‘Bismarck’s opposition to the unification of Germany was based on protecting Prussia’s state of independence.’ I try to repeat this phrase in my head in a variety of tones, pitches and speeds, but it sounds just as dull as when it’s said in the flattest and slowest way possible. What exactly was I on when [...]

Boni rests his head on my lap. He’s tired, he says. I start to ask him whether or not he’d like to join the others in their football match, or Kevin and Ruru in their dribbling. He sways his head and cuddles close. I contemplate the thinness of his neck. He’s scrawny, even for a [...]

December 21st 2012, 01.54 Brightness; flashes of white light, blinding me in the darkness, and yet…giving me hope. Coldness; embracing me like a cruel blanket, its fingers gripping tightly onto my skin and slithering slowly from one side of my body to the other. The silence; cutting through me like a knife. Why was I [...]

Technology has evolved in leaps and bounds in the last few decades. It is a prevalent part of today’s society, so much so that it has influenced culture irreversibly. Culture is both what makes us who we are, and what makes us part of a group. It shapes us as individuals and gives us our [...]

The word ‘translation’ comes, etymologically, from the Latin for ‘bearing across’. Having been borne across the world, we are translated men. It is normally supposed that something always gets lost in translation; I cling, obstinately to the notion that something can also be gained.1 -           Salman Rushdie, Imaginary Homelands Critical theory has established itself as [...]

Stanley Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange (1971) follows the story of Alex, a young working-class man whose rebellious nature cannot be subdued by social conventions. He is violent, uneducable, and a danger to all classes of society. His plot is presented by Kubrick in an elaborate cinematic framework, using highly symbolic scenery and music, and exploiting [...]

Laughter, colour, revelry and chaos. Clowns, fools and grotesque exaggeration. Such are the sights and sounds of a carnival, a Feast of Fools. The way Bakhtin infuses this liberal atmosphere into a particular literary form is what lies at the heart of his Carnivalesque. Like the carnivals themselves, the Carnivalesque is about breaking oppressive forms [...]