La lectura y escritura creativa como herramientas de análisis y transformación de la vejez

Maricel Oró-Piqueras; Emma Domínguez-Rué; Núria Mina-Riera; Núria Casado-Gual

doi:10.22234/recu.20210901.e548

Authors

Maricel Oró-Piqueras Universitat de Lleida https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6868-9113
Emma Domínguez-Rué Universitat de Lleida https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9718-0110
Núria Mina-Riera Universitat de Lleida https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2431-9310
Núria Casado-Gual Universitat de Lleida https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3778-6284

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.22234/recu.20210901.e548

Keywords:

ageing, wisdom, loneliness, illness, creativity

Abstract

Literature is especially important for senior citizens, since through literary representations they can question stereotypes and taboos associated to the ageing experience as well as the continuity of creativity during old age. The analysis and the results presented in this article are based on a reading and creative writing workshop organised within the “Aula abierta” programme at the Universitat de Lleida. In the four sessions that composed the workshop, texts from contemporary authors that focused on topics such as wisdom, loneliness, illness and death were analysed. Through the analysis of the debates and the creative writing activities of the participants, we conclude that literature is an ideal medium to reflect and debate on ageing from an open and creative perspective. Amongst the main conclusions of the analysis, creativity continues to be present in old age.

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Author Biographies

Maricel Oró-Piqueras, Universitat de Lleida

Spanish. Associate professor at the Department of English and Linguistics (DAL) at the Uiversity of Lleida (Pl. Víctor Siurana, 1, 25003). She has a degree in English philology from the University of Lleida, a Bachelor of Arts in English literature with language and linguistics from the University of Roehampton (London, UK) and a PhD in English philology from the University of Lleida. Her research interests include literary gerontology and aging studies, gender studies and contemporary literature in the English language. Her recent publications include the edition of the volume Re-Discovering Age(ing). Narratives of Mentorship. Bielefield: Transcript, 2019 (ISBN: 978-3-8376-4396-1) together with Casado-Gual i Domínguez-Rué and the article “The multiple faces of aging into wisdom in Julian Barnes's The Lemon Table” published in The Gerontologist, 2019, 59(6):1-8. https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/gnz089.

Emma Domínguez-Rué, Universitat de Lleida

Spanish. Associate professor of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures (DAL, by its acronym in Spanish) in the University of Lleida. An English philology graduate. She obtained The Diploma of Advanced Studies and PhD in the same university, also a master's degree (MA) in English literature from Swansea University (United Kingdom). Her post-doctoral research project is based in the interactions between gender and aging in a detective novel. The following are some of her publications about this topic: Núria Casado-Gual, Emma Domínguez-Rué & Brian Worsfold (Eds.). (2016). Literary Creativity and the Older Woman Writer: A Collection of Critical Essays. Bern: Peter Lang; Emma Domínguez-Rué. (2018). “The art of doing good. Aging, creativity and wisdom in the Isabel Dalhousie novels”. Journal of Aging Studies, 44, 22-27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaging.2017.11.003; and Núria Casado-Gual, Emma Domínguez-Rué, Maricel Oró-Piqueras (Eds.). (2019). Re-discovering Age(ing) Narratives of Mentorship. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag.

Núria Mina-Riera, Universitat de Lleida

Spanish. Associate professor of the Department of Foreign Languages and Literatures (DAL, by its acronym in Spanish) in the University of Lleida (UdL by its acronym in Spanish) and member of the research group Grup Dedal-Lit, which belongs to the same department. An English philology graduate and a Master's degree in Secondary Education Teacher Training and Language Teaching from the University of Lleida. Currently, she is finishing her doctoral studies in Contemporary Canadian Poetry written in the English language, also from UdL. Her main lines of research are literary gerontology in the English language and the relationship between literary creation and aging; contemporary Canadian poetry in the English language, and ecocritism in the English language. A member of the MINECO project ’Healthy Ageing, Creativity and Narrative’ (ECAVINAR by its acronym in Spanish) FFI2016-79666-R (http://www.envejecimientoycreatividad.udl.cat/es/equipos/nuria-mina/). Her most recent publication is Mina-Riera, N. & Voyer, V. (2020). Early retirement, social class, and family relationships in Cloutier’s Bonne Retraite, Jocelyne (2018). The Gerontologist, 20(20), 1-9, https://doi.org/10.1093/geront/gnaa033.The article Stoncikaite, I. & Mina-Riera, N. (2020). A creative writing workshop on sexuality and ageing: A Spanish pilot case study has been accepted for its publication on the academic journal Societies (ISSN 2075-4698).

Núria Casado-Gual, Universitat de Lleida

Spanish. Associate professor of the Department of English and Linguistics (DAL, by its acronym in Spanish) in the University of Lleida of which she, currently, is director. She holds a degree in English philology (1998) and a PhD in English philology (2006) from the same university. Since 2013, she is the lead researcher of the research group Grup Dedal-Lit, dedicated to the cultural gerontology and the study of literature in the English language, for which she has coordinated two competitive projects financed by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competiveness dedicated to the interaction between aging and literary creativity (2013-2016, ref. FFI2012-37050, and 2016-present, ref. FFI2016-79666-R). Within the field of literary gerontology, of which she has dedicated her post-doctoral research, she has co-edited three volumes of essays about literature and old age (with Maria Vidal in 2004, with Emma Domínguez-Rué and Brian Worsfold in 2018, and with Maricel Oró-Piqueras and Emma Domínguez-Rué in 2019), and “Ageing and Romance on the Big Screen: the ‘Silvering Romantic Comedy’ Elsa & Fred” in Ageing & Society, 2019.

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