Encyclopedic Narrative: From Dante to Pynchon

MLN ◽  
1976 ◽  
Vol 91 (6) ◽  
pp. 1267 ◽  
Author(s):  
Edward Mendelson
Keyword(s):  
Encyclopedic Narrative

The “Pursuit of Knowledge” and the Paradoxes of Postcolonial Encyclopedism in Zia Haider Rahman’s In the Light of What We Know

Genre ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 53 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-103
Author(s):  
Benjamin Bergholtz
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
Incompleteness Theorem ◽  
First Century ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Twenty First Century ◽  
Encyclopedic Narrative

The author argues that Zia Haider Rahman’s In the Light of What We Know (2014) is an encyclopedic narrative that encourages and interrogates the pursuit of knowledge. Rahman achieves this feat by creating a deceptive dialogue revolving around knowledge and narrative. While his characters’ analysis of everything from America’s intervention in Afghanistan to Gödel’s incompleteness theorem illustrates the ways in which the light of history, metaphor, and narrative (mis) shape the pursuit of knowledge, our own knowledge is limited by the history and metaphors of our twin narrators. The conflict between the search for knowledge and the inadequacies of narrative would appear to doom the encyclopedism of Rahman’s characters and readers alike, but the novel complicates this conclusion. Rather than refuting or embracing the pursuit of knowledge, In the Light fosters a uniquely postcolonial approach to encyclopedism that is simultaneously curious and cautious, polymathic and prudent, wide-reaching and reflective. This “postcolonial encyclopedism,” as he calls it, helps us recognize that encyclopedic narrative, a genre long associated with the giants of European and American literature, may be a potentially empowering, if ambivalent, mode of inquiry for postcolonial and global authors in the twenty-first century.

Encyclopedic Narrative

2016 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 6-7
Author(s):  
Hilary Clark
Keyword(s):  
Encyclopedic Narrative

INTERSTITIAL CARTOGRAPHER: DAVID LIVINGSTONE AND THE INVENTION OF SOUTH CENTRAL AFRICA

2009 ◽  
Vol 37 (1) ◽  
pp. 255-271 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian S. Wisnicki
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
Civil Law ◽  
Central Africa ◽  
Human Race ◽  
The Public ◽  
Geographical Society ◽  
Oxford University ◽  
South Central ◽  
Queen Victoria ◽  
Encyclopedic Narrative

Upon returning to England in December 1856 after sixteen years in the interior of southern Africa, David Livingstone, the celebrated missionary and explorer, received an enthusiastic welcome. Already a household name because of his well-publicized discoveries and travels, Livingstone now found himself a hero of national stature. The Royal Geographical Society and the London Missionary Society organized large receptions in his honor; he received the freedoms of several cities, including London, Edinburgh, and Glasgow; Oxford University awarded him an honorary D.C.L. (Doctor of Civil Law); and Queen Victoria invited him to a private audience (Schapera ix-x). Likewise, the encyclopedic narrative of his adventures, Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa (1857), garnered numerous favorable reviews, sold some 70,000 copies, and ultimately made the explorer a rich man. Livingstone's narrative, wrote one early reviewer, opened up “a mystic and inscrutable continent,” while the story of Livingstone's famous four-year transcontinental journey – the first such documented journey in history – inspired admiration for being “performed without the help of civilized associate, trusting only to the resources of his own gallant heart and to the protection of the missionary's God” (“Dr. Livingstone's African Researches” 107). In promoting the Zambesi River as a natural highway into the interior of Africa and in advocating for the three C's – Christianity, commerce, and civilization – as a means to ending the slave-trade and opening the continent's natural riches to the outside world, Missionary Travels also struck a resounding chord with the public. Reviewers welcomed Livingstone's pronouncements, while describing the missionary as “an instrument, divinely appointed by Providence for the amelioration of the human race and the furtherance of God's glory” (“Livingstone's Missionary Travels” 74).

scholarly journals THE IMAGE OF ATAMAN YERMAK IN THE RUSSIAN ENCYCLOPEDIC NARRATIVE OF THE EARLY 19TH CENTURY

2021 ◽  
pp. 110-116
Author(s):  
A. A. Chernyshev ◽  
◽  
S. I. Chernomorchenko ◽  
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
Social Thought ◽  
The State ◽  
Early 19Th Century ◽  
The Past ◽  
Russian State ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
Encyclopedic Narrative

The purpose of the article is to reveal the image of Yermak presented in the Russian encyclopedic narrative of the early 19th century. The first half of the 19th century is of particular interest in this regard, since at that timeб there was interest in the past of the country, the history of its development, and the history of the conquest of Siberia by ataman Yermak. The issue of the conquest of Siberia by the Cossack ataman Yermak was reflected in journalism and fiction, and with the advent of encyclopedias it penetrated there. For researchers of that time, the history of Siberia’s conquest seemed important for understanding the uniqueness and greatness of the Russian state. It should be noted that the dictionary and encyclopedic publications of the first half of the 19th century are currently insufficiently studied as a historiographical source and a monument of social thought. The appearance of the encyclopedia is a certain milestone that fixes the state of science itself and its achievements for society. Encyclopedic publications not have only a great informational potential, but also influence the construction of the reader's picture of the world.

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