Title

ACACIA, a Book of Wonders, or the Meditations of Fontaine Caldwell, Containing the True Account of Her Captivity as Written in Her Little Books

Date of Award

6-2020

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Organizational Unit

College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences, English and Literary Arts

First Advisor

Selah Saterstrom

Second Advisor

Joanna Howard

Third Advisor

Clark Davis

Fourth Advisor

Frederique Chevillot

Keywords

Creative writing, Screenwriting

Abstract

ACACIA is a gothic-inflected surrealist captivity narrative modeled after storied historical accounts such as Mary Rowlandson's Sovereignty and the Goodness of God, Charles I’s Eikon Basilike, and the prison narratives of the French Quietist mystic, Jeanne Guyon. Told by Fontaine Caldwell, the matriarchal prophetess of an East Texas isolationist cult, ACACIA draws on Rudolf Otto's theological concept of “mysterium tremendum et fascinans”—the presence of dread tempered with Heavenly allure when confronted with numinous spiritual events—to populate the spiritual wonders of Fontaine’s diaries—her “little books.” As a captivity account, ACACIA calls on rhetorical dynamics essential to that genre to pose questions about divine goodness, the veracity of the teller, and the psychology undergirding adherence to power, religious or otherwise.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. Permanently suppressed.

Rights Holder

Vincent James

Provenance

Received from author

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

325 pgs

Discipline

Creative writing

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