On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry
Anne Carson argues in eros: The Bittersweet that insofar as eros is lack, it requires three components to be ‘activated’: ‘lover, beloved and that which comes between them’ (16); and the activity of eros consists in reaching across that-which-comes-between-them. For Carson, it is writing above all u...
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sg-ntu-dr.10356-1539192023-03-11T20:06:48Z On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry Lee, Cheryl Julia School of Humanities Humanities::Literature Aidan Higgins Epistolary Anne Carson argues in eros: The Bittersweet that insofar as eros is lack, it requires three components to be ‘activated’: ‘lover, beloved and that which comes between them’ (16); and the activity of eros consists in reaching across that-which-comes-between-them. For Carson, it is writing above all utterances that most evidently manifests this structure of desire – as Aidan Higgins’s 1983 novel, Bornholm Night-Ferry, demonstrates. The novel tells the love story of two people who are held apart by every possible circumstance and who yet reach across the amorous impasse for each other by way of letters. In telling this exemplary story of eros as reach, Higgins aptly challenges and extrapolates the conventions of the epistolary mode beyond its function as a testament to reality. The result of his experimentations is the revelation of the epistolary as an imaginative and dynamic mode that participates in the forging of reality – a revelation that challenges the Barthesian assertion that writing is always inadequate to the task of expressing reality. Ministry of Education (MOE) Nanyang Technological University Accepted version Part of this research was conducted with the Department of English Studies, Durham University, UK, and was supported by the Ministry of Education and Nanyang Technological University’s HASS International PhD Scholarship. Further research for this paper was made possible by a Start-Up Grant (No.04INS000799C420) from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. 2021-12-13T05:08:19Z 2021-12-13T05:08:19Z 2020 Journal Article Lee, C. J. (2020). On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry. Textual Practice. https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0950236X.2020.1839949 0950-236X https://hdl.handle.net/10356/153919 10.1080/0950236X.2020.1839949 en 04INS000799C420 Textual Practice This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor and Francis in Textual Practice on 02 Nov 2020, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/0950236X.2020.1839949. application/pdf |
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Anne Carson argues in eros: The Bittersweet that insofar as eros is lack, it requires three components to be ‘activated’: ‘lover, beloved and that which comes between them’ (16); and the activity of eros consists in reaching across that-which-comes-between-them. For Carson, it is writing above all utterances that most evidently manifests this structure of desire – as Aidan Higgins’s 1983 novel, Bornholm Night-Ferry, demonstrates. The novel tells the love story of two people who are held apart by every possible circumstance and who yet reach across the amorous impasse for each other by way of letters. In telling this exemplary story of eros as reach, Higgins aptly challenges and extrapolates the conventions of the epistolary mode beyond its function as a testament to reality. The result of his experimentations is the revelation of the epistolary as an imaginative and dynamic mode that participates in the forging of reality – a revelation that challenges the Barthesian assertion that writing is always inadequate to the task of expressing reality. |
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School of Humanities Lee, Cheryl Julia |
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Lee, Cheryl Julia |
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Lee, Cheryl Julia |
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On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry |
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On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry |
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On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry |
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On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry |
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On the epistolary as a function of eros in Aidan Higgins’s Bornholm Night-Ferry |
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on the epistolary as a function of eros in aidan higgins’s bornholm night-ferry |
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2021 |
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https://hdl.handle.net/10356/153919 |
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