica já publicada sobre sua utopia para, em seguida, desenvolver minha interpretação da figura do hermafrodita como alegoria da hibridização 1) do poder real absoluto, 2) do Estado absolutista e 3) do panorama religioso francês desta época. Passo em seguida à análise da figura do hermafrodita tal como ela é descrita pelo autor, percebendo que ela se insere na tradição menipéia e luciânica. Na parte seguinte, estudo outros temas relevantes para a compreensão desta utopia: a questão religiosa no capítulo VI ("Da religião dos austrais"), a ciência e a técnica na Terra Austral, o prefácio e o narrador-editor, a temática das línguas e da tradução nesta utopia e, por fim, o libertinismo. Um apêndice é dedicado ao estudo das fontes gregas da utopia. No volume 2 está a tradução para o português, organizada numa edição bilíngue acompanhada de notas.
Abstract: The aim of this doctoral thesis is to analyze and translate La Terre Australe connue. According to "G. de F. ", the narrator of the preface, La Terre Australe connue is the translation of Nicolas Sadeur's voyage account to the last continent still unknown in the 17th Century, called terra australis incognita on the maps of the period, an inhabited place, in all aspects pleasing and totally planned by perfectly rational hermaphrodites. This pseudodocument is a literary Utopia. It was, in fact, written by Gabriel Foigny and published in Geneva in 1676, under a false name of city and editor. The work is divided into two volumes. Volume 1 is dedicated to the analysis of the text and contains two main chapters. The first one deals with the definition of Utopia as a literary genre starting from the paradigmatic text of Thomas More, Utopia. The second brings a biography of Gabriel de Foigny, a review of the published criticism about his Utopia with the purpose of, afterwards, presenting my personal reading of it, based on the figure of the hermaphrodite as an allegory of the hybridization of 1) the absolute royal power, 2) the absolutist state and 3) the religious panorama of 17th Century France. I examine, then, the figure of the hermaphrodite as it is described by the author, observing that it continues the menippean and lucianic tradition. After that, I study other relevant subjects to the understanding of this Utopia: the religious question in Chapter VI ("The religion of the Southern"), science and technology in the Southern Land, the preface and the narrator-editor, the thematics of language and translation in this Utopia and, eventually, the philosophical libertinism. An appendix is devoted to the study of Greek sources of Utopia. In volume 2 we present the Portuguese translation, organized in a bilingual edition, accompanied by notes.
Doutorado
Historia e Historiografia Literaria
Doutor em Teoria e História Literária

L’étude du conte de fées de 1690 à 1789, période de la mode du genre en France, montre que la matière merveilleuse s’est constituée dès ses débuts avec des éléments de pratiques lettrées transposés du réel mais aussi et surtout transformés de manière fantaisiste. Les premiers conteurs (1690-1704) érigent en effet le genre selon une poétique complexe mariant l’oralité des temps naïfs et l’écrit, signe d’une pratique sociale et culturelle du conte. Les conteurs suivants en apportent des infléchissements plus parodiques, des imitations et des variations notamment orientalisantes. L’ensemble des auteurs est concerné mais à des degrés divers, Perrault, Choisy et Fénelon étant moins prolixes en la matière que Madame d’Aulnoy, Pétis de la Croix ou le chevalier de Mailly.Le pays merveilleux dévoile ses arcanes, son secret de fabrication métatextuelle à travers des scènes plus ou moins fugaces de lecture, d’écriture et d’évocations de bibliothèques féériques
The study of the fairy tale over the years 1690-1789, when the genre was in fashion in France, shows that, from its inception, the subject matter grew up with elements of realistic literary practice which were largely reshaped by imagination. The first storytellers (1690-1704) set up the literary genre according to a complex poetics allying the orality of naive times with literacy, which is the mark of a social and cultural practice of the story. The contributions of the forthcoming storytellers are imitations, parodies or are tinged with Orientalism. All the writers are affected, but to varying degrees: Perrault, Choisy and Fénelon are less inventive in this respect than Madame d’Aulnoy, Pétis de la Croix or the Chevalier de Mailly. The wonderland reveals its mysteries and the secret of its metatextual layout through more or less fleeting scenes of book reading or writing conjuring up a magical library

L’influence littéraire exercée par l'Espagne du Siècle d’or sur la France du premier XVIIe siècle est liée à un ample mouvement éditorial. Cette thèse, qui associe histoire du livre et histoire littéraire, étudie les traductions françaises de textes espagnols qui ont circulé en France entre 1600 et 1660 – traductions qui concernent des textes de toute nature (religieux, littéraires, scientifiques, techniques...). Pour évaluer l’ampleur de ce mouvement éditorial, une enquête bibliométrique est d’abord réalisée. Elle permet de reconstituer l’histoire de cette diffusion par l’imprimé. On identifie les principaux foyers de production et on examine la production des officines de librairie engagées dans ce marché. L’analyse se porte ensuite sur l’activité de traduction elle-même, dans la diversité de ses pratiques. Les profils des principaux traducteurs d’espagnol en français sont distingués : le traducteur professionnel, l’amateur éclairé, l’imprimeur, le religieux, le médecin etc. Une attention particulière est accordée aux hommes de lettres qui tentent de concilier un travail de plume mal considéré avec leurs ambitions littéraires. Les pratiques des traducteurs sont enfin cernées par l’analyse des textes et de leur « mise en livre », en comparant différentes traductions (concurrentes ou successives) d’un même texte. Les motivations diverses de ces versions et la spécificité de chaque projet d’écriture et de publication sont ainsi cernées. Portant sur un large pan de la production écrite en français souvent délaissé par l'histoire littéraire, ce travail sur la pénétration de la culture espagnole en France et sur le monde des traducteurs interroge aussi la relation entre écriture et publication, et sur le rôle de « l’éditorial » dans la construction de l’autorité littéraire
The literary influence exercised by Golden Age Spain on France in the first half of the 17th century is related to a very considerable mass of editorial activity. This thesis, which combines the history of the book and literary history, studies French translations of Spanish texts which circulated in France between 1600 and 1660 - translations concerning texts of all kinds (religious, literary, scientific, technical, etc.).In order to evaluate this editorial activity, a bibliometric enquiry must first be carried out. This enquiry allows us to reconstitute the history of of the circulation of this material in print. The principal centres of production are identified and the production of the workshops of the booksellers’ operating in this market are examined. The analysis then shifts to the activity of translation itself, in all its diversity. The profiles of the different principal translators from Spanish to French are laid out: the professional translator, the enlightened amateur, the printer, the cleric, the physician, etc. Particular attention is paid to men of letters who attempt to conciliate what is perceived as lowly hackwork with their literary ambitions. Finally, the translators’ practices themselves are the object of study, through comparison, using textual analysis as well as examining questions of format and layout, of different (concurrent or successive) translations of the same text. Account is thus made of the diverse motivations of these versions and the specificity of each writing project and publication. Taking as its base a large swathe of writing produced in French often neglected by literary history, this study of the penetration of Spanish culture in France and of the world of translators looks anew at the relation between writing and publication, as well as at the editorial role in the construction of literary legitimacy

L’Astrée d’Honoré d’Urfé marqua à divers titres le roman de la première moitié du XVIIe siècle. Non seulement cette œuvre ouvrait la voie aux vastes fictions héroïques de Gomberville ou de Scudéry, mais elle apparaissait également comme un modèle de composition parvenant à unir, au sein d’un unique roman, une matière hétéroclite. La complexité de L’Astrée est donc tout autant thématique que structurelle :les traditions pastorale et chevaleresque s’entremêlent et le récit principal est sans cesse interrompu par des narrations secondes prises en charge par les personnages mêmes de la diégèse. Cependant, le récit n’en forme pas moins un ensemble unifié ;d’ailleurs, il fut d’emblée reçu comme un roman et non comme un recueil de nouvelles. C’est pourquoi, nous avons désiré étudier le « système » que l’auteur met en place afin d’unifier l’œuvre aussi bien au niveau de la forme qu’au niveau du contenu. Pour y parvenir, nous avons établi une description complète des structures narratives de L’Astrée via une observation narratologique qui s’attache tantôt à rechercher dans différentes traditions littéraires les éléments de structure faisant sens dans le roman d’Urfé, tantôt à cartographier la mécanique narrative qui régit la progression des nombreux fils du récit. Ensuite, d’un point de vue davantage thématique, nous avons souhaité mettre au jour divers mécanismes – dont les variations sur le thème de la perte et du regret – qui assurent au roman une unité quant à sa matière foisonnante. Par ces analyses, nous espérons éclairer le fonctionnement d’un roman-clé de l’histoire, qui posa les premiers jalons de la modernité romanesque.
Doctorat en Langues et lettres
info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

This study examines the constructions and uses of the figure of Ovid in French writing of the second half of the seventeenth century, and explores how they were modulated by contemporary aesthetic and cultural concerns. As the influence of Ovid’s poetry made itself felt in various ways – in the mythopoeia of the Sun-King and the fashionable galant salons – interest in the story of Ovid’s life blossomed. This, I argue, was facilitated by new forms of ‘life-writing’, the nouvelle historique and histoire galante, and fuelled in unexpected ways by the escalating querelle des Anciens et des Modernes. Research has been done on the reception and influence of Ovid’s poetry in this period, but little attention has been paid to the figure of Ovid. This thesis offers a new perspective and, informed by recent renewed interest in life-writing, argues that analysis of biographical depictions is vital for establishing a coherent picture of the uses of Ovid in the ‘Grand Siècle’. I explore a diverse range of textual descriptions of Ovid (Vies; prefatory material attached to translations and editions of his work; correspondence; dialogues des morts; biographical dictionaries and historical novels), organized according to their different, though intersecting, ways of writing about this poet. He was constructed as a historical figure, an author, a fictional character and a ‘parallèle’ – a point of identification or contrast for contemporary writers. Through close analysis of a multi-authored corpus, this thesis identifies and examines two instances of paradox: though an ancient poet, Ovid became emblematic of 'Moderne' movements and was used to explore aspects of galanterie; and, though his creative work was mobilized in the service of royal propaganda, Ovid, as a figure for the exiled poet, was also used to express anxieties about the sway of power and the machinations and pitfalls of the world of the court.

Dès la fin du XVIIe siècle, Corneille, Racine et Molière se voient attribuer une supériorité indiscutable sur l’ensemble des autres dramaturges contemporains. Cette hiérarchie dont l’histoire littéraire actuelle a hérité continue à nous faire admettre comme une évidence la précellence accordée à ce trio de « classiques » et les études consacrées aux auteurs dits « mineurs » interrogent rarement le statut d’auteur « majeur ». Nous avons souhaité étudier le processus d’élaboration du statut de grand dramaturge. Cette thèse met ainsi en lumière les différents aspects et manifestations de cette construction, dont elle retrace les étapes du vivant des auteurs — des années 1640 à 1680 —, tout en identifiant les facteurs permettant de comprendre pourquoi ces trois dramaturges bénéficièrent d’un tel statut, au détriment de leurs confrères et concurrents. Ce travail observe ensuite l’immédiate postérité de nos auteurs — des années 1670 à 1720 —, afin de montrer comment la hiérarchisation et la classification à l’œuvre dans le double processus de majoration et de minoration desdramaturges posent les bases de l’histoire du théâtre français. Pour comprendre la constitution du panthéon des grands dramaturges, nous analysons les mécanismes d’écriture de l’histoire du théâtre dit « classique » et faisons émerger le processus de mythification qui préside à l’apparition de la « triade sacrée » Corneille- Racine-Molière. Nous expliquons alors comment l’histoire du théâtre français s’écrit à la gloire de ces auteurs, à partir et autour de leurs trois figures, classicisées et transformées en symboles du « siècle de Louis XIV »
From the late 17th century, Corneille, Racine and Molière are given an undeniable superiority over all other contemporary playwrights. This hierarchy, from which current literary history has inherited, continues to make us consider the pre-eminence granted to this “classical” trio as obvious and the studies devoted to the so-called “minor” authors rarely question the “major” author status. Our goal has been to study the elaboration process of the great playwright status. Thus, this PhD thesis highlights the different aspects and manifestations of this construction, retracing its stages during the authors’ lifetime — from the 1640s to the 1680s — while identifiying the factors allowing to understand why these three playwrights were given such a status, at the detriment of their colleagues and competitors. Moreover, this work studies our authors’ immediate posterity — from the 1670s to the 1720s — in order to show how the hierarchy and classification at work in the “majoration” and “minoration” process lay the foundation of French theater history. To understand how the great playwrights’ pantheon was built, we analyze the writing mechanisms of “classical” theater history and bring out the process of mythification that leads to the birth of the “sacred triad” Corneille-Racine-Molière. We then explain how the French theater history is written in praise of these authors, from and around their three figures, classicized and converted into symbols of “the age of Louis XIV”

Cette thèse remet en question le soupçon pesant sur les catégories de « classique » et « classicisme ». Centrales dans les manuels, ces notions sont pourtant renvoyées par les spécialistes à de purs anachronismes, et jugées impertinentes pour caractériser le XVIIe siècle et sa littérature. Marqués par la rhétorique et la sociologie historique, les travaux actuels écartent l’opposition idéologique entre classicisme et modernité. Mais l’analyse de l’antagonisme chez Barthes, et l’étude des querelles impliquant les Classiques de 1898 à 1966, permettent de donner un contenu inattendu au classicisme, très éloigné de l’irénisme dont on l’a accusé.La notion, son antonyme et ses parasynonymes (antimodernisme et post-classicisme) circonscrivent d’abord, pour la littérature, différents « régimes d’historicité » dont débattent les polémistes. Le terme reste également associé à l’élaboration d’un « dispositif » utopique, où écrire, critiquer et enseigner iraient de pair : cette configuration, essentielle au XVIIe siècle, est sans cesse « remise sur le métier » dans les querelles postérieures entre Anciens et Modernes. De 1666 à 1694, semblent surgir en réalité la plupart des questions que les critiques continueront de poser à la littérature. C’est le cas, notamment, chez Barthes, Gide et Valéry, quand ils cherchent à en déterminer les fonctions et les prérogatives. Parce que le concept d’autonomie n’est pas pour eux détaché de toute exemplarité, il s’avère utile, bien qu’anachronique, pour lire les textes du XVIIe siècle. L’art de la « disponibilité », que Barthes reconnaissait chez Racine, serait alors l’autre nom de la littérarité, le nom d’une littérarité autre – non formaliste – que les Classiques auraient bel et bien inventée et qui autoriserait leur lecture « vivante, concernée »
This dissertation interrogates the scepticism that falls on the categories of “classics” and “classicism”. Though they are considered key concepts in textbooks, these notions are viewed by many specialists as pure anachronisms, and declared irrelevant in defining the 17th century and its literature. Drawing influences from rhetoric and historical sociology, recent work dismisses the ideological divide between classicism and modernity, but an analysis of this opposition in Barthes’s corpus, supported by a study of the quarrels involving the Classics from 1898 to 1966, endows classicism with an unheralded substance, far from the irenicism for which it has been condemned. The notion of classicism, its antonym, and its parasynonyms (anti-modernism and post-classicism) first and foremost delineate, as far as literature is concerned, different regimes of historicity that are debated by the polemicists. The term ‘classicism’ is continuously associated with the establishment of a utopian apparatus within which writing, criticism and teaching go hand in hand. This blueprint was essential in the 17th century and is revisited again and again in the subsequent quarrels between Ancients and Moderns. In fact, most of the questions that critics continue to ask literature seem to arise between 1666 and 1694. Case in point, Barthes, Gide and Valéry all sought answers to these age-old questions in their attempts to determine both the functions and the prerogatives of literature. According to them, the concept of autonomy in literature cannot be separated from exemplarity. Thus, it proves useful, although anachronistic, in the reading of 17th-century texts. The art of “availability”, which Barthes recognized in the works of Racine, would then be the other name of literariness, a distinct – non formalist – literariness that the Classics have invented which allows their “vital, concerned” reading

L’étude du conte de fées de 1690 à 1789, période de la mode du genre en France, montre que la matière merveilleuse s’est constituée dès ses débuts avec des éléments de pratiques lettrées transposés du réel mais aussi et surtout transformés de manière fantaisiste. Les premiers conteurs (1690-1704) érigent en effet le genre selon une poétique complexe mariant l’oralité des temps naïfs et l’écrit, signe d’une pratique sociale et culturelle du conte. Les conteurs suivants en apportent des infléchissements plus parodiques, des imitations et des variations notamment orientalisantes. L’ensemble des auteurs est concerné mais à des degrés divers, Perrault, Choisy et Fénelon étant moins prolixes en la matière que Madame d’Aulnoy, Pétis de la Croix ou le chevalier de Mailly.Le pays merveilleux dévoile ses arcanes, son secret de fabrication métatextuelle à travers des scènes plus ou moins fugaces de lecture, d’écriture et d’évocations de bibliothèques féériques
The study of the fairy tale over the years 1690-1789, when the genre was in fashion in France, shows that, from its inception, the subject matter grew up with elements of realistic literary practice which were largely reshaped by imagination. The first storytellers (1690-1704) set up the literary genre according to a complex poetics allying the orality of naive times with literacy, which is the mark of a social and cultural practice of the story. The contributions of the forthcoming storytellers are imitations, parodies or are tinged with Orientalism. All the writers are affected, but to varying degrees: Perrault, Choisy and Fénelon are less inventive in this respect than Madame d’Aulnoy, Pétis de la Croix or the Chevalier de Mailly. The wonderland reveals its mysteries and the secret of its metatextual layout through more or less fleeting scenes of book reading or writing conjuring up a magical library