Landscape and Transtextuality: A Commented Translation of Robert W. Chambers' "The White Shadow" and "Passeur"

Abstract

Robert W. Chambers is mostly known for publishing The King in Yellow in 1895, but this is not his only contribution to the weird fiction genre. Indeed, in 1897, Chambers published The Mystery of Choice, a collection of strange and mystical short stories. This thesis focuses on the translation and the analysis of two of these stories, "The White Shadow" and "Passeur". This thesis explores three aspects of the short stories. The first of these aspects is the use of scenic descriptions and their role in the broader narrative: Chambers took great care to properly and accurately depict the natural world in his stories while also giving them the role of a theater's drop-curtain that separates the "human world" where the human characters reside from the "hidden world" where hidden agents act behind the scenes. The second aspect, on transtextuality, studies how Chambers borrowed and recontextualized other literary works in his own stories in order to both comment on the narrative and the themes he explores, while also transforming these quotes in order to create his own mythology. These borrowings include Bible and Quran verses as well as Edward Fitzgerald's translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. The final aspect of this thesis focuses on the relationship between the two main characters of "The White Shadow", exploring how Chambers depicts Jack's growing infatuation and idolization of Sweetheart's beauty.