Agenda
Événements & colloques

"Madness in Fiction": Second Ghent Narratology Workshop

Publié le par Marielle Macé (Source : Gunther Martens)

International Narratology Workshop on the Narrative Presentation of Madness in Modern Fiction: Strategies and Implications

Ghent (Belgium), May 15-16, 2008

Keynote speakers: Alan Palmer (London) and James Phelan (Ohio)

with a session on Richard Powers' The Echo Maker: Douwe Draaisma (Groningen), Luc Herman (Antwerp) & Bart Vervaeck (Ghent)

Theme:

This workshop aims to gain insight into the rhetorical and narrative particularities of representations of madness in modern fiction. In research on literature and madness, much attention has been given to the historical, social and psychological construction of madness. Although it is clear that literary representations of madness derive their specific imaginative force from the narrative's technical organization, rhetoric and narrative mechanisms have been somewhat overlooked. Modern fiction does not only rely on psychoanalytical notions to portray mad characters and narrators, but also on a whole range of narrative procedures. Readers are provided (or refused) access to a fictional character's madness through elements of thought representation, characterization, focalization, perspective structure and temporal structure. Furthermore, these elements are far from neutral. They often mark a certain ethical stance, and certain strategies can convey philosophical positions such as epistemological and ontological doubt. Therefore, participants of the workshop will discuss the philosophical, ethical and aesthetic implications of the narrative presentation of madness.

The last few decades have seen the development of several ‘postclassical' narratological approaches that open new perspectives for research on literature and madness. The workshop therefore also aims to explore the possibilities and limitations of these new directions in narrative studies (possible worlds theory, cognitive, constructivist, rhetorical, and natural narratology). How can narratological concepts such as ‘possible world', ‘hypothetical focalization', ‘character perspective', ‘naturalization', ‘narrative unreliability' and ‘irony' help to understand narratives of madness? How does the deviant mind-set of fictional characters determine the organization of time, space and plot in the narrative? How does the representation of delusional worlds differ from the representation of other mental acts (dreams, fantasies, wishes) and other fictional worlds (magic, fantasy)? The participants of the workshop will address these and other questions in specific casestudies, in different national traditions and in more general reflections.

Venue: Het Pand, Onderbergen 1, 9000 Ghent, Belgium

Website : http://www.narratology.ugent.be

Registration: contact Lars Bernaerts (Lars.Bernaerts@ugent.be)

Organizing Committee: Lars Bernaerts (Ghent University), Luc Herman (University of Antwerp), Gunther Martens (Ghent University / Free University of Brussels), Bart Vervaeck (Ghent University)

Scientific Committee: Jan Baetens (Catholic University of Louvain), Luc Herman (University of Antwerp), Liesbeth Korthals Altes (University of Groningen), Jürgen Pieters (Ghent University), Ernst van Alphen (University of Leiden), Bart Vervaeck (Ghent University)

With the support of the Research Foundation – Flanders (FWO) and Olith


Programme:

Thursday, May 15

Morning Session (Het Pand)

9.40-10.10: Registration

10.10-10.20: Introduction

10.20-11.30

Gunther Martens (Ghent University / Free University of Brussels)
De(ar)ranged: minds, worlds and narrative agency

Henrik Schärfe (Aalborg University)
Diegetic Displacements

11.45-12.35

Lars Bernaerts (Ghent University)
The Embedding of Delirium in Narrative

Afternoon Session (Het Pand)

14.00-15.00

Alan Palmer (London)
Attributions of Madness in Ian McEwan's Enduring Love

15.00-15.35

Annina Temmes (University of Tampere)
The Ethics and Narrative Structure: Patrick McGrath's Spider

16.00-17.10

Catherine Hoffmann (University of Le Havre/Poitiers)
Dancing to Ollie's tunes: the rhetoric of narrative stutter

Lasse Gammelgaard (Aarhus University)
Narrating Madness in Beckett's ‘One Evening'

Friday, May 16

Morning Session (Het Pand)

9.20-10.30

Maija Könönen (University of Helsinki)
The Role of Logos in Russian Madmen's Diary-Fiction

Benjamin Biebuyck (Ghent University)
‘Schwarzwehende Löcher'. Metaphor, Metonymy, Synecdoche and the Arbitration of Madness as a Mode of Interpersonal Understanding in Günter Grass' Die Blechtrommel

10.50-12.00

Gislind Rohwer (University of Bonn/Gieβen)
Madness in Poetry. Unreliable Narration and Abnormal Mental States in the Dramatic Monologue

Els Jongeneel (University of Groningen)
Madness in narrative perspective. On Sartre's short story ‘The Room' (‘La Chambre', in Le Mur, 1938)

Afternoon Session (Museum Dr. Guislain)

13.50-14.00

Welcome by Patrick Allegaert (curator of the museum)

14.00-15.00

James Phelan (Ohio State University)
Judging Madness in The Sound and the Fury

15.10-15.50
Session on Richard Powers' The Echo Maker

Luc Herman (University of Antwerp) & Bart Vervaeck (Ghent University)
Capturing Capgras: The Echo Maker by Richard Powers

15.50-16.30

Douwe Draaisma (University of Groningen)
Echoes, doubles and delusions. Capgras syndrome in science and literature

16.30-16.40
Closing remarks

Reception at the Museum Dr. Guislain