Articoli di riviste sul tema "Regret – fiction"

Abstract Scholars addressing the conflict between Elizabeth Gaskell and her editor Charles Dickens during the serialization of North and South tend to focus on her resistance to his heavy editorial hand or his chagrin at her less suspenseful style. This essay turns instead to their shared tendency to refer to fictional works-in-progress as alive yet mortal—a guiding metaphor that shapes the novel's morbid concluding themes. Dickens, as editor, understood what he called the “vitality” of Gaskell's fiction in terms of sustained readership, while Gaskell sensed that “Margaret”—both her protagonist and her eponymously named manuscript—lived in some way, and could therefore die should the novel fail artistically. These themes color the novel's conclusion, where we find not only the flaws that prompted Gaskell's fears of failure, but also a series of morbid meditations as the protagonist anticipates deathbed retrospection and regret. This study of Dickens and Gaskell's joint investment in the “life” and “death” of fiction, together with Margaret's morbid meditations and desire for atonement, allows us to read in North and South a collaborative yet contested meditation on the anticipated ends of serial fiction.

Abstract Scholars addressing the conflict between Elizabeth Gaskell and her editor Charles Dickens during the serialization of North and South tend to focus on her resistance to his heavy editorial hand or his chagrin at her less suspenseful style. This essay turns instead to their shared tendency to refer to fictional works-in-progress as alive yet mortal—a guiding metaphor that shapes the novel's morbid concluding themes. Dickens, as editor, understood what he called the “vitality” of Gaskell's fiction in terms of sustained readership, while Gaskell sensed that “Margaret”—both her protagonist and her eponymously named manuscript—lived in some way, and could therefore die should the novel fail artistically. These themes color the novel's conclusion, where we find not only the flaws that prompted Gaskell's fears of failure, but also a series of morbid meditations as the protagonist anticipates deathbed retrospection and regret. This study of Dickens and Gaskell's joint investment in the “life” and “death” of fiction, together with Margaret's morbid meditations and desire for atonement, allows us to read in North and South a collaborative yet contested meditation on the anticipated ends of serial fiction.

Résumé Poser la question de la sexuation du discours en bordure du réel impos-sessible, dans le hors-champ de la différence et non dans le champ des différences, même sexuelles, telles est l'ambition de cet article qui voudrait saisir le sujet d'énonciation dans l'aliénation qui le traverse et l'expulse hors des lieux dits de son identité, dans l'espace métapborisant de sa fiction. Dans le récit-fleuve que sont Les Voyageries de Victor-Lévy Beaulieu, l'auteure essaie de lire -le désenchantement' du " si pauvre Abel- dont l'écriture semble se conjuguer au futur antérieur, tout entière entre regret et promesse, en plein coeur du désir.

Intizar Hussain was a fiction writer with a novel use of symbolic and metaphorical styles, but for all his retrospect and escapism and denial of the future, his writings have a strange poignancy and beauty. It has the same charm one feels in old buildings on moonlit nights. Besides being a respected name in Urdu fiction, he was a great challenge to the pioneer fiction writers due to his style and changing tones. The atmosphere of his writings echoes the stories of the past. Regret, rememberance of past , love of the classics, nostalgia for the past, lamenting the past and seeking refuge in tradition are very prominent here. In many places, the style and tone become harsh in expressing the sadness and expression of the disintegration of the old values ​​and the superficial and sentimental nature of the new values. He also made the mythological trend a part of his writings. Extensive study is also required to find out the mysteries of their legends. A special kind of tension regarding migration is ongoing with Intizar Hussain. He could not logically separate himself from this situation. He was not interested in the external structure of life, but he cared about the condition that was faced inwardly. This is the deep diving and stylistic diversity of Intar Hussain. But they also call it intellectual and visual backwardness. In such a case, they declare the moral struggle of the individual as meaningless. This thematic and stylistic level is where Intizar Hussain seems to enter the foreground of fiction.

Abstract Old people have always figured in literature, but the unprecedented and worldwide growth of longevity in the twentieth century has triggered new fictional approaches to the topic of aging. Thus, since the late 1980 s, an ever growing number of established British writers, reaching their own advanced years, have written on age from an insider’s perspective, creating old main characters and focusing on their mental and physical experiences. I have examined six of such novels, published between 1986 and 2019, trying to find out how the authors construct their heroes’ and heroines’ aging selves by imagining their attitudes to certain central issues like time, death, physical decay and human relationships. Of the classical formative categories (gender, class, ethnicity, etc.) gender has proved to be the most essential, especially when it comes to the perspectives on time. While the view of heroes created by male writers remains fixed on the past, often with nostalgia, sometimes with regret, the women authors’ heroines focus on their present situation with a view to the future, represented by children and grandchildren. Class turned out to be a second important category: the (uncontemplated) safe middle-class position of all protagonists appears as an indispensable precondition for the free choice of attitude to the challenges of aging.

During the Sangam age, both male and female poets sang about the situations of women. The thoughts and understandings of women by the male poets are different. The female body songs of the male poets are shown as attractive and for the sake of lust. It is the same that can be seen in the songs of the female poets with a great deal of regret. This article attempts to explain these points. Titled ‘Pen Udal Mozhi (Female Body Language)’, which is known through the songs of Natrinai Avvaiyar, this article explains the information about the body language of a woman in Natrinai, one of the Ettutthokai books (The Eight Anthologies) of Sangam literature. Only four poems of a female poet, Avvaiyar, have been explained in the preface along with the songs of some male poets, feminist thought in Sangam literature, interpretation of body language, eight primary elements of body language, the body language of women, body language, organ welfare fiction, women and makeup, the destruction of organ welfare, conclusion, sub-book list, etc. In this article, it is explained that only the concepts spoken about the woman's body are body language.

Brexit, as seen from the present perspective, is seemingly a success story. Taking into account a myriad of voices expressed in the public domain over the past few years, it is legitimate to make a cautious claim that some of the expectations people shared before/during the referendum have been inflated and deflated in the post-plebiscite reality. In 2016, across the majority that voted for the divorce, a growing consensus on the soundness and solidity of pro-Leave arguments about Britain being in crisis was seen. The proponents of change had endorsed the policy of restoring a sense of national dignity. That mode of reasoning, though still present within current “British” mindsets, has been confronted with the “unplanned” turbulence of national (re) adjustment. The whole process of bidding farewell to the European Union has led to sentiments of uncertainty/anxiety/regret, rather than to the anticipated sense of satisfaction/relief. Therefore, it seems both vital and interesting to juxtapose the passion about restoring people’s trust in Britishness/Englishness, and its “exceptionality” with more sobering projections of a new post-Brexit world. In order to discuss the consequences of this self-inflicted condition, I will here elaborate on selected English literary texts. They feature authors who draw conclusions running parallel to Anderson’s assumptions that in times of crisis a general predilection for self-deluding (re)constructions of collective identity can be observed, which are variously expressed in a merely referential, subversive or satirical manner.

Many abstract concepts in modern Turkic languages are borrowed from Arabic and Persian and have free use in the language system of the Turkic peoples. The use of some emotive lexical concepts that are absent in the Turkic languages, including Kazakh, can be traced in the texts of medieval written monuments. Emotive vocabulary is widely used in the fiction of the modern Kazakh language, and in colloquial speech. Since then, emotive lexical units have become the richest lexical means of language, firmly entrenched in our vocabulary. In this regard, this article in the XIII-XIV centuries examines the features of the use of emotive vocabulary in the texts of written monuments borrowed from Arabic and Persian languages, continuity with the modern Kazakh language. In the language of monuments of artistic poetic writing that have come down to our era, the special use of emotive lexical units was used by Turkic poets to glorify Allah, preach Islam, describe the beauty of a girl and glorify relationships between people. The article classifies Arabic, Persian emotive lexical units in the texts of written monuments of the Golden Horde era within the framework of the functional and semantic field, analyzes the continuity with the modern Kazakh language. As a result of the research, the main emotive concepts on the content of written monuments are revealed. That is, the emotive concept of "love" is systematized into microconceptual models of "love", "joy", "regret".

Daniel Defoe is an enchanted incinerator of English literature sprung during the initial years of eighteenth century. His applauded Moll Flanders (1722) is professed as picaresque in literary vegetation. He has emotionally painted the commotion of a solitary, imprudent and prevalent female distinct against an inimical and droopy humanity. As a matter of datum, the female chief strolls into the alleyway of assorted catastrophes. She has borne the humanity either in an orthodox or warped mundane. All these archetypes of women have shed light in the fiction even before the initiation of feminist movements athwart the realm. These movements have engrossed the intellect of community and sedated as operational. At regular intervals, these have performed more elegant and redundant than being operative.Moll Flanders is not a typical incarnation of feminist thoughts. It has never strained to sketch an itinerary for the relegated female personality to outshine her eccentricity. Yet, it is indubitably pro-woman and reconnoiters a female character with the reputation of protagonist. The farsighted image of woman with grander tenets of empathy and sympathy is blossomed. In the contemporary habitat, the novel may not seem like far-reaching as it pushes the female lead to imitate and regret with ceaseless kinks and contraventions. But the novelist is ahead of his epoch in aiding his female protagonist to gallop and endure the probabilities amidst dejection and misfortunes. Hence, the research ornate has through an endeavour to enchant the inner quandary of woman in a masculine captivated sophistication with reference to Daniel Defoe’s Moll Flanders.

The Beothuk of Newfoundland were among the first inhabitants of North America to encounter European explorers and settlers. By the first part of the nineteenth century the Beothuk were extinct, exterminated by the fishers and soldiers and settlers of western Europe. The last Beothuk was a woman named Shanadithit. She was captured and lived with white settlers for a few years before she died in 1829. Today all that remains of the Beothuk nation, which once numbered seven hundred to one thousand people, are some bones, arrowheads, tools, written records of explorers and settlers, and copies of drawings by Shanadithit in the Newfoundland Museum. In recent years several writers (all are white and male) have written fiction and poetry and drama about the Beothuk, including Peter Such (Riverrun, 1973), Paul O'Neill (Legends of a Lost Tribe, 1976), Sid Stephen (Beothuk Poems, 1976), Al Pittman ("Shanadithit," 1978), Geoffrey Ursell (The Running of the Deer; A Play, 1981), Donald Gale (Sooshewan: A Child of the Beothuk, 1988), and Kevin Major (Blood Red Ochre, 1990). A recurring theme in all these narratives is the theme of regret and guilt. These narrative accounts of the Beothuk raise significant questions about voice and narrative, including: Who can speak for Native peoples? Who can speak for extinct peoples? Are there peoples without voices? How is voice historically determined? What is the relationship between voice and power? How are the effects of voice generated? What is an authentic voice? How is voice related to the illusion of presence? What is the relation between voice and silence? In examining contemporary narrative accounts of the Beothuk my goal is to reveal the rhetorical ways in which the Beothuk are given voice(s) and to interrogate the ethical and pedagogical implications of contemporary authors revisiting and revisioning and re-voicing a nation of people long extinct.

Few game studies scholars will regret that the infelicitous ludology vs. narratology debate has been left behind. However, one misconception concerning the nature of literary theory continues to haunt game studies. If Gonzalo Frasca (correctly) observes that "Ludologists Love Stories, Too" (2003), I wish to point out that his conciliatory gesture seriously threatens to distort the concerns of literary theorists in ways that make their reflections on human sense-making indeed seem of very limited use to game studies scholars. If we truly want to know in what respects game studies can profit from literary theory without jeoparidizing the strategies of distinction a still emergent field such as game studies needs to position itself vis-à-vis dominant theoretical paradigms--and which Espen J. Aarseth calls for in his editorial to the first issue of Game Studies (2001)--we need to be aware of two things. First, narratologists make up only a fraction of the literary-theoretical community. And the narratologists most often cited by game studies scholars usually practice a structuralist version of narratology that has come under sustained critical scrutiny since the late 1960s. Second, not all literary scholars are concerned with narrative. Of course, they often study narrative texts such as novels and short stories, but they also study plays, poems, and other non-narrative texts. More importantly, even when they do study narrative texts, literary scholars--be they narratologists or not--are not always interested in the forms and functions of stories.This essay argues that game studies can profit from reflections on issues other than narrative by a literary theorist whose work has been unduly reduced to those concerns. In Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature (1997), Aarseth refers to the work of Wolfgang Iser as one influential model of literary communication that does not help explain the specific forms and functions of nonlinear, multicursal computer games. More specifically, Aarseth argues that Iser's notion of Leerstellen (blanks) cannot account for the kinds of openings cybertexts offer their users. Yet the later work of Iser is a much more promising avenue of exploration for ludologists. Iser's The Fictive and the Imaginary: Charting Literary Anthropology (1993) develops what is arguably the most sustained theory of fictionality available today. While honed in the study of literary texts, Iser's theory can tell us much about the cultural work of fiction in a variety of media without leveling the distinctions between different cultural practices. As such, Iser's later work does not provide yet another framework for reading games as stories but challenges games studies scholars to rethink some of their central concepts, in particular 'play,' 'simulation,' and 'immersion.' Moreover, it invites us to ask whether the rhetoric of distinction that much game studies scholarship still employs to stake out its claims has outlived its usefulness, serving less as an effective defense mechanism than as an obstacle to cross-disciplinary fertilization.

This article examines the way in which three contemporary novelists have interpreted the proliferation of cults and other independent communities in the USA. Thomas Pynchon's Vineland is read as a critique of individualism that regrets the loss of collective identity and purpose. A subsequent reading of Katherine Dunn's Geek Love demonstrates the destructive consequences of individual submission that draws parallels between the dynamics of “cult” communities and mainstream society. This is developed further in a discussion of Don DeLillo's Mao II, which is represented as an attempt to reconcile libertarian and communitarian discourses, while remaining mindful of the dangers of both.

Would you rather have youth, or power and money? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, a 20-something software engineer, after an extensive physical exam, is brought into meet the elderly head of the mega-corporation he works for. The wheelchair bound owner makes him an offer; they will switch bodies. The wealthy tycoon gets the young man’s body, and nothing else, while the young man gets the old man’s body and all the wealth and power that comes with it in the remaining years. The young software engineer has a sister in need of money medical expenses, and he thinks of all the good he could do. He accepts the offer and they switch bodies. The young man almost immediately regrets his decision.

Should you set aside religious convictions to allow a medically necessary procedure to save your life? Is it wrong to interfere with those who make the choice to die for their religious convictions? In this medical and faith-based philosophical short story fiction, Jenny is a devote Christian whose life is threatened by a terminal illness. However, she can be saved by the use of stem cell technology, which she considers cloning. As such, she declines the procedure and, against the urging of her husband, accepts her pending death. Her husband secretly dismisses her wishes and lies to the doctor so that, when she is near death, she is able to accept the life-saving stem cell procedure. Jenny lives, and divorces her husband for refusing to follow her religious wishes. Her husband regrets nothing.

Geschichtsschreibung und Interpretation des Okkultismus pflegen ihr Objekt manchmal zu enthistorisieren, indem sie ihn behandeln, als habe er eine autonome Geschichte, als wäre diese nicht von seinen historisch-variablen Relationen zu den anderen Diskursen der jeweileigen Epoche geprägt, als hätte er in jeder Epoche dieselbe kulturelle Relevanz. Für die Frühe Moderne gilt nun, daß der Okkultismus – obwohl an sich ein minoritäres Phänomen – hohe kulturelle Relevanz hat und daß er sich zu plausibilisieren und legitimieren strebt, indem er sich auf unterschiedliche Weise in Beziehung zu den Wissenschaften zu setzen sucht. Günstig ist ihm dabei die Konstellation, daß gegen Ende des 19. Jahrhunderts verschiedene Wissenschaften (Bakteriologie, Radiologie, Psychotherapie) neue – ebenso faszinierende wie bedrohende – Phänomene entdeckt haben, deren ,Unsichtbarkeit‘ sich mit der der okkulten Phänomene korrelieren zu lassen schien. Solche Verknüpfungen werden literarisch nicht zuletzt in Fantastik und Science Fiction versucht, zwei Erzähltypen, die die in der Frühen Moderne in verschiedenartigsten Relationen zwischen Figuren relevante Dimension von ,Macht‘ vs ,Ohnmacht‘ optimal zu inszenieren vermag: Beherrschung der unsichtbaren wissenschaftlichen und okkultistischen Phänomene verspricht Macht und bedroht die, die nicht an ihr teilhaben.

When is “reasonable discussion” no longer an option? Under what conditions are we no longer required to listen and consider the opinions of others? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the elderly narrator has two children who are no longer speaking to each other because of the upcoming election. One child supports liberal, open immigration policies, while the other supports the populist, emotional, and charismatic leader who believes in shutting down borders. There is a rally, and a counter-rally. The two protesting groups begin to merge for a pending street conflict. To stop the conflict, the narrator walks into the street with a bag of groceries, intentionally slips, and injures herself. She is helped up by her nursing aid, Asael, and members of the two conflicting groups. The video of the groups working together goes viral, making both seem like reasonable people. The populist candidate wins the election by a narrow margin and passes his anti-immigration laws. Shortly thereafter, Asael is in a car accident, and it deported to the violent country of his birth while his legal wife and family stay in the United States. Asael is tortured and killed in his home country. The narrator regrets ever having tried to stay moderate in the discussion, and regrets her role in making the populist candidate seem reasonable.

When is “reasonable discussion” no longer an option? Under what conditions are we no longer required to listen and consider the opinions of others? In this work of philosophical short story fiction, the elderly narrator has two children who are no longer speaking to each other because of the upcoming election. One child supports liberal, open immigration policies, while the other supports the populist, emotional, and charismatic leader who believes in shutting down borders. There is a rally, and a counter-rally. The two protesting groups begin to merge for a pending street conflict. To stop the conflict, the narrator walks into the street with a bag of groceries, intentionally slips, and injures herself. She is helped up by her nursing aid, Asael, and members of the two conflicting groups. The video of the groups working together goes viral, making both seem like reasonable people. The populist candidate wins the election by a narrow margin and passes his anti-immigration laws. Shortly thereafter, Asael is in a car accident, and it deported to the violent country of his birth while his legal wife and family stay in the United States. Asael is tortured and killed in his home country. The narrator regrets ever having tried to stay moderate in the discussion, and regrets her role in making the populist candidate seem reasonable.

Does empathy and moral choice only require that we better understand things from the perspective of others? What if we could force criminals to get that better understanding? In this work of nature-of-punishment short story fiction, Rat has been sentenced to a government “brainwashing” facility. He regrets nothing, save having been caught. He comes from the mean streets, and sometimes that means doing horrible things to get by. As part of his punishment, the government forces him to live his criminal experiences three times. First, from his own perspective. Next, from the perspective of the person the crime was committed against. And finally, from a meta view that allows him to see how his actions, and the actions of others, fit into the larger repeating cycles, in the city. Rat emerges from the program with a new perspective and is ready to begin assisting the program with cleaning up the city.

The aim of my article is the analysis of the selected letters attributed to Plato to answer the question: what conception of Plato as a person can a reader create after reading his correspondence. The philosopher proves himself as a faithful friend, judicious advisor and mentor, who is willing to serve his help to everyone who wants to listen and follow his hints. Although Plato realizes his position and significance in a Greek world, in his Letters there is a note of bitterness and disappointment because of his unfulfilled political ambitions and disappointed hopes. Plato also shows his feelings of regret caused by the loss of his two friends, Socrates and Dion. The form and style of Plato’s letters are as interesting as the content. The author repeatedly writes down his thoughts in so realistic and vivid way as he would have a lively dialogue with his fictional interlocutor. In his Letters Plato uses willingly dramatic elements to depict the referred events in form of the scenes taking place, as it were before the reader’s eyes.

Poetry is a literary work whose language is bound by rhyme and is a person's ideas and feelings about something that are poured into beautiful words. Â Language style is one of the media in stylistic studies that can be used as a medium in assessing the beauty of fictional poetry and prose works. Â The background of this research is to analyze the language style (figure of speech) used in Ali Hasjmi's sorry poetry, as well as to assist in the development of Indonesian language learning in analyzing the language style of the poetry. Â The method used by researchers is a qualitative descriptive method. Â The data analysis was carried out through several stages including literature study by reading, writing the required content, and identifying the verse and lines of poetry that contained language styles. Â The results found in Ali Hasjmi's regretful poetry include three styles of language including affirmation, satire and comparison. Â The figures used are personification, metaphoric, hyperbole, sinekdoke, rhetorical, and irony. Â In regret poetry there are four stanzas and fifteen lines.

Poetry is a literary work whose language is bound by rhyme and is a person's ideas and feelings about something that are poured into beautiful words. Â Language style is one of the media in stylistic studies that can be used as a medium in assessing the beauty of fictional poetry and prose works. Â The background of this research is to analyze the language style (figure of speech) used in Ali Hasjmi's sorry poetry, as well as to assist in the development of Indonesian language learning in analyzing the language style of the poetry. Â The method used by researchers is a qualitative descriptive method. Â The data analysis was carried out through several stages including literature study by reading, writing the required content, and identifying the verse and lines of poetry that contained language styles. Â The results found in Ali Hasjmi's regretful poetry include three styles of language including affirmation, satire and comparison. Â The figures used are personification, metaphoric, hyperbole, sinekdoke, rhetorical, and irony. Â In regret poetry there are four stanzas and fifteen lines.

Every language has elements that serve as pragmatic function to emphasize or afirm the purpose of speech and those of to express emotions. Sundanese is a language that is rich in such elements that is called phatic form. Such forms in Sundanese language have the origins of Sundanese and also loan words, for example from Arabic. The use of Arabic loan words is in line with the practice of Islamic religion by the Sundanese people and has become a part of Sundanese culture so that the writing and pronunciation has been adapted to the Sundanese language system. This paper discusses three phatic forms derived from Arabic with its variations. The problem to discuss is what kind of intentions that is emphasized or afirmed by phatic forms in sentences and what kind of emotions that is expressed by phatic forms in sentences? Therefore, this paper’s objectives is to discuss the intentions emphasized or afirmed by phatic forms in sentences and the kind of emotions expressed by phatic forms in sentences. The irst problem involves all three phatic forms, while the second problem only involves the irst two phatic forms. Data were collected by observation method with the recording technique. Data were analyzed using distributional and referential method. Data source were ten Sundanese ictions. The results shows that the three phatic forms emphasize or afirm the intentions of surprise, astonishment, regret, shock, and willingness. The irst two phatic forms express emotions of surprise, astonishment, regret, and dumbfounded. AbstrakBahasa alamiah di seluruh di dunia memiliki ciri keuniversalan dan keunikan. Setiap bahasa memiliki unsur bahasa yang secara pragmatik memiliki fungsi untuk menekankan atau menegaskan maksud tuturan. Di samping itu, setiap bahasa memiliki unsur bahasa yang berfungsi mengekspresikan emosi. Akan tetapi, wujud dan jumlah unsur-unsur bahasa tersebut berbeda-beda sesuai dengan keunikan bahasa masing-masing. Bahasa Sunda merupakan salah satu bahasa yang kaya dengan unsur bahasa seperti dikatakan di atas. Unsur bahasa yang memiliki fungsi seperti itu di samping ada yang berasal dari bahasa Sunda sendiri, ada pula yang berasal dari bahasa lain, yakni unsur serapan dari bahasa Arab. Penggunaan unsur serapan dari bahasa Arab ini sejalan dengan pengamalan ajaran Islam oleh masyarakat Sunda. Penggunaan unsur bahasa di atas sudah menjadi bagian dari budaya masyarakat Sunda sehingga penulisan dan pelafalannya pun sudah diadaptasi mengikuti sistem bahasa Sunda. Unsur bahasa ini disebut fatis. Makalah ini akan membahas tiga fatis yang berasal dari bahasa Arab, yaitu lailaha illallah, astagfirullahalazhim, dan insya Allah dengan variasinya. Masalah yang akan dibahas adalah menekankan atau menegaskan maksud apa saja fatis tersebut dalam kalimat dan mengungkapkan emosi apa saja dalam kalimat? Untuk masalah pertama melibatkan seluruh tiga fatis terrsebut, sedangkan untuk masalah kedua hanya melibatkan dua fatis pertama. Data dikunpulkan dengan metode simak dengan teknik catat. Data dianalisis menggunakan metode agih (distribusional) dan padan. Sumber data berupa sepuluh buku cerita rekaan berbahasa Sunda. Hasil penelitian menunjukkan bahwa ketiga fatis menekankan atau menegaskan maksud keterkejutan, ketercengangan, penyesalan, keterperanjatan, dan kesediaan; kemudian dua fatis pertama mengekspresikan emosi terkejut, tercengang, menyesal, dan terperanjat.

Indian writers including both male and female novelists generally utilise novels to reveal the psychological conditions of the female sex with the help of their dramatic personas. One such Indian writer is Rohinton Mistry, who unveils the mental states of women through his independent female characters, especially fictional female singletons. Among his numerous works, A Fine Balance is a notable piece that falls into this category. The novel is about the life struggles of the widow heroine Dina Dalal after the death of her husband. Apart from Dina, Mistry has used many widow characters who play minor roles in developing the storyline. The paper aims to exhibit the mental fluctuations of the fictional widows that comprise the widow protagonist Dina Dalal. The investigation with the help of the female characters uncovers the psychological oscillations of the widows due to their singlehood statuses. It unmasks the emotional transpositions, loneliness, fears, regrets, hopelessness and mental instabilities of the widows. The analysis avails the psychoanalytic Literary Theory to support its arguments and to obtain its objectives. With the aid of the select prose narrative, the research brings out Rohinton Mistry’s typical representation of widow characters to have psychological problems because of losing their husbands. Hence, the article projects that despite picturing the fictional widows as persons who are bold and liberating, Mistry has represented them to be psychologically vulnerable rather than presenting them as mentally strong and stable individuals.

Abstract Although F. Scott Fitzgerald and Philip Roth are not necessarily writers with an obvious thematic or biographical connection, this article argues that both authors were fixated on war and that a central clue to their respective oeuvres is the situation either of the reluctant combatant or the discharged soldier who never sees action on the battlefield—no matter whether the specific theater of combat is the Great War, World War II, or the Korean War. For Fitzgerald, much of the sympathy Nick Carraway feels for Jay Gatsby reflects their mutual experiences on the Western Front. In a similar vein, Sergeant Nathan Marx, the narrator of Roth’s most controversial story, “Defender of the Faith,” feels an innate regard for Private Sheldon Grossbart, the Jewish scammer and shirker whom Marx tries and fails to turn into a conscientious, patriotic soldier. In other cases, the noncombatant regret Fitzgerald expresses in stories such as “‘I Didn’t Get Over’” (1936)finds something of a parallel in Nathan Zuckerman, Roth’s most famous alter ego narrator who appears in nine novels across more than four decades. Surveying a range of Roth texts from his breakthrough 1959 novella “Goodbye, Columbus” to his late novel Indignation (2008), this article argues that corollaries in attitudes toward war, especially as it affects the American home front, can be traced within several Fitzgerald fictions.

Las novelas Margarita de niebla (1927) de Jaime Torres Bodet y El réferi cuenta nueve (1943) de Diego Cañedo tienen protagonistas varones mestizos/criollos de clase alta. Éstos se encuentran en triángulos amorosos que los fuerzan a escoger entre una mujer mestiza y mexicana, por un lado, y una mujer blanca y alemana, por otro. En ambos casos, los hombres optan por la extranjera, pero se arrepienten poco después cuando ven que no son compatibles. Este ensayo categoriza ambas novelas como ficciones fundacionales fallidas. Doris Sommer acuñó el término “ficciones fundacionales” al analizar literatura que imaginaba una reconciliación nacional a través del romance y matrimonio heterosexual entre personas de sectores distintos de la sociedad. Las novelas que analizamos a continuación hacen lo opuesto, pues interpretan el romance entre hombres mexicanos de la élite y mujeres extranjeras como una afrenta a los intentos del Estado posrevolucionario por construir una nación a través del proyecto oficial de mestizaje. Tanto Torres Bodet como Cañedo pintan a los hombres que evitan el matrimonio interracial como obstáculos a la institucionalización de una comunión nacionalista. The novels Margarita de niebla (Jaime Torres Bodet 1927) and El réferi cuenta nueve (Diego Cañedo 1943) follow the lives of well-to-do mestizo/criollo Mexican males who find themselves in love triangles that force them to choose between a Mexican mestiza or a white, German woman. In both cases, the men opt for the foreigner, but they soon regret their decisions when they realize that they are incompatible with their mates. For this reason, I view these novels as failed foundational fictions. Doris Sommer coined the term “foundational fictions” while analyzing literature that imagined a national reconciliation through heterosexual romance and marriage between people from different sectors of society. These novels do the opposite because they view romances between Mexican elites and foreign Others as antithetical to the nation-building project of official mestizaje. As such, both Torres Bodet and Cañedo depict those men who eschew interracial marriage as a hindrance to the institutionalization of a nationalist communion.

This research discussed about schizophrenia symptoms in Teddy alias Andrew Laedis that was acute and dangerous and also discussed the psychodrama treatment for Andrew. The main character is described to have a dangerous illness which is schizophrenia due to get from his traumatic events in world of war. Some of traumatic event that Andrew is experienced actually like when Andrew killed hundred soldier during the war in Dachau, his guilt because he did not bring his wife, Dolores to psychiatrists then unpredictable his wife killed her three children and drowning her child in a pond and regret for the rest of his life who was forced to kill his beloved wife until die and he finally lost all his family. Andrew cannot escape from the reality and without unconsciously he became experiencing mental disorder. The fictional story written by Dennis Lehane (2003.This novel was using the theory of psychoanalysis approach by Sigmund Freud. By using the concept of Sigmund's theory this research examined the symptoms of acute schizophrenia in Teddy alias Andrew's character which showed that his id is more dominant than his ego and the superego did not almost non-existent. Andrew points out three types of self defense mechanisms, namely, denial projections, regression and displacement. Meanwhile, the process of psychiatric recovery treatment by Dr. Cawley is used a psychodrama.

The current study undertakes a detailed analysis of Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner representative novel. Hosseini, an Afghan born American writer depicts a war-torn Afghanistan in various universal themes i.e., family re-union, discrimination, regret, childhood, guilt, womanhood, betrayal, religion and salvation that played a considerable role in abating commission of crimes in Afghanistan during pre and post-Taliban periods which ended up shaping the interminable psychological scars of the protagonist. In his work, Hosseini reveals the devastating status of Afghans in general and women and children in particular who have, for decades, been irrationally marginalized and confined to the four walls of their homes by the society. His quests for wealth, love, loyalty and unqualified peace among Afghan citizenry whom he equates to have rights just like other human beings globally is the only means through which the protagonist considers a key to chart out a new future. Moreover, in reference to the Pashtun and Hazara ethnic communities’ customs and traditions and by use of historical, factual, real and fictional information, the article discusses the constructive human relations in a society bedeviled with mistrust, confusion, doubt and betrayal. Besides, by adopting the historical perspective method, the study examines how discrimination as a theme has been utilized to portray Hosseini’s literary image as a protagonist writer. Finally, a summary of the paper along with recommendations is made in the conclusion section.

The paper aims to look at the politics of representation and the importance of historical fiction in renegotiating women’s position in history by focusing on the representation of Rani Jindan Kaur in Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s The Last Queen (2021). The book is written from Rani Jindan Kaur’s perspective who was the last wife of Maharaja Ranjit Singh and the last regent queen of the Sikh Empire to reclaim her lost identity. This analysis begins with a brief description of Sikh empire and its glorious past with a special focus on a woman who equally contributed and shaped it. It then traces how historians have always been partial towards women for not giving them enough space in the annals of history. This underrepresentation was the systematic erasure as not only were they punished for stepping outside the limited roles offered to them but if they achieve great things they were often ignored or forced to submit to the prevailing gender norms of their times. It then focuses on how Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni has used the erasure of women representation in history as a winning chance to rewrite the lost world of Rani Jindan that is not much talked about in historical documents. It further points out how this systemic bias has perpetuated a skewed historical narrative that failed to recognize the full extent of women's contributions and resilience throughout history.

In his satirical novel, 'Father Malachy's Miracle' (1931), Bruce Marshall (24 June 1899–18 June 1987), the Edinburgh-born author of over forty books, presents the reader with an elderly Benedictine monk, Fr Malachy Murdoch, who has been sent from his monastery in the Scottish Highlands to improve the singing and the manners on the altar of St Margaret's Church in Edinburgh – like many of the episodes in the novel, Marshall's characters, thinly-disguised, are based on 'real' people – in spite of the author's protestations to the contrary.<br/> After a chance but testy meeting with a dapper Episcopalian clergyman who challenges the monk to prove that miracles can really happen. Malachy impulsively jettisons his brief and accepts the challenge, deciding to petition God to move an adjacent dancehall of ill repute (along with its clientele) onto the windy summit of the Bass Rock, a volcanic island some twenty miles away in East Lothian. Inexplicably, the displacement immediately becomes a tourist attraction – for which Malachy is roundly admonished by a cardinal newly-arrived from Rome.<br/> He begins to grasp the wider implications of what he has done. He regrets his hasty reaction and implores God to restore the seedy dancehall to its former site beside the Church of Saint Margaret of Scotland – he is left with an abiding sense of guilt and failure. Interviewed in Rome by the literary critic Luigi Silori in 1959, Marshall confided that 'the author should not preach. This is why the clergy generally does not understand me very well – because they expect me to preach, and I don't want to do this.'<br/> So why has this comic masterpiece been almost forgotten? Recently, new research into 'Father Malachy's Miracle' has revealed just how closely Marshall's deft fictionalisation imitated real life – the thin line between fact and Marshall's fiction.

This article features two versions of A Chapter from the History of Charles V written by Louis Xavier Auguet de Saint- Sylvain, Baron de los Valles. The original French version was published in 1835, while the Spanish translation appeared 1837. The text describes the background and the start of the First Carlist War in Spain in 1833–1835. The author was a confidant of Don Carlos, and so his book reflected the Carlist perspective. The author believes that the Spanish translation included certain semantic modifications and additions made due to fit the changing political situation. These almost imperceptible modifications were able to change the perception of some military and political figures of the era, e.g., former Minister F. T. Calomarde, Carlist general V. Gonzalez Moreno, Christino general and future Regent B. Espartero, etc. The research objective was to show how Baron de los Valles interpreted the events related to the capture of Villafranca by the Carlists in 1834. This historical episode, later popularized by numerous memoirs and fiction, appeared only in the Spanish version of the book. The account made by the Baron de los Valles differed from the versions of other memoirists, as well as from the official press reports. A Chapter from the History of Charles V by Baron de los Valles has a low value as a historical source, but presents a considerable interest as an example of Carlist propaganda during the war of 1833–1840.

IntroductionWhat ties Ahab, the notorious captain of the Pequod in Herman Melville's 1851 novel, Moby-Dick, to King Lear, the desperate old regent from William Shakespeare's eponymous play published in 1608, is not only their overabundant quest for meaning, or their obsession with pursuing their targets, but their idiosyncratic experiencing of themselves in their personal realities.AimsCaptain Ahab is put in relation with King Lear, in order to show in what way issues of identity and of existence emerge in the course of their fictional lives. Lear is considered to have had deep influence on Melville the author in creating the character of Ahab. Since, in terms of present-day psychopathology, both fictional characters present with symptoms, their issues when put in historical context can untangle their personal realities.MethodsThrough a close reading of the characters’ behaviour and experiencing in historical context, issues of identity and of existence are elaborated on in order to advance to the psychodramatic substrate.ResultsWhereas at the beginning of the seventeenth century conflicts are newly transposed to characters’ minds instead of surroundings, the nineteenth century still sees Ahab's monomania on the outside. Identity and existence have increasingly been placed in individual psyche, though.ConclusionsA paradigmatic change in personality concept at the turn of the modern epoch enables psychiatry and psychopathology to conceptualize the individual and to derive identity and existence from. Collective identity gives way to personal identity. With that, choice, interpretation, and failing are individualized.Disclosure of interestThe author has not supplied his/her declaration of competing interest.

Kasus kriminalitas di Indonesia beberapa tahun terakhir menunjukkan peningkatan yang begitu memprihatinkan, serta pada beberapa kasus dikaitkan dengan gangguan gejala psikopat. Psikopat ialah bentuk kekalutan mental yang ditandai dengan tidak adanya pengorganisasian dan pengintegrasian pribadi, tidak bisa bertanggung jawab secara moral, selalu konflik dengan norma sosial dan hukum yang diciptakkan oleh angan-angannya sendiri. Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mendeskripsikan fenomena perilaku psikopat pada novel Katarsis karya Anastasia Aemilia dengan pendekatan psikologi sastra, khususnya menggunakan teori gangguan kepribadian psikopat Sigmund Freud. Pada dasarnya psikologi sastra memberikan perhatian pada masalah kejiwaan para tokoh fiksional yang terkandung dalam karya sastra. Sasaran dalam penelitian ini adalah fenomena perilaku psikopat yang dialami oleh tokoh dengan mengkaji bentuk perilaku, dan faktor penyebabnya. Teknik analisis data yang digunakan adalah teknik deskriptif kualitatif. Berdasarkan hasil penelitian dapat diketahui bahwa (1) bentuk perilaku psikopat tokoh dalam novel Katarsis karya Anastasia Aemilia diketahui berdasarkan ciri perilaku khusus pada psikopat yaitu berperilaku antisoasial, suka memanipulasi, berperilaku agresif, berperilaku sadistis, serta tidak menyesal dan tidak merasa bersalah sehingga dapat ditentukan bentuk perilaku psikopat yang terbagi ke dalam tiga bentuk, yaitu ringan, sedang, dan berat. (2) Faktor yang menyebabkan tokoh dalam novel Katarsis berperilaku psikopat yaitu faktor biologis dan faktor lingkungan. Cases of criminality in Indonesia in recent years have shown such an alarming increase, and in some cases linked to psychopathic symptoms disorder. Psychopaths are forms of mental disorder that is characterized by lack of organization and personal integration, can not be morally responsible, always conflict with social norms and laws created by wishful thinking alone. This study aims to describe the phenomenon of psychopathic behavior in the novel Katarsis by Anastasia Aemilia with the approach of literature psychology, in particular using the theory of psychopath personality disorder from Sigmund Freud. Basically, literature psychology gives attention to the psychological problems of the fictional characters contained in the literary work. Target in this research is phenomenon of psychopathic behavior experienced by the character by studying the form of behavior, and the cause factor. Data analysis technique used is descriptive qualitative technique. Based on the results of the research can be seen that (1) the form of psychopathic behavior of characters in the novel Katarsis by Anastasia Aemilia is known based on specific behavior on the psychopath that is behaving antisoasial, like to manipulate, behave aggressively, behave sadistis, and not regret and not feel guilty, so it can be determined form psychopathic behavior is divided into three forms, a light, medium, and heavy. (2) Factors that cause characters in the novel Katarsis behave psychopaths namely biological factors and environmental factors.

Abstract, this research applied qualitative approach, by using field research model. The qualitative approach model that is applied emphasize more on Phenomenological perspective, which is focus on the interpretation and emic meaning analysis in the forms of expressions (empiric) found in the field. While the focus of this research concists of (1) what is the meaning of "politic" for Kiai and Santri Pamekasan? (2) How is the tendency of Santri’s political attitude to the Kiai’s political attitude? (3) How are the ways and efforts taken by Kiai to defend their autoritative leadership?. This research took place in Palengaan district, Pamekasan regency where the focus of this study is the Kiai’s involvement and santri in the politic on regent and vise regent election in 2008 – 2013 period (Local Leaders Election), that is held on 5 March 2008 and on 9 January 2013 – 2018 period. The results of this research are: the first, the Kiai’s political formula is used to retain his leadership authority to Santri which relies on two powers, they are; traditional and charismatic domination. It means Kiaikeeps to retain his glamour as religious charismatic figure by using the symbols of obedience which are framed by religious moral values in retaining his santri’s obedience. Second, Santri’ political attitude have shifted from political obedience to the political difference although it is done by alumnus only. From their political attitude, it is found that there are three Santri’s political typology, they are: (1) Santri with absolute obedience, (2) Santri with fictive obedience, (3) Prismatic Santri Key Word: Kiai-Santris’s Politic, Charismatic, Obedience الملخص:استخدم هذا البحث المنهج النوعي بالإطار الميداني. فيطلق المنهج النوعي على وجهة النظر الفينومنولوجية التي تؤدي إلى تفسير وتحليل المعنى الداخلي الذي يتعلق بالعبارات الموجودة فى الميدان. أما تحديد هذا البحث فيطلق إلى ما يلي: 1) ما هو معني السياسة عند أسياد المعاهد الإسلامية وطلابها فى مدينة باميكاسن؟ 2) إلى ما اتجهت سلوك السياسة لطلاب المعاهد الإسلامية نحو انتخاب أسياد المعاهد السياسي؟ 3) ما هي المحاولات والمواقف لأسياد المعاهد على محافظة سيطرتهم الرياسية؟ حل هذا البحث فى منطقة بالنجاعن بمحافظة باميكاسن بالتركيز إلى مشاركة أسياد المعاهد وطلابها فى سياسة انتخاب رئيس المحافظة ونائبها بمرحلة السنة 2008- 2013 من الميلاد ، المعقدة تاريخ الخامس من مارس سنة 2008 م وفى فترة بين شهر يناير 2008 إلى يناير 2018. فالاستنتاجات من هذا البحث هي: 1) صيغة أسياد المعاهد السياسية المستخدمة فى محافظة سيطرتهم الرياسية على جميع الطلاب تركز إلى القوتين، هما: التقليدية و الهيمنة الكاريزمية. فهما تعنيان أن أسياد المعاهد يحافظ أنفسهم كأشخاص كاريزمي متدين برموز الطاعات مع إطارات القيم الدينية فى محافظة طاعات الطلاب نحوهم. 2) وقوع التغييرات فى الاتجاهات السياسية لطلاب المعاهد من الإطاعة السياسية إلى التفرق السياسي، رغم أن ذلك منفذ فى المجالات المحدودة (فرقة الخريجين). فمن قبل الاتجاهات المتنوعة، أوجد الباحث ثلاثة أنواع الطلاب: 1) الطلاب المطيع فى الدرجة المطلقة، 2) الطلاب المطيع فى الدرجة الزائفة، 3) الطلاب البرسماتيكية. Abstrak, penelitian ini menggunakan pendekatan kualitatif, dengan model penelitian lapangan. Model pendekatan kualitatif yang digunakan lebih menekankan pada perspektif fenomenologi, yaitu penekanan kepada interpretasi dan analisis makna emic yang berupa ungkapan-ungkapan (empiris) yang ditemukan di lapangan. Adapun, fokus penelitian ini terdiri dari: (1) Apa makna politik bagi kiai dan santri di Pamekasan? (2) Bagaimana kecenderungan perilaku politik santri terhadap pilihan politik kiai? (3) Bagaimana upaya dan sikap kiai mempertahankan otoritas kepemimpinannya? Riset ini mengambil tempat di Kecamatan Palengaan, Kabupaten Pamekasan dengan fokus kajian keterlibatan kiai dan santri dalam politik pemilihan bupati dan wakil bupati periode 2008-2013 (Pilkada), yang dilaksanakan pada tanggal 5, Maret 2008 dan periode 9 Januari 2013-2018. Hasil penelitian ini adalah: Pertama, formula politik kiai yang digunakan dalam mempertahankan otoritas kepemimpinannya terhadap santri bertumpu pada dua kekuatan yatu; traditional dan charismatic domination. Artinya kiai tetap mempertahankan pesona sebagai sosok karismatik relijius melalui simbol-simbol kepatuhan yang dibingkai nilai moral agama dalam mempertahankan kepatuhan santrinya. Kedua, perilaku politik santri telah terjadi pergeseran dari kepatuhan politik ke perbedaan politik walaupun hal itu dilakukan oleh sebatas santri alumni. Dari perilaku politik santri tersebut ditemukan ada tiga tipologi politik santri yaitu: (1) Santri patuh mutlak, (2) Santri patuh semu dan (3) Santri prismatik.

We regret that in the review of Ruth Hoberman, Museum Trouble: Edwardian Fiction and the Emergence of Modernism (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2011), published in the Journal of British Studies 51, no. 3 (July 2012): 770–72, a quotation attributed to Ezra Pound (772) should have been attributed to Filippo Tommasso Marinetti.

This first in a series of two essays considers the relation of the juvenile tradition to cheap, mass-produced dime fiction in America from the 1860s on. Part One provides a survey of fiction-factory writing by now-unrecognized young writers in the latter half of the nineteenth century; my interest lies in recovering what juvenile writers who worked in that industry thought about it. This essay focuses on how they embraced new opportunities for authorship that mass-market publication provided. Such an assembly-line mode of literary production carried a new understanding of its authors as workers in the fiction factory. Rather than regret the loss of inspiration or genius in their writing identity, however, young dime writers hailed their role as “hack” writers by asserting youth’s modern character as “wide-awake”—aware, practical, savvy, and successful.

Late in life in in his Memoirs of a Literary Veteran (1851) R. P. Gillies reflected on a career fraught with difficulties owing to debt and other obstacles, though in it earlier stages it might be said to have paralleled in some respects the path of Walter Scott, while reaching a highpoint in the 1820s through Gillies’s significant input as a Germanist into Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine. One deep regret as expressed in the Memoirs was his eventual incapacity to piece together his own literary record owing to the loss of materials at significant points in his life. The present article attempts to ameliorate this situation by providing a fuller record than was then available to Gillies himself, through means such as the recovery of rare editions, identification of periodical contributions, and information provided by the archives of the Royal Literary Fund. More particularly it offers an improved account of Gillies’s output as a novelist and translator of fiction, with some newly identified titles being added to the list, while others are removed.

Abstract Among varied syntactic and semantic functions of the dative case in Latvian, the attitude dative or dativus ethicus is a less studied one. As an optional pronominal clitic, it serves two broad functions: first, it expresses the speaker’s authority and affectedness of the speaker or the addressee in a speech-act situation, and second, it expresses the speaker’s stance towards the contents of the utterance. In terms of register, the attitude dative normally occurs in informal interaction. The current study examines three basic types of attitude datives in Latvian and their functions in different syntactic constructions and speech acts. The examples are extracted from corpora as well as Latvian fiction and everyday speech. It follows from the examples that the attitude dative has different meanings in certain speech acts and syntactic constructions. The attitude dative is used in giving orders, expressing prohibition and threats, as well as showing disagreement, disappointment, and regret. The study suggests that the attitude dative tends to be used in lexicalized syntactic constructions (set expressions) including specific lexemes and grammatical forms, and its functions are emphasized with particles.

Abstract The proposed demolition in 1844 of the infamous ‘Thieves' House’, a dilapidated structure situated on West Street in the notorious London slum of West Smithfield, was the focus of great public interest. Thousands of spectators reportedly came to see the house in the days leading up to its destruction, with some privileged individuals given lamp-lit tours of its interior. An unremarkable facade belied its strange internal construction, which incorporated trap doors, false walls and secret passages. These were described in detail in several journalistic accounts in which the house was imagined as a lair of thieves and murderers, fitted out for the commission and concealment of crime. The house seized the imagination of both authors and artists, becoming the inspiration for serialized fiction, three dramas, and a large body of drawings and prints. While the various representations of it foreground the familiar ‘slum’ narratives of dereliction, degeneration and criminality, this article uncovers a counter-narrative of nostalgia and regret for the old city as a space shaped by the needs of its inhabitants, in contrast to the emerging metropolis designed for the circulation of labour and capital.

Donaldson, Julia. The Highway Rat. Illus. Axel Scheffler. New York: Arthur A. Levine Books, 2013. Print.The children’s literature dream team of author Julia Donaldson and illustrator Axel Scheffler are at it again with this delightful take on Alfred Noyes’ classic narrative poem, “The Highwayman.” Donaldson and Scheffler, best known for their popular Gruffalo series as well as Room on the Broom, have created a lush narrative replete with repetitive phrases and rich illustrations that will captivate children while engaging the adult reader in an intelligent manner.“The Highway Rat was a baddie; the Highway Rat was a beast. He took what he wanted and ate what he took…” Indeed! The Highway Rat holds up fellow travelers and those he meets along the way with a voracious attitude and pointy sword. Though he prefers sweets, he takes anything –even a bunch of clover deemed tasteless and dull –to satisfy his greed and without a morsel of regret. As the other creatures along the road grew thinner and thinner, the Highway Rat grows plump until one plucky duck delivers poetic justice and some just ‘desserts’ to this nasty rat. Children will be pleased with the appropriate comeuppance for the Highway Rat that arrives with a healthy message of kindness and sharing.Fans of Donaldson and Scheffler’s previous work will not be disappointed, in particular those who have encountered “The Highwayman” as younger readers. This rollicking book will make a nice addition to any elementary school library collection and is best suited for students in K-3. Highly recommended: 4 out of 4 stars Reviewer: Debbie FeisstDebbie is a Public Services Librarian at the H.T. Coutts Education Library at the University of Alberta. When not renovating, she enjoys travel, fitness and young adult fiction.

The traditional German tale of the Pied Piper of Hamelin inhabits an ambiguous narrative borderland, a liminal space between fact and fiction, fantasy and horror, concrete details and elusive mystery. In his study of the Pied Piper in Tradition and Innovation in Folk Literature, Wolfgang Mieder describes how manuscripts and other evidence appear to confirm the historical base of the story. Precise details from a fifteenth-century manuscript, based on earlier sources, specify that in 1284 on the 26th of June, the feast-day of Saints John and Paul, 130 children from Hamelin were led away by a piper clothed in many colours to the Koppen Hill, and there vanished (Mieder 48). Later manuscripts add details familiar today, such as a plague of rats and a broken bargain with burghers as a motive for the Piper’s actions, while in the seventeenth century the first English-language version advances what might also be the first attempt at a “rational” explanation for the children’s disappearance, claiming that they were taken to Transylvania. The uncommon pairing of such precise factual detail with enigmatic mystery has encouraged many theories. These have ranged from references to the Children’s Crusade, or other religious fervours, to the devastation caused by the Black Death, from the colonisation of Romania by young German migrants to a murderous rampage by a paedophile. Fictional interpretations of the story have multiplied, with the classic versions of the Brothers Grimm and Robert Browning being most widely known, but with contemporary creators exploring the theme too. This includes interpretations in Hamelin itself. On 26 June 2015, in Hamelin Museum, I watched a wordless five-minute play, entirely performed not by humans but by animatronic stylised figures built out of scrap iron, against a montage of multilingual, confused voices and eerie music, with the vanished children represented by a long line of small empty shirts floating by. The uncanny, liminal nature of the story was perfectly captured. Australia is a world away from German fairy tale mysteries, historically, geographically, and culturally. Yet, as Lisa M. Fiander has persuasively argued, contemporary Australian fiction has been more influenced by fairy tales than might be assumed, and in this essay it is proposed that major motifs from the Pied Piper appear in several Australian novels, transformed not only by distance of setting and time from that of the original narrative, but also by elements specific to the Australian imaginative space. These motifs are lost children, the enigmatic figure of the Piper himself, and the power of a very particular place (as Hamelin and its Koppen Hill are particularised in the original tale). Three major Australian novels will be examined in this essay: Joan Lindsay’s Picnic at Hanging Rock (1967), Christopher Koch’s The Doubleman (1985), and Ursula Dubosarsky’s The Golden Day (2011). Dubosarsky’s novel was written for children; both Koch’s and Lindsay’s novels were published as adult fiction. In each of these works of fiction, the original tale’s motifs have been developed and transformed to express unique evocations of the Pied Piper theme. As noted by Fiander, fiction writers are “most likely to draw upon fairy tales when they are framing, in writing, a subject that generates anxiety in their culture” (158). Her analysis is about anxieties of place within Australian fiction, but this insight could be usefully extended to the motifs which I have identified as inherent in the Pied Piper story. Prominent among these is the lost children motif, whose importance in the Australian imagination has been well-established by scholars such as Peter Pierce. Pierce’s The Country of Lost Children: An Australian Anxiety explores this preoccupation from the earliest beginnings of European settlement, through analysis of fiction, newspaper reports, paintings, and films. As Pierce observed in a later interview in the Sydney Morning Herald (Knox), over time the focus changed from rural children and the nineteenth-century fear of the vast impersonal nature of the bush, where children of colonists could easily get lost, to urban children and the contemporary fear of human predators.In each of the three novels under examination in this essay, lost children—whether literal or metaphorical—feature prominently. Writer Carmel Bird, whose fiction has also frequently centred on the theme of the lost child, observes in “Dreaming the Place” that the lost child, the stolen child – this must be a narrative that is lodged in the heart and imagination, nightmare and dream, of all human beings. In Australia the nightmare became reality. The child is the future, and if the child goes, there can be no future. The true stories and the folk tales on this theme are mirror images of each other. (7) The motif of lost children—and of children in danger—is not unique to the Pied Piper. Other fairy tales, such as Hansel and Gretel and Little Red Riding Hood, contain it, and it is those antecedents which Bird cites in her essay. But within the Pied Piper story it has three features which distinguish it from other traditional tales. First, unlike in the classic versions of Hansel and Gretel or Red Riding Hood, the children do not return. Neither are there bodies to find. The children have vanished into thin air, never to be seen again. Second, it is not only parents who have lost them, but an entire community whose future has been snatched away: a community once safe, ordered, even complacent, traumatised by loss. The lack of hope, of a happy ending for anyone, is striking. And thirdly, the children are not lost or abandoned or even, strictly speaking, stolen: they are lured away, semi-willingly, by the central yet curiously marginal figure of the Piper himself. In the original story there is no mention of motive and no indication of malice on the part of the Piper. There is only his inexplicable presence, a figure out of fairy folklore appearing in the midst of concrete historical dates and numbers. Clearly, he links to the liminal, complex world of the fairies, found in folklore around the world—beings from a world close to the human one, yet alien. Whimsical and unpredictable by human standards, such beings are nevertheless bound by mysteriously arbitrary rules and taboos, and haunt the borders of the human world, disturbing its rational edges and transforming lives forever. It is this sense of disturbance, that enchanting yet frightening sudden shifting of the border of reality and of the comforting order of things, the essence of transformation itself, which can also be seen at the core of the three novels under examination in this essay, with the Piper represented in each of them but in different ways. The third motif within the Pied Piper is a focus on place as a source of uncanny power, a theme which particularly resonates within an Australian context. Fiander argues that if contemporary British fiction writers use fairy tale to explore questions of community and alienation, and Canadian fiction writers use it to explore questions of identity, then Australian writers use it to explore the unease of place. She writes of the enduring legacy of Australia’s history “as a settler colony which invests the landscape with strangeness for many protagonists” (157). Furthermore, she suggests that “when Australian fiction writers, using fairy tales, describe the landscape as divorced from reality, they might be signalling anxiety about their own connection with the land which had already seen tens of thousands of years of occupation when Captain James Cook ‘found’ it in 1770” (160). I would argue, however, that in the case of the Pied Piper motifs, it is less clear that it is solely settler anxieties which are driving the depiction of the power of place in these three novels. There is no divorce from reality here, but rather an eruption of the metaphysical potency of place within the usual, “normal” order of reality. This follows the pattern of the original tale, where the Piper and all the children, except for one or two stragglers, disappear at Koppen Hill, vanishing literally into the hill itself. In traditional European folklore, hollow hills are associated with fairies and their uncanny power, but other places, especially those of water—springs, streams, even the sea—may also be associated with their liminal world (in the original tale, the River Weser is another important locus for power). In Joan Lindsay’s Picnic at Hanging Rock, it is another outcrop in the landscape which holds that power and claims the “lost children.” Inspired partly by a painting by nineteenth-century Australian artist William Ford, titled At the Hanging Rock (1875), depicting a group of elegant people picnicking in the bush, this influential novel, which inspired an equally successful film adaptation, revolves around an incident in 1900 when four girls from Appleyard College, an exclusive school in Victoria, disappear with one of their teachers whilst climbing Hanging Rock, where they have gone for a picnic. Only one of their number, a girl called Irma, is ever found, and she has no memory of how and why she found herself on the Rock, and what has happened to the others. This inexplicable event is the precursor to a string of tragedies which leads to the violent deaths of several people, and which transforms the sleepy and apparently content little community around Appleyard College into a centre of loss, horror, and scandal.Told in a way which makes it appear that the novelist is merely recounting a true story—Lindsay even tells readers in an author’s note that they must decide for themselves if it is fact or fiction—Picnic at Hanging Rock shares the disturbingly liminal fact-fiction territory of the Piper tale. Many readers did in fact believe that the novel was based on historical events and combed newspaper files, attempting to propound ingenious “rational” explanations for what happened on the Rock. Picnic at Hanging Rock has been the subject of many studies, with the novel being analysed through various prisms, including the Gothic, the pastoral, historiography, and philosophy. In “Fear and Loathing in the Australian Bush,” Kathleen Steele has depicted Picnic at Hanging Rock as embodying the idea that “Ordered ‘civilisation’ cannot overcome the gothic landscapes of settler imaginations: landscapes where time and people disappear” (44). She proposes that Lindsay intimates that the landscape swallows the “lost children” of the novel because there is a great absence in that place: that of Aboriginal people. In this reading of the novel, it is that absence which becomes, in a sense, a malevolent presence that will reach out beyond the initial disappearance of the three people on the Rock to destroy the bonds that held the settler community together. It is a powerfully-made argument, which has been taken up by other scholars and writers, including studies which link the theme of the novel with real-life lost-children cases such as that of Azaria Chamberlain, who disappeared near another “Rock” of great Indigenous metaphysical potency—Uluru, or Ayers Rock. However, to date there has been little exploration of the fairy tale quality of the novel, and none at all of the striking ways in which it evokes Pied Piper motifs, whilst transforming them to suit the exigencies of its particular narrative world. The motif of lost children disappearing from an ordered, safe, even complacent community into a place of mysterious power is extended into an exploration of the continued effects of those disappearances, depicting the disastrous impact on those left behind and the wider community in a way that the original tale does not. There is no literal Pied Piper figure in this novel, though various theories are evoked by characters as to who might have lured the girls and their teacher, and who might be responsible for the disappearances. Instead, there is a powerful atmosphere of inevitability and enchantment within the landscape itself which both illustrates the potency of place, and exemplifies the Piper’s hold on his followers. In Picnic at Hanging Rock, place and Piper are synonymous: the Piper has been transformed into the land itself. Yet this is not the “vast impersonal bush,” nor is it malevolent or vengeful. It is a living, seductive metaphysical presence: “Everything, if only you could see it clearly enough, is beautiful and complete . . .” (Lindsay 35). Just as in the original tale, the lost children follow the “Piper” willingly, without regret. Their disappearance is a happiness to them, in that moment, as it is for the lost children of Hamelin, and quite unlike how it must be for those torn apart by that loss—the community around Appleyard, the townspeople of Hamelin. Music, long associated with fairy “takings,” is also a subtle feature of the story. In the novel, just before the luring, Irma hears a sound like the beating of far-off drums. In the film, which more overtly evokes fairy tale elements than does the novel, it is noteworthy that the music at that point is based on traditional tunes for Pan-pipes, played by the great Romanian piper Gheorge Zamfir. The ending of the novel, with questions left unanswered, and lives blighted by the forever-inexplicable, may be seen as also following the trajectory of the original tale. Readers as much as the fictional characters are left with an enigma that continues to perplex and inspire. Picnic at Hanging Rock was one of the inspirations for another significant Australian fiction, this time a contemporary novel for children. Ursula Dubosarsky’s The Golden Day (2011) is an elegant and subtle short novel, set in Sydney at an exclusive girls’ school, in 1967. Like the earlier novel, The Golden Day is also partly inspired by visual art, in this case the Schoolgirl series of paintings by Charles Blackman. Combining a fairy tale atmosphere with historical details—the Vietnam War, the hanging of Ronald Ryan, the drowning of Harold Holt—the story is told through the eyes of several girls, especially one, known as Cubby. The Golden Day echoes the core narrative patterns of the earlier novel, but intriguingly transformed: a group of young girls goes with their teacher on an outing to a mysterious place (in this case, a cave on the beach—note the potent elements of rock and water, combined), and something inexplicable happens which results in a disappearance. Only this time, the girls are much younger than the characters of Lindsay’s novel, pre-pubertal in fact at eleven years old, and it is their teacher, a young, idealistic woman known only as Miss Renshaw, who disappears, apparently into thin air, with only an amber bead from her necklace ever found. But it is not only Miss Renshaw who vanishes: the other is a poet and gardener named Morgan who is also Miss Renshaw’s secret lover. Later, with the revelation of a dark past, he is suspected in absentia of being responsible for Miss Renshaw’s vanishment, with implications of rape and murder, though her body is never found. Morgan, who could partly figure as the Piper, is described early on in the novel as having “beautiful eyes, soft, brown, wet with tears, like a stuffed toy” (Dubosarsky 11). This disarming image may seem a world away from the ambiguously disturbing figure of the legendary Piper, yet not only does it fit with the children’s naïve perception of the world, it also echoes the fact that the children in the original story were not afraid of the Piper, but followed him willingly. However, that is complicated by the fact that Morgan does not lure the children; it is Miss Renshaw who follows him—and the children follow her, who could be seen as the other half of the Piper. The Golden Day similarly transforms the other Piper motifs in its own original way. The children are only literally lost for a short time, when their teacher vanishes and they are left to make their own way back from the cave; yet it could be argued that metaphorically, the girls are “lost” to childhood from that moment, in terms of never being able to go back to the state of innocence in which they were before that day. Their safe, ordered school community will never be the same again, haunted by the inexplicability of the events of that day. Meanwhile, the exploration of Australian place—the depiction of the Memorial Gardens where Miss Renshaw enjoins them to write poetry, the uncomfortable descent over rocks to the beach, and the fateful cave—is made through the eyes of children, not the adolescents and adults of Picnic at Hanging Rock. The girls are not yet in that liminal space which is adolescence and so their impressions of what the places represent are immediate, instinctive, yet confused. They don’t like the cave and can’t wait to get out of it, whereas the beach inspires them with a sense of freedom and the gardens with a sense of enchantment. But in each place, those feelings are mixed both with ordinary concerns and with seemingly random associations that are nevertheless potently evocative. For example, in the cave, Cubby senses a threateningly weightless atmosphere, a feeling of reality shifting, which she associates, apparently confusedly, with the hanging of Ronald Ryan, reported that very day. In this way, Dubosarsky subtly gestures towards the sinister inevitability of the following events, and creates a growing tension that will eventually fade but never fully dissipate. At the end, the novel takes an unexpected turn which is as destabilising as the ending of the Pied Piper story, and as open-ended in its transformative effects as the original tale: “And at that moment Cubby realised she was not going to turn into the person she had thought she would become. There was something inside her head now that would make her a different person, though she scarcely understood what it was” (Dubosarsky 148). The eruption of the uncanny into ordinary life will never leave her now, as it will never leave the other girls who followed Miss Renshaw and Morgan into the literally hollow hill of the cave and emerged alone into a transformed world. It isn’t just childhood that Cubby has lost but also any possibility of a comforting sense of the firm borders of reality. As in the Pied Piper, ambiguity and loss combine to create questions which cannot be logically answered, only dimly apprehended.Christopher Koch’s 1985 novel The Doubleman, winner of the Miles Franklin Award, also explores the power of place and the motif of lost children, but unlike the other two novels examined in this essay depicts an actual “incarnated” Piper motif in the mysteriously powerful figure of Clive Broderick, brilliant guitarist and charismatic teacher/guru, whose office, significantly, is situated in a subterranean space of knowledge—a basement room beneath a bookshop. Both central yet peripheral to the main action of the novel, touched with hints of the supernatural which never veer into overt fantasy, Broderick remains an enigma to the end. Set, like The Golden Day, in the 1960s, The Doubleman is narrated in the first person by Richard Miller, in adulthood a producer of a successful folk-rock group, the Rymers, but in childhood an imaginative, troubled polio survivor, with a crutch and a limp. It is noteworthy here that in the Grimms’ version of the Pied Piper, two children are left behind, despite following the Piper: one is blind, one is lame. And it is the lame boy who tells the townspeople what he glimpsed at Koppen Hill. In creating the character of Broderick, the author blends the traditional tropes of the Piper figure with Mephistophelian overtones and a strong influence from fairy lore, specifically the idea of the “doubleman,” here drawn from the writings of seventeenth-century Scottish pastor, the Reverend Robert Kirk of Aberfoyle. Kirk’s 1691 book The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies is the earliest known serious attempt at objective description of the fairy beliefs of Gaelic-speaking Highlanders. His own precisely dated life-story and ambiguous end—it is said he did not die but is forever a prisoner of the fairies—has eerie parallels to the Piper story. “And there is the uncanny, powerful and ambiguous fact of the matter. Here is a man, named, born, lived, who lived a fairy story, really lived it: and in the popular imagination, he lives still” (Masson).Both in his creative and his non-fiction work Koch frequently evoked what he called “the Otherland,” which he depicted as a liminal, ambiguous, destabilising but nevertheless very real and potent presence only thinly veiled by the everyday world. This Otherland is not the same in all his fictions, but is always part of an actual place, whether that be Java in The Year of Living Dangerously, Hobart and Sydney in The Doubleman, Tasmania, Vietnam and Cambodia in Highways to a War, and Ireland and Tasmania in Out of Ireland. It is this sense of the “Otherland” below the surface, a fairy tale, mythical realm beyond logic or explanation, which gives his work its distinctive and particular power. And in The Doubleman, this motif, set within a vividly evoked real world, complete with precise period detail, transforms the Piper figure into one which could easily appear in a Hobart lane, yet which loses none of its uncanny potency. As Noel Henricksen writes in his study of Koch’s work, Island and Otherland, “Behind the membrane of Hobart is Otherland, its manifestations a spectrum stretched between the mystical and the spiritually perverted” (213).This is Broderick’s first appearance, described through twelve-year-old Richard Miller’s eyes: Tall and thin in his long dark overcoat, he studied me for the whole way as he approached, his face absolutely serious . . . The man made me uneasy to a degree for which there seemed to be no explanation . . . I was troubled by the notion that he was no ordinary man going to work at all: that he was not like other people, and that his interest couldn’t be explained so simply. (Koch, Doubleman 3)That first encounter is followed by another, more disturbing still, when Broderick speaks to the boy, eyes fixed on him: “. . . hooded by drooping lids, they were entirely without sympathy, yet nevertheless interested, and formidably intelligent” (5).The sense of danger that Broderick evokes in the boy could be explained by a sinister hint of paedophilia. But though Broderick is a predator of sorts on young people, nothing is what it seems; no rational explanation encompasses the strange effect of his presence. It is not until Richard is a young man, in the company of his musical friend Brian Brady, that he comes across Broderick again. The two young men are looking in the window of a music shop, when Broderick appears beside them, and as Richard observes, just as in a fairy tale, “He didn’t seem to have changed or aged . . .” (44). But the shock of his sudden re-appearance is mixed with something else now, as Broderick engages Brady in conversation, ignoring Richard, “. . . as though I had failed some test, all that time ago, and the man had no further use for me” (45).What happens next, as Broderick demonstrates his musical prowess, becomes Brady’s teacher, and introduces them to his disciple, young bass player Darcy Burr, will change the young men’s lives forever and set them on a path that leads both to great success and to living nightmare, even after Broderick’s apparent disappearance, for Burr will take on the Piper’s mantle. Koch’s depiction of the lost children motif is distinctively different to the other two novels examined in this essay. Their fate is not so much a mystery as a tragedy and a warning. The lost children of The Doubleman are also lost children of the sixties, bright, talented young people drawn through drugs, immersive music, and half-baked mysticism into darkness and horrifying violence. In his essay “California Dreaming,” published in the collection Crossing the Gap, Koch wrote about this subterranean aspect of the sixties, drawing a connection between it and such real-life sinister “Pipers” as Charles Manson (60). Broderick and Burr are not the same as the serial killer Manson, of course; but the spell they cast over the “lost children” who follow them is only different in degree, not in kind. In the end of the novel, the spell is broken and the world is again transformed. Yet fittingly it is a melancholy transformation: an end of childhood dreams of imaginative potential, as well as dangerous illusions: “And I knew now that it was all gone—like Harrigan Street, and Broderick, and the district of Second-Hand” (Koch, Doubleman 357). The power of place, the last of the Piper motifs, is also deeply embedded in The Doubleman. In fact, as with the idea of Otherland, place—or Island, as Henricksen evocatively puts it—is a recurring theme in Koch’s work. He identified primarily and specifically as a Tasmanian writer rather than as simply Australian, pointing out in an essay, “The Lost Hemisphere,” that because of its landscape and latitude, different to the mainland of Australia, Tasmania “genuinely belongs to a different region from the continent” (Crossing the Gap 92). In The Doubleman, Richard Miller imbues his familiar and deeply loved home landscape with great mystical power, a power which is both inherent within it as it is, but also expressive of the Otherland. In “A Tasmanian Tone,” another essay from Crossing the Gap, Koch describes that tone as springing “from a sense of waiting in the landscape: the tense yet serene expectancy of some nameless revelation” (118). But Koch could also write evocatively of landscapes other than Tasmanian ones. The unnerving climax of The Doubleman takes place in Sydney—significantly, as in The Golden Day, in a liminal, metaphysically charged place of rocks and water. That place, which is real, is called Point Piper. In conclusion, the original tale’s three main motifs—lost children, the enigma of the Piper, and the power of place—have been explored in distinctive ways in each of the three novels examined in this article. Contemporary Australia may be a world away from medieval Germany, but the uncanny liminality and capacious ambiguity of the Pied Piper tale has made it resonate potently within these major Australian fictions. Transformed and transformative within the Australian imagination, the theme of the Pied Piper threads like a faintly-heard snatch of unearthly music through the apparently mimetic realism of the novels, destabilising readers’ expectations and leaving them with subversively unanswered questions. ReferencesBird, Carmel. “Dreaming the Place: An Exploration of Antipodean Narratives.” Griffith Review 42 (2013). 1 May 2016 <https://griffithreview.com/articles/dreaming-the-place/>.Dubosarsky, Ursula. The Golden Day. Sydney: Allen and Unwin, 2011.Fiander, Lisa M. “Writing in A Fairy Story Landscape: Fairy Tales and Contemporary Australian Fiction.” Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature 2 (2003). 30 April 2016 <http://openjournals.library.usyd.edu.au/index.php/JASAL/index>.Henricksen, Noel. Island and Otherland: Christopher Koch and His Books. Melbourne: Educare, 2003.Knox, Malcolm. “A Country of Lost Children.” Sydney Morning Herald 15 Aug. 2009. 1 May 2016 <http://www.smh.com.au/national/a-country-of-lost-children-20090814-el8d.html>.Koch, Christopher. The Doubleman. 1985. Sydney: Minerva, 1996.Koch, Christopher. Crossing the Gap: Memories and Reflections. 1987. Sydney: Vintage, 2000. Lindsay, Joan. Picnic at Hanging Rock. 1967. Melbourne: Penguin, 1977.Masson, Sophie. “Captive in Fairyland: The Strange Case of Robert Kirk of Aberfoyle.” Nation and Federation in the Celtic World: Papers from the Fourth Australian Conference of Celtic Studies, University of Sydney, June–July 2001. Ed. Pamela O’Neil. Sydney: University of Sydney Celtic Studies Foundation, 2003. Mieder, Wolfgang. “The Pied Piper: Origin, History, and Survival of a Legend.” Tradition and Innovation in Folk Literature. 1987. London: Routledge Revivals, 2015.Pierce, Peter. The Country of Lost Children: An Australian Anxiety. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1999.Steele, Kathleen. “Fear and Loathing in the Australian Bush: Gothic Landscapes in Bush Studies and Picnic at Hanging Rock.” Colloquy 20 (2010): 33–56. 27 July 2016 <http://artsonline.monash.edu.au/wp-content/arts/files/colloquy/colloquy_issue_20_december_2010/steele.pdf>.

What if Uchronia had been invented during the 17th Century? In the novel Polexandre, Marin Le Roy de Gomberville recycled an old project of his, i.e. a chronicle of the Last Valois Kings, mixing facts and fiction with a lot of freedom. As he stated in Le Discours sur les Vices et les Vertus de l’Histoire (Discourse on the vices and virtues of History), true history could offend and had to be transformed. Invention is based on a “normalized narrative of the real past” (Singles). Parallels between past and present enable the writer to express regrets and to imagine plausible divergent histories, directly influenced by the preoccupations of the time. The narration questions the foundation of History itself and of the received identity of famous historical figures.

Käesolev artikkel käsitleb piirilinna Narva kujutamist kahe baltisaksa autori – laulja ja laulupedagoogi Monika Hunniuse (1858–1934) ning provintsiaalpoliitiku Eduard von Stackelbergi (1867–1943) mälestustes. Nende lapse- ja nooruspõlve meenutustest koorub välja baltisaksa Narva – linn, mida pärast II maailmasõda enam olemas ei ole ning mis on suuresti ununenud ka eesti kultuurimälus. Oma geograafilise asetuse ning arhitektuurilise ja kultuurilise mitmekesisusega joonistub Narvast valitud baltisaksa mälestustes välja oluline lääne kultuuri ja saksluse eelpost idas. The article focuses on the border town of Narva as it emerges in the memoirs of two Baltic German authors – the singer and singing pedagogue Monika Hunnius (1858–1934) and the provincial politician Eduard von Stackelberg (1867–1943). Their recollections of their days of childhood and youth reveal a Baltic German Narva, a city that ceased to exist with World War II and has been largely wiped from Estonian cultural memory. Due to the city’s geographic position as well as its architectural and cultural diversity, these Baltic German memoirs provide a sketch of Narva as a city of symbolic value experienced as an outpost of German culture in the East. Narva has been depicted by the historian of culture and author of non-fiction Erik Thompson in his albums of the city that highlight the specialness of the Baltic German Narva – the Western, German cultural space reached its limit in the border town, while beyond it, the Eastern, Russian cultural space began. The border town was also depicted in literary writings, many of them short poems. The memoirs of Monika Hunnius and Eduard von Stackelberg, however, contain a more extensive retrospective look at Narva as it was in their childhood and youth. Stackelberg went to school in Narva, residing with his parents at Sillamäe during the vacations, and left the city without regret, while Hunnius, who actually lived in the city, remembers it as a nostalgic home space full of sunshine to which she later longs to return. The most important topics emerging from Hunnius’s and Stackelberg’s descriptions of Narva are connected with the town’s geographical location and its social-political conditions. The most significant among these are the river serving as a border, contrasts and confrontations, the German cultural space in Narva, religion as a phenomenon creating and breaking down boundaries, and the (lost) glory of Narva and its close vicinity. For Stackelberg, Narva symbolises a strong border that has found expression in its geographical situatedness at the end of one cultural space and the beginning of another. He sees Narva as an outpost of German culture and his experiences there are coloured by conflicts with the students of the Russian school and the self-protection attempts of Germanness. Like Hunnius, he experiences buildings as symbols of a German Narva that today can only be considered a site in cultural memory. In addition, he creates an opposition between the baroque old town and the ‘ugly’ new suburbs; also, the ritual battles that take place between students are with the boys from the suburbs. As regards the border between the East and the West, Stackelberg even draws a parallel with ancient Rome and calls it a limes, thus comparing the Germans with Romans and the Russians with barbarians. By the time of Stackelberg, the city is declining as its commerce has shifted to Tallinn and St. Petersburg. Due to the profession of Hunnius’s father, a Lutheran pastor, for her the scene of confrontations between the East and the West is that of the church where Russian Orthodoxy and Lutheranism clash. Although the boundary between different denominations is vague in Narva, even a positive contact with Russians through a beloved Russian nanny will not counterbalance the negative experience of an Orthodox service nor prevent the creation of a mental boundary between ’us’ and ’them’. Neither of the memoirs is restricted only to the city of Narva: Hunnius’s childhood paradise also includes a summer house called Schmetzky close to the town, while Stackelberg describes the manor of Sillamäe and the atmosphere of the summer getaway, including an endless quarrel with the neighbours over the boundaries of the land.

Filmic portrayals of Clara Schumann from World War II to the present provide a fascinating insight into changing conceptions of her professional and domestic roles. Just as fictional reshapings of her biography from the late-nineteenth century to the present can be understood to relate to changing social and political contexts, filmic portrayals of this great musical figure over the past 80 years speak to both constancy and change. The image that remains constant, the depiction of a loyal wife in the service of her husband's art, takes on different guises as it is reflected in the mirror of each film's historical, social, and political moment. In Träumerei (1943/44) Clara Schumann provides an idealized depiction of the German woman in the context of war, one who sacrifices her performance career for love of husband, children and domesticity. Song of Love (1947) reflects the revered role of the mother of a large family in post-war America. Limiting its narrative frame to the years leading up to Robert Schumann's death, Frühlingssinfonie (1974) casts a new light on the domestic strands explored in Träumerei, reflecting then recent developments in research in the Neue Schumann-Gesamtausgabe. In Geliebte Clara (2008), whereas the titular focus shifts explicitly to Clara herself, this passionate retelling is based on the familiar narrative that informs all four films. Building on the historiographical work of Beatrix Borchard, Matthias Wendt, and Yael Braunschweig, this article provides a rich cultural context for each film, and explores how that context relates to source materials including letters and diaries. Reaching beyond that scholarship, this article challenges the familiar narrative found in these movies by re-reading passages of Clara's letters and diaries that can be understood to express regret and frustration at the limitations that her domestic life imposed on her artistic career.

AbstrakPenyutradaraan film “Setia Bersamamu” ini menyuarakan sudut pandang baru terhadap stigma masyarakat, yang selalu memihak pada sudut pandang negatif terhadap fanatisme suporter sepakbola. Menjadi suporter sepak bola memiliki sisi manusia seutuhnya yang saling mencintai dan memiliki prioritas kewajiban sebelum menjalankan haknya walaupun banyak kekurangan menjadi manusia seutuhnya.Fanatisme diibaratkan seperti cinta yang dapat mengubah hal keras menjadi lembut, yang kemudian memiliki pertimbangan logis bahwasannya diri sendiri adalah prioritas kehidupan, semua yang akan dijalankan harus dipertimbangkan matang-matang agar tidak berakhir penyesalan, bahwasannya prioritas kewajiban menjadi utama sebelum haknya terpenuhi. Bentuk fanatisme tersebut yang menjadi pondasi dalam penyutradaraan film Setia Bersamamu.Pertimbangan teknis sangat berpengaruh dalam film ini yang diimplementasikan secara hiperbola untuk mendukung konsep fanatisme melalui konsep mise-en-scene yang menjadi pondasi untuk membangun karakter utama yang secara fanatis mendukung tim favoritnya, seperti warna biru muda yang mendominasi pada setiap setting menjadi bentuk fanatisme tokoh utama dalam kehidupannya mendukung tim favoritnya sebagai warna identitas tim. Kata Kunci : Penyutradaraan, Fanatisme, Mise-en-scene, Film Fiksi Abstract“Be Faithful to you” movie has been directed for sounding a new point of view of society stigma which always taking sides for negative stigma to soccer fanatic supporter. Being soccer club supporter is completely have a humanity point which loving each other and have priority to do their obligations before their rights even though being human always have minus point.Fanaticism is more like love who can change solid things to be soft, and then, have logically considered that our self is a priority, Everything that has to do must be carefully considered, so that not become regrets in the end. That is obligation need to be a main priority before the rights has been fulfilled. This Fanaticism being the foundation for directing this “Be Faithful to you” movie.Technical consider is most effected to this movie to be implemented for being hyperbolic, so that will support fanaticism via mise-en-scene which being founded to build main character fanatically support his favorite soccer club, Like blue color is his favorite soccer club colors, that color is dominating for every setting for creating fanaticism image in his life to support that soccer club. Keyword : directing, fanaticism, mise-en-scene, fiction movie.

PurposeThis teaching case aims to analyze the business model of Amaro, a company that directly sells lifestyle goods to end consumers (B2C), focused on the women's market. Amaro's original business model is introduced and a challenging dilemma is proposed: could Amaro innovate its business model, moving from a digitally native vertical brand (DNVB)-type company to a platform, specifically a vertical marketplace focused on the female audience? Would Amaro be prepared for this evolution or would it be more appropriate to focus on or strengthen the DNVB model?Design/methodology/approachThis teaching case was developed based on in-depth interviews with Amaro's leadership. The teaching notes were proposed based on business model innovation, competitive positioning and market trends concepts. The teaching case considers a new type of business model called DNVB. Students can review the concepts, create analyses and recommend which strategic options can leverage the company for a new growing cycle.FindingsUsing the case study in the classroom should promote the discussion and reflections on business model innovation and the future of retail in omnichannel contexts - Amaro offers products online (on an e-commerce platform and native mobile applications) and physically in locations called guide shops. The authors suggested the adoption of frameworks and tools (e.g. the competitive positioning map to allow students to visualize ways to compare strategies and make decisions).Research limitations/implicationsThe case introduces a fictional dilemma related to the decision to maximize offline or online investments or completely change the company's business model by adding a new vertical marketplace approach.Practical implicationsThis teaching case contributes to the student's learning about business model innovation and evolution. Case discussions could explore contemporary concepts such as value proposition, disintermediation and omnichannel commerce.Originality/valueOffering goods directly to the consumers by using modern technological architecture through vertical integration within the supply chain makes the DNVB business model an original topic in the start-up segment.

Fergus, Maureen. The Gypsy King. Toronto: RazorBill Penguin Canada, 2013. Print.Described by the publisher, Penguin Canada, as “The Princess Bride meets A Game of Thrones with a hint of Ever After,” this book holds great promise. As a fan of all three, my expectations were high and I was a little disappointed. The book is enjoyable, the writing is engaging, the plot has a few interesting twists, the main characters are interesting, but the abrupt ending felt like a marketing ploy. At least it is an effective ploy. I am already watching the shelf for the next book in the series to arrive.Fergus depicts a rigid caste system, a ruthless and vindictive regent, a selfish quest for eternal life, and a society fighting for survival. The Gypsy King tells the story of Persephone, a strong-willed slave, who longs for freedom but does not take action. When she encounters Azriel, a charming gypsy and resourceful thief, her situation takes a dramatic turn. Azriel believes Persephone may be part of a 15-year old prophecy shared by the last gypsy seer following the slaughter of innocent gypsies. The primary villain, Mordecai, is exceptionally evil; he is ruthless, maniacal, and makes puppy-murdering Cruella look like a normal human being. His actions are more gruesomely depicted than expected and this book is not for those with a weak stomach. The novel contains scenes of violence and sexuality that may not appeal to all readers.The fiercely independent female protagonist, Persephone, is the best part of this book. I was frustrated with her at times for her reticence to escape her situation, but ultimately I found myself appreciating her loyalty and commitment to those in need of her assistance—both humans and animals. She has moments in distress, but never plays the maiden in need of a hero. Although she clearly has feelings for Azriel, and vice versa, their relationship does not progress much beyond palpable sexual tension. Showing her resourcefulness, our protagonist seizes opportunities and works to extricate herself and others from the grasp of Mordecai and his merciless men. Facing an oppressive society that scorns her social class and her gender, Persephone is fighting her way up two bitterly steep hills. However, she finds the strength, the courage, and the resolve to survive. That being said, she is not a saint. She experiences jealousy, hatred, and selfishness yet she is a vibrant and passionate character. Fergus has developed a perfectly human protagonist and it is a refreshing change. Because I am so looking forward to the next installment and I love a strong female lead, I will give the book four stars.Recommended: Four out of Four StarsReviewer: Jorden SmithJorden is a Public Services Librarian in Rutherford Humanities and Social Sciences Library at the University of Alberta. She is an avid fiction reader and subscribes to Hemingway’s belief that “there is no friend as loyal as a book.”

I’ve been thinking about why I read the New York Times Book Review from cover to cover. If I have no intention of reading most of the books that any given issue reviews, why do I enjoy reading the reviews themselves? Part of the appeal might lie in the review’s ability to survey and condense: forearmed by the Book Review, I won’t have to stare blankly if someone mentions they’re reading Malcolm Gladwell’s Blink, even if I never get around to reading the book myself. Yet by this logic, I should enjoy CliffsNotes more than novels and abstracts more than articles – which I do not. Another explanation for the appeal of book reviews is that they steer one towards good books and away from bad ones. This, too, is inadequate, for I tend to be as interested in reviews of books I have already read as I am in those of books I plan to read. So again, the real puzzle is why one enjoys reading a review of a book that one would not actually enjoy reading. It is these cases that argue for the independent, self-contained nature of the review. A good review possesses a character distinct from that of the work that it discusses. At its core, the review is not a hermeneutical or scholarly appendage to a larger work, but an autonomous form of entertainment: a closet drama, staged only on the page, in which two protagonists seek fundamentally different ends. The dramatic essence of the review is most readily discernable in a “pan:” the withering, skewering, choose-your-favourite-metaphor-ing dismissal of a work’s very right to exist. Take Clive James’s recent review of Elias Canetti’s posthumous Party in the Blitz: The English Years. James terms Canetti’s memoir “a book fit to serve every writer in the world as a hideous, hilarious example of the tone to avoid when the ego, faced with the certain proof of its peripheral importance, loses the last of its inhibitions” (9). It is the virulence with which Canetti recalls his contemporaries (calling T. S. Eliot, for example, “a libertine of the void, a foothill of Hegel, a desecrator of Dante” or saying of Iris Murdoch, “Everything I despise about English life is in her”) that motivates James’s own uninhibitedly virulent review. Whereas the title of James’s review is “Insistence on Myself,” the Book Review’s editors put the case more baldly in a subhead on the front cover: “Clive James: the Insufferable Canetti.” James’s review is as much an epitaph as it is an analysis, and its very forcefulness prompted me to pick up a copy of the book that had so incensed him. When panning a book that we have already suffered through, the reviewer becomes the avenging hero of an Elizabethan tragedy, righting a wrong and cutting the rot out of Denmark. While there is no book I could nominate as being categorically bad without some partisan coming to its defence, I suspect that I was not the only reader gratified by Walter Kirn’s review of Jonathan Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. How reaffirming to find that Kirn, like me, was annoyed by Foer’s cloying narrator: “Kids, we’re told, will say the darnedest things, but kids like Oskar – authorial surrogates with their darling whimsicalities and cute ‘have you ever noticed?’ observations … drive adults to the bar for a stiff drink” (1). I left the review, as I did not Foer’s novel, with a sense of catharsis. Readers and reviewers alike may feel even more vindicated when the subject of such a pan is not a book, but a film, for while we may feel a twinge of regret for the solitary author who has failed ignominiously, we do not for a committee of writers and studio executives. When the pan is unjustified, however, or seems motivated by a reviewer’s ire rather than by a work’s deficiency, our sympathies shift. The reviewer is no longer a Hamlet, but an Iago, and while some part of us may still delight in his ruthlessness, we also identify with the author as victim. This is particularly true in the case of first-time novelists, for surely most avid readers of book reviews believe, on some level, that they have one good novel in them just waiting to be put down on paper. The first-time author is our surrogate, and we cringe for him. There may be yet a third panning scenario, one in which the reviewer becomes a quixotic mock-hero, tilting at windmills of public opinion, or an all-licensed fool, needling an omnipotent king. T. S. Eliot’s assertion that Hamlet is “most certainly an artistic failure” comes to mind (143), as do any number of reviews that attempt to catalogue the deficiencies of the Harry Potter books. More favourable reviews, too, are fundamentally dramatic in nature. For the review may not simply be a précis or a summary. The author of the book has said something; the reviewer, no matter how much he admires the book, must say something different. If drama arises from two characters desiring conflicting outcomes, then the reviewer who sets out to praise a work may be tasked harder than one who means to castigate it. The unfavourable review questions a work’s right to exist, but the favourable review must establish its own right to exist. The reviewer is cast not in a revenge tragedy, but in a Freudian family drama, and must mark his independence from the book that has given birth to his article. While the reviewer has far less space and time within which to assert his independent identity than did his book-writing subject, he does hold the clear advantage of speaking second. He, therefore, has a number of means by which he can encircle the book or shift the ground from under it. Whether by contextualising a work, by talking about a new work in light of the author’s previous work, by discussing a book’s reception, or by reviewing several works in light of each other, the reviewer seeks to make his own inscription on another’s text. Yet the greater the book, the harder it is for the reviewer to scrawl his “Kilroy was here” across it. What can one say about Ian McEwan’s Saturday, for example, that the book does not already say about itself? Reviewers of the novel have struggled to do more than load it with encomiums. Michiko Kakutani, for example, while praising the novel as “one of the most powerful pieces of post-9/11 fiction yet published,” avers that “Saturday is too indebted to Mrs. Dalloway to resonate with the fierce originality of the author’s last book, Atonement” (37). While Kakutani is right to note McEwan’s debt to Virginia Woolf, she says far less about this relationship than does the author himself in his last novel. Briony, the narrator of Atonement, falls under the thrall of The Waves, which she reads three times and which directs her own writing (265). Yet the editor of a literary journal to which she submits a manuscript identifies Woolf’s influence as a limitation, writing in a rejection letter: …we wondered whether it owed a little too much to the techniques of Mrs. Woolf. The crystalline present moment is of course a worthy subject in itself… However, such writing can become precious when there is no sense of forward movement. Put the other way round, our attention would have been held even more effectively had there been an underlying pull of simple narrative. (194) This “underlying pull of simple narrative” is McEwan’s great strength, one that allows him, consciously, to echo Mrs. Dalloway without being overridden by it. Kakutani’s review is not so lucky, for McEwan’s discussion of Woolf trumps her own, frustrating her bid for critical autonomy. Ultimately, the review is a dramatic form in that it draws its life and vigour from the interplay of competing voices. In an essay or an interview, authors more or less speak for themselves. A review, on the other hand, puts simulacra of an author and his text into dialogue with “the reviewer,” a role that the reviewing author adopts for the occasion. Both authors therefore become characters when they enter the stage of the review. Thus, even the least appealing book can make for an entertaining and engaging review, for the dialogic nature of the review casts its subject as the stuff of drama. References Eliot, T. S. Selected Essays. London: Faber and Faber, 1932. James, Clive. “Insistence on Myself.” Rev. of Party in the Blitz: The English Years, by Elias Canetti. New York Times Book Review 2 Oct. 2005: 8-9. Kakutani, Michiko. “A Hero with 9/11 Peripheral Vision.” Rev. of Saturday, by Ian McEwan. New York Times Book Review 18 March 2005: 37. Kirn, Walter. “Everything Is Included.” Rev. of Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, by Jonathan Safran Foer. New York Times Book Review 3 April 2005: 1. McEwan, Ian. Atonement. New York: Doubleday, 2001. Citation reference for this article MLA Style Bolton, Matthew. "The Book Review as Closet Drama." M/C Journal 8.5 (2005). echo date('d M. Y'); ?> <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0510/02-bolton.php>. APA Style Bolton, M. (Oct. 2005) "The Book Review as Closet Drama," M/C Journal, 8(5). Retrieved echo date('d M. Y'); ?> from <http://journal.media-culture.org.au/0510/02-bolton.php>.

During the War on Terror, the United States military has been conducting an increasing number of foreign campaigns by remote control using drones—also called unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or remotely piloted vehicles (RPVs)—to extend the reach of military power and augment the technical precision of targeted strikes while minimizing bodily risk to American combatants. Stationed on bases throughout the southwest, operators fly weaponized drones over the Middle East. Viewing the battle zone through a computer screen that presents them with imagery captured from a drone-mounted camera, these combatants participate in war from a safe distance via an interface that resembles a video game. Increasingly, this participation takes the form of targeted killing. Despite their relative physical safety, in 2008 reports began mounting that like boots-on-the-ground combatants, many drone operators seek the services of chaplains or other mental health professionals to deal with the emotional toll of their work (Associated Press; Schachtman). Questions about the nature of the stress or trauma that drone operators experience have become a trope in news coverage of drone warfare (see Bumiller; Bowden; Saleton; Axe). This was exemplified in May 2013, when former Air Force drone pilot Brandon Bryant became a public figure after speaking to National Public Radio about his remorse for participating in targeted killing strikes and his subsequent struggle with post-traumatic stress (PTS) (Greene and McEvers). Stories like Bryant’s express American culture’s struggle to understand the role screen-mediated, remotely controlled killing plays in shifting the location of combatants’s sense of moral agency. That is, their sense of their ability to act based on their own understanding of right and wrong. Historically, one of the primary ways that psychiatry has conceptualized combat trauma has been as combatants’s psychological response losing their sense of moral agency on the battlefield (Lifton).This articleuses the popular science fiction novel Ender's Game as an analytic lens through which to examine the ways that screen-mediated warfare may result in combat trauma by investigating the ways in which it may compromise moral agency. The goal of this analysis is not to describe the present state of drone operators’s experience (see Asaro), but rather to compare and contrast contemporary public discourses on the psychological impact of screen-mediated war with the way it is represented in one of the most influential science fiction novels of all times (The book won the Nebula Award in 1985, the Hugo Award in 1986, and appears on both the Modern Library 100 Best Novels and American Library Association’s “100 Best Books for Teens” lists). In so doing, the paper aims to counter prevalent modes of critical analysis of screen-mediated war that cannot account for drone operators’s trauma. For decades, critics of postmodern warfare have denounced how fighting from inside tanks, the cockpits of planes, or at office desks has removed combatants from the experiences of risk and endangerment that historically characterized war (see Gray; Levidow & Robins). They suggest that screen-mediation enables not only physical but also cognitive and emotional distance from the violence of war-fighting by circumscribing it in a “magic circle.” Virtual worlds scholars adopted the term “magic circle” from cultural historian Johan Huizinga, who described it as the membrane that separates the time and space of game-play from those of real life (Salen and Zimmerman). While military scholars have long recognized that only 2% of soldiers can kill without hesitation (Grossman), critics of “video game wars” suggest that screen-mediation puts war in a magic circle, thereby creating cyborg human-machine assemblages capable of killing in cold blood. In other words, these critics argue that screen-mediated war distributes agency between humans and machines in such a way that human combatants do not feel morally responsible for killing. In contrast, Ender’s Game suggests that even when militaries utilize video game aesthetics to create weapons control interfaces, screen-mediation alone ultimately cannot blur the line between war and play and thereby psychically shield cyborg soldiers from combat trauma.Orson Scott Card’s 1985 novel Ender’s Game—and the 2013 film adaptation—tells the story of a young boy at an elite military academy. Set several decades after a terrible war between humans and an alien race called the buggers, the novel follows the life of a boy named Ender. At age 6, recruiters take Andrew “Ender” Wiggin from his family to begin military training. He excels in all areas and eventually enters officer training. There he encounters a new video game-like simulator in which he commands space ship battalions against increasingly complex configurations of bugger ships. At the novel’s climax, Ender's mentor, war hero Mazer Rackham, brings him to a room crowded with high-ranking military personnel in order to take his final test on the simulator. In order to win Ender opts to launch a massive bomb, nicknamed “Little Doctor”, at the bugger home world. The image on his screen of a ball of space dust where once sat the enemy planet is met by victory cheers. Mazer then informs Ender that since he began officer training, he has been remotely controlling real ships. The video game war was, "Real. Not a game" (Card 297); Ender has exterminated the bugger species. But rather than join the celebration, Ender is devastated to learn he has committed "xenocide." Screen-mediation, the novel shows, can enable people to commit acts that they would otherwise find heinous.US military advisors have used the story to set an agenda for research and development in augmented media. For example, Dr. Michael Macedonia, Chief Technology Officer of the Army Office for Simulation, Training, and Instrumentation told a reporter for the New York Times that Ender's Game "has had a lot of influence on our thinking" about how to use video game-like technologies in military operations (Harmon; Silberman; Mead). Many recent programs to develop and study video game-like military training simulators have been directly inspired by the book and its promise of being able to turn even a six-year-old into a competent combatant through well-structured human-computer interaction (Mead). However, it would appear that the novel’s moral regarding the psychological impact of actual screen-mediated combat did not dissuade military investment in drone warfare. The Air Force began using drones for surveillance during the Gulf War, but during the Global War on Terror they began to be equipped with weapons. By 2010, the US military operated over 7,000 drones, including over 200 weapons-ready Predator and Reaper drones. It now invests upwards of three-billion dollars a year into the drone program (Zucchino). While there are significant differences between contemporary drone warfare and the plot of Ender's Game—including the fact that Ender is a child, that he alone commands a fleet, that he thinks he is playing a game, and that, except for a single weapon of mass destruction, he and his enemies are equally well equipped—for this analysis, I will focus on their most important similarities: both Ender and actual drone operators work on teams for long shifts using video game-like technology to remotely control vehicles in aerial combat against an enemy. After he uses the Little Doctor, Mazer and Graff, Ender's long-time training supervisors, first work to circumvent his guilt by reframing his actions as heroic. “You're a hero, Ender. They've seen what you did, you and the others. I don't think there's a government on Earth that hasn't voted you their highest metal.” “I killed them all, didn't I?” Ender asked. “All who?” asked Graff. “The buggers? That was the idea.” Mazer leaned in close. “That's what the war was for.” “All their queens. So I killed all their children, all of everything.” “They decided that when they attacked us. It wasn't your fault. It's what had to happen.” Ender grabbed Mazer's uniform and hung onto it, pulling him down so they were face to face. “I didn't want to kill them all. I didn't want to kill anybody! I'm not a killer! […] but you made me do it, you tricked me into it!” He was crying. He was out of control. (Card 297–8)The novel up to this point has led us to believe that Ender at the very least understands that what he does in the game will be asked of him in real life. But his traumatic response to learning the truth reveals that he was in the magic circle. When he thinks he is playing a game, succeeding is a matter of ego: he wants to be the best, to live up to the expectations of his trainers that he is humanity’s last hope. When the magic circle is broken, Ender reconsiders his decision to use the Little Doctor. Tactics he could justify to win the game, reframed as real military tactics, threaten his sense of himself as a moral agent. Being told he is a hero provides no solace.Card wrote the novel during the Cold War, when computers were coming to play an increasingly large role in military operations. Historians of military technology have shown that during this time human behavior began to be defined in machine-like, functionalist terms by scientists working on cybernetic systems (see Edwards; Galison; Orr). Human skills were defined as components of large technological systems, such as tanks and anti-aircraft weaponry: a human skill was treated as functionally the same as a machine one. The only issue of importance was how all the components could work together in order to meet strategic goals—a cybernetic problem. The reasons that Mazer and Graff have for lying to Ender suggest that the author believed that as a form of technical augmentation, screen-mediation can be used to evacuate individual moral agency and submit human will to the command of the larger cybernetic system. Issues of displaced agency in the military cyborg assemblage are apparent in the following quote, in which Mazer compares Ender himself to the bomb he used to destroy the bugger home world: “You had to be a weapon, Ender. Like a gun, like the Little Doctor, functioning perfectly but not knowing what you were aimed at. We aimed you. We're responsible. If there was something wrong, we did it” (298). Questions of distributed agency have also surfaced in the drone debates. Government and military leaders have attempted to depersonalize drone warfare by assuring the American public that the list of targets is meticulously researched: drones kill those who we need killed. Drone warfare, media theorist Peter Asaro argues, has “created new and complex forms of human-machine subjectivity” that cannot be understood by considering the agency of the technology alone because it is distributed between humans and machines (25). While our leaders’s decisions about who to kill are central to this new cyborg subjectivity, the operators who fire the weapons nevertheless experience at least a retrospective sense of agency. As phenomenologist John Protevi notes, in the wake of wars fought by modern military networks, many veterans diagnosed with PTS still express guilt and personal responsibility for the outcomes of their participation in killing (Protevi). Mazer and Graff explain that the two qualities that make Ender such a good weapon also create an imperative to lie to him: his compassion and his innocence. For his trainers, compassion means a capacity to truly think like others, friend or foe, and understand their motivations. Graff explains that while his trainers recognized Ender's compassion as an invaluable tool, they also recognized that it would preclude his willingness to kill.It had to be a trick or you couldn't have done it. It's the bind we were in. We had to have a commander with so much empathy that he would think like the buggers, understand them and anticipate them. So much compassion that he could win the love of his underlings and work with them like a perfect machine, as perfect as the buggers. But somebody with that much compassion could never be the killer we needed. Could never go into battle willing to win at all costs. If you knew, you couldn't do it. If you were the kind of person who would do it even if you knew, you could never have understood the buggers well enough. (298)In learning that the game was real, Ender learns that he was not merely coming to understand a programmed simulation of bugger behavior, but their actual psychology. Therefore, his compassion has not only helped him understand the buggers’ military strategy, but also to identify with them.Like Ender, drone operators spend weeks or months following their targets, getting to know them and their routines from a God’s eye perspective. They both also watch the repercussions of their missions on screen. Unlike fighter pilots who drop bombs and fly away, drone operators use high-resolution cameras and fly much closer to the ground both when flying and assessing the results of their strikes. As one drone operator interviewed by the Los Angeles Times explained, "When I flew the B-52, it was at 30,000 to 40,000 feet, and you don't even see the bombs falling … Here, you're a lot closer to the actual fight, or that's the way it seems" (Zucchino). Brookings Institute scholar Peter Singer has argued that in this way screen mediation actually enables a more intimate experience of violence for drone operators than airplane pilots (Singer).The second reason Ender’s trainers give for lying is that they need someone not only compassionate, but also innocent of the horrors of war. The war veteran Mazer explains: “And it had to be a child, Ender,” said Mazer. “You were faster than me. Better than me. I was too old and cautious. Any decent person who knows what warfare is can never go into battle with a whole heart. But you didn't know. We made sure you didn't know" (298). When Ender discovers what he has done, he loses not only his innocence but his sense of himself as a moral agent. After such a trauma, his heart is no longer whole.Actual drone operators are, of course, not kept in a magic circle, innocent of the repercussions of their actions. Nor do they otherwise feel as though they are playing, as several have publicly stated. Instead, they report finding drone work tedious, and some even play video games for fun (Asaro). However, Air Force recruitment advertising makes clear analogies between the skills they desire and those of video game play (Brown). Though the first generations of drone operators were pulled from the ranks of flight pilots, in 2009 the Air Force began training them from the ground. Many drone operators, then, enter the role having no other military service and may come into it believing, on some level, that their work will be play.Recent military studies of drone operators have raised doubts about whether drone operators really experience high rates of trauma, suggesting that the stresses they experience are seated instead in occupational issues like long shifts (Ouma, Chappelle, and Salinas; Chappelle, Psy, and Salinas). But several critics of these studies have pointed out that there is a taboo against speaking about feelings of regret and trauma in the military in general and among drone operators in particular. A PTS diagnosis can end a military career; given the Air Force’s career-focused recruiting emphasis, it makes sense that few would come forward (Dao). Therefore, it is still important to take drone operator PTS seriously and try to understand how screen-mediation augments their experience of killing.While critics worry that warfare mediated by a screen and joystick leads to a “‘Playstation’ mentality towards killing” (Alston 25), Ender's Game presents a theory of remote-control war wherein this technological redistribution of the act of killing does not, in itself, create emotional distance or evacuate the killer’s sense of moral agency. In order to kill, Ender must be distanced from reality as well. While drone operators do not work shielded by the magic circle—and therefore do not experience the trauma of its dissolution—every day when they leave the cyborg assemblage of their work stations and rejoin their families they still have to confront themselves as individual moral agents and bear their responsibility for ending lives. In both these scenarios, a human agent’s combat trauma serves to remind us that even when their bodies are physically safe, war is hell for those who fight. This paper has illustrated how a science fiction story can be used as an analytic lens for thinking through contemporary discourses about human-technology relationships. However, the US military is currently investing in drones that are increasingly autonomous from human operators. This redistribution of agency may reduce incidence of PTS among operators by decreasing their role in, and therefore sense of moral responsibility for, killing (Axe). Reducing mental illness may seem to be a worthwhile goal, but in a world wherein militaries distribute the agency for killing to machines in order to reduce the burden on humans, societies will have to confront the fact that combatants’s trauma cannot be a compass by which to measure the morality of wars. Too often in the US media, the primary stories that Americans are told about the violence of their country’s wars are those of their own combatants—not only about their deaths and physical injuries, but their suicide and PTS. To understand war in such a world, we will need new, post-humanist stories where the cyborg assemblage and not the individual is held accountable for killing and morality is measured in lives taken, not rates of mental illness. ReferencesAlston, Phillip. “Report of the Special Rapporteur on Extrajudicial, Summary, or Arbitrary Executions, Addendum: Study on Targeted Killings.” United Nations Human Rights Council (2010). Asaro, Peter M. “The Labor of Surveillance and Bureaucratized Killing: New Subjectivities of Military Drone Operators”. Social Semiotics 23.2 (2013): 196-22. Associated Press. “Predator Pilots Suffering War Stress.” Military.com 2008. Axe, David. “How to Prevent Drone Pilot PTSD: Blame the ’Bot.” Wired June 2012.Bowden, Mark. “The Killing Machines: How to Think about Drones.” The Atlantic Sep. 2013.Brown, Melissa T. Enlisting Masculinity: The Construction of Gender in US Military Recruiting Advertising during the All-Volunteer Force. London: Oxford University Press, 2012. Bumiller, Elisabeth. “Air Force Drone Operators Report High Levels of Stress.” New York Times 18 Dec. 2011: n. pag. Card, Orson Scott. Ender’s Game. Tom Doherty Associates, Inc., 1985. Chappelle, Wayne, D. Psy, and Amber Salinas. “Psychological Health Screening of Remotely Piloted Aircraft (RPA) Operators and Supporting Units.” Paper presented at the Symposium on Mental Health and Well-Being across the Military Spectrum, Bergen, Norway, 12 April 2011: 1–12. Dao, James. “Drone Pilots Are Found to Get Stress Disorders Much as Those in Combat Do.” New York Times 22 Feb. 2013: n. pag. Edwards, Paul N. The Closed World: Computers and the Politics of Discourse in Cold War America. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1997.Galison, Peter. “The Ontology of the Enemy: Norbert Wiener and the Cybernetic Vision.” Critical Inquiry 21.1 (1994): 228.Gray, Chris Hables “Posthuman Soldiers in Postmodern War.” Body & Society 9.4 (2003): 215–226. 27 Nov. 2010.Greene, David, and Kelly McEvers. “Former Air Force Pilot Has Cautionary Tales about Drones.” National Public Radio 10 May 2013.Grossman, David. On Killing. Revised. Boston: Back Bay Books, 2009. Harmon, Amy. “More than Just a Game, But How Close to Reality?” New York Times 3 Apr. 2003: n. pag. Levidow, Les, and Robins. Cyborg Worlds: The Military Information Society. London: Free Association Books, 1989. Lifton, Robert Jay. Home from the War: Vietnam Veterans: Neither Victims nor Executioners. New York: Random House, 1973. Mead, Corey. War Play: Video Games and the Future of Armed Conflict. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013. Orr, Jackie. Panic Diaries: A Genealogy of Panic Disorder. Durham: Duke University Press, 2006.Ouma, J.A., W.L. Chappelle, and A. Salinas. Facets of Occupational Burnout among US Air Force Active Duty and National Guard/Reserve MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper Operators. Air Force Research Labs Technical Report AFRL-SA-WP-TR-2011-0003. Wright-Patterson AFB, OH: Air Force Research Laboratory. 2011.Protevi, John. “Affect, Agency and Responsibility: The Act of Killing in the Age of Cyborgs.” Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 7.3 (2008): 405–413. Salen, Katie, and Eric Zimmerman. Rules of Play: Game Design Fundamentals. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2003. Saleton, William. “Ghosts in the Machine: Do Remote-Control War Pilots Get Combat Stress?” Slate.com Aug. 2008. Schachtman, Nathan. “Shrinks Help Drone Pilots Cope with Robo-Violence.” Wired Aug. 2008.Silberman, Steve. “The War Room.” Wired Sep. 2004: 1–5.Singer, P.W. Wired for War: The Robotics Revolution and Conflict in the Twenty-First Century. New York: Penguin Press, 2009. Zucchino, David. “Drone Pilots Have Front-Row Seat on War, from Half a World Away.” Los Angeles Times 21 Feb. 2010: n. pag.

Since its return in 2005 the science fiction series Doctor Who (BBC1) has featured many alien creatures which bear a striking similarity to non-human Earth species: the Judoon in “Smith and Jones” (2007) have heads like rhinoceroses; the nurses in “New Earth” (2006) are cats in wimples; the Tritovores in “Planet of the Dead” (2009) are giant flies in boilersuits. Yet only one non-human animal has appeared twice in the series, in unrelated stories: the pig. Furthermore, alien races such as the Judoon and the Tritovores simply happen to look like human species, and the series offers no narrative explanation as to why such similarities exist. When the pig has appeared, however, it has instead been as the consequence of experimentation and mutation, and in both cases the appearance of such porcine hybrids is signalled as horrific, unsettling and, in the end, to be pitied. The fact that the pig has appeared in this way twice suggests there is something about the human understanding of this animal which means it can fulfil a role in fiction unavailable to other Earth species. The pig’s appearance has been in two stories, both two-parters. In “Aliens of London”/“World War Three” (2005) a spaceship crashes into London’s Thames river, and the pilot inside, thought to be dead, is sent to be scientifically examined. Alone in the laboratory, the pathologist Doctor Sato is startled to find the creature is alive and, during its attempt to escape, it is shot by the military. When the creature is examined The Doctor reveals it is “an ordinary pig, from Earth.” He goes on to explain that, “someone’s taken a pig, opened up its brain, stuck bits on, then they’ve strapped it in that ship and made it dive-bomb. It must have been terrified. They’ve taken this animal and turned it into a joke.” The Doctor’s concern over the treatment of the pig mirrors his earlier reprimand of the military for shooting it; as he cradles the dying creature he shouts at the soldier responsible, “What did you do that for? It was scared! It was scared.” On the commentary track for the DVD release of this episode Julie Gardner (executive producer) and Will Cohen (visual effects producer) note how so many people told them they had a significant emotional reaction to this scene, with Gardner adding, “Bless the pig.” In that sense, what begins as a moment of horror in the series becomes one of empathy with a non-human being, and the pig moves from being a creature of terror to one whose death is seen to be an immoral act. This movement from horror to empathy can be seen in the pig’s other appearance, in “Daleks in Manhattan”/“Evolution of the Daleks” (2007). Here the alien Daleks experiment on humans in order to develop the ability to meld themselves with Earthlings, in order to repopulate their own dwindling numbers. Humans are captured and then tested; as Laszlo, one of the outcomes of the experimentation, explains, “They’re divided into two groups: high intelligence and low intelligence. The low intelligence are taken to becomes Pig Slaves, like me.” These Pig Slaves look and move like humans except for their faces, which have prolonged ears and the pig signifier of a snout. At no point in the story is it made clear why experimentations on low intelligence humans should result in them looking like pigs, and a non-hybrid pig is not seen throughout the story. The appearance of the experiments’ results is therefore not narratively explained, and it does not draw on the fact that “in digestive apparatus and nutrient requirements pigs resemble humans in more ways than any mammal except monkeys and apes, which is why pigs are much in demand for [human] medical research” (Harris 70); indeed, considering the story is set in the 1930s such a justification would be anachronistic. The use of the pig, therefore, draws solely on its cultural, not its scientific, associations. These associations are complex, and the pig has been used to connote many things in Western culture. Children’s books such as The Sheep-Pig (King-Smith) and Charlotte’s Web (White) suggest the close proximity of humans and pigs can result in an affinity capable of communication. The use of pigs to represent Poles in Maus: A Survivor’s Tale (Spiegelman), on the other hand, has been read as offensive, drawing on the animal’s association with dirt and greed (Weschler). These depictions are informed by debates about pigs in the real world, whereby an animal which, as mentioned above, is similar enough to humans to be useful in medical research can also, for the food industry, go through a slaughtering process described by Bob Torres as “horribly cruel” (47). Such cruelty can only be justified if the boundaries between the pig and the human are maintained, and this is why pig-human representations are capable of being shocking and horrific. The hybrid nature of the human-pig creature draws on the horror trope that Noël Carroll refers to as “fusion” which works because it “unites attributes held to be categorically distinct” such as “inside/outside, living/dead, insect/human, flesh/machine” (43). He explains that this is why characters in horror narratives do not find such creatures simply fearful, but also “repellent, loathsome, disgusting, repulsive and impure” (54); their failure to conform to accepted cultural categories destabilises assumed norms and, perhaps most horrifically, undermines ‘the human’ as a stable, natural and superior category. As Donna Haraway notes, “‘The species’ often means the human race, unless one is attuned to science fiction, where species abound” (18). Science fiction therefore commonly plays with ideas of species because it is often interested in “the image of the scientist ‘playing god’” (Jones 51) and the horrific outcomes of “the total severing of scientific concerns from ethical concerns” (53). That the result of human/non-human experimentation should be regarded as horrific is evidence of the need to maintain the distinctions between humans and other creatures; after all, a pig/human can only be thought of as horrific if it as assumed that there is something unnatural about the destabilisation of the human category. And it is precisely the human which matters in this equation; it is not really as if anyone cares about the pig’s categorical stability in all of this. In both these stories, the appearance of the pig-creature is narratively structured to be surprising and shocking, and is withheld from the audience for as long as possible. The first appearance of a Pig Slave in “Daleks in Manhattan” constitutes that episode’s pre-credits cliff-hanger, with the creature appearing out of the shadows and bearing down upon the camera, directly towards the audience viewing at home. At this point, the audience has no idea why such a creature exists; the meaning of the pig-human hybrid is contained purely in its visual appearance, with the horrific fact of its contradictory appearance perhaps drawing on the pig’s historical association with evil and the Devil (Sillar and Meyler 82). Similarly, in “Aliens of London” we see Sato’s shocked reaction to the pig far earlier than we actually see the creature ourselves, and Sato’s scream is clearly intended to construct what we have yet to encounter as horrific. The Doctor’s search for the creature is similarly signalled, as he roams dimly-lit corridors trying to find it, following the trail of the grunts and noises that it makes. That the pig might constitute a horrific—or at least unsettling—site for humans is unsurprising considering the cultural roles it has often played. There is, after all, an “opposition between civilization and piggishness” (Ashley, Hollows, Jones and Taylor 2) in which (incorrect) assumptions about pigs’ filthy behaviour helps mark out humanity’s cleaner and more civilised way of living. While this is true of all human/non-human interactions, it is argued that the pig occupies a particular role within this system as it is a “familiar beast” (4) because for centuries it has been a domesticated animal which has often lived alongside humans, usually in quite close proximity. In that sense, humans and pigs are very similar. Demarcating the human as a stable and natural “conceptual category ... in which we place all members of our own species and from which we exclude all non-members” (Milton 265-66) has therefore required the denigration of non-humans, at least partly to justify the dominion humans have decided they have the right to hold over other creatures such as pigs. The difficulties in maintaining this demarcation can be seen in the documentary The Private Life of Pigs (BBC2 2010) in which the farmer Jimmy Docherty carries out a number of tests on animals in order to better understand the ‘inner life’ of the pig. Docherty acknowledges the pig’s similarity to humans in his introductory piece to camera; “When you look in their piggy little eyes with their piggy little eyelashes you see something that reflects back to you—I don’t know—it makes you feel there’s a person looking back.” However, this is quickly followed by a statement which works to reassert the human/non-human boundary; “I know we have this close relationship [with pigs], but I’m often reminded that just beneath the surface of their skin, they’re a wild animal.” Perhaps the most telling revelation in the programme is that pigs have been found to make certain grunting noises only when humans are around, which suggests they have developed a language for ‘interacting’ with humans. That Docherty is uncomfortably startled by this piece of information shows how the idea of communication troubles ideas of human superiority, and places pigs within a sphere hitherto maintained as strictly human. Of course, humans often willingly share domestic spaces with other species, but these are usually categorised as pets. The pet exists “somewhere between the wild animal and the human” (Fudge 8), and we often invest them with a range of human characteristics and develop relationships with such animals which are similar, but not identical, to those we have with other humans. The pig, however, like other food animals, cannot occupy the role afforded to the pet because it is culturally unacceptable to eat pets. In order to legitimise the treatment of the pig as a “strictly utilitarian object; a thing for producing meat and bacon” (Serpell 7) it must be distinguished from the human realm as clearly as possible. It is worth noting, though, that this is a culturally-specific process; Dwyer and Minnegal, for example, show how in New Guinea “pigs commonly play a crucial role in ceremonial and spiritual life” (37-8), and the pig is therefore simultaneously a wild animal, a source of food, and a species with which humans have an “attachment” (45-54) akin to the idea of a pet. Western societies commonly (though not completely) have difficulty uniting this range of animal categories, and analogous ideas of “civilization” often rest on assumptions about animals which require them to play specific, non-human roles. That homo sapiens define their humanity in terms of civilization is demonstrated by the ways in which ideas of brutality, violence and savagery are displaced onto other species, often quite at odds with the truth of such species’ behaviour. The assumption that non-human species are violent, and constitute a threat, is shown in Doctor Who; the pig is shot in “Aliens of London” for assumed security reasons (despite it having done nothing to suggest it is a threat), while humans run in fear from the Pig Slaves in “Evolution of the Daleks” purely because of their non-human appearance. Mary Midgley refers to this as “the Beast Myth” (38) by which humans not only reduce other species to nothing other than “incarnations of wickedness, … sets of basic needs, … crude mechanical toys, … [and] idiot children” (38), but also lump all non-human species together thereby ignoring the specificity of any particular species. Midgley also argues that “man shows more savagery to his own kind than most other mammal species” (27, emphasis in original), citing the need for “law or morality to restrain violence” (26) as evidence of the social structures required to uphold a myth of human civilization. In that sense, the use of pigs in Doctor Who can be seen as conforming to centuries-old depictions of non-human species, by which the loss of humanity symbolised by other species can be seen as the ultimate punishment. After all, when the Daleks’ human helper, Mr Diagoras, fears that the aliens are going to experiment on him, he fearfully exclaims, “What do you mean? Like those pig-men things? You’re not going to turn me into one of those? Oh, God, please don’t!” In the next episode, when all the Pig Slaves are killed by the actions of the Doctor’s companion Martha, she regrets her actions, only to be told, “No. The Daleks killed them. Long ago”, for their mutation into a ‘pig-man thing’ is seen to be a more significant loss of humanity than death itself. The scene highlights how societies are often “confused about the status of such interspecies beings” (Savulescu 25). Such confusion is likely to recur considering we are moving into a “posthumanist” age defined by the “decentering of the human” (Wolfe xv), whereby critiques of traditional cultural categories, alongside scientific developments that question the biological certainty of the human, result in difficulties in defining precisely what it is that is supposedly so special about homo sapiens. This means that it is far too easy to write off these depictions in Doctor Who as merely drawing on, and upholding, those simplistic and naturalised human/non-human distinctions which have been criticised, in a manner similar to sexism and racism, as “speciesist” (Singer 148-62). There is, after all, consistent sympathy for the pig in these episodes. The shooting of the pig in “Aliens of London” is outrageous not merely because it gives evidence of the propensity of human violence: the death of the pig itself is presented as worth mourning, in a manner similar to the death of any living being. Throughout the series the Doctor is concerned over the loss of life for any species, always aiming to find a non-violent method for solving conflicts and repeatedly berating other characters who resort to bloodshed for solutions. Indeed, the story’s narrative can be read as one in which the audience is invited to reassess its own response to the pig’s initial appearance, shifting from fear at its alien-ness to sympathy for its demise. This complication of the cultural meanings of pigs is taken even further in the two-part Dalek story. One of the key plots of the story is the relationship between Laszlo, who has been transmuted into a Pig Slave, and his former lover Tallulah. Tallulah spends much of the story thinking Laszlo has disappeared, when he has, in fact, gone into hiding, certain that she will reject him because of his post-experimentation porcine features. When they finally reunite, Laszlo apologises for what has happened to him, while Tallulah asks, “Laszlo? My Laszlo? What have they done to you?” At the end of the story they decide to try re-establishing their relationship, despite Laszlo’s now-complicated genetic make-up. In response to this Martha asks the Doctor, “Do you reckon it’s going to work, those two?” The Doctor responds that while such an odd pairing might be problematic pretty much anywhere else, as they were in New York they might just get away with it. He reflects, “That’s what this city’s good at. Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, and maybe the odd Pig Slave Dalek mutant hybrid too.” While there is an obvious playfulness to this scene, with the programme foregrounding the kinds of narrative available to the science fiction genre, it is also clear that we are invited to find this a good narrative conclusion, a suitable resolution to all that has preceded it. In that sense, the pig and the human come together, dissolving the human/non-human divide at a stroke, and this is offered to the audience as something to be pleased about. In both narratives, then, the pig moves from being understood as alien and threatening to something if not quite identical to human, then certainly akin to it. Certainly, the narratives suggest that the lives, loves and concerns of pigs—even if they have been experimented upon—matter, and can constitute significant emotional moments in primetime mainstream family television. This development is a result of the text’s movement from an interest in the appearance of the pig to its status as a living being. As noted above, the initial appearances of the pigs in both stories is intended to be frightening, but such terror is dependent on understanding non-human species by their appearance alone. What both of these stories manage to do is suggest that the pig—like all non-human living things, whether of Earth or not—is more than its physical appearance, and via acknowledgment of its own consciousness, and its own sense of identity, can become something with which humans are capable of having sympathy; perhaps more than that, that the pig is something with which humans should have sympathy, for to deny the interior life of such a species is to engage in an inhuman act in itself. This could be seen as an interesting—if admittedly marginal—corrective to the centuries of cultural and physical abuse the pig, like all animals, has suffered. Such representations can be seen as evoking “the dreaded comparison” (Spiegel) which aligns maltreatment of animals with slavery, a comparison that is dreaded by societies because to acknowledge such parallels makes justifying humans’ abusive treatment of other species very difficult. These two Doctor Who stories repeatedly make such comparisons, and assume that to morally and emotionally distinguish between living beings based on categories of species is nonsensical, immoral, and fails to acknowledge the significance and majesty of all forms of life. That we might, as Gardner suggests, “Bless the pig”—whether it has had its brain stuffed full of wires or been merged with a human—points towards complex notions of human/non-human interaction which might helpfully destabilise simplistic ideas of the superiority of the human race. References Ashley, Bob, Joanne Hollows, Steve Jones and Ben Taylor. Food and Cultural Studies. London and New York: Routledge, 2004. Carroll, Noël. The Philosophy of Horror, or, Paradoxes of the Heart. New York and London: Routledge, 1990. Dwyer, Peter D. and Monica Minnegal. “Person, Place or Pig: Animal Attachments and Human Transactions in New Guinea.” Animals in Person: Cultural Perspectives on Human-Animal Intimacies. Ed. John Knight. Oxford and New York: Berg, 2005. 37-60. Fudge, Erica. Pets. Stocksfield: Acumen, 2008. Haraway, Donna J. When Species Meet. Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2008. Harris, Marvin. “The Abominable Pig.” Food and Culture: A Reader. Ed. Carole Counihan and Penny Van Esterik. New York and London: Routledge, 1997. 67-79. Jones, Darryl. Horror: A Thematic History in Fiction and Film. London: Arnold, 2002. King-Smith, Dick. The Sheep-Pig. London: Puffin, 1983. Midgley, Mary. Beast and Man. London and New York: Routledge, 1979/2002. Milton, Kay. “Anthropomorphism or Egomorphism? The Perception of Non-Human Persons by Human Ones.” Animals in Person: Cultural Perspectives on Human-Animal Intimacies. Ed. John Knight. Oxford and New York: Berg, 2005. 255-71. Savulescu, Julian. “Human-Animal Transgenesis and Chimeras Might be an Expression of our Humanity.” The American Journal of Bioethics 3.3 (2003): 22-5. Serpell, James. In the Company of Animals: A Study of Human-Animal Relationships. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996. Sillar, Frederick Cameron and Ruth Mary Meyler. The Symbolic Pig: An Anthology of Pigs in Literature and Art. Edinburgh and London: Oliver and Boyd, 1961. Singer, Peter. “All Animals are Equal.” Animal Rights and Human Obligations. Ed. Tom Regan and Peter Singer. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, 1989. 148-62. Spiegel, Marjorie. The Dreaded Comparison: Human and Animal Slavery. London and Philadelphia: Heretic Books, 1988. Speigelman, Art. Maus: A Survivor’s Tale. New York: Pantheon Books, 1986/1991. Torres, Bob. Making a Killing: The Political Economy of Animal Rights. Edinburgh, Oakland and West Virginia: AK Press, 2007. Weschler, Lawrence. “Pig Perplex.” Lingua France: The Review of Academic Life 11.5 (2001): 6-8. White, E.B. Charlotte’s Web. London: Harper Collins, 1952. Wolfe, Cary. What is Posthumanism? Minneapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press, 2010.

"Outwit, Outplay, Outlast" "All entertainment has hidden meanings, revealing the nature of the culture that created it" ( 6). This quotation has no greater relevance than for the most powerful entertainment medium of all: television. In fact, television has arguably become part of the "almost unnoticed working equipment of civilisations" (Cater 1). In other words, TV seriously affects our culture, our society, and our lives; it affects the way we perceive and approach reality (see Cantor and Cantor, 1992; Corcoran, 1984; Freedman, 1990; Novak, 1975). In this essay, I argue that the American television programme Survivor is an example of how entertainment (TV in particular) perpetuates capitalistic ideologies. In other words, Survivor is a symptom of American economic culture, which is masked as an "interpersonal game". I am operating under the assumption that television works "ideologically to promote and prefer certain meanings of the world, to circulate some meanings rather than others, and to serve some interests rather than others" (Fiske 20). I argue that Survivor promotes ideals on two levels: economic and social. On the economic level, it endorses the pursuit of money, fame, and successful careers. These values are prevalent in American society and have coalesced into the myth of the "American Dream", which stands for the opportunity for each individual to get ahead in life; someone can always become wealthy (see White, 1988; Cortes, 1982; Grambs, 1982; Rivlin, 1992). These values are an integral part of a capitalistic society, and, as I will illustrate later, Survivor is a symptom of these ideological values. On the second level, it purports preferred social strategies that are needed to "win" at the game of capitalism: forming alliances, lying, and deception. Ideology The discussion of ideology is critical if we are to better understand the function of Survivor in American culture. Ideologies are neither "ideal" nor "spiritual," but rather material. Ideologies appear in specific social institutions and practices, such as cultural artefacts (Althusser, For Marx 232). In that way, everyone "lives" in ideologies. Pryor suggests that ideology in cultural practices can operate as a "rhetoric of control" by structuring the way in which people view the world: Ideology `refracts' our social conditions of existence, structuring consciousness by defining for us what exists, what is legitimate and illegitimate, possible and impossible, thinkable and unthinkable. Entering praxis as a form of persuasion, ideology acts as a rhetoric of control by endorsing and legitimising certain economic, social and political arrangements at the expense of others and by specifying the proper role and position of the individual within those arrangements. (4) Similarly, Althusser suggests, "ideology is the system of ideas and representations which dominate the mind of a man or a social group" (Ideology 149). Thus, ideology, for Althusser, represents the way individuals "live" their relations to society (Eagleton 18). Grossberg suggests, "within such positions, textuality is a productive practice whose (imaginary) product is experience itself. Experience can no longer serve as a mediation between the cultural and the social since it is not merely within the cultural but is the product of cultural practices" (409). The "text" for study, then, becomes the cultural practices and structures, which determine humans. Althusser concludes that ideology reifies our affective, unconscious relations with the world, and determines how people are pre-reflectively bound up in social reality (Eagleton 18). Survivor as a Text In the United States, the "reality TV" genre of programming, such as The Real World, Road Rules, and Big Brother (also quite famous in Europe), are currently very popular. Debuting in May, 2000, Survivor is one of the newest additions to this "reality programming." Survivor is a game, and its theme is: "Outwit, Outplay, Outlast". The premise is the following: Sixteen strangers are "stranded" on a remote island in the South China Sea. They are divided into two "tribes" of eight, the "Pagong" and "Tagi." They have to build shelter, catch food, and establish a "new society". They must work together as a team to succeed, but ultimately, they are competitors. The tribes compete in games for "rewards" (luxury items such as food), and also for "immunity". Every third day, they attend a "tribal council" in which they vote one member off the island. Whoever won the "immunity challenge" (as a tribe early in the show, later, as an individual) cannot be voted off. After several episodes, the two tribes merge into one, "Rattana," as they try to "outwit, outlast, and outplay" the other contestants. The ultimate prize is $1,000,000. The Case of Survivor As Althusser (For Marx) and Pryor suggest, ideology exists in cultural artefacts and practices. In addition, Pryor argues that ideology defines for us what is "legitimate and illegitimate," and "thinkable and unthinkable" by "endorsing certain economic and social arrangements" (4). This is certainly true in the case of Survivor. The programme is definitely a cultural artefact that endorses certain practices. In fact, it defines for us the "preferred" economic and social arrangements. The show promotes for us the economic arrangement of "winning" money. It also defines the social arrangements that are legitimate, thinkable, and necessary to win the interpersonal and capitalistic game. First, let us discuss the economic arrangements that Survivor purports. The economic arrangements that Survivor perpetuates are in direct alignment with those of the "game" of capitalism: to "win" money, success, and/or fame (which will lead to money). While Richard, the $1,000,000 prize winner, is the personification of the capitalistic/American Dream come true, the other contestants certainly have had their share of money and fame. For example, after getting voted off the island, many of the former cast members appeared on the "talk show circuit" and have done many paid interviews. Joel Klug has done approximately 250 interviews (Abele, Alexander and Lasswell 62), and Stacey Stillman is charging $1200 for a "few quotes," and $1800 for a full-length interview (Millman et al. 16). Jenna Lewis has been busy with paid television engagements that require cross country trips (Abele, Alexander and Lasswell 63). In addition, some have made television commercials. Both B. B. Andersen and Stacey Stillman appeared in Reebok commercials that were aired during the remaining Survivor episodes. Others are making their way even farther into Hollywood. Most have their own talent agents who are getting them acting jobs. For example, Sean Kenniff is going to appear in a role on a soap opera, and Gervase Peterson is currently "sifting through offers" to act in television situation comedies and movies. Dirk Been has been auditioning for movie roles, and Joel Klug has moved to Los Angeles to "become a star". Even Sonja Christopher, the 63-year-old breast cancer survivor and the first contestant voted off, is making her acting debut in the television show, Diagnosis Murder (Abele, Alexander and Lasswell 57). Finally, two of the women contestants from Survivor were also tempted with a more "risky" offer. Both Colleen Haskell and Jenna Lewis were asked to pose for Playboy magazine. While these women are certainly attractive, they are not the "typical-looking" playboy model. It is obvious that their fame has put them in the mind of Hugh Heffner, the owner of Playboy. No one is revealing the exact amount of the offers, but rumours suggest that they are around $500,000. Thus, it is clear that even though these contestants did not win the $1,000,000, they are using their famous faces to "win" the capitalistic game anyway. Not only does Survivor purport the "preferred" economic arrangements, it also defines for us the social arrangements needed to win the capitalistic game: interpersonal strategy. The theme of the strategy needed to win the game is "nice guys don't last". This is demonstrated by the fact that Gretchen, a nice, strong, capable, and nurturing "soccer mother" was the seventh to be voted off the island. There were also many other "nice" contestants who were eventually voted off for one reason or another. However, on the other hand, Richard, the million-dollar winner, used "Machiavellian smarts" to scheme his way into winning. After the final episode, he said, "I really feel that I earned where I am. The first hour on the island I stepped into my strategy and thought, 'I'm going to focus on how to establish an alliance with four people early on.' I spend a lot of time thinking about who people are and why they interact the way they do, and I didn't want to just hurt people's feelings or do this and toss that one out. I wanted this to be planned and I wanted it to be based on what I needed to do to win the game. I don't regret anything I've done or said to them and I wouldn't change a thing" (Hatch, n.pag.). One strategy that worked to Richard's advantage was that upon arriving to the island, he formed an alliance with three other contestants: Susan, Rudy, and Kelly. They decided that they would all vote the same person off the island so that their chances of staying were maximised. Richard also "chipped in", did some "dirty work", and ingratiated himself by being the only person who could successfully catch fish. He also interacted with others strategically, and decided who to vote off based on who didn't like him, or who was more likeable than him (or the rest of the alliance). Thus, it is evident that being part of an alliance is definitely needed to win this capitalistic game, because the four people who were part of the only alliance on the island were the final contestants. In fact, in Rudy's (who came in third place) final comments were, "my advice for anybody who plays this game is form an alliance and stick with it" (Boesch, n.pag.). This is similar to corporate America, where many people form "cliques", "alliances", or "particular friendships" in order to "get ahead". Some people even betray others. We definitely saw this happen in the programme. This leads to another essential ingredient to the social arrangements: lying and deception. In fact, in episode nine, Richard (the winner) said to the camera, "outright lying is essential". He also revealed that part of his strategy was making a big deal of his fishing skills just to distract attention from his schemings. He further stated, "I'm not still on the island because I catch fish, I'm here because I'm smart" (qtd. in Damitol, n.pag.). For example, he once thought the others did not appreciate his fishing skills. Thus, he decided to stop fishing for a few days so that the group would appreciate him more. It was seemingly a "nasty plan", especially considering that at the time, the other tribe members were rationing their rice. However, it was this sort of behaviour that led him to win the game. Another example of the necessity for lying is illustrated in the fact that the alliance of Richard, Rudy, Sue, and Kelly (the only alliance) denied to the remaining competitors that they were scheming. Sue even blatantly lied to the Survivor host, Jeff Probst, when he asked her if there was an alliance. However, when talking to the cameras, they freely admitted to its existence. While the alliance strategy worked for most of the game, in the end, it was destined to dissolve when they had to start voting against each other. So, just as in a capitalistic society, it is ultimately, still "everyone for her/himself". The best illustration of this fact is the final quote that Kelly made, "I learned early on in the game [about trust and lying]. I had befriended her [Sue -- part of Kelly's alliance]; I trusted her and she betrayed me. She was lying to me, and was plotting against me from very early on. I realised that and I knew that. Therefore I decided not to trust her, not to be friends with her, not to be honest with her, for my own protection" (Wiglesworth, n.pag.). Therefore, even within the winning alliance, there was a fair amount of distrust and deception. Conclusion In conclusion, I have demonstrated how Survivor promotes ideals on two levels: economic and social. On the economic level, it endorses the pursuit of money, fame, and successful careers. On the social level, it purports preferred interpersonal strategies that are needed to "win" at the game of capitalism. In fact, it promotes the philosophy that "winning money at all costs is acceptable". We must win money. We must lie. We must scheme. We must deceive. We must win fame. Whether or not the audience interpreted the programme this way, what is obvious to everyone is the following: six months ago, the contestants on Survivor were ordinary American citizens; now they are famous and have endless opportunities for wealth. References Abele, R., M. Alexander and M. Lasswell. "They Will Survive." TV Guide 48.38 (2000): 56-63. Althusser, L. For Marx. Trans. Ben Brewster. New York: Vintage Books, 1969, 1970. ---. "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses." 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[your date of access] <http://www.api-network.com/mc/0010/survivor.php>. Chicago style: Carol Morgan, "Capitalistic Ideology as an 'Interpersonal Game': The Case of Survivor," M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 3, no. 5 (2000), <http://www.api-network.com/mc/0010/survivor.php> ([your date of access]). APA style: Carol Morgan. (2000) Capitalistic Ideology as an 'Interpersonal Game': The Case of Survivor. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 3(5). <http://www.api-network.com/mc/0010/survivor.php> ([your date of access]).