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Both Joseph Conrad's novella Heart of Darkness and Francis Ford Coppola's film Apocalypse Now are regarded as outstanding works in their respective field of art. Their reputation rests partly on their artistic value and partly on their preoccupation with topics which were highly relevant at the time of their publication/release. They are for the most part regarded as independent works of a

Africa has suffered two traumatizing events in history that have helped shape the present day individual, be it on the continent or in the diaspora. First there was the transatlantic slave trade that spanned from the 15th century to the late 19th century and saw the inhuman and forceful transportation of Africans to plantations and homes in the Americas. Then came colonialism immediately after sla

Uppsatsen undersöker hur graviditet gestaltas i samtida svensk prosa, genom närstudie av romanerna Hysteros (2013) av Helena Granström, Förvandling (2005) av Eva Adolfsson och Värddjuret (1995) av Marie Hermanson. Aspekter av graviditetstematiken som ägnas särskilt fokus är kroppslighet, främmandeskap, bruk och underminerande av traditionellt könade dikotomier, subjektivitetsproblematik och identiThis thesis investigates how pregnancy is mediated in contemporary swedish prose, through a close reading of the novels Hysteros (2013) by Helena Granström, Förvandling (2005) by Eva Adolfsson and Värddjuret (1995) by Marie Hermanson. Aspects of the theme of pregnancy that are especially emphasized are corporeality, alienation, the use and deconstruction of traditionally gendered dichotomies, prob

This thesis examines how Ellen Nordmark’s Epos (2024) relates to the epic genre. Rather than categorizing the work within a single, fixed genre, I employ close reading to analyze how it comments on, questions, and reformulates conventions on the epic genre. Particular attention is given to how Epos both reveals and reconfigures the epic tradition, and how the text emphasizes oral and aural modes o

In the last few decades, dissatisfaction with the prevailing critical paradigm ¬– what Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick as early as 1997 dubbed “paranoid” or “suspicious” reading – has grown significantly. This thesis is a survey of three recent works, The Albertine Workout (2014), Unfinished Business: Notes of A Chronic Re-Reader (2020), and A Ghost in the Throat (2020), that emerge from this discontent. Pa

This paper is an analytical study of the Indian cultural elements in Ginsberg’s life and work, focusing on Indian Journals: March 1962 - May 1963. The aim is twofold: firstly the study explores close-readings of poetry and prose from Indian Journals. The study also focuses on his poetic aesthetics and specific themes in Indian Journals and relates them to incidents of his personal life in a larger

This essay argues that acedia is a helpful concept in illuminating the fiction of the American author David Foster Wallace, particularly his unfinished novel The Pale King. Following a brief biographical sketch of Wallace, the essay explores the development of the term acedia—which means something along the lines of apathy, sloth, and listlessness—and the two types of acedia: personal acedia and t

Eternity and time are central concepts within the Prophetic Works. In the Prophetic universe, eternity is defined as a positive state of infinite potentiality, whereas time is depicted as a state founded on the exclusion of possibilities; hence, the existence of the human mind in time rather than in eternity severely limits the sum of his existence. Viewed as a whole, the Prophetic cycle can be se

This essay analyses how Mary Shelley challenges speciesist thinking popular at the time of the publication of Frankenstein (1818). Speciesism is a discriminatory belief that favours the human species over any species other than human, and that is manifested in how we perceive and treat nonhuman beings. Much literary criticism has touched upon Frankenstein’s monster’s otherness, mainly in relation

This thesis investigates similarities and differences between Emily Brontë’s Heathcliff and Anne Brontë’s Huntingdon. Moreover, their conduct is compared to eighteenth- and nineteenth-century masculinities. Neither of the two characters corresponds with ideal masculine behaviour. As the novels progress they become increasingly depraved. But the causes to their wickedness are not self-evident. Howe

This thesis explores the works and personas of Sylvia Plath and Taylor Swift and analyses the popular conflations of their real lives and their works. Jon Helt Haarder’s theory of biographical performativity is introduced to analyse the threshold aesthetics between reality and art and investigate the feedback loops between oeuvres andlives as well as the interpretation of these in the public spher

This thesis examines queerness in the poetry of John Donne by re-examining same-gender desire in his poetry, proposing metaphysical poetry as having points of similarity with queering strategies and queer theory, and exploring contextual and historical tensions within and around Donne’s body of works. The thesis closely analyses poems which have previously been discussed as queer, such as “Sapho t

In the past decades, a field of so-called Wallace Studies, i.e. academic studies dedicated to the investigation of David Foster Wallace’s writings, has emerged and developed. These studies are often connected to the equally new literary concept of new sincerity. However, despite the number of articles published on the subject, the scholarly works going into any textual, exemplifying analysis of Wa

Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels and Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels set in Ankh-Morpork are similar enough that both can be treated as belonging to the subgenre of comic fantasy. The narratives foreground the fantastic, written to entertain and amuse its readers but also contain societal criticism in the form of satire or parody. This paper compares the unnatural aspects of Gulliver’s Trave

This thesis examines the representation of rape in J. M. Coetzee’s Disgrace (1999), Shani Motoo’s Cereus Blooms at Night (1996), Ian McEwan’s Atonement (2001), and Joyce Carol Oates’ Rape: A Love Story (2003). The analysis of the novels is introduced by a background chapter that outlines the literary history of the rape metaphor and feminist attitudes towards the representation and definition of r

Uppsatsen syftar till att studera konstruktionen av odödlighet i De odödliga genom att undersöka skillnaden mellan hur odödliga gestalter med ett evigt livsspann och hur dödliga gestalter med ett begränsat livsspann framställs. Undersökningen genomförs med hjälp av det grundläggande narratologiska begreppsparet platta och runda gestalter, och utökas därefter med Paul Ricoeurs modell om narrativ idThis thesis aims to study the construction of immortality in Lars Jakobson’s novel The Immortals (De odödliga, 2015) by examining the difference between how immortal and mortal characters are portrayed. Initially the characters of the novel are classified according to E. M. Forster’s narratological division between flat and round characters. It soon becomes evident that the immortal character, wit

Researchers of contemporary literature have noticed a surge in motherhood memoirs and literature that reflects on contemporary motherhood. Kate Zambreno’s three literary works – Book of Mutter (2017), Drifts (2020) and The Light Room (2023) – are examples of contemporary life-writing. In different but prominent and clear ways, these three works acknowledge and contemplate mothering, the act of wri

This dissertation argues that the incongruity between the narrating I and the narrated I in The Shadow of the Torturer produces a site where myth is made. The novel differs from other works in the canon of science fantasy because its science and fantasy are rarely, if ever, juxtaposed. Instead, I argue that whatever technological understandings the narrator obtains throughout their journey are rep

Using Jacques Lacan’s theories of subjectivity, this dissertation analyses the relationships between the ideal selves and the romantic desires of characters in Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, Alasdair Gray’s Poor Things and Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondous Life of Oscar Wao. Lacan argues that there is an inherent lack in all human beings, stemming from incompleteness and early helplessness, and emp

The following master's thesis discusses Virginia Woolf's essays A Room of One's Own and Three Guineas from contemporary feminist points of views in order to define the nature of Woolf's feminism. The two feminist theorists Rosi Braidotti and Judith Butler serve as the bases of the two most widely known branches in feminist theory today, the sexual difference theory on the one hand,