Hardev Kaur

The butterfly effect hits Complicité: a chaotic reading of Mnemonic and A Disappearing Number

The middle ground chaos theory secures among other gigantic scientific theories to describe the world has brought it to the fore lately. It neither declines the Newtonian clockwork model completely nor promotes the quantum indeterministic model entirely. It preaches that the world is both ordered and disordered, and man is both bound and free. Unlike relativity and quantum physics, it is neither busy with massive objects nor preoccupied with tiny ones, the atoms. It simply works in between, our world. Thus, it spreads and is widely utilised in a variety of disciplines, including literary and cultural domains. Conversely, Theatre de Complicite promotes nonlinearity and fragmentation for structure, and physicality and visual imagery for performance. It does not prefer pre-written texts rather favours devising its own through a lengthy process of improvising and rehearsing. It believes that the world is no longer a world of a single story. It cannot be encompassed within one philosophy or viewpoint. Mnemonic and A Disappearing Number suggest human body within the context of origin as a collective identity, and math within the context of infinity as a path for eternity. Hence, chaos theory is deemed to be the appropriate choice for analysis as it can provide an avenue of escape from the soul-crushing mechanical view of the world dominated most critical approaches for decades and can also furnish an alternative language and scope for literary interpretation. Keywords : chaos theory; butterfly effect; strange attractors; recursive symmetry; nonlinearity and fragmentation

Truth problematization and identity formation: a Foucauldian reading of Martin Amis's Money

Transgression in postmodern age marked a unique social and cultural aspect in re-forming the identity of the postmodern man. Martin Amis mirrors the identities of his characters through their transgression of the social norms, specifically, the established norms of truth of masculinity. However, this idea of truth transgression in Amiss novel Money has not been fully taken into account and there has been little discussion about it in terms of identity formation. Thus, the aim of this paper is to investigate the way in which transgression of truth affects the idea of identity formation in Amiss novel Money. Drawing on Michel Foucaults technique of problematisation, the present paper investigates the notion of transgressing the historical truth of masculinity which becomes a significant idea that the protagonist John Self manipulates to actualise himself and to pick up his own identity. The paper reveals a conclusion in which transgression of truth can be instrumental in realising the self and re-affirming subjectivity as the case is in John Self. Keywords: transgression; Foucault; problematisation; Amis; money DOI: http://doi.org/10.17576/3L-2016-2202-09

Facilitating the Grotesque Reception and Human-Nature Interrelationship in Tunku Halim’s Dark Demon Rising

Horror novels often celebrate gore, darkness, madness and emotional repression as the central themes to invoke terror and horror in readers. In the novel Dark Demon Rising (1997) the elements of grotesque and nature provide the impetus and the plot, thus invoking horror. Apart from the evident elements of grotesque, nature as a backdrop is also significant. Both elements are omnipresent and pivotal in developing the plot. Noting the relationship between the two elements, this paper explores the relationship between the grotesque and nature through the portrayal of human-nature interconnectedness in the selected novels. This paper utilises the concepts of ecocriticism and grotesque. Ecocriticism provides sufficient explanation on the relationship between humans and the natural world. The concept of grotesque by Wolfgang Kayser provides a solid framework in highlighting and exploring the texts. The application of these concepts will then demonstrate that apart from imagery, the role of nature is also evident in channelling the relationship between human and nature. The interrelationship between nature and the grotesque is portrayed under Kayser’s notion of the grotesque reception. Pertaining to this notion, the interconnectedness is unveiled through the comic/horror and attractive/repulsive dualities. The finding concludes that the element of nature depicts the grotesque reception via the characters’ demeanour, especially the protagonists’ emotions, perceptions and attitude. Keywords: grotesque; Wolfgang Kayser; xa0ecocriticism; nature; grotesque reception DOI: http://doi.org/10.17576/3L-2016-2201-05