Patricia D. FOX
Fiction, Biography, Autobiography, and Postmodern
Nostalgia in (Con)Texts of Return
Abstract: Patricia D. Fox discusses in her article, "Fiction, Biography,
Autobiography, and Postmodern Nostalgia in (Con)Texts of Return," the meditations,
in novel and essay, of variously positioned writers and protagonists as each
contemplates return to a never glimpsed or long-lost geographical and cultural
center. Attempting to decipher the grounding in place and time, by heritage
or tradition, Fox's analysis juxtaposes selected texts: Hungarian Rhapsodies:
Essays on Ethnicity, Identity and Culture (Richard Teleky, 1997); Out
of America: A Black Man Confronts Africa (Keith B. Richburg, 1998); Dreaming
in Cuban: A Novel (Cristina García, 1992); The Hundred Secret
Senses (Amy Tan, 1995); Next Year in Cuba: A Cubano's Coming-of-Age in
America (Gustavo Pirez Firmat, 1995); and Zenzele: A Letter for
My Daughter (J. Nozipo Maraire, 1996). The discussion compares the at once
postmodern and nostalgic negotiation of the enunciated perception of displacement,
on the one hand, and, on the other, a truncated sense of belonging, be it circumstantial,
constructed, or assumed. Thus, the study suggests that, coupling imagination
and substitution in the search of tangible ties (e.g., language), essayist,
novelist, and protagonist transform themselves into architects of a unique transcultural
history and diversely place themselves within a desired territorial context
by the studied reconciliation of polarities.
Frank DE GLAS
Literature, "In-House"Writers, and Processes of Success
in Publishing
Abstract: Frank de Glas discusses in his article, "Literature, `In-House'
Writers, and Processes of Success in Publishing," the fact that too many studies
of twentieth-century publishing practices concentrate on individual case studies
while neglecting more general patterns and that too little use is made of theoretical
concepts developed in the sociology of cultural production. He argues that one
of the contributing elements in the economic and artistic success of a publishing
house is the bringing together of a productive group of "in-house authors."
To build up and to maintain such a group, publishers steadily launch new authors
who they hope will become productive writers associated with their publishing
house. There is little systemic and empirical knowledge, however, of the extent
of how and to what degree such publishers succeed. The present article presents
empirical research -- based on explicit theoretical and methodological argumentation
-- into the literary careers of Dutch-language writers of literary fiction in
the period of 1961 to 1965. The results of the study increase our insight into
general tendencies in the productivity of authors and their commitment, or lack
of it, to particular publishers in The Netherlands.
Peter SWIRSKI
Popular and Highbrow Literature: A Comparative View
Abstract: In his article, "Popular and Highbrow Literature: A Comparative
View," Peter Swirski discusses the role and status of popular fiction in contemporary
culture. Starting with the basic question, "Who needs popular fiction?," he
surveys select sociological evidence and prevailing aesthetic arguments in order
to take stock of the ways in which highbrow literature and popular fiction relate
to each other. He begins with statistical and socio-economic data which casts
a different lights on many myths prevailing in scholarship as well as in general
social and cultural discourse, such as the death of the novel, the alleged decline
of the reading public, and the role of paperback publishing and commercial pressures
in shaping literary production. In the second part of the article Swirski examines
the most persistent aesthetic arguments used to deride and attack popular literature.
Both parts of the article are, in fact, extended arguments for a greater literary
democracy, reflected in his recommendations for a critical response to popular
fiction more compatible with its actual socio-aesthetic status.
F. Elizabeth DAHAB
Théophile Gautier and the Orient
Abstract: In her article, "Théophile Gautier and the Orient,"
F. Elizabeth Dahab discusses the function of the Orient in general, and in particular,
the function of Ancient Egypt in some of Gautier's contes fantastiques
written between 1835 and 1857. Gautier and many of his contemporaries including
Baudelaire wanted to escape from a society dominated by the idea of progress.
They expressed deep doubt in many of their texts and strived to find solace
in the notion of permanence in art characteristic of Ancient Egyptian architecture
and mortuary customs. They also believed that Ancient Egypt may provide an answer
to humanity's quest for immortality. Their opposition to progress may also explain
at least in part Gautier's personal obsession with Ancient Egypt. Since Gautier
visited Egypt only three years before his death, it becomes of great interest
to scholars of culture and literature to determine the influence Ancient Egypt
has made in his writing and to refer to the accuracy of his accounts, notably
in Le Roman de la momie (1857).
Andrea FÁBRY
A Comparative Analysis of Text and Music and Gender
and Audience in Duke Bluebeard's Castle
Abstract: Andrea Fábry discusses in her article, "A Comparative
Analysis of Text and Music and Gender and Audience in Duke Bluebeard's Castle,"
the image of Bluebeard as a metaphor for gender relations. Béla Bartók's
opera and its libretto represent a prime example of the metaphor that in turn
can be found in a range of text types, from fairy tales through novels to films.
In the article, Fábry analyzes Bartók's contribution to the metaphor,
namely with his opera, Duke Bluebeard's Castle. She relates the opera
to the text of the opera's libretto, written by film theoretician Béla
Balázs, and places her analysis in the larger historical framework of
audience research in modernity. The analysis reveals that in a pronounced misogynistic
artistic climate of the time and working from a libretto whose tragic ending
denies transcendence to the female character of the opera, Bartók's opera
can be understood as the representation of simplistic domesticity where the
real story remains un-mediated and un-narrated.
Roumiana DELTCHEVA
Western Mediations in Reevaluating the Communist
Past:
A Comparative Analysis of Gothár's Time
Stands Still and Andonov's Yesterday
Abstract: Roumiana Deltcheva's article, "Western Mediations in Reevaluating
the Communist Past: A Comparative Analysis of Gothár's Time Stands
Still and Andonov's Yesterday," offers a comparative analysis of
two films, Peter Gothár's Time Stands Still and Ivan Andonov's
Yesterday. Both films appeared in the 1980s, in Hungary and Bulgaria,
respectively, and were highly acclaimed by the critics and the audience. Both
films deal with the Communist past of these two countries. In her analysis,
Deltcheva's adopts the perspective of "in-between peripherality," a particular
manifestation of the post-colonial paradigm in its application to East Central
and Central Europe. The two films use similar strategies to suggest the specific
position that the countries belonging to the Soviet sphere of political influence
possessed during the forty years of communist rule. Ironically, the films completed
prior to the Changes of 1989 present a much more vivid representation of these
processes than anything else that has since been produced in the region.
Steven
Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient,
"History," and the Other
Abstract: In his article, "Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient,
'History,' and the Other," Steven Tötösy discusses the historical
background of Michael Ondaatje's novel, The English Patient (1992).
The historical background and its analysis extend to selected aspects of
Anthony Minghella's and Michael Ondaatje's adaptation of the novel to film (1996)
and the ensuing controversy after the release of the film. From the historical
background Tötösy designates as the "Almásy theme" of the novel
and the film, he relates Ondaatje's engagement of the protagonist -- Central
European Hungarian László Almásy -- to the notion of the
Other as a historical and fictional concept. Tötösy argues that Ondaatje's
particular rendition of the notion of the Other provides venues for a specific
understanding of the historical background of the novel (the "real" Almásy)
as well as its fictional presentation (the "Almásy theme"). The article
also responds to the pronounced interest in the novel's and the film's protagonist
and his "real" history, evident internationally after the release of the film
in 1996.
Book Review Articles
Joseph PIVATO
The New Comparative Literature:
A Review Article of Work by Bassnett, Bernheimer,
Chevrel, and Tötösy
The Year's Work: List of Articles in Volume 1.1-4 (1999)