Showing papers in "Neohelicon in 2004"
TL;DR: The authors argued that the same cannot be said about the cultures to which migration has given rise and argued that European intellectuals must learn to view the cultures of migration less as extensions of Europe than as cultures with which to enter in dialogue.
Abstract: As a social phenomenon, migration has received its share of attention. The premise of this paper is that the same cannot be said about the cultures to which migration has given rise. This is all the more true, this paper will further maintain, of the cultures of the Europeanmigration, all of which could now at any rate stand some recontextualization in the light of recent European history. My argument is that to properly relate migration to this history, it must first be distinguished from other forms of displacement, all of which have had some cultural purchase among European intellectuals. I outline some of the distinctions, using Italian-Canadian literature as a point of reference. My conclusion is that the cultures of the European migration can be of great relevance for European intellectuals but that in order for that to happen European intellectuals must learn to view the cultures of migration less as extensions of Europe than as cultures with which to enter in dialogue.
10 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a survey of studies concerning immigrant literature in Italy in the second half of the 20th century is presented, focusing on the relationship between literature and immigration in Italy since the 1990s.
Abstract: The article is a first survey of studies concerning immigrant literature in Italy in the second half of the 20th century. The phrase ‘immigrants’ literature' here means all those texts which have been written and published in Italian by individuals who have immigrated since the 1970s, but whose first works have been published in the late 1980s. More specifically, the essay attempts to focus on how Italian and foreign critics - be they academic or independent - have mostly approached the relationship between literature and immigration in Italy since the 1990s. The article aims at highlighting the main issues and outlining the development of some critical trends which have made visible and tried to interpret the interaction of two apparently extraneous ambits: on the one hand the experience of immigration and the production of texts in Italian by immigrants, on the other hand its interrelationship with the canon of contemporary Italian literature.
7 citations
4 citations
4 citations
TL;DR: In der zweiten halfte des 20. Jahrhunderts, a Variante des historischen Romans entwickelt, deren Handlung nicht durch historische Ereignisse, sondern durch geschichtliche Alternativen gepragt wird.
Abstract: In der zweiten Halfte des 20. Jahrhunderts hat sich eine Variante des historischen Romans entwickelt, deren Handlung nicht durch historische Ereignisse, sondern durch geschichtliche Alternativen gepragt wird. Texte dieser Art erzahlen eine Welt, in der die Kunst des Buchdrucks schon im Altertum erfunden wird, sich die industrielle Revolution in der Renaissance vollzieht, oder die Achsenmachte den Zweiten Weltkrieg gewonnen haben. Eine eingehende literaturwissenschaftliche Auseinandersetzung mit der Poetik diese Genres steht bislang aus.
3 citations
3 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors discuss the process of nationalizing literature, that is, the formation of a national literary canon in Slovene poetry from the Enlightenment to Post-Romanticism, and the use of images of Parnassus and Elysium, these topoi in the European cultural memory, was one of the self-regulatory strategies acquired by Slovene writers to mark the distinction between their own discourse and the norms of the 'classics' and a competitive comparison with other modern national literatures in order to achieve integration into the canon of 'world literature'
Abstract: The author discusses the process of nationalizing literature, that is, the formation of a national literary canon in Slovene poetry from the Enlightenment to Post-Romanticism. The utopian projection and formation of a ‘Slovenised’ literary system has been intertwined with the successful establishment of a unified Slovene literary language. The use of images of Parnassus and Elysium, these topoi in the European cultural memory, was one of the self-regulatory strategies acquired by Slovene writers to mark the distinction between their own discourse and the norms of the ‘classics’ and a competitive comparison with other modern national literatures in order to achieve integration into the canon of ‘world literature’.
3 citations
TL;DR: The authors examined the interaction of post-modernist thrust with the subtext of development discourse on the example of Wole Soyinka's Season of Anomy and found that the creative universe of a post-colonial text implicitly suggests a hope of possibilities for the black world, while the explicit narrative formulates the difficulties of accomplishing these possibilities.
Abstract: African novels are sometimes regarded in the academic discourse as characteristically postmodern pieces of literature because of the combination of western art and non-western sources of inspiration. Third-World literature, however, tends to be deeply interested in the economic, social and ideological reality of postcolonial situation. This paper examines the interaction of postmodernist thrust with the subtext of development discourse on the example of Wole Soyinka’s Season of Anomy. The narrative design of Season of Anomy exemplifies a characteristic disjoint: the creative universe of a postcolonial text implicitly suggests a hope of possibilities for the black world, while the explicit narrative formulates the difficulties of accomplishing these possibilities. In contrast with the events displaying the frustrations of the postmodern discourse in the postcolonial world the titles of the sub-divisions appear to affirm the possibilities in figural terms.
2 citations
TL;DR: The authors examines aspects of setting -place, time, social context of characters and the atmosphere, which includes mood, feeling and emotion that they generate in selected African autobiographies noted for their artistry and argues that the autobiographers, through the use of such means as shift in time frames, symbolized and naturalistic descriptions are able effectively to render and re-create the setting in their autobiographies, stressing that such rendering and recreation enable them to transmute an ordinary experience into fantasy.
Abstract: This essay examines aspects of setting - place, time, social context of characters - and the atmosphere, which includes mood, feeling and emotion that they generate in selected African autobiographies noted for their artistry and argues that the autobiographers, through the use of such means as shift in time frames, symbolized and naturalistic descriptions are able effectively to render and re-create the setting in their autobiographies, stressing that such rendering and re-creation enable them to transmute an ordinary experience into fantasy. Setting is a vital part of the autobiographies as literary works, the essay concludes.
2 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, a theoretischen Konturen einer modernen “Migrationsliteratur” dargestellt, which nicht mehr unter dem Aspekt des Kulturaustausches gesichtet werden kann, also not mehr als Exotikum oder als bereichernder Spiegel fur die Majoritat.
Abstract: Der Begriff der Interkulturalitat scheint sich im deutschsprachigen Raum viel starker durchgesetzt zu haben als der Begriff der Multikulturalitat. Insbesondere in Bezug auf die Literatur von Autoren nicht deutscher Herkunft dominiert in Weiterentwicklung der Gastarbeiter-, Auslander- oder Migrantenliteratur nicht etwa die Bezeichnung der “Multikulturellen Literatur”, sondern vielmehr der “Interkulturellen Literatur”. Ziel des Artikels ist es zunachst, auf theoretischer Ebene die besonderen Konstitutionsmerkmale des Begriffs der “Interkulturalitat” zu erhellen, bzw. den Begriff im Kontext der im deutschsprachigen Raum entwickelten literatur- und kulturwissenschaftlichen Disziplinen zu erkunden. In einem weiteren Schritt werden die theoretischen Konturen einer modernen “Migrationsliteratur” dargestellt, die nicht mehr unter dem Aspekt des Kulturaustausches gesichtet werden kann, also nicht mehr als Exotikum oder als bereichernder Spiegel fur die Majoritat. Daruber hinaus wird auf theoretischer Ebene durch die Kombination literaturwissenschaftlicher und sozialisationstheoretischer Konzepte (Lothar Krappmann) ein “interkulturelles Analysemodell” entwickelt, mit dessen Hilfe interkulturelle Elemente in literarischen Texten erforscht werden konnen. Exemplarisch werden Kemal Kurts Erzahlung "Der Chinese von Schoneberg" und Sten Nadolnys Roman "Selim oder Die Gabe der Rede" herangezogen.
2 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors of this period reject the lengthy narration and praise national character and their individual experiences in their work, and the magazines in which they prefer to publish their short stories favor the transition from the novel to the novelette while Nikolaos Politis paves the way to ethography.
Abstract: At the end of the 19th century in Greece, to a greater extent than in France, a need for a change in literature emerges. Naturalism appers as a reaction to the romanticism movement. The authors of this period reject the lengthy narration and praise national character and their individual experiences in their work. Moreover, the magazines in which they prefer to publish their short stories favor the transition from the novel to the novelette, while Nikolaos Politis paves the way to ethography. Even if we cannot talk yet of naturalims - in Greece, neohellenic literature in this period unambiguously shows a tendency toxards realism. From this point on, naturalism will appear in Greece in some works of some authors, the most innovative ones, which during the course of their work were not characterized as naturalists. Above all, the thematic, the style, the tone and the way they see things are shared by some authors such as Michael Mitsakis, Andreas Karkavitsas, Gregorios Xenopoulos, Konstantinos Theotokis and Kostas Hatzopoulos. These authors reacted irrespective of Schools and literary movements, however, their work may allow us to assert that it fulfills certain criteria of the French naturalism and to compare it with the work of Zola. This is due to the fact that naturalism is in no way a School with strict and stable features, but rather an animate literary system, ready to change appearance according to place and time. In the Greek naturalists' work there are also denunciations equally worthy of those of Zola, but apart from any influences, it can be argued that naturalists in this period react in the same way, irrespective of borders and intentions. Because, if it is true that naturalism was a French School with one theory and one leader, it certainly existed as an international literary movement as well.
TL;DR: In this article, the cultural dimension of the European imperialist project with particular reference to Anglophone Africa is highlighted and the implications of the subtle use of the literature of empire for the promotion of European imperialism.
Abstract: This paper underscores the cultural dimension of the European imperialist project with particular reference to Anglophone Africa. Drawing on assumptions and insights rooted in colonial discourse analysis, it explores the implications of the subtle use of the literature of empire for the promotion of European imperialism. It reveals that African curriculum planners, who perpetuate the imperialist hegemony by giving undue prominence to literary works that were originally popularised by the colonial establishment, are still serving the imperialist interest promoted by colonial education. This suggests that while colonialism is a determinable experience in temporal terms, imperialism outlives the official termination of colonial engagements.
TL;DR: A. Echenoz et al. as discussed by the authors discuss the representation of SDF in the context of the roman urbain contemporain, in which personnages are assumed to be partieintegrante in the paysage of the Romanians.
Abstract: Ce texte se penche sur les representations romanesques des marginauxde notre temps : les sans domicile fixe. Ces personnages apparaissent tresfrequemment dans le roman urbain contemporain, mis en scenesur deux modes differents : en tant que personnages principaux dontle texte retrace le parcours et en tant que personnages anonymes faisant partieintegrante du paysage urbain. On cite ici a titre d'exemplesdes romans de J.-C. Izzo, M. Lindon et J. Echenoz pour le premier cas, ainsi que les textes d'A. Ernaux pour le second. Ces representations des SDF dans les romans urbains sont interessantes dans la mesure ouelles fournissent aux auteurs une occasion privilegiee d'exercer une critique sociale visant d'une part l'emergence d'une importantepauvrete urbaine au sein de la societe de consummation et, d'autre part, l'indifference generale que suscite ce phenomene. Dans la plupart des textes, un veritablefosse social se creuse entre les marginaux et les autres personnages, ce qui explique en partie pourquoi les rencontres entre ces deux groupes de personnages restent anonymes ou se font uniquement a l'intermediairedes medias. Un fosse pareil separe souvent la vie anterieureet la vie actuelle du meme personnage devenu SDF. Le parcours de ces personnages peuvent presenter plus ou moins d'individualite,les raisons les plus couramment evoquees temoignent cependant toujours d'une sorte d'incapacite des personnages a se plieraux contraintes de la societe, d'une sensibilite ou d'un moral plus marques qui les empechent de faire un compromis afin de reussir a s'integrer. Il s'agit la d'une strategiedont les auteurs se servent pour mettre le lecteur du cote des personnages echoues et du meme coup contre la societedont le mauvais fonctionnement provoque leur declassement. On faitegalement l'inventaire des sujets les plus frequemment evoques apropos des clochards : la perte progressive de la sexualite dont l'aspect purificateur peut etre plus ou moins accentue, l'habitat des personnages SDF, les objets personnels et leur role modifie par rapport l'usage courant dans la societe occidentale, etc. Ence qui concerne le mode de vie des SDF representes dans les romans, deux modeles dominants se font contraste : la vie en communautemenee dans les grandes villes (il s'agit d'une societeparallele qui coexiste avec la societe normale), et lavie solitaire menee a la campagne. Cette derniere representeune forme de refus de la vie urbaine, un theme nostalgique en voiede disparition dans la litterature contemporaine. A travers les differentestechniques de survie mises en scene dans les textes, les romanciers focalisent l'attention du lecteur sur l'indifference generalequi se manifeste aussi bien au niveau collectif (administratif) qu'au niveau individuel. Le fait que la solidarite soit toujours montreecomme reaction individuelle et plutot exceptionnelle contribue ala denonciation de l'irresponsabilite sociale.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors gefragt, inwiefern in den USA Versuche, dieser Literatur aus multikultureller Sicht gerecht zu werden, tatsachlich erfolgreich gewesen sind.
Abstract: Im Beitrag wird gefragt, inwiefern in den USA Versuche, dieser Literatur aus multikultureller Sicht gerecht zu werden, tatsachlich erfolgreich gewesen sind. Fuhrt die in den USA gefuhrte Diskussion uber Minority Literature nicht zu einer kultur-ethnischen Auslegung einzelner Werke? Literaturwissenschaftler nicht deutscher Herkunft, die in Deutschland leben und uber Migrationsliteratur arbeiten, betonen, dass die 'interkulturellen Dominanten' dieser Literatur vornehmlich von Literaturwissenschaftlern der 'zweiten Generation' erfasst werden konnen, denn nur sie verfugen uber ein erlebtes Wissen in Sprache und Kultur mindestens zweier Lander. Im Beitrag werden Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede der drei Grundpositionen - die nordamerikanische, die deutsche und die der Wissenschaftler nicht deutscher Herkunft - herausgearbeitet und insbesondere im Hinblick auf die Thematisierung des multikulturellen Diskurses hinterfragt.
TL;DR: The Serbian word seoba has several meanings: 'wandering','migration','moving to a new place' as mentioned in this paper and the novel Seobe by Milos Crnjanski proves that the Serb folk Odysseus represents in the reality a 20th-century 'labyrinth existence'.
Abstract: The Serbian word seoba has several meanings: 'wandering', 'migration', 'moving to a new place'. The novel Seobe by Milos Crnjanski proves that the Serb folk Odysseus represents in the reality a 20th-century 'labyrinth existence'. Crnjanski's novel borrows its topic from the Serbian history, and it does not talk about the now universal crisis situation in the mood of the aggressive 'national epic stories' of the 20th-century. Between 1945 and 1948, the official ideology of the re-created Czechoslovakia named Slavic nations, i.e., Czechs and Slovaks, state building ones, and it aimed at eliminating the German and Hungarian ethnic minorities from the country. The fact that writing in Hungarian in Czechoslovakia was dangerous between 1945 and 1948 resulted in a rebirth of orality and the use of manuscript distribution.
TL;DR: In this article, the avangardist phases or features in Attila Jozsef's and Lőrinc Szabo's poetry have been repeatedly overshadowed or excluded by the canonical constructions of modern Hungarian poetry, although it is possible to point out their impact on the poetical principles upon which those canons are based.
Abstract: Historical models of 20th century Hungarian poetry seem to have failed repeatedly in their attempt to integrate avant-garde poetics into their evolutional concepts. This failure blurs the significance or, at least, reduces the extent of the role the reception of avantgardist techniques played in the renewal of the language of Hungarian poetry in the 30s, highlighted by the mature work of Attila Jozsef and Lőrinc Szabo. The paper attempts to evade this shortcoming in focusing on the presence of the avantgardist critique of poetic language in earlier volumes of both Hungarian poets, considering also the possibility of their revaluation. It will be argued that the avangardist phases or features in Attila Jozsef's and Lőrinc Szabo's poetry have been repeatedly overshadowed or excluded by the canonical constructions of modern Hungarian poetry, although it is possible to point out their impact on the poetical principles upon which those canons are based.
TL;DR: Rilke's Funfte Elegie neu auszulegen as discussed by the authors, in which Rilke in jedem einzelnen (lebendigen, objektalen oor auch geographischen) Phanomen, auf allen (bildlichen, begrifflichen wie auch kompositionellen and thematischen), Niveaus seines Werks eine konsequente Depravation von der Allmacht des modernen kunstlerischmensch
Abstract: Der Aufsatz trachtet danach, Rilkes Funfte Elegie neu auszulegen. Nach seiner zentralen These hat Rilke in jedem einzelnen (lebendigen, objektalen oder auch geographischen) Phanomen, auf allen (bildlichen, begrifflichen wie auch kompositionellen und thematischen) Niveaus seines Werks eine konsequente Depravation von der Allmacht des modernen kunstlerisch-menschlichen Daseins und mithin die Depravation der teleologisch ausgerichteten elegischen Schopfung durchgefuhrt. Nach der textnahen Analyse des Gedichts wird ihre Stellung zunachst im Lebenswerk (vor allem in bezug auf die gleichzeitig entstandenen Sonette an Orpheus) dargelegt, dann ihre Stellung in der modernen Tradition des kunstlerischen Selbstportrats (Baudelaire, Banville, Mallarme, Apollinaire).
TL;DR: In this article, Chinua Achebe and Ahmadou Kourouma locate their major novels in temporal breaks which, nevertheless, offer the possibilities of constructing a new discourse on Africa.
Abstract: Chinua Achebe, from Nigeria, and Ahmadou Kourouma, from Ivory Coast, locate their major novels in temporal breaks which, nevertheless, offer the possibilities of constructing a new discourse on Africa. The main break is the shift from colonialism to independence, from the colonial system to a postcolonial situation. Exiled by the colonial culture and alienated from their ancestral tradition, Achebe and Kourouma claim to reconnect Africa to its cultural heritage and find narrative to be a crucial instrument of reinventing a new community of language and culture. Whereas new nations were built in Africa, Achebe and Kourouma take up a challenge : creating an African novel in spite of the indebtedness of this literary genre to an alien tradition and its absence of a native genealogy. Narrative strategies have to go together with questions of national identity and the African novel must not be a genre in exile.
TL;DR: In the last two centuries for the young Romanian intellectuals seeking a Western education, cultural accomplishment, or political asylum, France and its capital city became both a Mecca and a hospitable land.
Abstract: Over the last two centuries for the young Romanian intellectuals seeking a Western education, cultural accomplishment, or political asylum France and its capital city became both a Mecca and a hospitable land The Romanian fascination with Paris took many different forms Under the circumstances the continuity between Bucharest, the Romanian ‘Little Paris,’ and the French capital was almost seamless The very first wave of exiles arrived in Paris in the aftermath of the 1848 revolutions Between the two world wars the integration of displaced Romanians into the French cultural milieus - sometimes through mixed marriages - encouraged inter-artistic cross-fertilizations The writers, painters, sculptors, frequently associated with the historical avant-garde, left for Paris to produce literature in an adopted language and scenery A later group, the post-war asylum-seeking wave of Romanian intellectuals, formed an anticommunist Diaspora They clustered around the Romanian department of Radio Free Europeand managed to radicalize and to coagulate the Romanian community For them Paris represented a political and a cultural alternative to totalitarianism, an option for intellectual survival Starting with the Paris of the 1848 generation - to a great extent a political and cultural fiction, dominated by the myth of the Great Revolution - for the successive waves of Romanian intellectual exiles the hospitable French land was only the starting point of a long process of imaginative construction, constantly built and re-built, in slightly different versions and turned into a topographical non-lieu
TL;DR: In this paper, the role played by nature in the works of Dun Karm (1871-1961), Malta's national poet, is explored, which is considered as typifying an attitude which emanates from a deep love towards the country and from the need to discover meaning in the outer world.
Abstract: As typically Mediterranean, Maltese Literature gives paramount importance to the natural environment and identifies its transcendental significance. Literature of nature is somehow an offshoot of literature inspired by religious faith. This essay explores the role played by nature in the works of Dun Karm (1871–1961), Malta’s national poet. His ecological awareness is considered as typifying an attitude which emanates from a deep love towards the country and from the need to discover meaning in the outer world. Poetry of an apparently descriptive character is subsequently interpreted in existential terms.