Ludic Transformations: Game and Play in Julio Cortazar's 62 MODELO PARA ARMAR and Georges Perec's LA VIE MODE D'EMPLOI.
Date of Award
2009
Document Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelors
Department
Humanities
First Advisor
Van Tuyl, Jocelyn
Keywords
Game, Play, Ludic, Cortazar, Julio, Perec, Georges, Oulipo
Area of Concentration
Humanities
Abstract
Experimental authors have often used the theme of game and play in literature for stimulating new ways of reading and narrating. The Argentinian writer Julio Cortazar (1914-84) and French author Georges Perec (1936-1982) integrated this notion into their work in order to experiment with different narrative designs and encourage reader participation. The application of this theme to literature often carries a tension between control and freedom that affects the structure of the text as well as how it is interpreted. With reputations as the authors' most complex works, 62 Modelo para Armar and La Vie Mode D'emploi thematize the notions of games and play and provide examples of how the tension between these terms makes the interpretation of the texts more open but, alternatively, more regulated. In this thesis I focus on how the notions of game and play influence the reception as well as the creation of the text. In the first chapter, I look at the ways in which the authors' use of "game" frames the relationship between the figures of the reader and the author as being both competitive and collaborative. In the second chapter, I look at a set of arbitrary models around which the authors structure their novels. Through these models, these writers are able to destabilize meaning in the texts by relying on a network of rules instead of traditional analysis of the text. My focus throughout this study is directed towards an analysis of the textual dynamics affected by the concept of game and play, and how concepts such as constraint, regulation, and freedom of choice come together in the reading and writing of the text.
Recommended Citation
Jaramillo, Alba, "Ludic Transformations: Game and Play in Julio Cortazar's 62 MODELO PARA ARMAR and Georges Perec's LA VIE MODE D'EMPLOI." (2009). Theses & ETDs. 4130.
https://digitalcommons.ncf.edu/theses_etds/4130