The genre of the novel developed as a response to the social and historical changes European society experienced at that time, as explained further by Watt: Ian Watt in The Rise of the Novel (1957) points out the individualistic turn of the Renaissance in Europe: he observes that “from the Renaissance onwards, there was a growing tendency for individual experience to replace collective tradition as the ultimate arbiter of reality” (1957, 15). Such a shift was not only thematic but also became intertwined with questions of genre, specifically that of the novel, which was considered as the European genre par excellence. Thus, Witi Ihimaera was the first Māori writer to extensively use Māori mythology in his novel The Whale Rider (1987). 1 In Aotearoa/New Zealand literature, the Renaissance movement that started in the 1970s was marked by the return to Māori cultural elements in novels written by emerging Māori writers.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |