Papers by Evita Lykou
Mapping Minds, 2010
Visual Pathography: Graphic Representations of Illness in David B.'s Epileptic Evita Lykou A... more Visual Pathography: Graphic Representations of Illness in David B.'s Epileptic Evita Lykou Abstract This paper focuses on how illness is presented via the graphic medium and how the very use of it creates the premises for understanding illness as a mental fermentation of ...
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Το κείμενο που ακολουθεί αποτελεί εργασία που εκπονήθηκε το ακαδημαϊκό έτος 2004-2005 στο πλαίσιο... more Το κείμενο που ακολουθεί αποτελεί εργασία που εκπονήθηκε το ακαδημαϊκό έτος 2004-2005 στο πλαίσιο του μαθήματος «Εισαγωγή στη Λογοτεχνία» του Παντείου Πανεπιστημίου, με διδάσκοντα/επιβλέποντα τον Καθηγητή Δημήτρη Δημηρούλη. Η εργασία ασχολείται με το εκδοτικό πρόβλημα όπως εμφανίζεται στο έργο του Διονυσίου Σολωμού, ένα πρόβλημα που έχει απασχολήσει επί μακρόν τους φιλολογικούς κύκλους της χώρας προκαλώντας διαμάχες, διαφωνίες και έντονο προβληματισμό. Κύριος σκοπός αυτής της εργασίας είναι να ορίσει το εκδοτικό ζήτημα, και δη το εκδοτικό πρόβλημα όπως προκύπτει από τα χειρόγραφα του Διονυσίου Σολωμού, με τρόπο σαφή και κατανοητό ώστε να μπορέσουμε σε δεύτερο επίπεδο να δούμε κάποια επιμέρους, σημαντικά και ενδιαφέροντα ζητήματα όπως την κατάσταση του σολωμικού αρχείου, όπως βρέθηκε μετά το θάνατο του ποιητή και την πρώτη εκδοτική προσπάθεια του Πολυλά, να αναστηλώσει ένα έργο που βρισκόταν σε σπαράγματα. Ακολούθως θα εξεταστούν οι δύο θεωρίες που αφορούν στο εκδοτικό ζήτημα, η αναλυτική και η συνθετική. Θα αναλυθεί η διαμάχη σχετικά με τις σολωμικές εκδόσεις που κρατά από τα προπολεμικά χρόνια και τη γενιά του τριάντα. Θα κλείσουμε με μια σύντομη και συνοπτική αναφορά στους εκδότες μετά τον Πολυλά και πώς εκείνοι χειρίστηκαν το εκδοτικό ζήτημα, αναπτύσσοντας τις θεωρίες τους και εξετάζοντας το αποτέλεσμα των κόπων τους. Το εκδοτικό πρόβλημα είναι ένα θέμα ενδιαφέρον γιατί μοιάζει με αποστολή ανεύρεσης χαμένου θησαυρού, ενός θησαυρού που όλο ξεφεύγει κάνοντας την αναζήτηση ολοένα και πιο συναρπαστική. Ίσως μοιράζει επουσιώδες και υπέρ το δέον ειδικού φιλολογικού ενδιαφέροντος, όμως νομίζω ότι το κείμενο μπορεί ν’ αποτελέσει διαφωτιστικό ανάγνωσμα για οποιονδήποτε φίλο των γραμμάτων, της ιστορίας και της λογοτεχνίας. Το ιδιαίτερο ιστορικό ενδιαφέρον προκύπτει απ’ το γεγονός ότι ο Σολωμός αποτελεί τον Εθνικό μας ποιητή, κι όμως ελάχιστοι Έλληνες γνωρίζουν το έργο του σε κάποια έκταση, πόσο μάλλον την βιογραφία του, πόσο μάλλον τις ειδικές συνθήκες που προκύπτουν από την γλωσσική και πολιτισμική του ιδιαιτερότητά. Σήμερα, 25η Μαρτίου 2012, θα μπορούσα να έχω γράψει για την ματαιότητα μιας εθνικής επετείου σ’ αυτά τα χρόνια της φοβέρα και της άγνοιας που διανύουμε. Θα μπορούσα να σας έχω γράψει για την αντίθεσή μου για τις μαθητικές και στρατιωτικές παρελάσεις. Θα μπορούσα να έχω σχολιάσει ένα σωρό σημεία της επικαιρότητας. Αλλά πραγματικά δεν μπορώ να δω την σκοπιμότητα για κάτι τέτοιο σ’ αυτή τη φάση. Ας αναρτήσω εγώ ένα επιστημονικό άρθρο, κι ας διαβάσετε εσείς μια επιστημονική μελέτη. Και ίσως κάποια πράγματα να ξεκαθαρίσουν και κάποια άλλα να μπουν στη θέση τους, κι έτσι να μην χρειαστεί να πω ούτε για την επέτειο, ούτε για τις παρελάσεις, ούτε για τίποτα άλλο απ’ αυτές τις ζοφερές αφορμές για συζήτηση που προσφέρει η επικαιρότητα.
Σημείωση: Καθώς η εργασία αυτή γράφτηκε το 2005, δυστυχώς δεν έχει μελετήσει και άρα δεν έχει καθόλου λάβει υπόψιν την έκδοση του Δημήτρη Δημηρούλη το 2007 από το Μεταίχμιο.
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This paper focuses on how illness is presented via the graphic medium and how the
very use of it ... more This paper focuses on how illness is presented via the graphic medium and how the
very use of it creates the premises for understanding illness as a mental
fermentation of unconscious instability and the Unconscious itself. In the graphic
novel Epileptic, David B. recites his childhood as the younger brother of the
epileptic Jean-Christophe, whose condition casts a heavy pall over the lives of the
family; his illness does not respond to medical treatment, forcing his parents to
search for alternative therapies; driving the whole family into a spiral of
spiritualism, mysticism and occultism. This somewhat contradictory existence has
dire consequences on the development of the younger siblings’ mentalities and is
reflected in their adult lives. Throughout the course of the story, the disease acts as
a major motive force; both in terms of plot and character development. In
Epileptic’s use of both a communal linguistic and more subjective visual semiotic
we can read the text as a graphic representation of the Unconscious, in
psychoanalytic terms, particularly as formulated in confrontation with the
mysterious sickness. The author-narrator attempts to reconstruct his childhood in
order to illustrate, explain, and finally understand the brother’s illness, which
shaped his own life.
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Conference Presentations by Evita Lykou
Θα ήθελα να ξεκινήσω κάνοντας μια μικρή περίληψη του ερευνητικού μου αντικειμένου, που δεν είναι ... more Θα ήθελα να ξεκινήσω κάνοντας μια μικρή περίληψη του ερευνητικού μου αντικειμένου, που δεν είναι σε επιστημονικό επίπεδο ιδιαίτερα συναφές με το θέατρο, όμως πιστεύω πως οι διάφορες εκφάνσεις της έρευνάς μου μπορούν να λειτουργήσουν συμπληρωματικά σε μια ημερίδα για το θέατρο και το θέαμα, όπως η σημερινή. Το αντικείμενο της διδακτορικής μου διατριβής, που ολοκλήρωσα περίπου πριν ενάμιση χρόνο, κάνει αναφορές στην αυτοβιογραφία ως είδος, στο κόμικ ως μέσο και στην ψυχανάλυση ως φιλολογικό εργαλείο, και όχι μόνο. Ουσιαστικά σε όλη τη διάρκεια της εκπόνησης της διατριβής μου προσπάθησα να συνθέσω μια θεωρία της πρόσληψης του μέσου του κόμικ, σε ψυχαναλυτικούς όρους, που αφορούσε στην δομή και κατασκευή της ατομικής και κοινωνικής ταυτότητας. [...]
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In this paper I am going to talk about the psychoanalytic dimensions of autobiography and how the... more In this paper I am going to talk about the psychoanalytic dimensions of autobiography and how the practice of narrating the self is actually an act of identity construction and memory management. Psychoanalysis is a practise based on the function of language. It is both the process of reading into the story of the patient and the very action of narrating the story itself, thus it depends both on the content and the structure of the formulation of the narration. The engagement of psychoanalysis with language is the first of many steps that bring it closer to literature and literary criticism. Memory management is one of the functions of language, a function connecting it straightforwardly with psychoanalysis. In psychoanalytic terms, memory is this constructed formulation, a tableau over which the person is going to structure the reminiscences that constitute their life history. Autobiography is a category of life-writing, produced by a subject ‘I’ and referring to an object ‘I’, both of which are resident within the same broader identity. The cartography of the ‘life space’ that has been pursued with the aid of memory is an energetic procedure during which the past is deconstructed, interpreted, re-evaluated, and reconstructed into a personal truth which is as firm and conclusive for the narrating ‘I’ as existence itself. The connections of autobiography with psychoanalysis is strong and worth exploring and this paper is going to bring in a number of theorists discussing the subject and composing a complex point valuable to stimulate further research.
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In this paper I am going to discuss the connections between the Freudian ‘dream-space’ and the gr... more In this paper I am going to discuss the connections between the Freudian ‘dream-space’ and the graphic medium of comics, using the example of the contemporary American graphic novel Asterios Polyp by David Mazzucchelli. An acclaimed graphic novel, taking place partly in the urban landscape of Ithaca, NY, partly in semi-rural Apogee, NY and partly in an imaginary non-place comprised by familiar cultural landmarks and abstract shapes, Asterios Polyp displays on the page the architecture of critical events in the imaginary biography of its namesake hero. In the course of the paper, I will show how the composition of the visual elements on the page –the full utilisation of the space on the page that characterises the novel– resembles the composition of the dream, and the dream elements as outlined by Freud in the Interpretation of Dreams (condensation, displacement, representation, and symbolism). The loaded geography of the shapes and shadows, the narrative of colour, the expressive ability of the lines sketched by the comics artist, representing space and time, reflects the dreamwork and its ability to mingle shapes and facts, likenesses and events, and narrate them out of context and in distorted time-sequence in order to cloak and simultaneously uncover the mysteries of the Unconscious; being a cultural artefact, the graphic novel has absorbed and reflects elements of culture that is the Unconscious itself.
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Dreaming and the Graphic Medium: Approaches to Psychoanalysis through Graphic Novels
In this p... more Dreaming and the Graphic Medium: Approaches to Psychoanalysis through Graphic Novels
In this paper I am going to discuss the visual narration through the graphic medium in association with Freudian dream theories and the idea of the image in psychoanalysis. Comics is a medium of the modern era, and has developed in a world already acquainted with Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams; thus, the influence of Freudian theories in the medium is easy to be found. What I am going to present is taking this a step further; it is the relevance of the visual structure of the graphic novel with the structure of dream, the similes of the comic strips with the procedure of iconography and the distorting operations of the dream process (condensation, displacement, representation, and symbolism). Using examples by acclaimed graphic novels I am going to show that the medium in itself has a distinct relevance with the formation of the dream content and its structure, providing as a result another way to the Unconscious, quite similar to the royal road though diacritically different since it is a product of the waking life. Furthermore, the image formation of the graphic medium is straightforwardly related to the unconscious constructions that constitute the idea of the self and personal identity. As we can see in a series of autobiographical graphic novels, the persona of the author is carefully structured, through the production of multiple images, in a psychoanalytic context that allows as to apply psychoanalytic interpretations in order to have a better look into the process of formatting ideas concerning the creation of identity. Psychoanalysis as a theory has important applications in the discussion on comics and the graphic medium in general and it is a way of both re-evaluating the theory through the prism of late modernity and the medium under the microscope of a theory of the psyche.
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This article is a psychoanalytic approach to Neil Gaiman’s modern fairy-tale Coraline, using Freu... more This article is a psychoanalytic approach to Neil Gaiman’s modern fairy-tale Coraline, using Freudian and Kleinian interpretive tools. The story is a literary presentation of the oedipal conflicts arising between mother and daughter which can be traumatic for both and constitute a massive obstacle for the psychological development of the child. In Coraline the heroine takes up a battle against these oedipal fixations and achieves an important –though not total– victory against the persona of the evil-mother, which Bettelheim has presented as being the excuse for the child to express well concealed feelings of hatred towards the mother.
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"In this paper I will discuss how illness is presented via the graphic medium and how the very us... more "In this paper I will discuss how illness is presented via the graphic medium and how the very use of it creates the premises for understanding illness not merely as a somatic manifestation of poor health, but, in psychoanalytic terms, as a mental fermentation of unconscious instability and the Unconscious itself. In the graphic novel Epileptic, David B. recites his childhood as the younger brother of the epileptic Jean-Christophe, whose condition casts a heavy pall over the lives of the family; his illness does not respond to medical treatment, forcing his parents to search for alternative therapies; driving the whole family into a spiral of homeopathic and oriental practices, spiritualism, mysticism and occultism. This somewhat contradictory existence has dire consequences on the development of the younger siblings’ mentalities and is reflected in their adult lives. Throughout the course of the story, the disease acts as a major motive force, both in terms of plot and character development. Demonstrated through Epileptic’s distinctive art, this malaise bears down on every situation, trapping Jean-Christophe and his family in a repetitive loop of grinding hopelessness. In Epileptic, complex visual representations are employed to depict familiar circumstances; a visual construction that comprises of real-life, monsters and occultism; a truly nightmarish narration. In Epileptic’s use of both a communal linguistic and more subjective visual semiotic we can read the text as a graphic representation of the Unconscious, in psychoanalytic terms, particularly as formulated in confrontation with the mysterious sickness. The author-narrator attempts to reconstruct his childhood in order to illustrate, explain, and finally understand the brother’s illness which shaped his own life. The visual medium employed by David B. functions, as I will demonstrate, both as a means of creating and a means of understanding, a means of presenting, but also a means of perceiving.
"
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Teaching Documents by Evita Lykou
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Papers by Evita Lykou
Σημείωση: Καθώς η εργασία αυτή γράφτηκε το 2005, δυστυχώς δεν έχει μελετήσει και άρα δεν έχει καθόλου λάβει υπόψιν την έκδοση του Δημήτρη Δημηρούλη το 2007 από το Μεταίχμιο.
very use of it creates the premises for understanding illness as a mental
fermentation of unconscious instability and the Unconscious itself. In the graphic
novel Epileptic, David B. recites his childhood as the younger brother of the
epileptic Jean-Christophe, whose condition casts a heavy pall over the lives of the
family; his illness does not respond to medical treatment, forcing his parents to
search for alternative therapies; driving the whole family into a spiral of
spiritualism, mysticism and occultism. This somewhat contradictory existence has
dire consequences on the development of the younger siblings’ mentalities and is
reflected in their adult lives. Throughout the course of the story, the disease acts as
a major motive force; both in terms of plot and character development. In
Epileptic’s use of both a communal linguistic and more subjective visual semiotic
we can read the text as a graphic representation of the Unconscious, in
psychoanalytic terms, particularly as formulated in confrontation with the
mysterious sickness. The author-narrator attempts to reconstruct his childhood in
order to illustrate, explain, and finally understand the brother’s illness, which
shaped his own life.
Conference Presentations by Evita Lykou
In this paper I am going to discuss the visual narration through the graphic medium in association with Freudian dream theories and the idea of the image in psychoanalysis. Comics is a medium of the modern era, and has developed in a world already acquainted with Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams; thus, the influence of Freudian theories in the medium is easy to be found. What I am going to present is taking this a step further; it is the relevance of the visual structure of the graphic novel with the structure of dream, the similes of the comic strips with the procedure of iconography and the distorting operations of the dream process (condensation, displacement, representation, and symbolism). Using examples by acclaimed graphic novels I am going to show that the medium in itself has a distinct relevance with the formation of the dream content and its structure, providing as a result another way to the Unconscious, quite similar to the royal road though diacritically different since it is a product of the waking life. Furthermore, the image formation of the graphic medium is straightforwardly related to the unconscious constructions that constitute the idea of the self and personal identity. As we can see in a series of autobiographical graphic novels, the persona of the author is carefully structured, through the production of multiple images, in a psychoanalytic context that allows as to apply psychoanalytic interpretations in order to have a better look into the process of formatting ideas concerning the creation of identity. Psychoanalysis as a theory has important applications in the discussion on comics and the graphic medium in general and it is a way of both re-evaluating the theory through the prism of late modernity and the medium under the microscope of a theory of the psyche.
"
Teaching Documents by Evita Lykou
Σημείωση: Καθώς η εργασία αυτή γράφτηκε το 2005, δυστυχώς δεν έχει μελετήσει και άρα δεν έχει καθόλου λάβει υπόψιν την έκδοση του Δημήτρη Δημηρούλη το 2007 από το Μεταίχμιο.
very use of it creates the premises for understanding illness as a mental
fermentation of unconscious instability and the Unconscious itself. In the graphic
novel Epileptic, David B. recites his childhood as the younger brother of the
epileptic Jean-Christophe, whose condition casts a heavy pall over the lives of the
family; his illness does not respond to medical treatment, forcing his parents to
search for alternative therapies; driving the whole family into a spiral of
spiritualism, mysticism and occultism. This somewhat contradictory existence has
dire consequences on the development of the younger siblings’ mentalities and is
reflected in their adult lives. Throughout the course of the story, the disease acts as
a major motive force; both in terms of plot and character development. In
Epileptic’s use of both a communal linguistic and more subjective visual semiotic
we can read the text as a graphic representation of the Unconscious, in
psychoanalytic terms, particularly as formulated in confrontation with the
mysterious sickness. The author-narrator attempts to reconstruct his childhood in
order to illustrate, explain, and finally understand the brother’s illness, which
shaped his own life.
In this paper I am going to discuss the visual narration through the graphic medium in association with Freudian dream theories and the idea of the image in psychoanalysis. Comics is a medium of the modern era, and has developed in a world already acquainted with Freud’s The Interpretation of Dreams; thus, the influence of Freudian theories in the medium is easy to be found. What I am going to present is taking this a step further; it is the relevance of the visual structure of the graphic novel with the structure of dream, the similes of the comic strips with the procedure of iconography and the distorting operations of the dream process (condensation, displacement, representation, and symbolism). Using examples by acclaimed graphic novels I am going to show that the medium in itself has a distinct relevance with the formation of the dream content and its structure, providing as a result another way to the Unconscious, quite similar to the royal road though diacritically different since it is a product of the waking life. Furthermore, the image formation of the graphic medium is straightforwardly related to the unconscious constructions that constitute the idea of the self and personal identity. As we can see in a series of autobiographical graphic novels, the persona of the author is carefully structured, through the production of multiple images, in a psychoanalytic context that allows as to apply psychoanalytic interpretations in order to have a better look into the process of formatting ideas concerning the creation of identity. Psychoanalysis as a theory has important applications in the discussion on comics and the graphic medium in general and it is a way of both re-evaluating the theory through the prism of late modernity and the medium under the microscope of a theory of the psyche.
"