Mary Shelley e a Sibila de Cumas molduras proféticas no romance The Last Man (1826)

No ano de 1826 a escritora inglesa Mary Shelley publica o romance apocalíptico The Last Man, contando a história de como a humanidade fora dissipada por uma peste em 2100, restando apenas um sobrevivente que, imune à pandemia, resolve deixar registrado em forma de diário, a história do fim do mundo como ele o conhecia. Ao apresentar o relato que levou à escritura da narrativa, Mary Shelley nos coloca em contato com o mito da Sibila de Cumas, revelando ter encontrado o manuscrito que indicava os fatos que ela narrou em seu romance. Este artigo visa discutir a importância do texto introdutório do romance, considerando as molduras estabelecidas entre o mito da Sibila e as capacidades criadoras de Shelley.

Seesaw of Spatial Metamorphosis in Aravind Adiga’s Last Man in Tower

Urban space is inherently uneven. Economic pursuits and commercial integrity translate urban space into categorization of haves and have-nots.Neo-Marxists theorize spatial disequilibrium through the dynamics of capital accumulation.Analysis of Last Man in Tower by Aravind Adiga helps to explorecity space as a commodified place that serves the interests of capital accumulation by converting it as a space of differences, struggles and negotiations. While examining spatial alienation, I probe the making of urban other who experiences, evictions, and displacements followed by the development projects of capital accumulation in the theoretical frame of David Harvey’s accumulation by dispossession. The urban space expands and grows not for the urban other but for the elitist consumption. This directs the argument to inspect the creation of a critical spatial consciousness to assert the urban other’s right to the city. By retaliating to their evictions and dispossessions they devise strategies for remaking their space through their lived daily experiences. This has been supported by the theoretical lens of Henri Lefebvre’s “The right to the city”. The selected fiction defines uneven city space whereby the spatial metamorphosis dispossesses and displaces the urban other andraises critical spatial consciousness to obstruct subsequent displacements.

Masterji’s Resistance in Aravind Adiga’s Last Man in Tower: An Embodiment of the Struggle of the Marginalized Class

Aravind Adiga’s Last Man in Tower, published in 2011, is a trenchant critique on the effects of globalization, urbanization, privatization and capitalism in the post-colonial era in India. All these changes in the contemporary society have effectively bifurcated the entire country into two groups—the rich and the poor, the centre and the margin, the privileged upper class and the underprivileged lower class. In the novel Dharmen Shah, a real estate mogul represents the first group of people who are socio-politically and economically highly influential, whereas Yogesh A. Murthy, aka Masterji, is the embodiment of the marginalized class that are constantly dominated and exploited by the former group. My present paper aims to analyse in detail how far Masterji is able to resist the scabrous sufferings unleashed by the rich realtor Dharmen Shah, and how far Masterji’s resistance becomes an incarnation of the resilience of marginalized people in the contemporary society.