Search

The article explores the connection between Marlowe's "Faustus," the Horse-Courser, and werewolves, delving into the folkloric origins of the story and its possible interpretations. It discusses how Faustus tricks a horse-courser into buying a horse that turns into straw when it crosses water, drawing parallels to werewolf transformation tales. The text also examines the broader legend of transformation and shape-shifting, linking it to ancient beliefs and anxieties about alchemy and magic. The article suggests that Faustus's failure to transform himself into a Renaissance man reflects the play's themes of conflicting religious and secular views on transformation and knowledge. [Extracted from the article]

The following article consists of an introduction by the first author, an annotated translation by the second, and then an analysis by the first, of the earliest known Scandinavian response to the Vampire phenomenon of Medvedia in 1732 by Nicolaus Boye, a state-employed physician residing in Stockholm. The translation shows that Boye's own article, which constitutes a complete refutation of Johann Flückinger's claims, was meticulously organised, abstracting and arguing against the major themes which he observed in the Visum et Repertum, while the analysis shows that Boye was working under the topical medical theories of the Dutch botanist and physician Herman Boerhaave. The analysis also demonstrates the extent to which Boye's rationalism in refuting the Visum at Repertum is informed by his Lutheranism and belief in the Day of Judgement, and concludes by showing examples of the impact his work exerted on other academics in the 1730s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the first author provides a summary and translation from the Latin of an important early medical lecture on vampires by Nils Retzius. The lecture was delivered in Sweden, at Lund University, in 1737, and was published almost immediately thereafter. This important text has been overlooked by modern scholars of vampires. This article will bring the lecture back into circulation in its first English translation. The second author then offers an analysis of the intellectual background to this rational debunking of vampires. He demonstrates how Retzius's attempt at a comprehensive rational explanation for vampires, typical of much Enlightenment thinking, nevertheless employs a fusion of Galenic medical thinking with more modern medical and psychosomatic notions of medicine, as well as certain Lutheran notions concerning the devil and the spirit world. His argument scotches the belief in the idea of sympathetic magic affecting the dreams of the living, while emphasising the psychosomatic effects of the imagination on the physical body. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the literary motif in the works of authors William Shakespeare, Longus, Samuel Richardson and Harriet Jacobs. They include Longus' "Daphnis and Chloe," Shakespeare's play "Othello," Richardson's novel "Pamela: Or, Virtue Rewarded," and Jacob's "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl." It also discusses Henry Fielding's 1741 parody of Richardson, "An Apology for the Life of Mrs. Shamela Andrews."

Issues concerning queries by literary scholars for assistance in their research on W. Hale White and Walt Whitman are examined. Topics include White's relationship to artist Walter Crane, and the identity of the 'bush boy' referred to in Walt Whitman's poem 'Song of Myself,' and how it may relate to the use of the same term in Thomas Pringle's 1824 poem 'Afar in the Desert'

The article presents the discussion on physiognomy in the European novel, Graeme Tytler denoting intensity of nature, temper, fire, spirit, enthusiasm, and magnetism.

Analyzes poet Thomas Pringle's images of bushmen in his works. Pringle's attitude toward gypsies; Pringle's understanding of colonial injustice towards natives; Separation of Pringle's work as activist and poet; Themes of Pringle's works on bushmen.