A novel and a critical preface. In the preface, the author attempts the first formation of an epistemological definition/description of weird within a literary contexts as well as the experience of weirdness itself. It analyzes works by authors Dennis Johnson and William Golding, among others, as well as number of extradiegetic examples, drawing on theorists Julia Kristeva, Tzvetan Todorov, Yuri Lotman and Aleksander Piatigorski, Jean-Paul Sartre, St. Augustine of Hippo, Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, and Plato to articulate a poetics relevant to the novel—and to the weird. The poetics suggests that the experience of weirdness is a deformation of psychological, emotional, and conceptual givens, and as such may be either a danger to or a liberating of notions and definitions of identity. The novel, while it is its own autonomous work, attempts to enact forms of weirdness across multiple registers such as described in the preface.
","abstract_html":"<p>A novel and a critical preface. In the preface, the author attempts the first formation of an epistemological definition/description of <em>weird</em> within a literary contexts as well as the experience of weirdness itself. It analyzes works by authors Dennis Johnson and William Golding, among others, as well as number of extradiegetic examples, drawing on theorists Julia Kristeva, Tzvetan Todorov, Yuri Lotman and Aleksander Piatigorski, Jean-Paul Sartre, St. Augustine of Hippo, Georges Bataille, Maurice Blanchot, and Plato to articulate a poetics relevant to the novel—and to the weird. The poetics suggests that the experience of weirdness is a deformation of psychological, emotional, and conceptual givens, and as such may be either a danger to or a liberating of notions and definitions of identity. The novel, while it is its own autonomous work, attempts to enact forms of weirdness across multiple registers such as described in the preface.</p>","abstract_has_math":false,"creators":["Dunham, Adam Seth"],"institution":null,"degree_name":"Ph.D.","degree_level":"Dissertation","degree_discipline":null,"degree_department":null,"school":null,"contributors":["Laird Hunt"],"advisors":[],"committee_chairs":[],"committee_members":[],"year":2014,"date_issued":"2014-06-01T07:00:00Z","date_published":"2014-06-01T07:00:00Z","updated_at":"2026-07-24T02:01:25Z","subjects":["Creative writing","Fiction","Arts and Humanities"],"languages":["en"],"rights":["Copyright is held by the author. This work may only be accessed by members of the University of Denver community. The work is provided by permission of the author for individual research purposes only and may not be further copied or distributed. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.
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"],"dc:format":["application/pdf"],"dc:identifier":["https://digitalcommons.du.edu/restrictedetd/33"],"dc:language":["en"],"dc:rights":["Copyright is held by the author. This work may only be accessed by members of the University of Denver community. The work is provided by permission of the author for individual research purposes only and may not be further copied or distributed. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.
"],"dc:subject":["Creative writing","Fiction","Arts and Humanities"],"dc:title":["Whalelight: A Sounding"],"thesis:degree_level":["Dissertation"],"thesis:degree_name":["Ph.D."]},"updated_at":"2026-07-24T02:01:25Z"}