Browsing by Author "Jon Thompson, Committee Member"

Now showing 1 - 10 of 10

Blues-Inspired Poetry: Jean Toomer, Sterling Brown and the BLKARTSOUTH Collective
(2008-06-13) Rutter, Emily; Tom Lisk, Committee Chair; Milton Welch, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
The Compulsion to Repeat and the Death Instinct in Franz Kafka's "The Judgment" and The Trial.
(2006-11-28) Barbeau, Robert Russell Jr; Ruth V. Gross, Committee Member; Hans Kellner, Committee Chair; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
Kafka's well-known obsessions with both language and death need to be understood in light of their common factor—the psychoanalytic concept of the repetition compulsion. Since these obsessions act as motivating forces compelling Kafka's writing, it is crucial to understand the constitutive nature of the repetition compulsion in Kafka's texts by examining its presence in two of his prominent works, "The Judgment" and The Trial. I will begin this study by first establishing my theoretical framework, defining the compulsion to repeat and the death instinct as they function in Freud's psychoanalytic theory. Next I will differentiate Lacan's (re)formulation of the repetition compulsion and the death instinct and show the critical role the symbolic order qua language has in this conception. Following this, I will examine Kafka's story, "The Judgment," looking at a typical piece of psychoanalytic criticism focused on Kafka's supposed Oedipus complex and then showing the pitfalls of such an approach. I will go on to show the possibilities for deeper readings offered by post-Freudian psychoanalytic concepts, focusing on the repetitive and constitutive role that the letter has for the subject, the function of the return of the repressed, and the significance of the space "between two deaths," where the story ends. The next section will examine The Trial in a similar manner; the focus will be on the importance of language in the novel, including the court as an agency of language and also the role lying or deceit plays in signification. I will also address the effect on K. of the initial trauma of his arrest, the role of memory and forgetting in the novel, and the relevance of the space "between two deaths."
The (De)Evolution of the Irish Anti-hero from Oisin's Fabled Isle to McDonagh's Lonesome West
(2007-12-10) Turney, Aaron Daves; Jon Thompson, Committee Member; Carmine Prioli, Committee Member; Mary Helen Thuente, Committee Chair
General Thesis: There is a constant, observable conflict in 20th century Irish drama between traditional pagan Irish values and those imported first by Christian missionaries and later by English invaders. Often, dramatic works of this period portray a single character confronting those forces that represent modernity. The character's heroism usually remains obscured by modern standards because he appears in the form of a tramp, an outcast, or even a violent criminal. But the motif is clear: characters such as these are heroic in the traditional Irish sense because they stand as resistors to foreign values that threaten their culture. In the contexts of the plots these characters are not stock heroes, but instead are anti-heroes alienated by events and circumstances and judged by modern standards. Such works do contain clearly defined heroes⁄heroines who operate according to accepted modern values. The rebellious, shocking, or violent behavior of the anti-hero or anti-heroine is put in juxtaposition. The project begins with an analysis of the Oisin and St. Patrick legend as the cornerstone emblem of the tug-of-war between Irish tradition and foreign modernity, highlighting the divergence in both the language and the values of those characters. The motif established with the Oisin and St. Patrick tale (the motif in which the invasion of the imported god with foreign values threatens preexisting Irish values recurs in Irish drama throughout the 20th century. My intention is to show that the characters, such as Oisin, who can not fit the mold of modernity, also must not. In their inability to adapt, they stand as misfits in their own time, but also as preservers of an Irish tradition that predates colonialism and only s in the fringes of modern Irish society. And there is your anti-hero: not always palatable to the audience (who may be caught up in the immediacy of dramatic events), but always true to dreaming and mythmaking as well as rebellious in behavior, language, verse, or song. The political intensity of the 20th century is portrayed in generated works of drama that often are reducible to that same heroic⁄anti-heroic motif. My project will follow a (flexible) chronology of works that will show the (de)evolution of this anti-hero motif beginning with Oisin, followed by characters of J.M. Synge, Sean O'Casey, Brendan Behan, and finally Martin McDonagh. My intended focus is on the anti-hero's life in a relative vacuum, with a specific focus on dialectical expressions, rebellious, even violent behavior, and a general propensity to misunderstand, if not ignore altogether, modern conventions. To clarify, the term "(de)evolution" is appropriate because the characters, as the century progresses, become increasingly antisocial in their sentiments and behavior.
"Faithful Departed": Tracing the Themes of Exile and Betrayal through James Joyce's Dubliners, A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, and Exiles
(2008-04-03) Jenkins, Elizabeth Speight; Mary Helen Thuente, Committee Chair; Tom Lisk, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
James Joyce left Ireland in 1904 because he felt betrayed by the publishing industry, several close friends, and the Irish Catholic Church. Although he returned to visit four times, he remained an artist in exile until his death in 1941. Manifest in his writing are feelings of exile and betrayal which reflect his own love⁄hate relationship with Ireland. In Dubliners, Joyce develops several different degrees of exile. In "Eveline," he presents a young girl who longs for physical exile, but in order to do so she must betray her duty to her father, her dead mother, and the Catholic Church. She ultimately cannot achieve physical exile, thereby betraying her future husband. In "A Painful Case," Joyce creates an "inner exile," one who, although he lives in Dublin, is estranged from it culturally and socially. Through his relationship with Mrs. Sinico, he experiences an interpersonal relationship, which, after it ends, leaves him unable to return to his life alienated from the city in which he lives. Joyce's A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man depicts the journey of Stephen Dedalus from idealistic school boy to exile. In what most critics see as his most autobiographical work, young Stephen inherits many situations Joyce faced as a young man in Dublin. Stephen, who initially trusts the cultural and religious institutions of Ireland, learns through a series of betrayals that physical exile is necessary for him to become an artist. Exiles, Joyce's only existing play, depicts the struggle of a writer who, after living in Rome, has returned to Dublin. Richard Rowan longs to be betrayed by his wife to atone for his years of infidelity. Joyce uses the element of betrayal to demonstrate the ways in which it precipitates exile.
"Fascinated Victims:" Aspects of Abjection in the Films of David Cronenberg
(2007-11-01) Sullivan, Gordon Matthew; Devin Orgeron, Committee Chair; Marsha Orgeron, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
"Fascinated Victims:" Aspects of Abjection in the Films of David Cronenberg" traces the intersections between Julia Kristeva's theory of the abjection and the films of David Cronenberg. While this pairing has been the center of critical attention for some time, remarkably little attention has been paid to the specifically cinematic production and presentation of abjection in Cronenberg's work. "Fascinated Victims" hopes to mine this territory and, in so doing, it aims to foreground more generally the cinematic medium's proclivity for the abject. The primary means of analysis will be close reading of a number of key Cronenberg films, with particular attention paid to the various means through which abjection is produced. Occasional reference will be made to Cronenberg's responses to his films, and to their critical and theoretical surroundings. Although critical consensus seems to be that Cronenberg's use of the abject serves to make women monstrous, the present work will shift that focus for the figure of abjection to those forces, cinematically and diegetically, who are responsible for the process of abject-ing. Chapter 1 provides a survey of the critical literature regarding abjection in Cronenberg's films. Critics treat Cronenberg's films with little reference to his specifically cinematic tools, and find abjection in specific abject "objects," like the parasites of Shivers (1975). The critical failure to discuss Cronenberg in cinematic terms, to analyze the particular effects the cinematic apparatus might have on our understanding of the abject will be connected to the cinematic representation of the abject, demonstrating the need to explicate abjection in specifically cinematic terms. Chapter 2 examines closely what we might call Cronenberg's abjectifying narrative strategies. Through the use of the subjective point of view and the representation of hallucinations, Cronenberg reinforces the abject images on the screen. Furthermore, by connecting the viewer to a protagonist through the subjective point of view, the boundary between character and viewer is collapsed, producing another form of abjection. Chapter 3 will examine the process of adaptation in light of the abject. Because Cronenberg often adapts material from other media, creating hybrids in a manner that recalls the abject, both Naked Lunch and Crash will be analyzed to understand how their status as adaptations reinforce the abject produced by other cinematic means. The adaptation, by fusing media, elides the boundary between cinematic author/text and literary author/text, which recalls the lack of boundary in the abject. As with narrative techniques, adaptive techniques both reinforce the abject on the screen, while producing their own brand of abjection. The conclusion will discuss the use of the abject in the context, of Cronenberg's — and his critics' — attitude toward gender. Because Cronenberg's early films often feature monstrous women, while his later films see a transition to almost exclusively masculine monsters, the issue of gender is central to the use of abjection in Cronenberg's films, and to the wider question of his misogyny. With an understanding of the specifically cinematic means through which Cronenberg represents the abject, the charges of misogyny that critics have leveled at the director will be evaluated.
Finding Her Own Voice: Cynthia Ozick's Female Protagonists And Orthodox Jewish Law
(2008-04-21) Gerson, Eric Reed; Jon Thompson, Committee Member; Sheila Smith-McKoy, Committee Member; Michael Grimwood, Committee Chair
Karel Capek, Author of the Apocryphal Tales: A Study of Genre and the Capekian
(2008-04-21) Hester, Jordan Thacker; John Kessel, Committee Chair; Mont Welch, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
Lies and Little Deaths: Stories
(2010-03-28) Lundberg, Jason Erik; John J. Kessel, Committee Chair; Wilton Barnhardt, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
This collection of stories covers a wide variety of characters and settings, which alternate (for the most part) between third- and first-person viewpoints, with the final piece, "In Jurong," told in second person. Most of the tales take place in the mundane world of the present day, but a world that allows the magical or surreal to seep through. This blending of the realistic world with the fantastic one is of great importance to me as a writer and as a reader, as is the discussion of its merits within the broader field of literature. These twenty-three stories explore the perils and pleasures of sex (mostly the perils), the issues of the day but twisted into satire or literalized metaphor, the slightly magical, the truly bizarre, and the constant questioning of identity and the afterlife.
Something Blue: Poems
(2006-11-10) Stancar, Angela Diane; John Balaban, Committee Chair; Tom Lisk, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
Something Blue is a collection of poems that explore the physicality of relationships. "Light on Lake Michigan," the first poem in the manuscript, explores a mother's suicide by drowning. In the title poem, "Something Blue," the speaker finds out an ex-lover has married and wonders if his abuse has continued with his new wife. "Fourteen" and "Purge" examine the objectification of bodies that today's teenage girls inflict upon themselves. The poems are mostly written in free verse, with careful attention paid to line and stanza lengths and internal rhythm.
The Uncanny in Japanese and American Horror Film: Hideo Nakata's Ringu and Gore Verbinski's Ring
(2006-04-23) Ball, Sarah McKay; Maria Pramaggiore, Committee Chair; John Mertz, Committee Member; Jon Thompson, Committee Member
In the last few decades, interest in the uncanny in the body of literary theory has surged. The uncanny is a ubiquitous presence 21st century American and abroad, and it provides a useful metaphor for understanding the implications of some of the conventions of post-modernism. This thesis explores a contemporary definition of the uncanny as manifested through two film interpretations (Ringu and Ring) of the same source material, a novel titled Ringu by Koji Suzuki. Through a brief exploration of the historical evolution of the idea of the uncanny and the various critical cruxes surrounding it, I have developed six working characteristics of the uncanny as a base for my analysis of Ringu and Ring. Furthermore, I have explored the social, historical, and cultural underpinnings of Suzuki's original novel and its path to Japanese and eventually American theatres. Within the narrative of both films, the uncanny is manifested through extended use of the doppelganger and repetition. There is no significant difference in the films' rendering of the uncanny through narrative. The films differ slightly in their presentation of uncanny sound and visual elements: Ringu relies primarily on sound and characters' internal experience to produce the uncanny, whereas Ring focuses on the visual and characters' external experience. The films unify their internal rendering of the uncanny with their metatextual (and commercial) behavior with the gaze, an aspect of both films that implicates the viewer in their propagation of the uncanny and the film franchise. Overall, there is not a significant difference in the rendering of the uncanny in Ring and Ringu. An analysis of both films, however, does illuminate the pervasive, yet complex, presence of the uncanny in contemporary pop culture.