In order to join a series of events dedicated to the 90th birthday of the Canadian writer Alice Munro, winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2013, the students of the optional Canadian Literature course in the Faculty of Letters, History and Theology at UVT they planned an educational, but also enjoyable evening on May 25, 2021. The evening allowed the meeting of students with varied cultural concerns and who were either already declared fans of the writer, or became on the occasion of this occasion. In addition to the Romanian students from UVT, we were happy to have Sarka Zelinska, a PhD student from the Czech Republic, with us.
The event began with a presentation by Georgiana Buligan, a second-year student from the Languages and Literatures program, Romanian-English major, who spoke both about Alice Munro's career and about the awards she won. The presentation ended with a brief review of the story's theme, "Hate, Friendship, Love, Marriage," the cast of characters, and the multiple perspectives that contribute to the narrative like pieces of a puzzle. The second important moment of the evening followed, namely the viewing of the film "Hateship, Loveship" ("Hateship, Loveship", 2013), and the participants were asked to take into account several aspects from which the discussion would later start (What is the main theme of the film? What do you think about the prank of the two teenage girls? How easy is it to empathize with the female characters? What about the other characters? How would you describe the relationship between Sabitha and Edith? What is the meaning of the film's title?). The debate that followed the viewing of the film was moderated by Andreea Șerban and Loredana Bercuci, teaching and research staff at the English Language and Literature Collective.
In the last part of the evening, the participants engaged in a very lively discussion, even heated in some places, focused on the differences between film and storytelling regarding the titles, the prank set up by the two teenagers, the construction and development of the characters, context , the end of the film vs the end of the story, and last but not least, feminist aspects. Emphasis was placed especially on the typical of Munro's stories, especially on the specific ending of the writer's stories, without a clear resolution. The film, on the other hand, with a typical Hollywood happy ending, was seen by the participants as a cultural product that highlights the differences between American and Canadian culture. The ambiguity of the female characters in the novel and the film has been hotly debated. Some of the participants interpreted the female characters as feminist heroines in control of their own destinies, while others felt that the characters in "Hateship, Loveship" obeyed conventional gender roles to some extent. It was concluded that the defining element of Alice Munro's work is precisely this complexity of the female characters.
Some participants, who had no previous contact with Alice Munro's work, declared themselves fascinated by Munro's writings and female characters, promising further research into various aspects of Munro's stories. All in all, it was an enjoyable evening, with enlightening discussions between old and new Alice Munro admirers.
