Corpus Based Analysis of Literary Works of A Thousand Splendid Suns

DOI

10.2991/assehr.k.220706.026How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Corpus; Thousand Splendid Suns; Writing characteristics; Literary text

Abstract

In recent years, many scholars at home and abroad have applied corpus research methods to the field of literature and used corpus retrieval software to analyze literary texts. This paper aims to explore the application of corpus retrieval software WordSmith Tool 8.0 and AntConc in literary discourse analysis. WordSmith Tools is a software package primarily for linguists, in particular for work in the field of corpus linguistics. It is a collection of modules for searching patterns in a language. The software handles many languages. AntConc is a program for analysing electronic texts (that is, corpus linguistics) in order to find and reveal patterns in language. It was created by Laurence Anthony of Waseda University. The target literary work is A Thousand Splendid Suns, a 2007 novel by Afghan-American author Khaled Hosseini. The story is set in the early 1970s when people in Afghanistan suffer from wars and is mainly about the lives of two heroines. Mariam, an illegitimate teenager from Herat, is forced to marry a shoemaker from Kabul after a family tragedy. Laila, born a generation later, lives a relatively privileged life, but her life intersects with Mariam’s when a similar tragedy forces her to accept a marriage proposal from Mariam’s husband. After they start to live under the same roof, their relationship goes through different stages, and in the end, they become the support for each other. The results of the analysis contains threes aspects. One is that the lexical flow of the novel is medium. Another is the characters and surroundings of the two heroines. The third one is the way the author sets the plot to express the main concept of the novel.

Copyright

© 2022 The Authors. Published by Atlantis Press SARL.

Open Access

This is an open access article distributed under the CC BY-NC 4.0 license.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Zhijun Wan
PY  - 2022
DA  - 2022/07/14
TI  - Corpus Based Analysis of Literary Works of A Thousand Splendid Suns
BT  - Proceedings of the 2022 3rd International Conference on Language, Art and Cultural Exchange（ICLACE 2022)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 126
EP  - 131
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/assehr.k.220706.026
DO  - 10.2991/assehr.k.220706.026
ID  - Wan2022
ER  -