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The description of space in Greimas’ classical semiotics is based either on the subject’s narrative program and its relationship with the object of value or on the plastic properties of space, which determine the actor’s way of moving. In both cases, the relationship with space depends on the moving body; however, in literary texts, not only is motion important, but also the perception of space and the feelings it evokes. Usually, in literary criticism, the emotional relationship with space is regarded as a mental representation of the character. The analysis of Laura Sintija Černiauskaitė’s novelette “The Jasmin Chamber” highlights the limitations of this perspective, which assumes a one-sided link between the body and space. In the text, the character establishes a reciprocal bond with the home space. The home possesses corporeal properties, appears active and inviting, and the character functions as a sensitive and responsive body. In the novelette, a homology exists between the architectural structure and the individual body, both of which share the same category: continuous / discontinuous. The analysis of space shows that the characters connect only with family, driven by an unconscious desire for lasting relationships and continuity in their living space. Different characters’ interactions with space uncover the duality of desire: the wish to possess an object of value is intertwined with an unconscious pursuit of intense experiences.

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Olga Tokarczuk’s fragmented novel Flights (Bieguni, 2007) encompasses various genres and themes that distinguish corporeality. Its analysis reveals how a corporeal isotopy of the content plane explains the expression plane, i.e., the novel’s composition. Therefore, this article contributes to the marginally explored research field in the semiotics of literature – the interaction between content semantics and poetics. In the novel, not only can various forms of the human body be found – such as bodies engaged in different modes of travel, sick bodies, and body specimens – but also contrasting corporeal ideologies that elucidate the connection between different fragments of the book. The article describes the novel‘s characters – pilgrims, runaways, and anatomists – and their relationship with movement and the body, revealing their worldview. Moreover, it solves the problem of matching the opposite conceptions of the body, the phenomenological and the mechanical, and addresses how the opposing characters’ attitudes can be integrated into the text’s semantic universe. The axiology of the protagonists is expressed by the category of integrity/disintegration. This, along with the corporeal relationships that repeat in different stories, discloses that Tokarczuk’s text functions as a particular body. Furthermore, it suggests a specific conception of the literary text.

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This article presents the semiotic analysis of Giedrė Kazlauskaitė poem Venecijietiška kaukė… The research aims to delve into the structures of the poetic world of Giedrė Kazlauskaitė, which is achieved through executing a detailed semiotic analysis of one poem. Accordingly, this paper follows the semiotic framework of the analytical trajectory, which encompasses the analysis through the means of discursive, narrative, and logical semantic levels. In addition, the study includes Yuri Lotman’s discourse of the concept of the mirror in cultural semiotics. Findings derived from the semiotic analysis suggest that the figures of the mask and the mirror become central representations at the discursive level of the poem, as they exist in a paratopic space - the make-up room. The mask and the mirror appear in Kazlauskaitė’s poetry as an essential tool for shaping one’s own identity. Moreover, the analysis of the poem is supplemented with the expression of the passions of anger and jealousy. Such approach highlights two different forms of anger: destruction arising from jealousy and a creative act. These forms suggest that the passion of anger drives the subject to the act of doing. Furthermore, in this poem, the figure of the poet is not presented as calm or accommodating, but rather as angry and unafraid to show contempt.

Among Arab authors, a number of Egyptian writers use irony when addressing a criticism to the politics settled by the authorities. The enunciator of the text is perfectly aware that what he writes, or the speech he assigns to one of his characters, is a false compliment addressed to the government policy, since he intends to say or to make say the very contrary. He manages, at the same time, to put his words, and/or those of his character, in such a context that allows the reader to understand that the apparent meaning of the uttered speech is not what the enunciator, or the character, suggests. This same context also allows the reader to decode the secret meaning, easy to find, considering that the apparent meaning of the speech and its secret one are in relation of contrariety. To demonstrate that, I take as an example a short story published in 1980 by Yûsuf al-Qa‘îd from his collection Hikâyât al-zaman al-djarîh (Tales of the Injured Time).

Comment expliquer l’immense succès actuel de leaders populistes tels que Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro, Matteo Salvini, Victor Orban arba ir Marine Le Pen? Les explications sociologiques et politologiques font appel à une série de données contextuelles : ce qui joue en faveur des partis « anti-élitistes », c’est la crise économique, c’est le chômage, l’immigration, l’insécurité, attribués les uns et les autres à la faillite du « système » politique représentatif. Le but de cet article est de compléter ces explications en adoptant une perspective proprement sémiotique (en immanence) qui consiste à analyser les rapports sensibles, de caractère « intime » — personnellement, immédiatement, esthésiquement vécus — qui se nouent entre les leaders populistes et leurs partisans. L’article inclut en outre une typologie des régimes politiques (totalitarisme, absolutisme, démocratie représentative, démocratie « directe » et sa caricature, la démagogie) interdéfinis sur la base des régimes interactionels qui les sous-tendent.