Magersfontein, O Magersfontein! as karnavaleske roman

Summary

The aim of this investigation is to demonstrate that Etienne Leroux's novel Magersfontein, O Magersfontein! can be decribed as as a carnivalesque work. The concept “carnivalesque” is used in the sense in which it is applied by Mikhail Bakhtin in his Rabelais and His World (1984) in which he investigates popular humour and folk culture during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, as portrayed in the novels of François Rabelais. The following aspects of the said cultural-historical phenomenon, as highlighted by Bakhtin in the work of Rabelais and presented in Leroux's novel, will be focused on: (a) The perspective on history, (b) the suspension of hierarchy and authority and of the dogmatic and (c) of the accepted use of language, (d) the bodily principle, (e) laughter and the comical as forms of truth and liberation, (f) rebirth, (g) transgression of the boundaries between play and life and (h) the transfer from the spatially-vertical to the historically-horisontal.

Opsomming

Die doel van hierdie studie is om aan te toon dat Etienne Leroux se roman Magersfontein, O Magersfontein! (1976) as 'n karnavaleske werk bestempel kan word. Die begrip “karnavalesk” word gebruik in die betekenis waarin Mikhail Bakhtin dit aanwend in sy Rabelais and His World (1984), waarin hy ondersoek doen na die populêre humor en die volkskultuur gedurende die Middeleeue en die Renaissance, soos uitgebeeld in die romans van François Rabelais. Daar sal op die volgende aspekte van die betrokke kultuur-historiese fenomeen, soos dit deur Bakhtin in die werk van Rabelais uitgewys en in Leroux se roman neerslag vind, gefokus word: (a) Die perspektief op die geskiedenis, (b) die opheffing van hiërargie en gesag en van die dogmatiese, asook (c) van aanvaarde taalgebruik, (d) die fokus op liggaamlikheid, (e) lag en die komiese as vorm van waarheid en bevryding, (f) hergeboorte, (g) die oorskryding van die grense tussen spel en lewe en (h) die oordrag van die ruimtelik-vertikale na die histories-horisontale.