Wordplay and Ciphers in Mark Twain's Literature
| Project/Area Number |
16H07128
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| Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Research Activity Start-up
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| Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
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| Research Field |
Literature in English
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| Research Institution | Kobe City University of Foreign Studies |
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Principal Investigator |
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| Project Period (FY) |
2016-08-26 – 2018-03-31
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| Project Status |
Completed (Fiscal Year 2017)
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| Budget Amount *help |
¥2,080,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥480,000)
Fiscal Year 2017: ¥1,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,000,000、Indirect Cost: ¥300,000)
Fiscal Year 2016: ¥780,000 (Direct Cost: ¥600,000、Indirect Cost: ¥180,000)
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| Keywords | Mark Twain / マーク・トウェイン / Wordplay / 言葉遊び / Encryption / 暗号 / アメリカ文学 / American Literature / Riddle / Puzzle / Humor / Prince and the Pauper / Tom Sawyer / 英米文学 / トウェイン / クレメンス / 探偵小説 / 文学論 |
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| Outline of Final Research Achievements |
The purpose of this study is to show that the nineteenth-century U.S. author Mark Twain used wordplay as a medium of encryption in his literature. I gathered examples of Twain’s wordplay and encryption, as well as evidence of his interest in these two kinds of writing, from his published texts, notebooks, letters, manuscripts, and marginalia. I also conducted research on the culture of wordplay in the nineteenth-century U.S. from which Twain’s interest in wordplay developed. I then combined these two perspectives into a critical framework for examining the use of clandestine wordplay as a tool of encryption in Twain’s literature. Finally, I used this framework to examine how Twain uses wordplay to encode his prose fiction, mainly his short stories and novels.
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Report
(3 results)
Research Products
(1 results)
