| Title: | When “lost” names mean lost identities: David Dabydeen’s challenge of the European sense of guilt |
| Author: | Ligia Tomoiagă |
| Publication: | Numele și numirea. Actele Conferinței Internaționale de Onomastică. Ediția a II-a: Onomastica din spațiul public actual, p. 946 |
| ISBN: | 978-606-543-343-4 |
| Editors: | Oliviu Felecan |
| Publisher: | Editura Mega, Editura Argonaut |
| Place: | Cluj-Napoca |
| Year: | 2013 |
| Abstract: | [When “lost” names mean lost identities: David Dabydeen’s challenge of the European sense of guilt] David Dabydeen’s novel A Harlot’s Progress can be read as a reversed picaresque novel, although the narrative is typically picaresque, and the main character seems to be the embodiment of a 17th century picaroon. Nonetheless, as the story goes, after reading about the abhorrent experience that this boy in Hogarth’s plates is supposed to have been going through, he becomes a tragic hero, the epitome of all African slaves, and of all abused human beings. He carries three names in the novel, although he has forgotten his real name: he is Mungo, he is Noah and he is Perseus, according to the roles he plays, and the stories he tells. The lost memory is replaced with new ones, even if based on an imaginary universe, and the poor Mungo, being a true Noah, comes with an ark that carries the entire humanity of his continent. New images are expected to replace the stereotypical ones launched in Hogarth’s plates. |
| Key words: | slave trade, African slaves, the picaresque, replacing stereotypical images, commentary of the modern society, Mungo-Noah-Perseus, the picaroon becoming a tragic figure in a postmodern world |
| Language: | English |
| Links: |  pdf  html |
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