Studies in Literature and Language
The Owl of Modernity: Creating the Myth of an Absent Homeland
Abstract
This article explores the interconnection of myth and modernity in African literature with reference to the work of two prominent Sudanese writers, Dr Francis Deng and the late Tayib Salih. Both authors were highly educated intellectuals who lived mostly in the West, but each manifested a close and intimate emotional and intellectual attachment to his part of the country: Salih to the North and Deng to the South. Each expressed this fondness in his fiction, and indirectly reflected the tension between the two halves of the country. Each idealised the rural heartlands, and attempted to bring their myths and cultural traditions into life, advertise them to the world and reconcile them with modernity.
Keywords
Full Text:
PDFReferences
Anderson, B. (1991). Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. Retrieved 5 September.
Ahmed, A. J., & Adera, T. (Ed.). (2007). The road less traveled: Reflections on the literature of the horn of Africa. The Red Sea Press, Inc.
Bell, M. (1997). Literature, Modernism and Myth: Belief and responsibility in the twentieth century. Cambridge University Press.
Bell, M., & Poellner, P. (Ed.). (1998). Myth and the making of modernity. Amsterdam: Rodopi.
Chanady, A. B. (1985). Magical realism and the fantastic: Resolved versus unresolved antinomy. NY: Garland Publishing.
Connor, S. (2004). Myth and modernity. In L. Marcus & P. Nicholls (Eds.), The Cambridge history of twentieth-century English literature (pp.251-268). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Deng, F. M. (1972). The Dinka of the Sudan. United States of America, Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
Deng, F. M. (1978) Africans of two worlds. United States of America, Yale University Press.
Deng, F. M. (2009). The man called Deng Majok. United States of America, The Red Sea Press.
Lienhardt, G. (1961). Divinity and experience: The religion of the Dinka. Oxford, Clarendon Press.
Nordenstan, T. (1968). Sudanese ethics. Uppsala: The Scandinavian Institute of African Studies.
Scarborough, M. (1994). Myth and Modernity: Postcritical Reflections. NY: State University of New York Press.
Rutherford, A. (Ed.). (2001). From commonwealth to post-colonial. Australia: Dangaroo Press.
Spence, L. (1994). Introduction to Mythology. The Guernsey Press Co Ltd.
Salih, T. (1969). The Wedding of Zein and other stories. Malta, St Paul’s press Ltd.
Schipper, M. (1982). Theatre and society in Africa. South Africa, Ravan Press.
Smith, A. D. (1999). Myths and memories of the nation. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Smith, A. D. (1991). National identity. London: Penguin Books.
Soyinka, W. (1990). Myth, literature and the African world. Cambridge University Press.
Wai, D. M. (Ed). (1973). The southern Sudan: The problem of national identity. U.K, Frank Cass and Company limited.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3968/n
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
Copyright (c)
Share us to: 
Online Submission: http://cscanada.org/index.php/sll/submission/wizard
Please send your manuscripts to sll@cscanada.net，or sll@cscanada.org for consideration. We look forward to receiving your work.
We only use three mailboxes as follows to deal with issues about paper acceptance, payment and submission of electronic versions of our journals to databases: caooc@hotmail.com; sll@cscanada.net; sll@cscanada.org
Articles published in Studies in Literature and Language are licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC-BY).
STUDIES IN LITERATURE AND LANGUAGE Editorial Office
Address: 1055 Rue Lucien-L'Allier, Unit #772, Montreal, QC H3G 3C4, Canada.
Telephone: 1-514-558 6138
Website: Http://www.cscanada.net; Http://www.cscanada.org
E-mail: office@cscanada.net; office@cscanada.org; caooc@hotmail.com
Copyright © 2010 Canadian Academy of Oriental and Occidental Culture 
