Drawing on two founding texts of the Western literary canon on piracy – The Buccaneers of America, first written in Dutch by Alexander Olivier Exquemelin (1678), and A General History of the Pyrates (1724-1728), published under the authorial persona of Captain Charles Johnson –, this essay highlights the role of late 17th- and early 18th-century portraits of leading figures of ‘the Golden Age” of Caribbean and Atlantic piracy in defining a consistent genre, and elevating piratical lives and accounts from anecdotal subject matter available for multifarious narrative modes and agendas, to the increasingly myth-producing cultural constructs which still appeal to the current social imaginary.
Grazie all’analisi di due testi fondativi del canone letterario occidentale riguardante la pirateria – The Buccaneers of America, scritto in olandese da Alexander Olivier Exquemelin (1678), e A General History of the Pyrates (1724-1728), apparso sotto il nome fittizio del Capitano Charles Johnson –, il saggio interroga il ruolo dei ritratti delle principali figure della pirateria caraibica e atlantica riprodotti in queste opere nel delineare un genere letterario che prolunga il suo fascino nell’oggi. Tale rapporto simbiotico e reciprocamente avvalorante tra immagine e parola ha contribuito a elevare la varia aneddotica intorno all’immagine del pirata (divergente per stili, approcci e interpretazione etica) in materia vitale e mitopoietica per costruzioni culturali che tuttora parlano all’immaginario sociale contemporaneo.
'Thieves, Robbers, and Murtherers': Early Eighteenth-Century Illustration and the Making of the 'Piratical Subject' / L. De Michelis. - In: IL CONFRONTO LETTERARIO. - ISSN 0394-994X. - 74:(2020 Dec), pp. 191-211.
'Thieves, Robbers, and Murtherers': Early Eighteenth-Century Illustration and the Making of the 'Piratical Subject'
L. De MichelisPrimo
2020
Abstract
Drawing on two founding texts of the Western literary canon on piracy – The Buccaneers of America, first written in Dutch by Alexander Olivier Exquemelin (1678), and A General History of the Pyrates (1724-1728), published under the authorial persona of Captain Charles Johnson –, this essay highlights the role of late 17th- and early 18th-century portraits of leading figures of ‘the Golden Age” of Caribbean and Atlantic piracy in defining a consistent genre, and elevating piratical lives and accounts from anecdotal subject matter available for multifarious narrative modes and agendas, to the increasingly myth-producing cultural constructs which still appeal to the current social imaginary.File | Dimensione | Formato | |
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CL74-DeMIchelis PIRATI CONFRONTO LETTERARIO 74 - 2020 dicembre pp. 191-211.pdf
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