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Ngugi Wa Thiong'o's literary work "The River Between" is a novel that participates in the description of space by using language as a system of signs for the encoding and decoding of information. The fictional space in the novel is organized around two spatial cores physically determined and metaphorically evoked by an omniscient narrator; both banks Kameno and Makuyu. In this article, we will apply the categories in style in a fiction selectively to the description of the world of TRB. The procedure in this case will be to start with a general impression of the ridges and then to make selective use of the checklist in order to draw the readers' attention to what seems significant in the description of the Space.

Two contemporary novels dealing with the beekeeper’s social type, Le Maître des abeilles by Henri Vincenot and Maxence Fermine’s L’Apiculteur, reshape the social representations which are linked with this character in an original way. We shall show how each novel proceeds to join external images to the collective ideas we commonly build to figure out the beekeeper’s tasks (either congruent or not with the reality of this job) in order to create a new literary universe. The representations (or even stereotypes) of the adventurer, for instance, or of the religious officiant give a new sense to the reading according to the poetical choice of the two writers.

This article explores the cultural significance of initiation rites among the Northern Sotho in South Africa, with a particular focus on the blending of symbolic gender motifs in rock art. Scholars on Northern Sotho rock art have associated initiation with specific genders. A close analysis of Northern Sotho rock art, together with a nuanced reading of ethnographic material on initiation rites, shows that a motif may be a mnemonic device in initiation but communicate a symbolism unique to either group. In my research, I observed that rock art sites have imagery that can be argued to be symbolic for both males and females, often juxtaposed or superimposed on the same panels. I refer to this as a form of blending of gender categories, possible during rites of transition. Thus I suggest that the symbolism for gender could resonate or change depending on who was using the site. Based on this, I suggest that such rock art sites should be categorized as initiation sites without specific gendered coding. This article contends that while gender boundaries exist in Northern Sotho culture, initiation rites often create a fluidity that challenges and probably blends these categories, as reflected in the rock art.

Often looked upon from the perspective of his biography in relation with his works, Ion D. Sîrbu published the novel “Dansul ursului” [The Dance of the Bear], apparently a children’s book, in 1988. The key protagonists, Buru the Bear and the Gary the donkey are both lively alter egos of the writer. At the surface, the narrative builds on characters whose life is upset by World War II, while in fact the main theme concerns physical and intellectual freedom. This paper draws on studies referring to repression under the communist regime (Mareș, 2011), the novelist’s personal correspondence (2020, 1998, 1994) and his confessions (2009), to examine whether, and how, the imaginary has its roots in one’s personal experience. What happens to humans, domestic and wild animals when they lose the routine and values of their existence? Who are Gary and Buru, in fact? Is this work truly “a novel for children and grandparents” as the subtitle states? While interest in Sîrbu’s personality and works does not fade, this particular narrative opens as a combination of multiple connections, resistance and learning.

In the Symposium of Plato, Socrates reports that Diotima once described to him a process of initiation by which a lover rises from desiring one beautiful body to catching sight of what seems to be the Platonic form of beauty. Scholars have debated whether the lover is to make this ascent by a rational process or a non-rational one, or by both working either in concert or independently. This paper argues that love leads and guides a process in this initiation that necessarily involves rational activity. No teaching is necessary or appropriate, so that the process is an example of learning without being taught. The philosophical insight that results is life-changing, but it does not amount to the kind of knowledge that would fully satisfy a Socratic seeker after knowledge.

Copyright of Archives de Sciences Sociales des Religions is the property of Editions EHESS and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Recherches Feministes is the property of Groupe de Recherche et d'Echange Multidisciplinaires Feministes and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

A bilingual Latin-Greek boundary-inscription from the sanctuary of Samothrace (2nd c. AD) and the Senatus consultum de bacchanalibus (186 BC) provide the basis for an analysis of the Latin formulas and language use concerning the expression of mysteries and initiation. At Samothrace, the use of a purely Latin formulation (sacra accipere) to express initiation coexists with transcriptions and translation of Greek words. Inside the case of the Bacchanalia, as referred to by the senatus consulta and reported by Livy, the distinctions of vocabulary use between the two ways of report lead to a diachronic analysis of the rise and development of the Latin vocabulary of the mysteries. This analytic path results in interrogations on the methodological way to approach mysteries without falling into the trap of reductive key words and on the plurality of the rituality of initiation hidden behind the uniformity and the generalisation of the vocabulary. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lorsqu’en 1936 Carlo Levi, antifasciste et résistant, est envoyé au confino (en résidence surveillée), dans l’extrême-sud de l’Italie, il subit non seulement une peine mais réalise surtout un voyage initiatique qui modifie définitivement sa vision de l’Autre. Sa rencontre avec la réalité méridionale deviendra l’un des événements centraux de son existence et le portera à la révélation d’une réalité qui le transformera fondamentalement. Or, dans son expérience comme dans son roman, la femme est au centre de son initiation à l’Autre et à l’Ailleurs. Véritable force de la nature, maîtresse des lieux et des âmes, elle se présente à lui comme une sybille tellurique le préparant à un au-delà captivant. La femme reflète avec force la réalité à la fois païenne, épique et héroïque de cette région méridionale. Miroir de la culture d’un Sud vu comme paradigme d’une conception authentique de l’existence, elle le mène vers la connaissance et la prise de conscience de lui-même.

63III. CONVERGENCES ET DIVERGENCES IDENTITAIRESLES FORGERONS DU KASAÏ ET LEURS RITES INITIATIQUESJean HIAMBA OVUNGUISP-Kananga, Université de Lodjajeanrogacien@gmail.comAbstract:THE BLACKSMITHS OF KASAÏ AND THEIR RITES OF INITIATIONInitiation is a phenomenon that touches upon the essential question of the human condition. It is therefore not surprising that it occupies a prominent place among blacksmiths. As regards the blacksmiths of Central Africa and particularly the Ankutshu Membele of Kasaï, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, integration into these social class requires, in any case, an initiation. Thus, by initiation, this social class generally designates a set of rites and oral teachings or practices which aim at radically changing the status of the subject to be initiated. Philosophically speaking, initiation is regarded as an ontological mutation of the existential regime, because, at the end of the teaching-learning process, the initiate or the neophyte enjoys a completely different existence than before the initiation.

Alocasia of Indonesian endemic has significant market potential. However, the scarcity of qualified seedlings hampered their commercialization. The purpose of this study was to obtain the best sterilization technique and media for in vitro propagation of Alocasia cuprea through the organogenesis pathway using microbulblet explants. Randomized complete block designs with five to ten replicates were applied in the experiments. Application of 5 and 10% clorox for 5 and 10 minutes resulted in 40.6% aseptic explants, 10% browning explants, and 90% explant growth potential. The best shoot initiation was achieved on the MS added 4.54 μM thidiazuron and 2.22 μM BAP. This medium had an 85% explant initiation, 4.2 shoots per explant, and 6.5 days initiation time. The best shoot proliferation was discovered on MS medium with 4.44 μM BAP, which produced 10.5 initial shoots with a shoot height of 1.3 cm and a clump diameter of 1.3 cm. The best plantlet regeneration was determined on ½ MS medium with 6.5 cm plantlet height, 3.5 leaves total, 3.8 cm leaf length, 2.6 cm leaf width, and 3.8 roots. This propagation method will be applicable to the propagation of qualified seedlings for commercial purposes and potentially used for other endemic Alocasia.

Dès le début des années 60 du siècle dernier, plusieurs philologues se sont penchés sur la présence de parallélismes significatifs entre la représentation de Dionysos qu’offrent les Bacchantes d’Euripide et celle qui est au cœur des Grenouilles d’Aristophane, des parallélismes que la chronologie relative de ces deux pièces a sans doute contribué à souligner. Ces données ont été interprétées de différentes manières, étant le plus souvent mises sur le compte du mythe auquel les deux pièces se réfèrent ou de la parodie comique de la tragédie. Dans ce qui suit, je souhaite reconstituer les étapes principales de ce débat, tout en y apportant ma contribution. L’hypothèse que je soutiendrai est que les parallélismes identifiés par les chercheurs sont à comprendre dans le cadre d’une rivalité poétique inter-générique entre Euripide et Aristophane. Dans cette perspective, le fait que Dionysos soit le protagoniste des deux pièces ne peut pas être dissocié de sa fonction comme représentant de deux conceptions antagonistes du théâtre. Ces dernières s’expriment notamment par le moyen du travestissement dans le cadre des scénarios initiatiques qui concluent les Bacchantes et ouvrent les Grenouilles.

La Casamance est une région très riche culturellement, avec ses religions et ses systèmes de pensée. L'objet de cet article est de réfléchir sur l'espace de débat qu'offrent les cérémonies de la religion traditionnelle des différents groupes diola, et sa relation avec la perception locale des réalités socio-politiques, dans le contexte du conflit. En mettant l'accent sur les populations qui pratiquent la religion traditionnelle awaseena, nous pouvons découvrir d'autres réalités qui cohabitent et qui entrent en conflit ou qui existent parallèlement au domaine politique de l'État, montrant ainsi d'autres façons de définir des idées comme représentativité, autorité et légitimité. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a species of folk literature, the Romanian fairy tale is a narrative writing with a recuperating character of the archaic background of magical-religious beliefs and pre-Christian rites. The soteriological function specific to the "saying" of the myth on the occasion of sacred feasts or critical moments in the existence of the community seems to have been transferred to the act of telling a story. Stories were told on different occasions of ritual moments, such as wedding, cunning or funeral, and the storyteller was always initiated in the mystery of the world and a well-known magician of rituals and practices. I consider that, like the popular singers, the storytellers were called to entertain a particular audience with their tales which also had a "didactic" function. The stories were built from fixed narrative cores taken from the ritual skeleton of the fundamental founding myth, around which variable elements, more or less refined, were chained together in accordance with the creative intelligence of the creator. Thus, the popular fairy tale ”Ţugunea, fiul mătușii”, the version found by G. Dem. Teodorescu, is based on the specific stages of a foundation myth, which is followed by the phases of a double rite of passage, the one in the men's category and the other one in the shamanic type. These aspects can also be identified in Petre Ispirescuʼs version, entitled ”Tugulea, fiul uncheașului și al mătușii”. The novelty of the version of G. Dem. Teodorescu consists in the possibility of identifying the specific moments of a double ritual, magical and alchemical. In the first place, the Initiate, the Chosen one, discovers and frees from the darkness of the deep earth-alembic the Philosophical Stone, the superb autochthon-nous coincidentia oppositorum, suggestively represented by the image of the Fantastic Horse with the Sun in front and the Moon in the back. In the terrestrial world, Țugulea is the sacred hypostasis of the aunt's son (the midwife of the village named "meşteroaia" by Mircea Eliade), his birth being under the sign of the ambivalence of the female element, so that in the underground world his "rebirth" is supervised by the feared Goddess of the Earth, Zmeoaica Pământului. Secondly, but equally important, the hero manages to go through all the stages of the alchemical "baking" (to be understood, of self-maturity) in the earth-alembic (nigredo, albedo, citrinitas, rubedo), respectively the four alchemical operations (decay, calcination, distillation, sublimation) and succeeds in the annulment of human duality and the achievement of the Total Unity through a double hierogamy. The wedding of the hero with the daughter of the emperor symbolizes the alchemical union of the King and the Queen, which, in Jungʼs psychology, translates into the union of animus with anima, of consciousness with the unconscious. The hero also succeeds in uniting the worlds, the Kingdom from Above with the Kingdom of Beyond, in an atypical coincidentia oppositorum to the recent Romanian folk tale, but specific to the archaic one, unaffected by the Christian moral and dogma.

Since the beginning of the sixties of the last century, several philologists have studied the presence of significant parallels between the representation of Dionysus offered by Euripides' Bacchae and that which is at the heart of Aristophanes' Frogs, parallels that the relative chronology of these two plays has undoubtedly helped to underline. These data have been interpreted in different ways, being most often put on the account of the myth to which the two plays refer or of the comic parody of the tragedy. I propose to reconstruct the main stages of this debate, while making my own contribution. My hypothesis is that the parallels identified by the researchers are to be understood within the framework of an inter-generic poetic rivalry between Euripides and Aristophanes. In this perspective, the fact that Dionysus is the protagonist of both plays cannot be dissociated from his function as representative of two antagonistic conceptions of theater. The latter are expressed in particular by means of transvestism in the initiatory scenarios that conclude the Bacchae and open the Frogs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Revista Canadiense de Estudios Hispánicos is the property of Asociacion Canadiense de Hispanistas and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Revue Nerval is the property of Classiques Garnier and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry nous propose par l'intermédiaire de son œuvre un voyage initiatique dans le désert de l'Afrique. Ce voyage commence dans le roman « Courrier Sud», continue dans « Terre des Hommes » et finit dans le désert du Sahara au moment où le petit prince réussit à trouver une fontaine dont l'eau non seulement apaise la soif, mais crée une nouvelle perspective sur l'univers. Audelà du voyage initiatique, il y a encore beaucoup de significations intéressantes vers lesquelles renvoie le désert. Le personnage exupérien découvre le sentiment de dignité et de noblesse inspiré par l'étendue de sable et connaît les passions qui poussent les hommes à jouer toujours dans la pièce de théâtre qu'eux seuls connaissent. Il comprend la valeur de l'eau pour les hommes du désert qui cherchent toujours une oasis, en la considérant un don du ciel. L'accident de SaintExupéry dans le désert de Libye constitue une expérience en même temps douloureuse et enrichissante. Le miracle de l'apparition du Bédouin qui les a sauvés (lui et Prévot) est décrit dans une page mémorable qui constitue un hymne à l'eau, vue comme symbole de la vie.

The Incredible Shrinking Man, one of the two “written films” (quoted in Gonzalès 18) that Auster narrates in Report from the Interior, turns the book, as in The Book of Illusions, into a virtual screen, showing how influential the 1957 Universal Pictures production was to fabricate both Auster’s auctorial identity and his various characters’ identities. The Incredible Shrinking Man exclusively focuses on the physical metamorphosis of the protagonist who is submitted to a sudden, corporeal diminishment, and then on his rebirth at a higher state of consciousness: after dying to his old self, he struggles to survive, overcoming obstacles and trials as he is confined in the cellar of his own house. The plot undeniably recalls the process of regression, the so-called “art of hunger” that most Austerian protagonists experience. It also casts a light on the theme of the depletion of material resources which pervades Auster’s fictions and conveys, in multiple ways, the idea of “a return to origins” as Mircea Eliade, for instance, analyzed it. Carey’s initiatory and transformative adventure, which resembles a fairy tale, explains, at least partly, Auster’s fascination for this genre which has always inspired him, and Auster’s analysis of the film in Report from the Interior unveils his vision on initiation, on life and fiction, along with his obsession with enclosed spaces.

Les Neuf consciences du Malfini de Patrick Chamoiseau est un roman initiatique articulé autour de l’expérience pédagogique d’un disciple et des prouesses didactico-pédagogiques d’un maître. Fondée sur l’observation minutieuse et l’imitation formatrice du maître, cet apprentissage permet à l’initié de transcender ses élans prédateurs pour accéder au stade de la responsabilité écologique. Contrairement au roman de formation traditionnel dans lequel le maître mobilise le dispositif multisensoriel et multimodal pour relayer le savoir ou la vérité, celui-ci met le lecteur devant une situation « pédagogique » archétypale où la relation maître-disciple n’est pas interpersonnelle, interactive, volontaire ou ritualisée. En outre, le lien pédagogique ne s’y déploie pas seulement entre les protagonistes mis en texte, mais aussi entre le roman et le lecteur qui en est la cible privilégiée. À l’aune de l’écocritique et de l’approche sémiologique du personnage, cette réflexion se propose d’étudier le processus d’initiation et la dynamique des relations maître-disciple pour montrer que, par ce récit allégorique, Chamoiseau fait le procès de l’anthropocentrisme comme cause principale du déclin écologique et préconise l’horizontalité dans les relations Homme/Nature, gage de l’équilibre écologique.

In this paper, based on ethnographic data collected in the Kimberleys in the mid-1980s and recently updated, I address relationships between Australian Aborigines and their mythical past in the light of globalization. In order to illustrate fundamental changes within Aboriginal societies during the last century and the current dilemma they are facing, I selected initiation ceremonies and festivals. I then look at the globalization impact on both aiming to show that, if indeed globalization has had impact in remote communities, such in-depth changes are not necessarily new to Aborigines. Most of them, even during the darkest part of their recent history, have displayed great adaptive capacities as well as strong resilience to forge a new identity and the needed strength to live their contemporary situation drawing from their mythical past.

Initiation is a phenomenon that touches upon the essential question of the human condition. It is therefore not surprising that it occupies a prominent place among blacksmiths. As regards the blacksmiths of Central Africa and particularly the Ankutshu Membele of Kasaï, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, integration into these social class requires, in any case, an initiation. Thus, by initiation, this social class generally designates a set of rites and oral teachings or practices which aim at radically changing the status of the subject to be initiated. Philosophically speaking, initiation is regarded as an ontological mutation of the existential regime, because, at the end of the teaching-learning process, the initiate or the neophyte enjoys a completely different existence than before the initiation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Annals of Theology / Roczniki Teologiczne is the property of Towarzystwo Naukowe KUL & Katolicki Uniwersytet Lubelski Jana Pawla II and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

In this essay we base our study on the theme of labyrinth in the work of Mihai Eminescu in order to foreground the symbolic constellation associated with his work. In the first section, we analyse the labyrinth as an archetypal space connected to initiation. In the second section, we underscore the principal characteristics of the exterior labyrinth and the interior labyrinth in several poems of Eminescu. In the third section, we examine the labyrinth of the snow in Odin şipoetul, while in the fourth section, we study the Gothic labyrinth in several pieces of prose by him. In the fifth section, we end with reflections on the poetic labyrinth and on the originality of Eminescu's elaborations of the labyrinth: the ontological transmutation into the labyrinth is associated with eros (the erotic labyrinth), with the cosmos (the vegetable labyrinth), and with the logos (the textual labyrinth). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dans cette contribution, nous exposons un dispositif pour l’enseignement / apprentissage de l’arabe comme langue étrangère. Dans notre démarche, nous nous sommes inspiré d’abord de nos lectures de la théorie relative à la « pensée du langage » et du « constructivisme » ou « socioconstructivisme » (Vygotsky, 1934 et J. S. Bruner, 1983) qui place l’interaction sociale au centre de l’apprentissage, et puis de la méthode de mise en relation et collaboration entre apprenants appelée ‘tandem’. Ce concept de ‘tandem’ a été introduit il y a une quarantaine d’années dans le cadre de la didactique. De manière générale, ce concept désigne la coopération et l’entraide entre des apprenants dans leur apprentissage quelque soit la discipline. Le processus d’apprentissage, dans ce dispositif, n’a pas été perçu comme un ensemble de performances scolaires isolées mais a été plutôt abordé dans le contexte global de l’acquisition langagière. Motiver des apprenants, qui acceptent de travailler en interaction pour apprendre à communiquer en arabe, c’est d’abord leur permettre d’appréhender la relation sociale en les incitant à agir et à réagir entre eux. Cette attitude paraît indispensable pour de ne pas cantonner l’organisation de l’interaction à une seule forme d’échange descriptive ou limitée aux questions/réponses. Dans le cadre de l’interaction, les interlocuteurs ne sont pas de simples exécutants d’une consigne préconçue mais collaborent, négocient et interagissent entre eux par leurs attitudes et leurs productions langagières.

A Pinctada margaritifera box was unearthed at Viminacium in 1985, at the site of Pe}ine, in a grave containing cremated remains. It was made from the shell of a pearl oyster (Pinctada margaritifera), an exotic clam whose habitat is tropical seas: the Indo-Pacific region, the Persian Gulf, and the Red Sea. Based on the grave type and a coin found in it, the box has been dated to the second half of the first and the first half of the second century AD. Morphologically and functionally, it represents a rare find in the territory of present-day Serbia and, together with the finds from Aquincum and Savaria, it is also a rare find of P. margaritiferae in the Central Balkans. It is a high-prestige item, indicative of contacts between Viminacium and the Near East, i.e. the area of present-day Israel, Jordan and Syria, where the workshops producing Pinctada boxes are alleged to have been. This text discusses the geographic-historical and, in particular, functional aspects of the P. margaritifera box as a symbol of Venus and a cultic prop in initiation rites.

Dans son roman Il Giardino dei Finzi-Contini, Giorgio Bassani s’est paradoxalement inspiré du modèle du conte pour évoquer la persécution antisémite en Italie et une histoire d’amour douloureuse. Le roman étant centré sur la Shoah et l’issue du roman étant tragique, on voit bien que l’utilisation du conte de fées est ici directement liée à une réécriture du conte, largement revisité et réactualisé, voire subverti, lié aux bouleversements de l’histoire. Ainsi, le héros devient-il un anti-héros moderne tandis que la princesse se rebelle pour entraîner le protagoniste dans une expérience initiatique douloureuse mais finalement salvatrice.

Кравченко Г. Архетипные мотивы в романе Мирослава Дочинца «Вечник». В статье исследуются архетипные мотивы с точки зрения философского осмысления человеческого бытия. На уровне архетипа роман М. Дочинца «Вечник» значительно шире в понимании возможностей интерпретаций его семантики. Изучаются особенности реализации скрытых мотивов языческой архаики, которые могут беспрерывно обновлять свое духовное содержание в литературной традиции искусства слова. Ключевые слова: архетип, вечность, инициация, магия, ритуал, заговор, интерпретация, языческая архаика, циклическое время. Kravchenko Ganna. Archetypal Motives in the Miroslav Dochynts’ Novel "Vichnyk". In literature ulterior motives are often inclined to archaic pagan implementation in subtle and subtle forms, highlighting the nature of man, his understanding and his search for purpose in the world, associated with the permanent solution to the eternal questions about the meaning of life. The product "Vichnyk" requires specific reading hidden internal implementation plan possible motives as far as the subject of study includes the potential for interpretation. For example, archaic motif image of the river – a source of life, strength, wisdom, happiness and eternity. In other words – some top properties that their river is the world of the spirits in the human world. Indicative moment that focuses on cleaning features and stands out from the water as an act of rebirth in a new incarnation. The extreme dependence of man on the environment caused formation healing magic as a means of direct influence on natural phenomena. A primitive model of beliefs – charms, become a means of healing the protagonist. Therefore, all relations with the flora and fauna and find meaning and depth, and common sense. Spells and magic rituals were widely mentioned, because they were the only way to influence reality in antiquity. In this context the author takes special interest to the pre-Christian meaning of the archetype of ‘Serpent’ and reckons upon the semantic perspectives which could be revealed through it. Thus it should be kept in mind that the archaic scheme may perpetually renew its content in other archetypes. In this respect an important archetypal motif of ‘eternity’ that runs through the entire novel as its core meaning, deserves special attention. M. Dochynets’s ‘Eternity’ – is a spiritual property based on love of neighbor and generous returns, for durability on the ground – is an ability for a long time to be human. The article also examines cyclical concept of time, much attention is paid to the individual stages of «Call-BackCheck». «Vichnyk» – a literary image that the depth of artistic generalization beyond the specific work and shown it historical era, because contains inexhaustible possibilities philosophical understanding of life. In conditions of the crises of our time the M. Dochynets’s novel «Vichnyk» suggests a source of knowledge and a penetration to the inner core of the everyday and larger scale historical events, calling for the spiritual powers for the people who have been exhausted by the shotcomings of development of our industrial society and rapid transformations in the modern information society. Key words: archetype, eternity, initiation, magic, ritual incantation, interpretation, archaic pagan, cyclical time.

The Carnival and the liturgical, as forms of valorisation announcing the failure, are fundamental notions used by Ioan Derșidan in interpreting Mateiu I. Caragiale’s work: “We understand by liturgical the relationship of matein characters with transcendence, their metaphysical/religious position, their conditioning between esse and non-esse, the corresponding literary motifs and their specialized forms of expression. The Carnival reflects the characters’ relationship with history and with ‘life which lives itself’ and their fall into temporality, indifference and disorder (Ioan Derșidan). A characteristic of Craii de Curtea- Veche (Gallants of the Old Court) is the complementarity of the two, also illustrated by the South-Eastern concept according to which God and the Non-Brother are a simultaneous, indestructible presence. The Carnival style, seen as a bond between two liturgical realities, is not “an illicit presence in the Gates of Transcendence, but part of the script and plays a role in the show” (Ioan Derșidan). The initiation supposes the presence of the liturgical and of the carnival as well, whereas the crossing of a labyrinth path towards the spiritual/ metaphysical centre means not only exaltation through dreaming, but an immersion in the immune/ filth, into that “life which lives itself”. The path to the centre includes in the analysed novel an ascending dynamics by liturgical exploration, by the pilgrimages proposed by two of the three guides, Pantazi and Pașadia, but also the survival in the inferno of the carnival, conducted in real art by another ceremonial master, Pirgu, though in a grotesque manner. Valorisation of existence in a double register, carnaval-liturgical, “certifies a special code of experience and imagining in which mysticism is also present (subl. ns. – M.A.), mystification and the search of a centre in its own being” (Ioan Derșidan).

In this article, we try to understand the kind of imagery underlying representations of alterity. In the first part of article, following Emanuel Levinas, we describe the philosophical meaning of alterity, whilst in the second part we propose an intuition based on the idea that alterity (alterities) has its mythological foundation in the god Hermes and, therefore, that its imaginary manifests itself through it. The third part of the article expands the theme and links it to education understood as initiation: the Other is no longer a socius, a stranger who is expelled, whom one hates, or to whom one is indifferent, but a neighbor, a good illustration being the parable of the "Good Samaritan". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Quetes Litteraires is the property of Katolicki Uniwersityt Lubelski Jana Pawla II, Wydzial Nauk Humanistycznych, Institut Filologii Romaj and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Societes is the property of De Boeck Universite and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The article deals with the study of folk mythology actualized in М. Hrymych novel «Red poppy in the dew..». The author analyses the motives of initiation of heroes, mystical journey, motif of death, ancient, archetypal images which are the central in this novel.

Chickasaw writer Linda Hogan builds on a Native American tradition of creative story-telling which interweaves history with myth, science, poetry, and imagination. Her focus on Native Americans and on the rootedness of humans in non-human-nature coalesces with a greening movement in postcolonial literature and studies. Delving into Linda Hogan's ecopoet(h)ics, this paper examines her novel People of the Whale, and contributes to the fields of ecocriticism and ecopoetics by showing the centrality of gazes and liminality in her fiction. Not only can Victor Turner's anthropological theory of liminality shed light on the experiences of Hogan's characters, their manifold in-betweenness leads to threshold states and places revealing the multitudinous entanglements between humans and non-human life forms. In this paper, I argue that Hogan's fiction moves her readers to experience empathy and syneasthesia while immersing them in an organic realm composed of a biotic communitas. I first analyze the hybridity of her characters and the magical realist mode Hogan opts for, drawing on totemism to define notions of kinship. I then explore some of the exchanges between humans and non-humans in her fiction that may help one regain awareness of the world as an interdependent whole, the balance of which depends upon humans to either destroy or preserve.

Nekketsu shōnen constitutes one of the most famous and widespread genres of Japanese manga. This genre corresponds to a particular narrative structure rather than a register or setting, allowing it to include fantasy stories as well as realistic ones. Our hypothesis here is that the unity of this genre relies in the values it displays, which can be compared to sports values. In this paper, we analyze the main traits of Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball and compare it to other masterpieces of this genre in order to stress how, despite apparent diversity, all these manga display the same ideal of hard-working and ever-progressing sportsmen fighting their own self rather than enemies, in stark contrast with classical American or European comics heroes and avengers. These works hence propose an emancipation of sports from its classical frames towards fantasy, but keeping its essential characteristics.

The duty of giving the national culture a generous project, for the first time released from the pressure of extraculture, belongs to the interwar generation. There is a real esoteric generation, under the name of René Guénon, its legitimate representative being Vasile Lovinescu. He is an intellectual on his continuous way to initiation. His approach to Islam, to sufism, does not mean the fact that he abandoned the orthodox religion, but represents a pursuit of a transcendent unity of all religions. Vasile Lovinescu is a landmark of Romanian spirituality of the last century, a personality that still waits for being acknowledged.

Copyright of Philological Research & Studies. Romance Languages Series / Studii şi Cercetări Filologice. Seria Limbi Romanice is the property of Philological Research & Studies. Romance Languages Series and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Bulletin de l'Association des Amis d'Alfred de Vigny is the property of Classiques Garnier and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Le roman Los ríos profundos (1958) de l’écrivain péruvien José María Arguedas décrit le processus de maturation d’Ernesto, jeune homme solitaire qui doit choisir une voie personnelle entre les éléments antagoniques qui composent sa culture métisse. Ces éléments d’origine magique et religieuse guident le protagoniste dans une initiation mystique à travers un espace partagé entre la pureté régénératrice des Andes et la perverse promiscuité de l’internat du collège d’Abancay. L’initiation atteindra son accomplissement lorsque Ernesto unira sa vision animiste du monde à une pensée politique et sociale au même temps que le roman produira une version originale du réel merveilleux.

The Red Steppe of Joseph Kessel is a valuable work, insofar as it is mainly characterized by its generic hybridity. The six novellas oscillate between the biographical and autobiographical, between history and fiction, between the individual and the collective, between the current and the universal. A sort of juxtaposition and/or co-existence can be traced between the novella of Kessel and other literary genres such as the travelogue, the initiation story, the adventure story, the historical narrative and the fictional narrative. This interdiscursive report makes the historical text an open text, "a hybrid text."

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Copyright of Synergies Europe is the property of GERFLINT (Groupe d'Etudes et de Recherches pour le Francais Langue Internationale) and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

This paper examines, from an emic stance, a strand of Western esoteric wisdom that offers a particular perspective on psycho-spiritual development in relation to spiritual emergence, the mutually interdependent evolution of consciousness and substance, and the functional role of human incarnation within our planetary life. The writings of Alice A. Bailey (1880-1949) and Lucille Cedercrans (1921-1984) serve as significant reference points in this effort. These teachings hold an integral view of human development in which a person’s awareness and self-identification progress from polarization in physical matter and sensation through progressively subtler gradients of emotional and mental experience, culminating in “The Path of Initiation,” a phase of psychological and spiritual expansions into deepening levels of transcendent, supramental consciousness and functioning. The esoteric teachings described here portray this path descriptively rather than prescriptively, and have significant parallels to Sri Aurobindo’s Integral vision. Both consider human life in form to be a vital and necessary phase within the larger cosmic evolution of consciousness and matter, and both are frameworks that expansively embrace the significance of the Divine as both immanent and transcendent presence. The important issue of epistemological methodology and the testing of esoteric assertions is also considered.