Journal of Artistic Creation and Literary Research

When Shall We Restore Our Humanity? A Dialogue of Poetics with Carl Terver

Tolulope Oke — 2025-07-03

In this extensive dialogue, Tolulope Oke engages Carl Terver, his personal and intellectual sensibilities, and the socio-political undercurrents that inform his poetics. As a poet, critic, and editor, Carl embodies a literary restlessness that reflects the turbulence of contemporary Nigeria. His poetics, characterized by sharp wit, biting irony, and an unflinching engagement with existential, historical and present-day struggles, position him as a vibrant voice in contemporary Nigerian/African poetry. Carl’s poetry thrives on juxtaposition, humour and despair, the sacred and the profane, nostalgia and disillusionment etc. These contrasts are not incidental but reflective of the fragmented nature of the postmodern human condition. His poetry resists closure, favouring ambiguity and an open-ended pursuit of meaning that never fully resolves, allowing readers multiple interpretive entries. Beyond his versatility, his poems reinforce that which is poetry’s crux: to provoke and challenge us to restore our humanity. This conversation delves into his creative process, influences, and the tensions that animate his writing, particularly in his two collections: For Girl at Rubicon (2020) and Everyone I know is ripe in plumage (2023). This dialogue was conducted as an online exchange over a period of several weeks starting in December 2024.

Review of Watch Your Words: A Manifesto for the Arts of Speech (2025), by Geralt Garutti

Pablo Molinero Gómez — 2025-07-03

Tómame y de la mano

José Fabián Elizondo — 2025-07-03

The Old Woman and the Zipper

Carolina Fernández Rodríguez — 2025-07-03

“Like dancers to a music they deserve”: Setting to Music Lawrence Durrell’s Poetic Nostalgia for Greece

Ester Díaz Morillo — 2025-07-08

This article aims to examine several musical transmediations of Lawrence Durrell’s poems. Given the evocative imagery and musicality of Durrell’s own poetry, it is no wonder that his works have attracted musical renditions, ranging from jazz to art songs. Durrell’s friend Wallace Southam set to music different poems by Durrell, namely “Nemea,” “In Arcadia,” “Lesbos” and “Nothing is lost, sweet self” (based on the poem “Echo”). Thus far, Southam’s musical transmediations have mainly remained overlooked. Nevertheless, they offer us with interesting new perspectives on the transmediation of contemporary poetry. As a musician, Southam transmediates the poet’s musicality in his verses and plays with the rhythm, providing listeners with sometimes more melancholic renditions that convey hopelessness, and more tense musical rhythms, where the singing voice strengthens the anxiety of the poems. Interestingly, the poems chosen by Southam have a strong Greek flavour and show how Durrell captures the spirit of the places described. The obscure symbolism of Durrell’s verses translates, hence, into a music full of pathos. The analysis will focus on how the composer strives to transmediate Durrell’s words in musical terms, by transferring the haunting atmosphere and poignant emotions of the poet’s words.

Incorporación de las Adaptaciones Cinematográficas de Shakespeare en el Sistema Educativo Español

Rocío Moyano-Rejano — 2025-07-03

Este artículo examina el uso de las adaptaciones cinematográficas de Shakespeare en los planes de estudio del sistema educativo español, con especial atención a Hamlet (1601). Se analiza su integración en el currículo y su potencial como material didáctico para la enseñanza de la literatura. A través de una revisión teórica y un análisis didáctico, se exploran las ventajas del cine como herramienta pedagógica, incluyendo su capacidad para facilitar la compresión de textos clásicos, fomentar el pensamiento crítico y acercar la obra de Shakespeare a las nuevas generaciones. Asimismo, se estudia cómo estas adaptaciones pueden contribuir a una enseñanza más dinámica e interdisciplinar, conectando la literatura con otras áreas como el cine. Se discuten los desafíos y limitaciones de su implementación en el aula, como la selección de las versiones cinematográficas apropiadas y la necesidad de estrategias didácticas efectivas. El artículo concluye con una reflexión sobre los hallazgos obtenidos y su aplicación práctica, además de proponer líneas de investigación futuras para optimizar el uso de las adaptaciones cinematográficas en la enseñanza literatura.

Gender Inequality and the Influence of Mary Wollstonecraft in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice

Ángela Muro-Arpón — 2025-07-03

The conception of gender and sex traditionally divides society into two. The establishment embraces this sexually gendered binarism creating a patriarchal status quo where the masculine dominates the feminine. The subordination of the feminine has then been consistently denounced by women, but their criticism began to be noticed in the eighteenth century with Mary Wollstonecraft’s publication of Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). As a mirror of society, literature has also captured gender disparity and has sometimes counterattacked it. This research delves into Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice (1813), a novel where women are at the centre of the narration. It addresses the possibility of Austen agreeing with Wollstonecraft’s proto-feminist postulates and subtly denouncing the foundations of the patriarchal system through her characters. For this purpose, the study dissects the Austenian female characters of Pride and Prejudice, focusing on the stereotypes that are historically associated to the traditional sex-gender binarism. Through this analysis, it also attempts to unveil whether said characters may or may not accept their role in Georgian society. In the end, this project will try to determine if Jane Austen may have been a revolutionary or may just be considered a master writer of romance.

The Gothic Portrayal of Morality and Evil: Split Identities in Dorian Gray and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde

Marina Sanz Ortega — 2025-07-03

The concept of the dual nature of human beings has been highly present in literature, from the Original Sin to Doctor Faustus, always motivated by the longing for some unattained desire. The subject of Victorian ethics has been enriched by the contribution of Leslie Stephen among other writers, and the concept of evil will be analysed in this paper from the perspective of Philip Cole’s theory. The following paper collects the main ideas from both areas and focuses on the parallel journeys of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray (1890) and Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). The respective journeys may appear to be quite resemblant, nevertheless, it is primarily the distinctions between them what is to be considered in the present project. The concepts to be applied to the works of Wilde and Stevenson, namely, morality and evil, will be analysed from the Victorian Gothic perspective, which portrayed darkness as a completely different idea from the traditionally assumed. Evil lurked among the most respectable members of society rather than in faraway castles; and decadence, a widespread topic during the fin de siècle, characterized the development of the characters.

Narcissistic Personality Disorder in Lord Alfred Douglas: A Psychological Insight into Oscar Wilde’s Letter De Profundis

Nazaret Serrano Simancas — 2025-07-03

This essay, presented as a literary essay to honour Oscar Wilde’s memory in the 125th anniversary of his death, aims to cast some light on the psychology of lord Alfred Douglas by dealing with testimonies about his personality and behaviour, shown by Wilde in the letter he addressed to his lover during his imprisonment in Reading Gaol, from 1895 to 1897, called De Profundis. Taking the DSM-5-TR manual as a theoretical reference mixed with an innovative approach to the topic, the hypothesis that Alfred Douglas could be diagnosed with Narcissistic Personality Disorder has been formulated. This viewpoint, which has not been much studied to this day and could, therefore, give rise to ambiguity and discrepancies amongst scholars and thinkers, can ultimately serve as a conjectural exercise to, conceivably, understand the emotional abuse and toxicity that may have existed between the lovers. It also presents a plausible reason for the suffering and last erratic moves that led Wilde to his downfall, trying to find some closure to his experience through a new psychological insight. De Profundis is a text which requires further study and it can still be read nowadays as a powerful source of information about the author’s life and, arguably, as a testimony of what emotional abuse can do to a victim of a possible NPD manipulator.

“It’s So Cold in the D": How Detroit Rappers of the 1980-1990s Respond to Social Inequity

Brennen Siemens — 2025-07-03

This paper examines the rap music scene of Detroit during the 1980s and 1990s, analyzing its intricate relationship with the socio-economic landscape of post-industrial Detroit. As the city grappled with the collapse of its once-thriving automotive industry, rising unemployment, and systemic disenfranchisement, rap music emerged as both a creative response and a critical intervention in these crises. Focusing on how Detroit’s rappers addressed issues such as police violence, economic marginalization, and the emergence of "hustle culture"—a survival strategy shaped by career crime—this study explores rap as a form of artistic expression that reflects the attitudes of the people who created it. Through a combination of lyrical analysis and historical inquiry informed by critical discourse analysis, this paper investigates how Detroit rappers engaged with these challenges, not only through their music, but also through activism and community engagement. Additionally, the study considers the role of gendered labor in the city’s underground rap scene, particularly how female artists navigated both the male-dominated music industry and the broader socio-economic struggles of the era. By examining rap’s function as a platform for voicing dissent, promoting solidarity, and advocating for change, this paper situates hip-hop as a vital medium for contesting socio-economic inequities and fostering community empowerment.

No Other Land (2024), by Hamdan Ballal, Yuval Abraham, Basel Adra, Rachel Szor

Chiara Catania — 2025-07-03

Wicked (2024), by Jon M. Chu

César F. Más Sánchez — 2025-07-03

Here (2024), by Robert Zemeckis

Elena Velilla Gonzalvo — 2025-07-03

The Substance (2024), by Coralie Fargeat

Martina Villani — 2025-07-03