2025 May - 18 articles
When it comes to acting in modern productions of Shakespeare’s plays, size is more than all talk. That is, though how much a character speaks often serves as the measure of a role’s size, “small parts” may have a lot to say&md...
Graffiti’s dual existence as both public art and illicit practice has generated sustained legal, cultural, and aesthetic debates. This article examines the role of anonymity in shaping how graffiti is recognized, regulated, and interpreted with...
In this article, I explore Merle Collins’ reworking of poems from the Nelson’s Royal Readers. Focusing on Part V of Ocean Stirrings, I explore Collins’ use of poetic form to represent the mental unravelling and restitching of Louise...
In this piece, we approach graffiti from the perspective of the ‘circuits of valorization’ that qualify as well as quantify it. We understand a valorization circuit as an assemblage of cultural, legal, economic and geographic dynamics sur...
The article examines the inspiring relationship between the well-known Prague journalist Milena Jesenská and the world-famous writer Franz Kafka—authors of different genres who shared reflections on being human, the world, religion, and...
This article undertakes a comparative reading of the lives and legacies of Franz Kafka and Roberto Bolaño in order to explore the nature of their authorship after their deaths. To this end, this article considers the implications for the const...
Writing in November 2010 in the aftermath of a series of devastating hurricanes, Norman Girvan admitted to “a growing sense that Caribbean states may be more and more facing a challenge of existential threats”. By this, he continues, &ldq...
While the development of the Empedocles figure in the various versions of Hölderlin’s unfinished tragedy has long been the subject of scholarship, the shifts in his relationships to the women around him have largely gone unnoticed. Yet the...
The Mysteries of Udolpho was published at a time when poetry and music were being redefined, along with the notions of imitation and expression. From a precedence of word over music, theorists, musicians and composers started reconsidering the hierar...
In Ten Little Indians, Sherman Alexie presents nine poignant and emotionally resonant stories about Native Americans’ struggle with alienation and stereotypes. Instead of focusing merely on the ethnic identity of American Indians, Alexie writes...
In 1802, Friedrich Hölderlin experienced his first mental breakdown, which was followed by a second one in 1805. On 15th September 1806, he was admitted to the clinic of Johann Heinrich Ferdinand von Autenrieth in Tübingen who addressed H&o...
Curiosity lies at the heart of the sixteenth-century miscellany books, which served as precursors to the essay genre. Among them, a truly exceptional piece stands out: La silva curiosa by Julián de Medrano, published in 1583. This work pushes...
This paper critically examines Édouard Glissant’s philosophy of relation through the lens of Watsuji Tetsurō’s theory of fūdo (climate and milieu), arguing that Watsuji’s insights help address some of the tensions a...
Hong Kong-born British writer Timothy Mo’s novel An Insular Possession (1986) focuses on the First Opium War (1839–1842) and critically examines global inequalities. This article explores cosmopolitanism as a potential framework for mitig...
In this essay, I utilize Robert Stepto’s “ritual ground” concept and Ray Oldenburg’s “third place” theory to analyze Jacqueline Woodson’s Harbor Me. I posit that Ms. Laverne repurposes an old art classroom as...
Novels, which take shape in imaginary worlds, are closely connected to life and reality. Psychiatric disorders also belong to life and reality and are part of the content of literary works. Authors sometimes make use of mental disorders to tell a sto...
The word “curiosity” has an opaque history with contradictory attitudes and connotations acquired ever since Antiquity. This poses an interesting problem in the case of Leo Africanus, who never uses the word in his Cosmographia de l&rsquo...
It is increasingly acknowledged that one of the primary tasks of the humanities today is to engage with environmental issues: all the more so in light of the Anthropocene, which underlines significant—indeed transformative—human influence...
