Maupassant: the Semiotics of Text: Practical Exercises - Couverture souple

Greimas, Algirdas Julien

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 9027219443 ISBN 13 : 9789027219442

Editeur : John Benjamins Publishing Co, 1988

Synopsis

Translated by Paul Perron Maupassant's short story, “Two Friends”, is examined in order to test methodological tools and to hone them for their application in the analysis of narrative discourse, starting from the oral tale (Propp) and ending with the written tale instituted as literary genre. Complex procedures of textual production are identified: among which entire sequences as well as the “evenemential” level of narrative fade away in favor of its cognitive dimension. This semiotic investigation is accompanied by a challenge to certain conventions of literary criticism: dialogue, the locus of Realist stereotypes, appears laden with paradoxical truths; the description of nature, inherited from the Romantics, bristles with narrative intent, and entire sections of a valorized figurative universe unfold before us. Thematic readings are linked up with semantic analysis: the figure of Water exerts its profound fascination. A Christian symbolics is uncovered which traverses the text and invites us to read it as a new Gospel Parable. New readings complement older ones and remain as so many suspended possibilities. The tale appears somewhat as a sonnet, that is to say as a “fixed-form” genre, where the closure of the text would be a necessary condition for transcending it.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: John Benjamins Publishing Co
• Date d'édition: 1988
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 9027219443
• ISBN 13: 9789027219442
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 292
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: non disponible