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Introduction: Storytelling ad is presented from one or more narrative perspectives. Narrative perspective, which can alter the way in which the plot is physiologically or psychologically perceived, can significantly affect consumer experience. Methods: This study conducts three experiments with 526 participants to analyze the influencing mechanism of narrative perspective (first- versus thirdperson) on consumers’ brand attitudes in storytelling ads of products with different involvement (high versus low). Results: (a) Narrative perspective (first- versus third-person) exerts persuasive effects on consumer brand attitudes; (b) Processes of social presence and selfbrand connection explain the effects of narrative perspective on brand attitudes; (c) When product involvement is high, the use of the first-person narrative perspective in storytelling ads will result in a more positive brand attitude than the use of third-person narrative will; With lower product involvement, there is no significant difference in the impact on brand attitudes regardless of narrative perspective (first-person versus third-person). Discussion: This research finds that different narrative perspectives significantly impact the persuasiveness of advertising. Boundary conditions exist for the effect of narrative persuasion, and product involvement moderates the effect of narrative perspective on brand attitudes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A variety of visual information has received attention in the field of destination sensory marketing. However, the horizon height in a panoramic advertising image – one visual message often used in advertising – has yet to be researched. This research causes several noteworthy findings through three scenario-based experiments. Results reveal that the horizon height in a tourism panoramic advertisement should be tailored to the tourism activity type to enhance advertising effectiveness (i.e. increased travel intention): for a relaxing activity, customers should be exposed to a panoramic advertisement featuring a high horizon; for a challenging activity, a panorama with a low horizon is more persuasive. Findings also unearth the mediating (i.e. engagement) and moderating (i.e. narrative perspective) effects behind the interaction between the horizon height in a panoramic advertising view and tourism activity type on travel intention. These discoveries enrich the literature on tourism destination sensory marketing and provide destination marketers with a novel means of attracting visitors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper concentrates on the self-reflexive and multi-voiced narration in Damon Galgut's The Promise. Adopting Elleke Boehmer's analysis of postcolonial poetics and Derek Attridge's notion of resistance, the discussion shows how Galgut's novel both invites and resists modes of reading associated with the third-person narrative, specifically the principles of detachment and narratorial omniscience. The first part of this article investigates the narrator's complex interaction with the protagonists and the narratees. One feature of narration in The Promise is that it shows the narrator as belonging to the same racial group as the protagonists, at the same time seeking to transcend the limitations of their viewpoint. The fact that the protagonists' racially inflected perception of the world is projected onto the narratees impacts the readers' reception of the narrative text, denying them a stable subject position from which to judge the thoughts and actions of the protagonists. The second part of the article is devoted to the treatment of narratorial omniscience, which is consciously and self-reflexively limited by Galgut's decision to focus on the perspective of white South Africans. It is shown that the narrator's limitations direct our attention to the boundary between the said and the unsaid, thus resisting modes of reading connected with the realist novel. The conclusion of the article considers The Promise in the wider context of the liberal humanist tradition, arguing that the novel can be situated in the broad tradition of reconstructed liberalism, though it should be kept in mind that Galgut's treatment of this stance is characterized chiefly by cautiousness and political realism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

'The Laughing Girl' ('Yingning') is a short fictional story from Liaozhai zhiyi, a collection of uncanny and surreal stories written by the Chinese writer Pu Songling between the 1660s and 1720s. The stories have been made available for anglophone readers as Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio published in 2006, canonised by Penguin Classics and the translator John Minford, whose approach rooted in 'nouvelle Chinoiserie' imbues the tales with a sense of novelty or strangeness, both textually and paratextually. In this study, we will investigate how Minford foregrounds the story's novelty with his translator's voice in the translated text. Comparison and analysis reveal that on the textual level, Minford's shifting focalisation and narrative voice accentuates the strangeness in 'The Laughing Girl' and that his additions in terms of characterisation construct Yingning an even more outlandish fox spirit. On the paratextual level, he foregrounds the text's novelty at the expense of other themes, such as the moral edification or social critique. Minford's unique perspective on and approach to the source text align with the publisher's aim to appeal to a general readership, leading him to highlight the text's exoticism in his translation. Although Minford's translation is both accessible and stylistically deft, it appears to reduce Strange Tales to a mere anthology of the bizarre and grotesque while constructing an 'imagined and ethereal orient', as is clearly indicated by the corpus-assisted readers' reception analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the emergence of Hiplife as a musical genre in Ghana, it has enjoyed some scholarly attention, focusing primarily on issues pertaining to its evolution as a blend of Hip hop and Ghanaian Highlife genres, as well as how it employs linguistic resources involving code-switching and proverbs to comment on social issues. In this study, I approach the Ghanaian Hiplife genre from a stylistic perspective by focusing on the narrative perspectives Ghanaian Hiplife artistes use in conveying their messages to listeners. From the analysis, it was found that the artistes, in most cases, adopted the autobiographical, third-person and multi-perspectival narrative approaches where the narrator combined either the first-person or the third-person narrative technique. Also, the artistes used multimedia approaches, dialogue, cantor-response, and apostrophes in the songs. The study concludes that Hiplife artistes use traditional narrative perspectives as the initial tools and then adopt other narrative perspectives to be innovative, kill boredom and have lasting stylistic effects on listeners. The study provides a window for literary scholars to be more open to approaching literary analysis as modern creativity transcends the traditional purviews of point of view into more adoptive modes for stylistic effects.

Copyright of Prace Filologiczne. Literaturoznawstwo is the property of University of Warsaw 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.)

Laoshe, una de las principales figuras de la literatura china moderna y contemporánea, es conocido sobre todo por sus dos obras clásicas, El Camello Xiangzi y La casa de té. Sin embargo, el número de obras de Laoshe traducidas al español y difundidas al mundo hispanohablante es todavía relativamente limitado, entre estas, El Camello Xiangzi es la única que cuenta con dos versiones: El Camello Xiangzi, traducida por Blas Piñero Martínez y La verdadera historia del Camello Xiangzi traducida por Manuel Lacruz y Tan Hui. Este artículo presenta un estudio comparativo de la traducción de la voz y el punto de vista narrativos en estas dos versiones de El Camello Xiangzi, utilizando como marco teórico la narratología y los desplazamientos traductivos en textos narrativos. Para ello, se toman los conceptos de la voz y la focalización narrativas del académico francés Gérard Genette, la tipología y teoría del punto de vista narrativo de la autora china Shen Dan y el modelo descriptivo de desplazamientos traductivos de la estudiosa holandesa Kitty van Leuven-Zwart.

In Germany, over 60% of people use YouTube as a search engine and watch explainer videos or tutorials at least occasionally. Two studies were conducted to determine how explainer videos can be optimised to promote sustainable minority behaviour such as voluntary carbon offsetting. A typical way to present information in explainer videos is by using exemplars (the “meet Bob” trope), which can change recipients’ judgements of the frequency of events. When an exemplar is included, the frequency of occurrence can be estimated to be higher, even if the actual base-rate information is given. Therefore, study one (N = 482) tested whether an exemplar could enhance the positive effects of a dynamic descriptive social norm appeal (DSNA), prevent the backfire effects of a static minority DSNA, and examine whether there were any differences depending on the narrative perspective. In study one, we conducted a 2 (narrative perspective: first vs. third person) × 2 (DSNA: static vs. dynamic) × 2 (travel destination: Europe vs. overseas; control factor) between-subjects experiment using six self-produced explainer videos about voluntary carbon offsetting (N = 270). The results show that the narrative perspective, different DSNAs, and the destination had no effect on persuasive outcomes. Study two (N = 270) focused on social norm appeals and supplemented minority DSNAs (DSNA: static vs. dynamic vs. absent) with an injunctive social norm appeal (ISNA: present vs. absent). The results show that a majority injunctive social norm appeal can improve attitudes towards voluntary carbon offsetting and perceived effectiveness.

This experimental study explores the effects of narrative perspective on the outcomes related to health testimonials. One testimonial was presented to each respondent regarding one of the four topics (AIDS, lung cancer, gum disease, and alcoholism) and in one of the three perspectives (patient, parent, and doctor). Respondents (n = 967) were then asked to report on various reactions to the video, including credibility, identification, and story-consistent attitudes. Results show that a testimonial narrated from the doctors' perspective, as compared to patient perspective, produced greater credibility but less identification, affecting persuasion in opposite ways. These findings are discussed in the context of message design choices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rise of illiberalism and nationalism in Hungary is often attributed to Viktor Orbán’s leadership and rhetoric over the past decade. His ideas and words have also reverberated around the globe and served as models for conservative leaders. This article offers a rhetorical analysis with a focus on the role of the intertwining narratives of national ascent and a nation in peril as containers for the ideology of illiberalism. Taking a narrative perspective, it examines the way in which Orbán appeals to Hungarians to embrace nationalist, isolationist, and illiberal approaches to democratic governance. It concludes with a discussion of the implications of the rhetoric of illiberalism and the implications for future research into the rhetorics of the newest wave of conservatism spreading throughout the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Estudios Hispánicos is the property of Wroclaw University Press 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 article attempts to explore the intricate workings of gender dynamics in Badriyah Al-Bishr's Hend wa alʿaskar (2006). It investigates how the author challenges traditional gender norms through the representation of female characters who strive for liberation. Al-Bishr lays bare the complexities of gender roles within the Saudi Arabian context. Viewed from the lens of narrative perspective, her text reveals the silenced tales of women on the quest for agency and identity. Through vivid storytelling and rich character narrativization that builds on the stream of consciousness, flashback, anticipation, and disruptive temporality, Al-Bishr crafts a compelling narrative of women's revelations within a patriarchal setting. Drawing on cultural discourse analysis, and feminist social epistemology, the reading of Hend wa alʿaskar attempts to offer a nuanced exploration of how gender, power, and resistance intersect and coalesce together to produce a thought-provoking narrative about the contemporary Saudi Arabian context. The complexities of women's tales intricately weave an ambivalent knot of discourses within the narrative, enriching its depth and challenging conventional interpretations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, we propose a critical reading of Mawsim al-hijra ilā l-shamāl, a reading through which we attempt to show how Tayeb Sâlih succeeds in instituting a narrative strategy that allows him to achieve two almost antinomic operations: communicating to the reader a strong message and a very clear worldview while constructing a narrative universe according to the principle of narrative polyphony and multiple points of view. Indeed, the reader of Mawsim al-hijra can easily see how this novel is structured in the form of a double functioning, dividing the space of the narrative into two worlds of humanity and values, each with its own logic of perception and judgment of things and events. On the one hand, there is the world of Mustafa Said, a dramatic world, which constitutes the subject-core of the novel but which is assumed and perceived as such only by the narrator. On the other hand, it is the narrator, in fact, who leads us to perceive and grasp the dramatic character of the hero's life. We will try to show how the narration exercises here a metacommunicative function, in the sense that it is not satisfied with reporting and exposing the facts to us but also tries to awaken in us a specific sensibility capable of arranging the facts in the symbolic form of a drama. On the other hand, the text transports us from time to time into the world of some other characters (the people of the village), showing them leading their lives, simply and spontaneously, in the climate of a subjective, if not naive, totality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Storytelling ad is presented from one or more narrative perspectives. Narrative perspective, which can alter the way in which the plot is physiologically or psychologically perceived, can significantly affect consumer experience., Methods: This study conducts three experiments with 526 participants to analyze the influencing mechanism of narrative perspective (first- versus third-person) on consumers' brand attitudes in storytelling ads of products with different involvement (high versus low)., Results: (a) Narrative perspective (first- versus third-person) exerts persuasive effects on consumer brand attitudes; (b) Processes of social presence and self-brand connection explain the effects of narrative perspective on brand attitudes; (c) When product involvement is high, the use of the first-person narrative perspective in storytelling ads will result in a more positive brand attitude than the use of third-person narrative will; With lower product involvement, there is no significant difference in the impact on brand attitudes regardless of narrative perspective (first-person versus third-person)., Discussion: This research finds that different narrative perspectives significantly impact the persuasiveness of advertising. Boundary conditions exist for the effect of narrative persuasion, and product involvement moderates the effect of narrative perspective on brand attitudes., Competing Interests: The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest., (Copyright © 2024 Chen, Fan, He, Fan and Chen.)

Graeme Macrae Burnet’s His Bloody Project (2015) is formally a historical novel with elements of detective fiction and the thriller. The book playfully presents itself as a dossier consisting of ostensibly authentic documents related to the case of a triple murder committed by a young destitute peasant named Roderick Macrae in a small and remote crofting hamlet in the Highlands in 1869. The individual texts, written in different styles and genres, include medical reports, expert opinions, witnesses’ testimonies, transcripts of the court proceedings and, most importantly, a memoir written by the culprit in his prison cell while he was waiting for the trial’s sentence. This article discusses Burnet’s novel and its skilful composition within the context of British literary tradition, but also shows how it exemplifies the determining tendencies in contemporary historical fiction.

Author of powerful and little-treated work, the Portuguese Mafalda Ivo Cruz has a writing often considered hermetic due to its fragmentation, non-linearity and diversity of voices, often presented in a chaotic way and associated with a spatiotemporal rupture. In Oz (2006), these characteristics are at the service of a narrative that deals with the arrest of an artist - Oz - for the sexual abuse of his neighbor. The justice of incarceration calls into question, and the narrative is based on that doubt. To do so, Cruz uses a text composed of different perspectives and narrative voices, so that the faults of a character's memory and the missing points are filled by others, forming a cohesive whole. However, it does not necessarily mean clarity, on the contrary: we have to try, alone, to organize the chaos we are placed in. Resolving the motto of the narrative thus, ends up surpassing the simple discovery of the culprit, mainly because we are guided in this investigation by voices that we do not know are reliable - including, in fact, a possible criminal. As a result, the aesthetic network in which Cruz entangles us ends up proving to be much more important than the resolution of the criminal investigation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How was narrative point of view developed through an optical device? In between Richardson's publication of Pamela in 1740 and Fielding's publication of Tom Jones in 1749, a device known as the zograscope first appeared in England in 1745. Whether appearing as a tabletop mirror or a wooden box, the zograscope allowed its users to see the world in three dimensions and in color from the comfort of home or in crowded venues. An understanding of psychological perspective as it was developed in eighteenth-century novels, and optical perspective as it was created by the zograscope, are incomplete without relating them to each other. They are equally identifiable as forms of narrative perspective, and demonstrate how text and image, and their materialities, came to interpenetrate each other in modern conceptions of point of view. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Tropelías: Revista de Teoría de la Literatura y Literatura Comparada is the property of Prensas Universitarias de Zaragoza 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.)

We investigated the effects of narrative perspective on mental imagery by comparing responses to an English translation of Franz Kafka's Das Schloß (The Castle) in the published version (narrated in the third person) versus an earlier (first-person) draft. We analysed participants' pencil drawings of their imaginative experience for presence/absence of specific features (K. and the castle) and for image entropy (a proxy for image unpredictability). We also used word embeddings to perform cluster analysis of participants' verbal free-response testimony, generating thematic clusters independently of experimenter expectations. We found no effects of text version on feature presence or overall entropy, but an effect on entropy variance, which was higher in the third-person condition. There was also an effect of text version on free responses: Readers of the third-person version were more likely to use words associated with mood and atmosphere. We offer conclusions on "Kafkaesque" aesthetics, cognitive realism, and the future of experimental literary studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study compares passages from four novels by the renowned Albanian author Ismail Kadare with their English translations: Prilli i thyer (Broken April, 1990 [1980]), Kronika në gur (Chronicle in Stone, 2007 [1971]), Vajza e Agamemnonit (The Daughter of Agamemnon, 2006 [2003]) and Pallati i ëndrrave (The Palace of Dreams, 2011 [1999]). It uses the linguistic analysis of style in the source and the target languages aiming to identify the modification of narrative perspectives during the translation process. The stylistic comparison of the original with translated versions demonstrates the shift from the internal perspective to the narratorial perspective of narration, which may be the result of the translator’s inclination to explain. In Kadare’s novels which have been translated from French, the tendency to make a clear borderline between narrative voices is evident. The translator’s lack of ability to pick out stylistic features indicating the internal perspective of the character impacts the mental representation produced by the reader of the translated text. The shift from the character’s to the narrator’s perspective influences not only the reader’s attitude towards the culture narrated in the text but also the way how the identity of the narrator is construted. Consequently, the imposed narratorial voice in the translated Kadare’s novels gives a different impression from the non-intrusive narration that the author managed to create in the communist regime.

Copyright of Djoussour El-maarefa is the property of Association of Arab Universities 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 Journal of the International Arthurian Society is the property of De Gruyter 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 Studia Universitatis Babes-Bolyai, Philologia is the property of Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania 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.)

Graeme Macrae Burnet's His Bloody Project (2015) is formally a historical novel with elements of detective fiction and the thriller. The book playfully presents itself as a dossier consisting of ostensibly authentic documents related to the case of a triple murder committed by a young destitute peasant named Roderick Macrae in a small and remote crofting hamlet in the Highlands in 1869. The individual texts, written in different styles and genres, include medical reports, expert opinions, witnesses' testimonies, transcripts of the court proceedings and, most importantly, a memoir written by the culprit in his prison cell while he was waiting for the trial's sentence. This article discusses Burnet's novel and its skilful composition within the context of British literary tradition, but also shows how it exemplifies the determining tendencies in contemporary historical fiction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

William Faulkner, once won the Nobel Prize in 1950 presentation speech, is considered as one of the grandest Southern American novelists, because he is seemingly the "unrivaled master of all living British and American novelists". A Rose for Emily is one of Faulkner's most excellent short novels. Besides, the narrative of spaces in this novel is changeable and subtle, and the research on it has always been both difficult and hot. This paper attempts to interpret A Rose for Emily from a narrative style, to explore how Faulkner constructed the narrative of the novel, and then to analyze the characters of Emily in the novel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study compares passages from four novels by the renowned Albanian author Ismail Kadare with their English translations: Prilli i thyer (Broken April, 1990 [1980]), Kronika në gur (Chronicle in Stone, 2007 [1971]), Vajza e Agamemnonit (The Daughter of Agamemnon, 2006 [2003]) and Pallati i ëndrrave (The Palace of Dreams, 2011 [1999]). It uses the linguistic analysis of style in the source and the target languages aiming to identify the modification of narrative perspectives during the translation process. The stylistic comparison of the original with translated versions demonstrates the shift from the internal perspective to the narratorial perspective of narration, which may be the result of the translator's inclination to explain. In Kadare's novels which have been translated from French, the tendency to make a clear borderline between narrative voices is evident. The translator's lack of ability to pick out stylistic features indicating the internal perspective of the character impacts the mental representation produced by the reader of the translated text. The shift from the character's to the narrator's perspective influences not only the reader's attitude towards the culture narrated in the text but also the way how the identity of the narrator is construted. Consequently, the imposed narratorial voice in the translated Kadare's novels gives a different impression from the non-intrusive narration that the author managed to create in the communist regime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the obvious intellectual heft of Born in Exile, it has not attained the same eminence in the Gissing canon as New Grub Street. One challenge that the novel presents is the inextricability of narrative judgments and Godwin Peak's self-regarding perspective. Gissing's indulgent attitude to his self-involved hero inhibits the exploration of multiple perspectives that is a hallmark of his most compelling work. Attentiveness to the way London figures in the novel offers a productive means of forming an alternative, more nuanced perspective on Peak and his condition of exile. London functions as a literal birthplace for Peak and as a psychological environment that operates inconsistently on those who live in it. London's unreliability as a secure site of psychological location makes it an appropriate place of origin for the novel's hero, who seeks but persistently fails to escape exile. Peak's failure would be pitiable, except that what power he possesses resides in his failure to find satisfactory placement. His achievement is to remain in angry exile from satisfactory social integration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Life‐history narratives describing how a transgressor developed aversive traits can mitigate blame. How is their effectiveness affected by narrative perspective? In particular, how is blame mitigation impacted when the transgressor appears to be knowledgeable of the story of his self‐formation? In three experiments, we compare the effectiveness of narratives that reflect an objective perspective to those that reflect the transgressor's perspective. The experiments contrast two hypotheses. The Perspective Taking hypothesis asserts that the transgressor perspective will be especially effective for blame mitigation because it encourages 'stepping into the shoes' of the transgressor. In contrast, the Should Know Better hypothesis asserts that the transgressor perspective will be especially ineffective because it reveals the transgressor to have self‐knowledge, which triggers an inference that he deeply comprehends the suffering he causes. Results support the Should Know Better hypothesis. Furthermore, Experiment 3 shows that the transgressor perspective increases blameworthiness regardless of whether the transgressor's prior life experiences parallel what he inflicts on his victims. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Studia Universitatis Babes-Bolyai, Philologia is the property of Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj-Napoca, Romania 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.)

Barbara Kingsolver's novel, Prodigal Summer, portrays conflicting perspectives on forest use and suggests that understanding and integrating different points of view can lead to more nuanced, sustainable approaches to land management. Kingsolver writes the novel from three distinct perspectives, and also stages debates between conflicting views within each narrative perspective. That narrative structure, which emphasizes multiplicity and different ways of seeing, sheds light on the dynamics of contested landscapes. While most of the criticism on the novel focuses on the setting of the farm, we turn our attention to the forest, specifically, as a landscape where different stakeholders have conflicting ideas about protection, management, and timber extraction. Each point of view, individually, displays the limitations of assessing the forest landscape from a singular vantage point, and ultimately benefits from an engagement with other ways of seeing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Adab Al-Kufa is the property of Republic of Iraq Ministry of Higher Education & Scientific Research (MOHESR) 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 Journal of Computer-Aided Design & Computer Graphics / Jisuanji Fuzhu Sheji Yu Tuxingxue Xuebao is the property of Gai Kan Bian Wei Hui 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.)

Contemporary reviewers of Byron’s work often noted his skill in cultivating sympathy for outlaw figures – a skill that was admired, but also orried over since it implied sympathy’s independence from a moral code. Recent scholarship about sympathy in the Romantic period has not focused much on Byron, but this essay highlights acomplexity and originality in his invocation of sympathy that has been overlooked. Analyzing The Corsair with particular attention to narrative perspective and the use of direct address, this essay Shows Byron portraying characters overcoming the boundaries of gendered, national, class or religious difference in acts of generous sympathy, only to have these acts rendered ineffectual or even destructive. The ineffectiveness of intradiegetic acts of sympathy complicates the text’s invitation for readerly sympathy, suggesting that sympathy is morally neutral, a catalyst for unpredictable actions.

The general feeling of malaise, if not crisis, in Literary Studies forces us to urgently look for solutions that will bring the discipline forward. This article is a call for a concentration on fundamental issues in the study of literature, and at the same time for a more rigorous and accountable methodology in studying both the content and the form of literary texts as well as readers’ reactions to them. Some illustrations of work in the area of Empirical Study of Literature are provided, showing how fiction is a powerful regulator of human emotion, especially by formal features of the text. Case 1 reports a study which looks at the influence of narrative perspective (internal focalization in the first place) on judgements of readers. Case 2 delves into the textual ingredients by which readers’ absorption in a narrative world is enhanced. These ingredients are foremost of a kind that goes under the name of “foregrounding” devices in literary studies. The conclusion from the research is that texts that are rich in foregrounding are better able to elicit a more complex response, i.e., a more powerful impact, from readers. In its turn Case 3 looks at how readers react to literary pieces dealing with deep human suffering. The findings indicate that literature is able to evoke strong feelings of empathy through its formal make-up. The results also support the argument that one’s exposure to literature is the main variable to have an impact on prosocial behaviour, irrespective of personality, gender, age or social situation. Thus we claim that literary texts exert a powerful influence on readers’ value sharing, absorption and empathy, and the impact can only be studied empirically. The article shows a way out of the current crisis, not by just opening up a new fashion, in which literary texts are “interpreted” in yet another way, mostly academically, but by taking literary texts seriously in their workings on the minds and hearts of readers — which is ultimately what texts are written for.