J. M. Coetzee’s Foe : a narrative of dislocation through assimilation

Title: J. M. Coetzee’s Foe : a narrative of dislocation through assimilation
Source document: Brno studies in English. 2022, vol. 48, iss. 1, pp. 201-218
Extent
201-218
  • ISSN
    0524-6881 (print)
    1805-0867 (online)
Type: Article
Language
 

Notice: These citations are automatically created and might not follow citation rules properly.

Abstract(s)
This article rereads J. M. Coetzee's Foe (1986) and its intertextual bond with Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe (1719) in the framework of cognitive poetics to shed light on the complex issue of canonicity in terms of content and form/style in Foe. To this purpose, Marie-Laure Ryan's notions of textual actual world (TAW) and accessibility relations are used along with Barbara Dancygier's concept of narrative space construction to examine how Susan Barton's narrative (the postcolonial account) anchors/accesses the already consolidated TAW of Robinson Crusoe (the colonial text) to dislocate the colonizer's secluded, monologic text by superimposing another psyche, through cognitive blending, upon it. Susan's narrative incorporates her constant awareness of the social mind to assimilate – rather than push aside – the colonizer's narrative by driving it out of its monologic state toward a dialogic, multivocal exchange in the contemporary postcolonial world where Cruso(e)'s story becomes a part of Susan's story.
References
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