LIST OF CONTENTS

1. Statement of Purpose
2. Justification of Purpose
3. Expository and Analytical Structure
4. Theoretical Framework and Methodology
A. Informing Conceptions of the Interpretive Possibilities of Traditional African Thought
B. Autobiographical Discourse as a Quest for Thematic and Imagistic Convergence
C. Points of Convergence between the Hermeneutic Processes Involved in Ifa Divination and the Interpretation of Self and Individual History Constituted by Autobiography and the Self Portrait

a. Consciousness, Temporality and Textual Formations

b. van Gogh’s Letters as Imaginative Depictions of Self

c. The Self Portrait as Imaginative Self-Exploration

D. Correlation of the Hermeneutics of Ifa and Autobiographical Study in terms of the Orisanla Mythos
a. Orisanla Myth of Fragmentation and Reconstitution and the Levels of Possibility in its Symbolic Interpretation

b. The Orisanla Mythos as Embodying the Metaphysical Principles Central to the Ifa Divinatory Process and as Evocative of the Philosophical and Aesthetic Questions Inspired by
Autobiography

5. Depictions of Divergence and Convergence in the Visual and Verbal Art of van Gogh

A. van Gogh’s Last Self-Portrait as Emblematic of the Integration and Dissolution of Polarities in his Art and Life

B. van Gogh’s Conceptions of his Artistic Progression in Terms of a Convergence of Weakness and Power

C. van Gogh’s Interpretation of his Art in Terms of a Confluence of Form and Spirit

6. Conclusion: Triumph and Failure

Bibliography