Fictional Characters, Real Problems

Fictional Characters, Real Problems PDF Author: Garry Hagberg
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198715714
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 402

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Book Description
These new essays explore central aspects of the ethical content of literature: character, its formation, and its role in moral discernment; poetic vision in the context of ethical understanding; self-identity and self-understanding; literature's role in moral growth and change; and the historical background of the ethical dimension of literature.

Fictional Characters, Real Problems

Fictional Characters, Real Problems PDF Author: Garry Hagberg
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198715714
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 402

Get Book Here

Book Description
These new essays explore central aspects of the ethical content of literature: character, its formation, and its role in moral discernment; poetic vision in the context of ethical understanding; self-identity and self-understanding; literature's role in moral growth and change; and the historical background of the ethical dimension of literature.

Characters in Fictional Worlds

Characters in Fictional Worlds PDF Author: Jens Eder
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110232421
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 607

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Book Description
Although fictional characters have long dominated the reception of literature, films, television programs, comics, and other media products, only recently have they begun to attract their due attention in literary and media theory. The book systematically surveys today ́s diverse and at times conflicting theoretical perspectives on fictional character, spanning research on topics such as the differences between fictional characters and real persons, the ontological status of characters, the strategies of their representation and characterization, the psychology of their reception, as well as their specific forms and constellations in - and across - different media, from the book to the internet.

Why Do We Care about Literary Characters?

Why Do We Care about Literary Characters? PDF Author: Blakey Vermeule
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 1421403102
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 293

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Book Description
Blakey Vermeule wonders how readers become involved in the lives of fictional characters, people they know do not exist. Vermeule examines the ways in which readers’ experiences of literature are affected by the emotional attachments they form to fictional characters and how those experiences then influence their social relationships in real life. She focuses on a range of topics, from intimate articulations of sexual desire, gender identity, ambition, and rivalry to larger issues brought on by rapid historical and economic change. Vermeule discusses the phenomenon of emotional attachment to literary characters primarily in terms of 18th-century British fiction but also considers the postmodern work of Thomas Mann, J. M. Coetzee, Ian McEwan, and Chinua Achebe. From the perspective of cognitive science, Vermeule finds that caring about literary characters is not all that different from caring about other people, especially strangers. The tools used by literary authors to sharpen and focus reader interest tap into evolved neural mechanisms that trigger a caring response. This book contributes to the emerging field of evolutionary literary criticism. Vermeule draws upon recent research in cognitive science to understand the mental processes underlying human social interactions without sacrificing solid literary criticism. People interested in literary theory, in cognitive analyses of the arts, and in Darwinian approaches to human culture will find much to ponder in Why Do We Care about Literary Characters?

Fabulous Monsters

Fabulous Monsters PDF Author: Alberto Manguel
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300247389
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
An original look at how literary characters can transcend their books to guide our lives, by one of the world's most eminent bibliophiles Alberto Manguel, in a style both charming and erudite, examines how literary characters live with us from childhood on. Throughout the years, they change their identities and emerge from behind their stories to teach us about the complexities of love, loss, and the world itself. Manguel's favorite characters include Jim from Huckleberry Finn, Phoebe from The Catcher in the Rye, Job and Jonah from the Bible, Little Red Riding Hood and Captain Nemo, Hamlet's mother, and Dr. Frankenstein's maligned Monster. Sharing his unique powers as a reader, Manguel encourages us to establish our own literary relationships. An intimate preface and Manguel's own "doodles" complete this delightful and magical book.

Town

Town PDF Author: James Roy
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
ISBN: 1442984732
Category : City and town life
Languages : en
Pages : 378

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Book Description
In this award-winning novel, James Roy uses the short story to explore the lives of the young residents of an Australian town and the social tapestry of their community. This town doesn't have a name. But if it seems familiar, its because we recognise the people who walk its streets. From the serendipity of an unexpected moment of connection, to...

Use of Weapons

Use of Weapons PDF Author: Iain M. Banks
Publisher: Orbit
ISBN: 0316068799
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 329

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Book Description
The man known as Cheradenine Zakalwe was one of Special Circumstances' foremost agents, changing the destiny of planets to suit the Culture through intrigue, dirty tricks and military action. The woman known as Diziet Sma had plucked him from obscurity and pushed him towards his present eminence, but despite all their dealings she did not know him as well as she thought. The drone known as Skaffen-Amtiskaw knew both of these people. It had once saved the woman's life by massacring her attackers in a particularly bloody manner. It believed the man to be a lost cause. But not even its machine could see the horrors in his past. Ferociously intelligent, both witty and horrific, Use of Weapons is a masterpiece of science fiction. The Culture Series Consider Phlebas The Player of Games Use of Weapons The State of the Art Excession Inversions Look to Windward Matter Surface Detail The Hydrogen Sonata

The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep

The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep PDF Author: H. G. Parry
Publisher: Redhook
ISBN: 0316452726
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 464

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Book Description
The ultimate book-lover's fantasy, this sparkling debut is a "delight of magic and literature, love and adventure" (Kat Howard) featuring a young scholar with the power to bring literary characters into the world. For his entire life, Charley Sutherland has concealed a magical ability he can't quite control: He can bring characters from books into the real world. But when literary characters start causing trouble throughout the city and threatening to destroying the world, he learns he's not the only one with his ability. Now it's up to Charley and his reluctant older brother, Rob, to stop them--hopefully before they reach The End. Praise for The Unlikely Escape of Uriah Heep: "A star-studded literary tour and a tangled mystery and a reflection on reading itself; it's a pure delight." --Alix E. Harrow, Hugo Award-winning author "This beautifully-written novel is an exploration of the power fiction wields -- the power to inform and to change, even to endanger, our everyday world." --Louisa Morgan, author of A Secret History of Witches "Equal parts sibling rivalry, crackling mystery, and Dickensian battle royale, it'll be one of your most fun reads this year." --Mike Chen, author of Here and Now and Then

The Fictional 100

The Fictional 100 PDF Author: Lucy Pollard-Gott, PhD
Publisher: iUniverse
ISBN: 1440154406
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 499

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Book Description
Some of the most influential and interesting people in the world are fictional. Sherlock Holmes, Huck Finn, Pinocchio, Anna Karenina, Genji, and Superman, to name a few, may not have walked the Earth (or flown, in Superman's case), but they certainly stride through our lives. They influence us personally: as childhood friends, catalysts to our dreams, or even fantasy lovers. Peruvian author and presidential candidate Mario Vargas Llosa, for one, confessed to a lifelong passion for Flaubert's Madame Bovary. Characters can change the world. Witness the impact of Solzhenitsyn's Ivan Denisovich, in exposing the conditions of the Soviet Gulag, or Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom, in arousing anti-slavery feeling in America. Words such as quixotic, oedipal, and herculean show how fictional characters permeate our language. This list of the Fictional 100 ranks the most influential fictional persons in world literature and legend, from all time periods and from all over the world, ranging from Shakespeare's Hamlet [1] to Toni Morrison's Beloved [100]. By tracing characters' varied incarnations in literature, art, music, and film, we gain a sense of their shape-shifting potential in the culture at large. Although not of flesh and blood, fictional characters have a life and history of their own. Meet these diverse and fascinating people. From the brash Hercules to the troubled Holden Caulfield, from the menacing plots of Medea to the misguided schemes of Don Quixote, The Fictional 100 runs the gamut of heroes and villains, young and old, saints and sinners. Ponder them, fall in love with them, learn from their stories the varieties of human experience--let them live in you.

Rant

Rant PDF Author: Chuck Palahniuk
Publisher: Anchor
ISBN: 0307455599
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 338

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Book Description
Buster “Rant” Casey just may be the most efficient serial killer of our time. A high school rebel, Rant Casey escapes from his small town home for the big city where he becomes the leader of an urban demolition derby called Party Crashing. Rant Casey will die a spectacular highway death, after which his friends gather the testimony needed to build an oral history of his short, violent life. With hilarity, horror, and blazing insight, Rant is a mind-bending vision of the future, as only Chuck Palahniuk could ever imagine.

Literary Afterlife

Literary Afterlife PDF Author: Bernard A. Drew
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 078645721X
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 421

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Book Description
This is an encyclopedic work, arranged by broad categories and then by original authors, of literary pastiches in which fictional characters have reappeared in new works after the deaths of the authors that created them. It includes book series that have continued under a deceased writer's real or pen name, undisguised offshoots issued under the new writer's name, posthumous collaborations in which a deceased author's unfinished manuscript is completed by another writer, unauthorized pastiches, and "biographies" of literary characters. The authors and works are entered under the following categories: Action and Adventure, Classics (18th Century and Earlier), Classics (19th Century), Classics (20th Century), Crime and Mystery, Espionage, Fantasy and Horror, Humor, Juveniles (19th Century), Juveniles (20th Century), Poets, Pulps, Romances, Science Fiction and Westerns. Each original author entry includes a short biography, a list of original works, and information on the pastiches based on the author's characters.