The Complexity of the Concept of Literary Autonomy

Theoria ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nino Tevdoradze
Keyword(s):  
Literary Autonomy

Reading Pascale Casanova’s World Republic of Letters in Eastern Europe

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 189-210
Author(s):  
Magdalena Răduță ◽  
Oana Fotache-Dubălaru
Keyword(s):  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Theoretical Argument ◽  
Republic Of Letters ◽  
Historical Reality ◽  
The World ◽  
Literary Autonomy ◽  
Editorial Decisions ◽  
Communist Countries

Abstract The main focus of my article is to investigate the fate of Pascale Casanova’s translated work in the former communist literary spaces, where her theoretical argument about linguistic and historical dominance is a historical reality. I begin by examining the editorial decisions behind the translation of The World Republic of Letters into Romanian (2007, second ed. 2016) and the most representative echoes of this seminal book in several formerly communist countries (Romania, Serbia, Slovenia). I then test an essential concept in Pascale Casanova’s work: literary autonomy. Seen as a powerful tool to address the almost insurmountable break between textual singularity and its necessary historicity (Casanova 2005), literary autonomy can play an equally important role in investigating ideologically controlled literary spaces.

scholarly journals Making it New: Sappho, Mary Barnard and American Modernism

2013 ◽  
pp. 71
Author(s):  
Sarah Barnsley
Keyword(s):  
American Poetry ◽  
Turn Of The Century ◽  
Free Verse ◽  
American Modernism ◽  
The Public ◽  
Literary Autonomy ◽  
New Interpretation ◽  
Modernist Project ◽  
The University ◽  
As If

Contrary to the pessimism of American editors in the 1950s who told Mary Barnard that "Sappho would never sell," Barnard‘s Sappho: A New Translation (1958) is now in its fifty-fifth year of continuous print by the University of California Press. Expressing the bare, lyrical intensity of Sappho‘s poetry without recourse to excessive linguistic ornament or narrative padding, Barnard‘s translation is widely regarded as the best in modern idiom, with leading translation studies scholar Yopie Prins asserting that "Barnard‘s Sappho is often read as if it is Sappho." This essay will examine how Barnard managed this remarkable achievement, linking Sappho to the American modernist project to "make it new," to quote Ezra Pound. New archival material is used to show how Barnard declared herself "A Would-Be Sappho" as early as 1930. The essay begins with the reasons why Sappho was appealing to those with modernist sensibilities, reading the development of Imagists Pound, H.D. and Richard Aldington against the backdrop of the public excitement that surrounded the major excavations of Sappho‘s corpus at the turn of the century. The essay then zooms-in on the ways in which Sappho was a vital element in the formulation of Barnard‘s identity as a late modernist writer, particularly examining her appropriation of the imagery from Sappho‘s fragments as Barnard developed her "spare but musical" late Imagist style in her poems of the 1930s and 1940s. If Barnard‘s deep absorption of Sappho in her emergent years enabled her to find a means of producing American free verse in the modernist tradition, then there was an intriguing reciprocation: it was this very "Sapphic modernism," I contend, that enabled Barnard to find a means of translating Sappho to be read "as if it is Sappho." The essay concludes with a new interpretation of the significance of Barnard‘s appropriation of Sappho in her own poetry, noting how, peculiarly, Barnard drew out of her Sappho connection a thoroughly American idiom to pit against European literary autonomy, on a par with William Carlos Williams‘s own attempts to produce a thoroughly American verse. In making Sappho new for modern Americans, Barnard was, I find, making a new language for modern American poetry.

Authority and Discourse

1998 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-224 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Eira
Keyword(s):  
National Identity ◽  
Oral Tradition ◽  
Selection Process ◽  
Technological Advancement ◽  
Cultural Discourses ◽  
Literary Autonomy

On the surface, orthography selection and development are linguistic issues; but in practice they are loaded with imperatives arising from a number of sources. An orthography is constructed as a cultural semiotic, frequently holding sacred status at various levels, and representing the perceived political or technological advancement of one culture over another. This paper proposes a model for understanding the motivations which characterise the orthography selection process. At base, the authority which directs this process reflects a configuration of cultural discourses. Disagreement and imposed change can be explained in terms of conflict within or between discourses; choices which appear inexpedient according to the framework of one discourse become comprehensible from the perspective of the discourse that motivates them. A Hmong orthography project currently in progress in Coolaroo (Melbourne, Australia) can be seen as highlighting issues common to orthography establishment worldwide. Community representatives are working on the establishment of an orthography originating with the messianic figure Shong Lue Tang, on grounds including national identity, politico-religious allegiance, and linguistic suitability. The image of Shong Lue Tang arises from the hope, expressed throughout Hmong oral tradition, for a Messiah who brings political, spiritual, and literary autonomy to the Hmong. This project and its immediate and historical contexts serve as a case study for the model here proposed.

The Countercanon

2018 ◽  
pp. 147-168
Author(s):  
Robyn Creswell
Keyword(s):  
Arabic Poetry ◽  
Classical Poetry ◽  
Literary Autonomy ◽  
Internal Translation ◽  
Critical Project

This chapter focuses on Adonis's Diwan al-shi'r al-'arabi [Anthology of Arabic Poetry], a three-volume florilegium published between 1964 and 1968 whose origins are in the dossiers of pre-Islamic poetry first published in Shi'r. The Diwan was the most consequential revision of the classical heritage undertaken by Adonis. It is a massive critical project that hews strictly to the original impetus of Shi'r, a movement based on the paired goals of literary autonomy and deprovincialization. How do these goals affect Adonis's decisions as an editor of the corpus of classical poetry? As a collection of citations from the turath, the Anthology is a work of internal translation in which source and target texts are exactly the same, though provided with a new context. The chapter suggests that while Adonis's countercanon seeks to restore those voices silenced by orthodoxy, his own choices, tailored to the needs of the present, impose their own exclusions and repressions.

scholarly journals The Failure of Consuelo’s Designs: Carlos Fuentes and Trompe l’Oeil Modernity

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (2) ◽  
pp. 297-324
Author(s):  
Stephen Buttes
Keyword(s):  
Carlos Fuentes ◽  
Literary Form ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Second Person ◽  
Trompe L'oeil ◽  
Palabras Clave ◽  
Literary Autonomy

Este artículo estudia las tensiones entre los elementos barrocos y los elementos góticos en Aura (1962) de Carlos Fuentes. Estableciendo conexiones entre esta novela y La región más transparente (1958), el ensayo argumenta que en Aura Fuentes radicaliza la teatralidad de las formas barrocas y las góticas para señalar sus límites. Con el uso de la segunda persona singular, la novela desarrolla un concepto de modernidad que no se subordina a los modelos políticos existentes, un modelo parecido al arte anti-teatral en su variante pastoral estudiado por Michael Fried. Palabras clave: Carlos Fuentes, lo barroco, lo gótico, la antiteatralidad, la autonomía literaria  The present study examines the tensions between Baroque and Gothic elements in Carlos Fuentes’ Aura (1962). Analyzing unstudied connections between La región más transparente (1958) and Aura, the essay argues that Fuentes radicalizes the theatricality of Baroque and Gothic forms in his novel in order to signal their limits. With his use of the second person singular to narrate the novel, he seeks to develop a new concept of modernity, one that would not be subordinated to already existing political models. This concept of literary form parallels the pastoral conception of antitheatrical art studied by Michael Fried. Keywords: Carlos Fuentes, Baroque, Gothic, antitheatricality, literary autonomy

Branding the Open-minded Nation

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurens Ham
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Public Diplomacy ◽  
Nation Branding ◽  
Amnesty International ◽  
Book Fair ◽  
Literary Autonomy ◽  
Alternative Position

In 2011, the Netherlands was invited to be the guest of honour at the Beijing Book Fair. This fair attracted controversy that revealed the tensions that exist between nation branding, public diplomacy, and literary autonomy: while its sponsor, the Ministry of Culture, regarded the fair as a perfect marketing opportunity, Amnesty International used the occasion to protest repression in China. Dutch authors invited to participate in the fair forged an alternative position by emphasizing their status as autonomous artists. However, an analysis of the debate in the Dutch media shows that both the Ministry, Amnesty International, the Dutch Foundation for Literature, and many authors interpreted the contact between Chinese and Dutch authors as a clash between an open(-minded) culture and a closed one.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document