Magic in Christopher Whyte’s Novels
| Thesis title in Czech: | Magie v románech Christophera Whytea |
|---|---|
| Thesis title in English: | Magic in Christopher Whyte’s Novels |
| Key words: | Christopher Whyte|magic|magical realism|the fantastic|Scottish literature |
| English key words: | Christopher Whyte|magie|magický realismus|fantastika|skotská literatura |
| Academic year of topic announcement: | 2021/2022 |
| Thesis type: | Bachelor's thesis |
| Thesis language: | angličtina |
| Department: | Department of Anglophone Literatures and Cultures (21-UALK) |
| Supervisor: | Mgr. Petra Johana Poncarová, Ph.D. |
| Author: | hidden - assigned and confirmed by the Study Dept. |
| Date of registration: | 28.04.2022 |
| Date of assignment: | 28.04.2022 |
| Administrator's approval: | not processed yet |
| Confirmed by Study dept. on: | 02.05.2022 |
| Date and time of defence: | 31.01.2023 10:00 |
| Date of electronic submission: | 10.01.2023 |
| Date of proceeded defence: | 31.01.2023 |
| Submitted/finalized: | committed by student and finalized |
| Opponents: | Mgr. Daniela Theinová, Ph.D. |
| Guidelines |
| Despite featuring a wide range of characters and settings, the novels of the Scottish poet, critic, translator, and prose writer Christopher Whyte (1952) are connected by their interest in the topics of gender, queer identity, and sexuality, and also by the employment of magic to explore those topics. This thesis is going to analyse the use of magical elements in three of Whyte’s novels: Euphemia MacFarrigle & The Laughing Virgin (1995), The Warlock of Strathearn (1997), and The Cloud Machinery (2000). All novels challenge heteronormativity and allow “other” identities to emerge and take the central stage, and magic plays a central part in that process. Despite first being published more than two decades ago, the critical reception of Whyte’s novels is still limited, and this thesis seeks to contribute to their wider appreciation. The method of this thesis consists in close reading of the individual novels and comparing and contrasting magical features in each of them. It employs both theoretical works that deal with magic in literature, including Tzvetan Todorov’s seminal study The Fantastic, and scholarship that focuses on recent Scottish fiction and on Whyte’s writing in particular. |
| References |
| Macdonald, Kirsty. “Anti-heroes and Androgynes: Gothic Masculinities in Contemporary Scottish Men's Fiction.” In The Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies; Dublin. Iss. 3, (Nov 8, 2007): 37-53.
MacKenzie, Robin M. J. “The Hieroglyphic of Raindrops: Reading the Signs of Nature in the Warlock of Strathearn by Christopher Whyte.” Environmental and Ecological Readings - The Hieroglyphic of Raindrops: Reading the Signs of Nature in The Warlock of Strathearn by Christopher Whyte. Presses Universitaires De Franche-Comté, 2015. Accessed online at Todorov, Tzvetan. The Fantastic: A Structural Approach to a Literary Genre. Cornell University Press, 1975. Warnes, Christopher, and Kim Anderson Sasser. Magical Realism and Literature. Cambridge University Press, 2020. Wilson, Fiona. “Radical Hospitality: Christopher Whyte and Cosmopolitanism.” In The Edinburgh Companion to Contemporary Scottish Literature. Ed. by Berthold Schoene (Edinburgh: EUP, 2009), pp. 194-201. Whyte, Christopher. The Warlock of Strathearn. Victor Gollancz, 1997. Whyte, Christopher. Euphemia MacFarrigle & The Laughing Virgin. Victor Gollancz, 1995. Whyte, Christopher. The Cloud Machinery. Victor Gollancz, 2001. |