Issue Details: First known date: 2022... 2022 The Haunting Power of Dreamscapes within Tim Winton’s Gothic Novella In the Winter Dark
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

'Nightmares and their aesthetics of terror have been linked to Gothic literature since the birth of the genre during the pre-Romantic era. Indeed, many early authors of the form, including Horace Walpole, Ann Radcliffe and Mary Shelley, were driven to articulate the content of disturbing dreams via their literary work. Significantly, dark literary dream sequences continue to be a cornerstone feature of many contemporary Gothic texts. In this paper, I reflect upon some of the uniquely Australian Gothic tropes on display within Tim Winton’s 1988 novella, In the Winter Dark, while also discussing the various functions performed by dreamscapes within this work. In addition, and with occasional reference to Freudian concepts, I explore the use of Winton’s nightmare sequences to re-present, in recurring fashion, the fragmented sense of self to which his protagonists are subject as they struggle to recover from traumatic events (or not recover, as the case may be). Finally, I discuss the capacity of dreamscapes within this novella to contribute to narrational and structural strategies in ways that are aesthetically powerful and innovative.' (Publication abstract)

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    y separately published work icon TEXT Special Issue Writing Dreams : Reconceptualising the Literary Dream in Storytelling no. 68 2022 25657992 2022 periodical issue 'This Special Issue of TEXT explores the capacity of dreamscapes to function as powerful literary devices within an array of creative writing forms, while also informing and shaping creative arts practice more broadly. Its authors demonstrate diverse curiosities about creative practice as a kind of dreaming, where a practitioner’s engagements might constitute a quasi dreamwork-on-the-page. In addition to this, creative thinking itself can pass via registers reminiscent of the dream and of its atmospheres and formation, broaching unconscious material, experiences, and paradigms. Suffice to say, an inherent connection between dreams, storytelling and the production of artwork more generally is tested and expanded upon in these articles. The unconscious processes that unfold during dreaming may harvest their contents and compositions from the conscious processes engaged and activated intentionally by established practitioners when working in literary, narrative and poetic forms, but also vice versa. The poietic strategies fundamental to crafting dream sequences for written forms entail far more than a simple duplication of any real dreams’ narrative potential, associative chains, structures, or uncanny atmospheres: they require writers to translate dream-like elements into tangible sequences, rhythms, or scenes, to bring material substance to the oneiric.' 

    (Publication abstract)

    2022
Last amended 17 Jan 2023 08:40:26
https://textjournal.scholasticahq.com/article/57573-the-haunting-power-of-dreamscapes-within-tim-winton-s-gothic-novella-_in-the-winter-dark_ The Haunting Power of Dreamscapes within Tim Winton’s Gothic Novella In the Winter Darksmall AustLit logo TEXT Special Issue
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