If only we all had porous bones, and thinner skin, when listening to a tale. Such is one token of... more If only we all had porous bones, and thinner skin, when listening to a tale. Such is one token offered by Merlinda Bobis’ prismatic short story, ‘White Turtle’, which harnesses the uncanny in an intercultural meeting of the ear1 and tongue.2 ‘White Turtle’ is a story inside a story, as Bobis’ character, the Filipina chanter Lola Basyon, sings in her native language to conjure a white turtle that ferries the dreams of dead children in the presence of an Australian crowd at a Sydney writers’ festival
The girl awakens to the bird on her face, some black and skeletal thing clawing at her ribs, flap... more The girl awakens to the bird on her face, some black and skeletal thing clawing at her ribs, flapping its wings over her mouth so she can\u27t breathe. She turns her head away and throws her forearm over her face but still it will not leave her, this thing, this feathered thing that roused her from the depths of sleep and pinned her to the bed. Beak at......................................
Journal of the association for the study of Australian literature, 2012
When a Filipina storyteller gives a performance at a writers' festival in Sydney, a mystical ... more When a Filipina storyteller gives a performance at a writers' festival in Sydney, a mystical white turtle from her native homeland appears in the room, beguiling both audience and storyteller. Merlinda Bobis' "White Turtle" interrogates the ways in which different cultures react to 'uncanny' narratives – those tales situated between the real and the imaginary, the familiar and unfamiliar. In doing so, the story calls into question our relationships with Self and Other, Self and Self. This paper traces the geographical and mythical trajectories of "White Turtle", where distinct currents of Asian regionalism and Australian nationalism are linked by a shared, bodily experience of the uncanny, which, in this case, can be categorized as Other. More broadly, the notion of Other (may it be another nation, race, collective unconscious/mythic template, or state of existence) intertwines with the concept of the "transnational imagination" – a boun...
If only we all had porous bones, and thinner skin, when listening to a tale. Such is one token of... more If only we all had porous bones, and thinner skin, when listening to a tale. Such is one token offered by Merlinda Bobis’ prismatic short story, ‘White Turtle’, which harnesses the uncanny in an intercultural meeting of the ear1 and tongue.2 ‘White Turtle’ is a story inside a story, as Bobis’ character, the Filipina chanter Lola Basyon, sings in her native language to conjure a white turtle that ferries the dreams of dead children in the presence of an Australian crowd at a Sydney writers’ festival
The girl awakens to the bird on her face, some black and skeletal thing clawing at her ribs, flap... more The girl awakens to the bird on her face, some black and skeletal thing clawing at her ribs, flapping its wings over her mouth so she can\u27t breathe. She turns her head away and throws her forearm over her face but still it will not leave her, this thing, this feathered thing that roused her from the depths of sleep and pinned her to the bed. Beak at......................................
Journal of the association for the study of Australian literature, 2012
When a Filipina storyteller gives a performance at a writers' festival in Sydney, a mystical ... more When a Filipina storyteller gives a performance at a writers' festival in Sydney, a mystical white turtle from her native homeland appears in the room, beguiling both audience and storyteller. Merlinda Bobis' "White Turtle" interrogates the ways in which different cultures react to 'uncanny' narratives – those tales situated between the real and the imaginary, the familiar and unfamiliar. In doing so, the story calls into question our relationships with Self and Other, Self and Self. This paper traces the geographical and mythical trajectories of "White Turtle", where distinct currents of Asian regionalism and Australian nationalism are linked by a shared, bodily experience of the uncanny, which, in this case, can be categorized as Other. More broadly, the notion of Other (may it be another nation, race, collective unconscious/mythic template, or state of existence) intertwines with the concept of the "transnational imagination" – a boun...
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