Les articles de Luminia Munteanu, Anca Roncea, Daniela Ionescu-Bonanni, Monica Col, Raluca Oproiu (Andreescu) et Dagmar Maria

Anoca reprsentent les versions crites des communications prsentes loccasion de la Session scientifique annuelle de la Facult des Langues et Littratures Etrangres, Universit de Bucarest, 5-6 novembre 2010; les articles de Alexandra Ciocrlie, Joaquina Lanzuela Hernndez, Levente Pap, Irina Dubsk, va Bnyai, Judit Pieldner, Mihaela Chapelan, Monica Oanc, Thomas Schares, Andreea Diaconescu, Monica Manolachi et Susana Monica Tapodi reprsentent les versions crites des communications prsentes lors de la Session scientifique annuelle de la Facult des Langues et Littratures Etrangres, Universit de Bucarest, 11-12 novembre 2011.

ANALELE UNIVERSITII BUCURETI

LIMBI I LITERATURI STRINE

2012 Nr. 2

SUMAR SOMMAIRE CONTENTS

LITERATUR I STUDII CULTURALE/ LITTERATURE ET ETUDES CULTURELLES / LITERATURE AND CULTURAL STUDIES

LUMINIA MUNTEANU, Cuire lancienne. Quelques remarques sur le Trait de gastronomie dAli Eref Dede, Postnin du Tekke Mevlev dEdirne ................. ALEXANDRA CIOCRLIE, Antiquit et actualit: perception du temps chez Gheorghe Crciun ................................................................................................... JOAQUINA LANZUELA HERNNDEZ, Le temps dans Le Cid de Corneille ................. IOANA COSTA, Author and Hero (Gregory the Theologian, Basil the Great) .................. LUCIANA IRINA CRMID (VLUANU), Confucius and Feminism ..................... LEVENTE PAP, Time and Chronology in Tertullians Adversus Iudaeos (VIII. 8-15.) ..... IRINA DUBSK, For Immortality Is but Ubiquity in Time: Moby Dick on the Horizon of Myth ................................................................................................................... ANCA RONCEA, Whitmans Song and the Myth of Osiris ............................................... GEORGE GRIGORE, Der Jesidismus: ein Beispiel fr religisen Synkretismus ............... VA BNYAI, Transition Novels ...................................................................................... DANIELA IONESCU-BONANNI, Das interkulturelle Potential der Prosa Rumniendeutscher Autoren nach 1990 .................................................................................................. JUDIT PIELDNER, Time, Memory and Narration in W. G. Sebalds Austerlitz ................ MIHAELA CHAPELAN, Le temps mis sous rature dans la mtafiction ...........................

3 21 31 43 51 59 67 77 83 95 105 121 133

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IRINA-ANA DROBOT, The Readers Perception of Time in Virginia Woolfs Novels .... MONICA COL, Elements of Culture Shock in Their Dynamics in Neil Bissoondaths The Innocence of Age and the Short Stories ............................................................ MONICA OANC, Christian Time as Perceived by Margery Kempe ............................... RALUCA ANDREESCU, The End of the World as They Knew It? A Vision of the Apocalypse in Shirley Jacksons The Sundial ............................................................................. THOMAS SCHARES, A Poetology of Modernism: Approaches to Wallace Stevens The Idea of Order at Key West ....................................................................................... ANDREEA DIACONESCU, Lenfance le pass qui ne passe pas dans les romans de Pascal Quignard ...................................................................................................... MONICA MANOLACHI, Internal and External Time in Caribbean British Womens Poetry .. SUSANA MONICA TAPODI, Spatial and Temporal Structure in a Contemporary Hungarian Novel from Romania ............................................................................................... DAGMAR MARIA ANOCA, The Plain in the Slovak Language Literature in Romania ... * Recenzii ............................................................................................................................... 141 153 171 181 193 213 223 237 243

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COOKING IN THE TRADITIONAL WAY: SOME REMARKS ON THE GASTRONOMIC TREATISE BY ALI EREF DEDE, POSTNIN OF THE MEVLEV TEKKE IN EDIRNE It is often assumed that the life style in the tekkes of the Islamic mystical orders was characterized by asceticism, seclusion and regular prayers, but also by a certain disdain regarding the material aspects of the day-to-day existence. In fact, many members of the dervish lodges had great socialites, enjoyed life to the full and saw no contradiction between their private religious convictions and their worldly matters; on the other hand, many Sufi adepts were not bound to celibacy, but returned, after having been initiated, to their daily life and partook periodically to prayer meetings. The gastronomic treatise of Ali Eref Dede, postnin (Father superior) of the Mevlevi tekke in Edirne (1859-1901) offers an excellent example from this point of view. On the other hand, it has not many equivalents in the Ottoman history, excepting the cooking book by Mehmet Kmil, which was published in 1844. The treatise of the Mevlev shaykh offers lots of valuable information concerning the traditional Ottoman dishes, recipes, ways of cooking, kitchen ustensils, but also about the most common or rare ingredients, such as herbs and spices, all kinds of meat and fish, vegetables, fruits, salads, pickles, etc. Moreover, it demolishes some preconceptions and received ideas about the eating habits of the Mevlevi dervishes (for example, the fallacy of the prohibition on eating fish, considering that the writing of Ali Eref Dede includes a large amount of recipes concerning their preparation). We should also mention that the preparation of food had a special, symbolic meaning in the ideology of the Mevlevi order, insofar as the cooking process was likened to the maturation of the disciple under the guidance of his Sufi master. Keywords: Ottoman cookery book, sufism, Mevlev order of dervishes, Ali Eref Dede, 19th century.

Le trait de gastronomie dAli Eref Dede 1 , suprieur (postnin) du couvent Mevlev dEdirne, date de 1858-1859 (1275, suivant le calendrier hgirien), tant rdig peu avant ou peu aprs la nomination de son auteur la charge susmentionne, qui eut lieu en 18592.
Professeur de littrature et civilisation turques, Facult de Langues et Littratures trangres, Universit de Bucarest ; e-mail: [email protected] 1 El-fakr-l-Hakr/Hdiml-Mevlev Ali Eref [Ali Eref, le (humble) serviteur des Mevlev]. 2 Le tekke Mevlev (aujourdhui Muradiye Camii) dEdirne fut lev sur les ordres du sultan Murd II (1421-1444, 1446-1451), tant achev en 1426 ou, suivant dautres sources, 1436. Ce fut le premier tekke Mevlev (Mevlevihne) fond et financ par les Ottomans dans ce qui tait,

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Le manuscrit du trait fut dcouvert parmi dautres documents semblables donns lancien Institut de Recherches sur Mevlna (Mevlna Tetkikleri Enstits) par lun des descendants de Rm et se fait remarquer par son aspect soign, mme lgant : il est reli en cuir partiellement rouge, partiellement marbr et imprim sur un type de papier bleutre import dEurope ; ses lettres initiales sont enlumines dencre rouge. Laspect travaill du manuscrit suggre que le matre ne lavait pas conu comme un simple instrument de rfrence destin ses disciples, mais comme un ouvrage adress une audience plus large, constitue peut-tre de sympathisants Mevlev, de fins connaisseurs, et mme de gourmets. (Il ne faut pas oublier que lordre des Mevlev visait notamment les lites, dont les gots et les ressources, matrielles et financires, dpassaient de beaucoup ceux du menu peuple.) La dmarche dAli Eref Dede reprsentait sans doute une nouveaut dans les cercles Mevlev, o lenseignement spirituel continuait de rester, tout comme dans les autres milieux soufiques, essentiellement oral, parce que redevable la personne rvre du matre initiateur. Dautre part, le genre illustr par le trait dAli Eref Dede restait une raret en Turquie au milieu du XIXe sicle, et cela pour de fortes raisons : dabord, la Turquie ottomane tait lpoque une socit o la culture crite jouissait dune tradition peu solide, tant supplante, particulirement au niveau des contacts quotidiens, par loralit et, partant, la transmission orale du savoir ; ensuite, malgr les volutions dmocratiques survenues partir de 1839, l art de la bonne chre continuait dveiller plutt lintrt des lites et des lettrs que celui des gens du commun, qui se contentaient de la pratiquer, encore que souvent de manire peu raffine3. Il existe peu dinformations sur les mets et les recettes des Ottomans de jadis, particulirement sur ceux spcifiques des petites gens ; pour ce qui est de
ce moment-l, leur capitale (Ocak 2002 : 156). Ali Eref Dede Efendi aurait t nomm la tte de cette loge la suite dun concours organis Konya, du fait que lancien suprieur du dergh, Osman Dede, tait mort sans hritiers. Originaire dAydn, il fut initi au soufisme et, plus particulirement, au Mevlvisme par Osman Selhaddin Dede, le eyh du tekke Mevlev de Yenikap (Istanbul), pour passer ensuite six ans dans le couvent mre (sitne) des Mevlev Konya, auprs du eyh Said Hemdem elebi, et tre finalement introduit dans lordre par le sertabbh [ cuisinier en chef ] Nesb Dede Efendi (Halc 1992 : 79). Suivant Rdvan Canm (2007 : 306), Ali Eref Efendi aurait remplac Osman Dede, qui avait t destitu en 1276/1859 ; il garda cette dignit pendant quarante-six ans, cest--dire jusqu sa mort, survenue le 13 Ramadan 1319/le 24 janvier 1901, lge de soixante-trois ans, et fut hrit par son fils, Ahmed Selhaddin Dede (m. 1356/1937), qui devint le dernier eyh du tekke dEdirne. 3 Pourtant, lintrt pour la gastronomie ntait pas absent dans le monde musulman. Malek Chebel (1999 : 183-190) voque, par exemple, lessor de la cuisine orientale lpoque des Abbassides, cest--dire partir du IXe sicle, lorsque le genre reprsent par les livres de cuisine fut initi par le copiste Al-Warrq, avec son Kitb at-Tabkh (prcd au VIIIe sicle par les travaux dIbn Moukaff) ; le genre gastronomique fut illustr ensuite par dautres auteurs de prestige, tels Jahiz, Masdi et Miskawayh.

CUIRE LANCIENNE. QUELQUES REMARQUES SUR LE TRAIT DE GASTRONOMIE DALI EREF DEDE, POSTNIN DU TEKKE MEVLEV DEDIRNE

la cour impriale, on dispose surtout de listes daliments et dpices commands ou achets par les responsables du palais, bien que leur emploi prcis reste plus dune fois vague. Les matriaux de ce type augmentent sensiblement aux XVIIe et XVIIIe sicles, qui nous fournissent, part ces espces de listes, des dtails sur les menus quotidiens rservs aux sultans, mais aussi aux diffrentes catgories de personnes impliques dans la vie du srail, depuis les membres de lappareil bureaucratique jusquaux rsidentes du harem, aux eunuques, aux pages, etc. Sy ajoutent des menus destins habituellement aux vizirs du dvn (le conseil imprial ) et leurs suivants, des menus conus pour certains banquets ou repas dapparat (par exemple, loccasion des grandes ftes religieuses, loccasion des rceptions offertes aux ambassadeurs ou dautres htes de marque, loccasion des circoncisions ou des noces celebres dans la famille du sultan, etc.).4 Les renseignements fournis par les archives ottomanes sont compltes, surtout partir du XVIIe sicle, par les relations de certains trangers, soit de passage, soit tablis Istanbul ; une source particulirement intressante pour la vie quotidienne la cour impriale ottomane au XVIIe sicle est, par exemple, la relation dAlbertus Bobovius (Al Ufk Bey)5. Concidence ou non, cest galement partir des XVIIe et XVIIIe sicles que lon voit augmenter le nombre de demeures ottomanes pourvues de cuisines ; pour le gros du peuple, la prparation de la nourriture avait eu lieu jusque l en plein air, ce qui suggre quelle ntait pas trop laborieuse. Dans lIstanbul du XVIIe sicle, lexistence de la cuisine (matbah) constituait encore un indicateur du luxe ou, du moins, du bien-tre ; la diffrenciation fonctionnelle des pices des maisons allait devenir plus visible au XVIIIe sicle, lorsque la cuisine commena devenir une composante durable des habitations (Tanyeli 2006 : 342-343). Uur Tanyeli apprcie, juste titre, que cette tendance rvle une certaine volution de la gastronomie autrement dit, la cuisson des aliments tait devenue plus labore et exigeait des espaces et des instruments plus sophistiqus, au moins dans les villes. Bien que lentes et plutt ingales, ces transformations sont censes reflter lvolution globale de la socit et, donc, de la mentalit ottomane, devenue plus sensible lide de plaisir, de jouissance. Les contacts avec la civilisation et la mentalit occidentales ne faisaient que renforcer le got du luxe ou, du moins, dune vie plus facile ; ils se produisaient non seulement loccasion des voyages faits par les Turcs ltranger, qui restaient fatalement limits aux lites, mais aussi loccasion des voyages des Occidentaux en Turquie, notamment Istanbul vritable pitom de lOrient, la porte de tout Europen passionn d exotisme . Ces tendances et ces contacts
Voir les articles de Hedda Reindl-Kiel (2006) et Christoph K. Neumann (2006), que nous trouvons fort suggestifs du point de vue de la signification et de la codification sociales associes lalimentation dans la socit ottomane, encore que ces aspects eussent subi des mutations sensibles laube de la modernit. 5 Albertus Bobovius, Topkapi. Relation du Srail du Grand Seigneur (ed. : Annie Berthier et Stphane Yerasimos), Paris, 1999.
4

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sacclrrent au XIXe sicle, dans le contexte des reformes connues sous le nom de Tanzimat, lorsque bon nombre dtrangers dcidrent de stablir dans la capitale ottomane et de sy forger une vie nouvelle ; parmi ces coureurs daventure se trouvaient un certain nombre de restaurateurs et de traiteurs qui allaient ouvrir des restaurants alafranga, surtout dans le quartier de Pra, habit ou au moins intensment frquent par les Occidentaux. Sy ajoutrent les restaurants loccidentale ouverts par les Turcs lintention des Europens et des autochtones entichs du style de vie occidental. Dans cette atmosphre, lintrt, aussi bien commercial que livresque, pour lalimentation et le bien manger alla grandissant et ne fit quencourager les changes, voire les innovations. Confronts latmosphre concurrentielle impose par les Europens, les Turcs eurent la rvlation dun trsor quils traitaient auparavant plutt de banal, mais qui semblait faire la diffrence entre la cuisine occidentale et la cuisine orientale , qui tait dj dans lair. Ce fut, pensons-nous, largument premptoire pour lapparition des premiers livres de gastronomie en Turquie. Melcet-Tabbhn, Le refuge des cuisiniers , le premier ouvrage turc de ce genre, parut en 1260/1844, tant sign par Mehmet Kmil, enseignant lcole de Mdicine dIstanbul (depuis 1839, Mekteb-i Tbbiye-i Adliye-i hne), qui se serait inspir dun autre travail similaire, intitul Adiye Rislesi, Le trait des nourritures et des boissons 6 . Le livre de Mehmet Kmil comportait 12 chapitres et 227 recettes ; sy ajoutaient, sur les marges des pages, 46 recettes de salades, pickles et sauces, agrmentes de conseils pratiques. Les livres de gastronomie parus en Turquie dans la deuxime moiti du XIXe sicle ne firent que reproduire, dune manire ou dune autre, ce premier ouvrage imprim, qui connut 9 ditions entre 1844 et 1888/18897. Louvrage de Mehmet Kmil fut rimprim en 1997 par la maison ddition Unipro dIstanbul ; la nouvelle dition, soigne par Cneyt Kut, Turgut Kut et Gnay Kut, runit le texte originel de louvrage, en turc ottoman, sa version en turc moderne et le livre de cuisine publi par Turabi Efendi. Malheureusement, nous navons pas eu la possibilit de la consulter. Le livre de cuisine publi en anglais par Turabi Efendi (1865), qui ne faisait que reprendre louvrage de Mehmet Kmil, sadressait manifestement
6 Selon Turgut Kut ( A Bibliography of Turkish Cookery Books up to 1927 , http://www.turkish-cuisine.org/english/pages.php?ParentID=1&FirstLevel=11&PagingIndex=0), ce trait aurait t crit au XVIIIe sicle par le fils du gendre du eyhlislm Pamakzde Abdullah Efendi (m. 1145 AH/1732 AD), dont on ignore le nom; le manuscrit, aujourdhui perdu, fut tudi par Sheyl nver, qui en publia mme quelques recettes. 7 Turgut Kut, A Bibliography of Turkish Cookery Books up to 1927 , http://www.turkishcuisine.org/english/article_details.php?p_id=21&Pages=Articles&PagingIndex=1. Turgut Kut affirme avoir identifi plus de 40 livres de gastronomie publis en Turquie entre 1844-1927, en alphabet arabe ; ceux-ci constituent une source importante pour la reconstitution et la prservation de la cuisine turque traditionnelle, mais ils sont trs difficiles trouver aujourdhui, mme dans les grandes bibliothques publiques. Turgut Kut fait galement mention de 7 livres de gastronomie turque en alphabet armnien, parus entre 1871-1926.

CUIRE LANCIENNE. QUELQUES REMARQUES SUR LE TRAIT DE GASTRONOMIE DALI EREF DEDE, POSTNIN DU TEKKE MEVLEV DEDIRNE

aux occidentaux passionns de la cuisine turque, tant en quelque sorte un cho de la visite rendue Londres par le gouverneur de lgypte, Mehmet Ali Paa, en 1862. Turabi Efendi na, dailleurs, aucune prtention doriginalit ou de paternit, ainsi quil spcifie dans sa prface, plus que succincte :
I have been induced, through the persuasion of numerous friends acquainted with the East, and who have a grateful recollection of its savoury dishes, to translate the following Receipts, which I have taken the greatest pains to render accurate and concise. During the visit of the late Viceroy of Egypt to England, he gave a banquet on board his yacht, at which some of Englands fairest ladies and greatest statesmen were guests, and were unanimous in their approval of the Turkish cuisine. Emboldened by the recollection I send my little book to press, in the hope that my efforts to confer a benefit on the culinary art may not be entirely thrown away. (Turabi Efendi 1865 : Preface )

La version anglaise de Turabi Efendi renferme 253 recettes, groupes en 19 catgories, comme suit : nvi Chrblar Soups ; nvi Kbblar Kebabs, or Roast Meats ; nvi Kyl-Bsstilar Broiled Meats, &c. ; nvi Yhnilr ve Plkilr Fricassed or Stewed Meats, &c. ; nvi Kyftlr Balls of Minced Meats, &c. ; Twda Tibkh lunn Taamlar Fried Dishes ; Burk Nvndn ln Taamlar Pastry, with Meat, &c. ; nvi Bsstilar Dishes Made With Meat and Vegetables, &c. ; nvi Dlmlar Stuffed Dishes ; nvi Plwlr Pilaw, or Rice, Cooked with Meat, &c., in Various Ways ; Khmirdan Mml Sjk Ttli Taamlar Hot Sweet Pastry ; nvi Sghuk Ttlilar Cold Sweet Dishes ; nvi Kyghanalar Omelets ; nvi Slatalar Salads ; nvi Trshlar Pickles ; Myv Ttllari Stewed Fruits ; nvi Khshblar Various Kinds of Sherbets, with Fruit in Them ; nvi Shrblr Syrups ; nvi Rchllr Jams of Preserves. Les catgories de recettes mentionnes dans la traduction de Turabi Efendi se retrouvent dans bien des livres de gastronomie parus en Turquie au XIXe sicle, dont le point de dpart est gnralement le mme le livre de Mehmet Kmil, voire lAdiye Rislesi ; on les retrouve aussi dans le trait dAli Eref Dede, dont il sera question plus loin et qui comporte galement 19 catgories de recettes. Le trait de gastronomie labor par Ali Eref Dede, vraisemblablement ignor lpoque, nous semble intressant surtout parce quil fut conu dans un contexte assez diffrent par rapport aux autres. Il est difficile de savoir si lauteur tait ou non au courant de louvrage de Mehmet Kmil, son prdcesseur en la matire, car il nen fait aucune mention. Il noffre, dautre part, aucun renseignement sur le but de son travail. Vu sa qualit de matre spirituel Mevlev, on serait fort enclin tablir une certaine connexion entre sa dmarche et limportance particulire prte par les Mevlevs la cuisine, la prparation de la nourriture, aux communions alimentaires et au foyer (ocak), quils considraient comme sacr, tout comme les Bektch. Il ne faut pas oublier quune bonne partie de lentranement spirituel des futurs derviches

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Mevlev se droulait dans la cuisine du tekke o ils faisaient leur apprentissage ; les postulants y taient censs mrir linstar des aliments soumis au processus de cuisson, durant une priode de service ou bien dpreuve appele ile, tourment, supplice , qui durait mille un jours. En raison de cette posture, ils taient galement nomms matbah can, mes de la cuisine , tandis que leur entraneur spirituel portait le titre de ac ba ou ser-tabbh, cuisinier en chef 8 (Glpnarl 1977 : 223-224). Ce genre de symbolisme associ la cuisine remontait lpoque du patron de la confrrie, Mawln Jall ad-Dn ar-Rm, qui lui prtait une importance particulire et y faisait souvent rfrence : Moln compares almost everything to a kitchen : the soul, the heart, the head, the stomach, and even intellect in whose kitchen the poor Sufis remain hungry. (Schimmel 1993 : 145) Mais il sagit l de pures spculations, puisque le livret dAli Eref Dede na pas une vise ducatrice, voire initiatique explicite ; il ressemble plutt un guide pratique de gastronomie, lusage des friands , qu un ouvrage didactique rserv aux postulants Mevlev. Laspect soign du manuscrit suggre, dautre part, que celui-ci ntait pas regard comme une entreprise quelconque ; la diffrence du livre de Mehmet Kmil, qui sadressait lesprit pragmatique de la socit, il ntait pas destin limpression, donc la multiplication : du fait de sa conception, il devait rester unique. Les 19 chapitres du trait dAli Eref Dede9 sont structurs comme suit : 1. Potages aux lgumes (5 recettes) ; 2. Salades et pickles (4 recettes) ; 3. Varits de kebap (15 recettes) ; 4. Viande grille (10 recettes) ; 5. Helva et kadayf (55 recettes) ; 6. Geles lamidon et glaces (13 recettes) ; 7. Petits-fours secs [aux amandes, pistaches, etc.] (8 recettes) ; 8. Petits-fours enduits de sorbet et dautres gteaux semblables (8 recettes) ; 9. Pickles (10 recettes) ; 10. Plats base de ptes (2 recettes) ; 11. Beignets et galettes (17 recettes) ; 12. Lgumes farcis (5 recettes) ; 13. Varits daspic de mouton (paa) et boulettes daubergine (6 recettes) ; 14. Boulettes de viande (5 recettes) ; 15. Plats base dpinard et de courge (4 recettes) ; 16. Prparation de la moelle [de buf] et des ragots (12 recettes) ; 17. Varits de pilafs (11 recettes) ; 18. Nectars et compotes (18 recettes) ; 19. Manires de faire geler leau (2 recettes). Il sagit de 210 recettes au total, y compris les deux formules de prparer la glace, qui certifient une fois de plus, si besoin en tait, son importance comme moyen traditionnel de refroidissement, mais aussi de conservation des aliments10 .
Dans le tekke de Konya la loge principale des Mevlev, dsigne aussi par le syntagme Huzur-i Pr , litt. prsence du Pre fondateur , cette fonction tait remplie, de manire exceptionnelle, par le Ser-Taryk [Tarikat] Dede, savoir le suprieur de lordre. 9 Nous allons nous rapporter, dans ce qui suit, ldition de Feyzi Halc, parue en 1992 (Ali Eref Dedenin Yemek Risalesi, d. : Feyzi Halc, Atatrk Kltr Merkezi, Ankara, 1992) ; les renvois aux pages concernent la mme dition. 10 Istanbul, par exemple, la glace et la neige taient dabord charries depuis le Mont Olympe jusqu Mudanya, et ensuite transportes en bateau Istanbul.
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CUIRE LANCIENNE. QUELQUES REMARQUES SUR LE TRAIT DE GASTRONOMIE DALI EREF DEDE, POSTNIN DU TEKKE MEVLEV DEDIRNE

Observons, dautre part, la place assigne aux diffrentes varits de halva et de kadayf dans lensemble des sucreries. Le halva revtait une haute fonction symbolique parmi les Turcs, jouissant dune longue tradition ; il tait dispens de manire solennelle la fin des crmonies dinitiation pratiques par les ordres mystiques musulmans (tarikat), mais aussi durant les crmonies rserves au dpart et laccueil des troupes, au bout des campagnes militaires, lors des crmonies voues aux martyrs (ehit) et, plus tard, lors de toute crmonie funbre. Enfin, le halva jouait un rle essential dans les soi-disant helva sohbetleri, causeries du/au halva , qui reprsentaient une forme de divertissement et de socialisation hivernale fort agre dans tous les milieux sociaux (zbil 2011). Parmi les friandises mentionnes par Ali Eref Dede se retrouve le clbre rhat-i halkm11 (voir pp. 36-37) qui, suivant Zeynel zel (2011 : 171-174), tait prpar jadis uniquement dans la Helvahne-i Hassa Oca, mise au service exclusif du sultan, pour commencer ensuite, probablement la fin du XVIIIe ou au dbut du XIXe sicle, tre produit aussi par un nombre dtermin de confiseurs (ekerlemeci) autoriss, au bnfice du reste de la population (en signe, peut-tre, de la dmocratisation graduelle de lalimentation et, pas en dernier lieu, de lapparition dune logique tout fait diffrente par rapport la traditionnelle la logique concurrentielle du capitalisme naissant). part ces quelques sucreries qui puissent passer pour prtentieuses ou du moins rares, louvrage gastronomique du matre Mevlev a le mrite de nous offrir bon nombre dinformations non seulement sur les recettes dantan, mais aussi sur les lgumes et les fruits les plus communs, voire familiers ou peu coteux, les salades et les ingrdients des salades, les pickles et leur conservation, les types de viande, de poisson et de kebap les plus rputs, les sucreries traditionnelles, les varits de pain et de crales les plus accessibles, les pices les plus employes, mais aussi sur les rcipients et les ustensiles de cuisine en usage vers la moiti du XIXe sicle, en Turquie. En voici un bref inventaire, qui nous parat assez parlant des ressources, mais aussi des gots (au propre, comme au figur) de lpoque : Rcipients et ustensiles de cuisine : cuillres (kak), cuillres en bois (aa eli), louches (kepe), passoires (kevgir), mortiers en pierre (ta dibek), mortiers en bois (aa havan) et, plus spcialement, en bois de buis (imir el dibei), mortiers en marbre (mermer havan), tamis de cuisine, plus ou moins serrs (ince elek, kl elek, krbal), gouttoirs de gaze (seyrek astar), assiettes (tabak), bols (kse), casseroles (sahan), terrines et marmites (ge/gye/gve), plats de cuisson (tbe), cuelles (mlek), plateaux [creux et ronds] en cuivre (lenger, tepsi), couteaux (bak), pinces (maa), rouleaux ptisserie
Varit de confiserie dont la composition pouvait comporter de lamidon, du sucre (dans les poques plus recules, du miel), des amandes, des pistaches, des noisettes, de la crme, etc.
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(oklava), planches ptisserie (tahta), ptrins (tekne), bassins et bassines (leen), chiches (i) pour les kbaps, trpieds de cuisine (sa aya/sacaya), cruches en mtal (ibrik), bocaux (kavanoz), tonneaux et barriques (fuu, f). La plupart des instruments voqus plus haut semblent assez simples, de peu de valeur, tant confectionns de bois, de cuivre, de pierre, de marbre et, parfois, de terre cuite. Ils sont multifonctionnels, faciles utiliser, pratiques et se retrouvaient certainement dans bien des cuisines turques au XIXe sicle, sans avoir subi trop de changements au cours du temps ; de ce point de vue, on pourrait parler dune certaine atemporalit des outils. pices et fines herbes : poivre (bber/biber), menthe (nan), persil (midenos), safran (zaferan), cannelle (dr- in), cumin (kimon/kimyon), cardamome (kakule), anis (enison/anason), feuilles de laurier (tefne), feuilles de myrte (mersin yapra), feuilles de citron et de limette (limon ve turun yapra), coriandre (kini/kini), eau de rose (glb) et eau de fleurs doranger (iek suyu) employes notamment pour la prparation des sucreries , mastic (sakz), nigelle cultive ou cumin noir (am nebat), clous de girofle (karanfil/karangil), musc (misk), moutarde (hardal), salptre (gherile). Il est remarquer que certaines des pices et, surtout, des fines herbes mentionnes plus haut (le persil, lanis, le thym, la menthe) ne se retrouvent pas parmi les plantes aromatiques commandes par les intendants des cuisines du palais imprial, ainsi quil ressort de ltude de Christoph Neumann (2006) ; elles auraient pu tre cultives dans les jardins de celui-ci, ce qui ne serait pas une chose inhabituelle. Le persil et la menthe figurent en change dans le livre de gastronomie sign par Turabi Efendi. Crales, produits drivs de crales et plats base de crales : bl (kekeklik buday), farine de bl (buday unu), riz (pirin) et farine de riz (pirin unu), amidon (niasta), semoule (irmik/irmik unu), pilaf (pilav), pilaf de vermicelles (ehriye pilav). Il est remarquer quil ny a aucune mention du mas (msr), du seigle (avdar) et de lorge (arpa). Le mas12 fit son apparition
Le nom turc du mas (msr) est redevable lgypte, do la plante se serait propage en Turquie, via Syrie, au XVIe sicle (Eren 1999 : 295). Suivant Ellen Messer (2000 : 97), le mas, originaire de lAmrique du Sud, fut introduit dans lEurope tempre, de mme quen Asie et en Afrique, aux XVIe et XVIIe sicles. Il fit son apparition en Europe grce Christophe Colomb, en 1492-1493, et fut mentionn pour la premire fois en tant que crale cultive en 1500, Sville, do il se rpandit dans le reste de la Pninsule Ibrique. En Europe, o il connut une expansion plus rapide et plus facile que la pomme de terre, il fut gnralement dsign par des syntagmes que nous considrons fort parlants de sa perception comme crale trangre et qui, dautre part, trahissent souvent ses filires de transmission dans les rgions respectives : Spreading across Europe, maize acquired a series of binomial labels, each roughly translated as foreign grain: in Lorraine and in the Vosges, maize was Roman corn; in Tuscany, Sicilian corn; in Sicily, Indian corn; in the Pyrenees, Spanish corn; in Provence, Barbary corn or Guinea corn; in Turkey, Egyptian corn; in Egypt, Syrian dourra (i.e., sorghum); in England, Turkish wheat or Indian corn; and in Germany, Welsch corn or Bactrian typha. The French bl de Turquie
12

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dans les cuisines impriales vers la moiti du XIXe sicle, sous le nom de msr- buday (Samanc 2006 : 197), mais neut pas le mme succs que le bl et le riz ; aujourdhui encore, il reste moins populaire en Turquie que dautres crales. On lemploie notamment dans certaines rgions du pays (par exemple, sur la cte de la Mer Noire, o il entre dans la composition dune sorte de pain appel msr ekmei ou de certains gteaux o la farine de mas remplace la farine de bl). Varits de pains : pain blanc (francala), pain du souverain (hnkri has ekmek) et une varit de pte phyllo (yufka). Varits de viandes : volaille (tavuk), mouton et agneau (koyun, kuzu), veau [peu mentionn, puisque cher], viscres comestibles, tels le foie, les poumons et les tripes de moutons, le foie de poule et le pieds de mouton (paa). Varits de kebab : chiche-kebab de volaille (tavuk kebab), chiche-kebab de mouton ou dagneau prpar avec du lait (st kebab), chiche-kebab avec de la viande de poule mince (krma tavuk kebab), chiche-kebab aux petits morceaux de viande (kuba kebab)13, tas kebab [petits morceaux de viande et de lgumes cuits ltouffe], kebap aux dattes (hurma kebab), kbab cuit au four (frn kebab), chiche-kebab au foie de mouton ou dagneau (cier kebab), chiche-kebab du boucher [kasap kebab espce de rti de viande de mouton hache et assaisonne dherbes aromatiques, puis ensevelie dans du suif et cuite dans une casserole ou terrine], chiche-kebab en cuelle [mlek kebab sorte de kebab de mouton, cuit dans une cuelle ou, faute de mieux, dans une casserole, accompagn de gombos, daubergines, de courgettes, doignon et assaisonne dherbes aromatiques]. On pourrait y associer, en tant que plat spcifique, peru en Turquie comme gourmandise , mais plutt ignor, sinon abhorr en Occident, laspic de pieds de mouton (paa). Varits de poissons : mulets (kefal), barbeaux truits (levrek), sardines (sardalya, conserves en t par salaison et appeles Istanbul et dans les les environnantes, en raison de leur got sal, turu), anchois (inivye/anuvez), turbots (kalkan bal) et foie de turbot grill, maquereaux (uskumru), tassergals (lfer), poissons-pes ou espadons (kln bal), poissons deau douce (terhos/terkos bal), voqus de manire hyperonymique et probablement moins apprcis, vu leur odeur dsagrable. Ajoutons-y le caviar (haviar saltas).
(Turkish wheat) and a reference to a golden-and-white seed of unknown species introduced by Crusaders from Anatolia (in what turned out to be a forged Crusader document) encouraged the error that maize came from western Asia, not the Americas. (Messer 2000 : 105). 13 Les kebabs taient enduits dhuiles aromatiques et dautres pices en se servant de plumes de poules tavuk yelei.

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Le trait dAli Eref Dede, renfermant plusieurs recettes concernant la cuisson des poissons, dont il parat dailleurs entich, dmolit certaines ides reues au sujet des tabous alimentaires des Mevlev, qui ont fait couler beaucoup dencre et ont provoqu maintes spculations14 ; Ali Eref Dede parle de poissons en connaisseur et en suggre plusieurs manires de cuisson (il en va de mme pour la prparation de la salade de caviar ) il se comporte comme un vritable expert en la matire, non pas comme un matre Mevlev soucieux dloigner ses disciples de la mauvaise chair des cratures de leau. On pourrait sinterroger sur la source du malentendu en question. Mawln Jall ad-Dn ar-Rm, invoqu parfois par ses adeptes pour justifier telle ou telle option comportementale, ne parat pas avoir prouv de lapprhension pour les poissons. Prenons lappui de cette thse une anecdote tire de la traduction franaise de louvrage dAflk, suivant laquelle Mawln ( le Matre ) aurait dit une fois, au sujet des poissons :
Notre histoire est parvenue jusquaux poissons dans la mer ; le bouillonnement des eaux a apport mille vagues. Dans un autre endroit, il a dit encore : Les poissons connaissent notre directeur spirituel, tandis que nous en sommes loin ; ce bonheur, nous sommes des rprouvs, eux des lus . (Cl. Huart 1922 : 31)

Lorsque les circonstances et notamment les conditions naturelles le permettent, les gens qui entourent Mawln soccupent galement de la pche, qui semble un emploi de temps tout fait habituel et ne suscite aucun commentaire dprciatif :
Les anciens amis ont racont que le cheikh alh-eddn se trouvait avec son pre et sa mre dans le village de Kmil, aux environs de Qonya; ils employaient leur temps pcher du poisson dans le lac de celle localit. (Ibidem : 195)

Les proches ou les disciples de Mawln le prsentent parfois comme tant fort enclin lascse, quil recommande aussi ses disciples15. Pourtant, il
14

Les Mevlev/Mawlaw ne sont pas les seuls musulmans rputs pour ce genre dintolrance, dont les explications sont les plus diverses ; ni les Bekt, notamment les plus bigots dentre eux, ne mangent pas du poisson ; les Alaw (autrefois, Nusayr) vitent certaines espces de poissons. Pourtant, les cratures de la mer sont clairement mentionnes dans le Coran parmi les aliments licites (V : 96). 15 Par exemple, Sipehslr, disciple du pre de Mawln et ensuite de Mawln mme (les informations ce sujet restent plutt obscures), qui rdigea une sorte de mmorial consacr aux dires et aux exploits de celui-ci, met en exergue lattachement de son matre chri pour le jene et gnralement la continence, regards comme exemples duvre pie, de dtachement de la vie et des biens terrestres, sur la voie de Dieu (voir le chapitre intitul Orucu, Mcahedesi ve Alna Dair, Sur son jene, son combat et sa faim , 1977 : 45-49). Sipehslr (litt. comandant ), dont le nom rel tait Ferdn bin Ahmed, Ferdn, fils dAhmed , serait mort, selon les traditions Mevlev/Mawlaw, vers 1312, cest--dire peu avant ou peu aprs la mort du fils an de Mevln, Sultn Walad/Veled. La majeure partie de son uvre, qui fut probablement acheve

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ne semble pas dtach de la gastronomie et, en outre, prouve un vif intrt pour tout ce qui sadresse aux sens, y compris le got et lodorat ; qui plus est, il conoit lacte de manger comme un vritable symbole de la nourriture spirituelle : We can safely assert that Rumis imagery is filled, to an amazing extent, with images taken from the kitchen, although he always calls his disciples to fasting to the extent of starving, and spent many years in strict fasting discipline. (Schimmel 1993 : 138). Les allusions alimentaires parsemes dans ses vers nous permettent donc de nous forger une image sur les aliments les plus communs Konya, au XIIIe sicle, car Mawln voque des produits, des mets, des ingrdients et des armes extrmement divers, tels le tutma (sorte de vermicelles prpars avec de la viande et du yaourt), les potages, le kebap, les tripes, les pickles, les pois chiches, les petits-pois, loignon, lail, le riz, le bulgur, le pain, laubergine, lpinard, le navet, le lait, le fromage, le beurre, la grenade, la pche, la pomme, le kadayf, le halva (aliment de prdilection dans les cercles initiatiques), le sel, le sucre, le musc, etc. (Schimmel 1993 : 138-145). Varits de lgumes : oignon (soan) et jus doignon (soan suyu), ail (sarmsk/sarmsak), pois chiches (nohut), pinard (spanah/spanak), gombos (bamya), aubergines (badncan/patlcan), fves (bakla), cleri (kerefis/kereviz), carottes (havu), haricots blancs (brlce), poireaux (prasa), citrouilles (kitre). Il serait remarquer labsence de quelques lgumes trs populaires aujourdhui en Turquie, tels les tomates rouges et vertes, les haricots verts, les asperges, les pommes de terre qui, suivant zge Samanc (2006 : 197), auraient t adopts par les lites ottomanes vers la moiti du XIXe sicle16. Labsence des tomates dans les menus du palais imprial ottoman jusquau XIXe sicle17 contredit lide avance par Edgar Anderson, suivant laquelle les tomates auraient t, pendant des sicles, un lgume de prdilection ou, de moins, de base en Turquie, comme dans les Balkans (grce linfluence des Turcs), en Iran, en Arabie et en Ethiopie18. Il nen reste pas moins vrai que les tomates
aprs sa mort par son fils ou par quelquun dautre, fut emprunte par ams ad-Dn Ahmad Aflk dans son Mmorial des Saints (Manqb al-refn), commenc vers 1318 et achev en 1353. 16 Il en alla de mme pour certains fruits exotiques comme les bananes, le kiwi et lananas (Samanc 2006 : 198). 17 Suivant zge Samanc (2006 : 196-197), les tomates auraient t adoptes par le palais imprial en 1830 (donc, lpoque de Mahmut II), aprs avoir t consommes au dbut, tout comme en Occident, en tant que tomates vertes ; le fruit mr veillait, semblait-il, la mfiance des possibles amateurs, car il tait peru comme altr. 18 [Edgar] Anderson has noted that there is a wide and apparently coherent area, encompassing the Balkans and Turkey and running along the edge of Iran toward Arabia and Ethiopia, where the tomato has been used for centuries in the everyday diet of common people. (Long 2000 : 357). Edgar Anderson, cit par Janet Long, apprcie que la tomate fut diffuse dans le Levant et dans les Balkans par les Turcs au XVIe sicle, lorsque lEmpire ottoman dominait la rgion, aprs avoir t dcouverte dans les ports italiens et espagnols. Ce scnario nous parat hasardeux : dabord, les tomates semblent avoir t introduites en Europe par les Espagnols

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(rouges et vertes) et le jus de tomates apparaissent dans plusieurs recettes reproduites par Turabi Efendi dans son livre19, sans donner limpression quil sagit dun lgume exotique . Pour ce qui est des pommes de terre 20 , omniprsentes dans les menus contemporains, elles semblent peu assimiles par la gastronomie autochtone lpoque en question 21 ; plus encore, on dirait quelles sont largement supplantes par laubergine, qui savre beaucoup plus rpandue dans toute la gastronomie du Moyen-Orient22. Salades et ingrdients des salades : laitue dite romaine (marul saltas), enrichie parfois de feuilles de radis (Trk otu), de fleurs de rose, de gainier ou de cognassier (gl/erguvan/ayva icei). Pickles : cornichons, courgettes, chou, navet, ail, piment, aubergine, ainsi que des mlanges de lgumes, conservs surtout dans du vinaigre. Fruits : citrons (limon) et jus de citron (b- limon), cerises (kiraz), griottes (vine), cassis (ku zm), raisins de Smyrne (zmir siyah), grenades (nar), raisins verts (koruk), chtaignes [rties] ([kavrulmu] kestane), cornouilles (kzlck),
seulement la fin du XVIe ou, plutt, au dbut du XVIIe sicle ; ensuite, elles commencrent tre cultives dans les Balkans surtout au XIXe sicle. 19 Par exemple, dans celles des i kebap recette 12, p. 4, domatesli kzartma yahni recette 44, p. 14, sr eti yahnisi recettes 45-46, p. 15, gve bal recette 48, p. 16, uskumru balndan papaz yahnisi recettes 49-50, pp. 16-17, gve basts recette 100, p. 33, domates dolmas recette 116, p. 40, domates pilav recette 127, p. 44, midiye pilv recette 133, p. 46). 20 Les pommes de terre, originaires de lAmrique du Sud, semblent avoir gagn lEurope, via lEspagne, vers 1570, pour se rpandre ensuite en Italie, dans les Pays-Bas et en Angleterre (Messer 2000a : 190). 21 Une seule occurrence chez Turabi Efendi (recette 45, p. 15), aucune occurrence chez Ali Eref Dede. zge Samanc (2006 : 197-198) affirme que les pommes de terre commencent figurer parmi les acquisitions du palais imprial ottoman vers la moiti du XIXe sicle, mais en quantits limites, ce qui conduit la conclusion quelles taient offertes notamment aux htes trangers. Suivant Helmuth van Moltke, les pommes de terre taient connues Istanbul depuis 1835, sans pourtant avoir diffus dans les autres rgions de la Turquie. 22 The aubergine (eggplant), for example, is omnipresent on Middle Eastern tables. The Turks claim they know more than 40 ways of preparing this vegetable. It can be smoked, roasted, fried, or mashed for a poor mans caviar. According to a Middle Eastern saying, to dream of three aubergines is a sign of happiness. (Roger 1999 : 1142). Known in much of the world as aubergine and in the Middle East as poor-mans-caviar, the vegetable (technically a fruit) is native to southern and eastern Asia and was only introduced into Europe (by the Arabs via Spain) during the Middle Ages. It is a member of the nightshade family, which includes the potato, and has a reputation for bitterness, but is so versatile it can be fried, grilled, boiled, baked, deep-fried, stuffed, or stewed that its flavor changes with different methods of preparation, and in some cuisines (and diets) the eggplant, with its fleshy texture, takes the place of meat. Eggplant is the star in many famous dishes, such as the moussaka of Greece and the eggplant parmigiana of Italy. Although not especially nutritious, th eggplant is a good source of folic acid. ( A Dictionary of the Worlds Plant Foods , dans Keneth F. Kiple / Kriemhild Cone Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food II, 1999 : 1770).

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abricots (kays), prunes (erik), prunes de Mardin (Mardin erii), prunes de lle de Chio (Bardaa erii), prunes dAmasya et de Pozia, pommes (elma), poires (armut), oranges (portakal), fruits du laurier-cerise (taflan ou kara yemi), pignons (am fst), figues (incir), razyan/reazdene/rezzaki/razzki zm [espce de raisins blancs grains longs], dattes (hurma), noix (cevaz/ceviz), noisettes (fndk), amandes (badem), pistaches (fstk/am fst), noix de coco (cevz-i bevvy). Notons la large varit de fruits, y inclus les fruits secs/schs (kuru yemi), trs agrs par les Turcs et consums sous toutes les formes possibles (verts et mrs, frais et schs, confits, cuits sous forme de compotes, confitures, geles, marmelades, au sirop, sous forme de jus ou sirop, sous forme de fruits confis, etc.). Les fruits mentionns par Ali Eref Dede nous sont, pour la plupart, familiers, parce quacclimats dans bien des rgions du monde et, pour la plupart, peu prtentieux23. Notons, pourtant, lutilisation diffrente rserve certaines varits du mme fruit, lgume, poisson, etc., suivant leurs qualits matresses, ce qui constitue une constante de la cuisine et, finalement, du palais fin des gourmet turcs :
Millennia have worked to refine the Turkish palate. In Istanbul, the people choose their drinking water as others would choose their wine. A sip suffices to identify the spring from which the water comes. And the proverb says, choose your friend by the taste of his food. In Turkey you never order peaches. You must specify whether you want Bursa peaches or Izmir peaches. When you want fish you must specify its age. inakok is a generation younger then lfer. Torik is a year older the Palamut. This sensitivity to nuance reflects the Turkish aesthetic approach to food. (Neet Eren 1982 : 14)

Izzet Sak (2006 : 145) et zge Samanc (2006 : 198) remarquent la mme sensibilit gustative au niveau du palais imprial ottoman, qui accordait une grande importance au lieu de provenance des fruits, peru lpoque comme une sorte de marque ; on arrivait ainsi consommer ou employer dans la cuisson quatre-cinq varits de prunes ou de raisins, suivant leur saveur dominante (douce, cre, plus ou moins parfume, etc.), qui devait se marier la nature du repas ou du plat prpar. Sucreries : gteaux du type kadayf ou baklava, aure [sorte de plat doux, prpar de graines de crales, de sucre, de raisins, etc.], gll [sorte de sucrerie prpare de gaufrettes fourres de noix, noisettes, pistaches et sirop de lait aromatis de leau de rose], halva (helva) 24 , gele (palde/palze/pelte), pure damandes (badem ezmesi), pain de Gnes/gnois (spanya ekmei), pekmez
23 En tudiant les acquisitions du palais imprial ottoman en matire de fruits et de fleurs vers la moiti du XVIIIe sicle, Izzet Sak (2006 : 142-145) constate peu de changements en ce qui concerne les varits de fruits consumes et leurs emplois entre les XVIe-XIXe sicles. 24 Y compris la varit connue sous le nom de gaziler helvas (pp. 26-27), qui apparat galement chez Turabi Efendi (recette 163, p. 55).

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[mlasse prpare avec du jus de raisins], hmeri [homerim, espce de sucrerie prpare avec du fromage frais, non-sal, de la farine et du sucre ou du miel]. Produits lacts : lait (leben, r, st), yogourt en outre (torba yourdu), crme (kaymak), lor peynir [fromage frais fait de lait de chvre], ayr peyniri [espce de fromage frais], fromage en outre (tulum peyniri), fromage frais, non-sal espce de caillebotte (teleme). Ingrdients employs pour la prparation des aliments au chaud : sel (tuz), trs important non seulement dans la prparation des mets, mais aussi pour son poids symbolique, huile dolives (rugan-i zeyt/zeyt ya), dont lemploi dans la cuisine turque tait plutt de frache date25, beurre (rugan- sade), dont lemploi remontait trs loin dans le temps, vu le pass nomade et loccupation de prdilection des Turcs anciens, savoir llevage du btail, miel (asel/bal), sucre (eker/eker-i kanid), y compris le sucre vgtal (nebat ekeri) (glucose?)26, vinaigre (sirke), eau de pois chiches (nohut-ab), employ dans la prparation de certains mets. Boissons : boza [boisson base de grains de crales ferments], salep (sahlep), sorbet (erbet), mot (zm ras), tisane de camomille (papatya suyu). Ali Eref Dede indique de manire trs mticuleuse les quantits des ingrdients entrant dans la composition des plats (en kyye/okka = 1.282 grammes ou en dirhem = 3.25 grammes, suivant le cas) ; il remarque, en outre, que lemploi de ces mesures de masse est plus prcis que la mthode proportionnelle, impliquant lemploi de certains rcipients de cuisine, tels les bols, les cuelles, etc. (p. 21). Observons que les units de masse savrent toujours problmatiques lorsquil sagit de sadresser un public ou un lecteur autre que lhabituel. Cette question est dcele correctement dans maints livres de gastronomie turque sadressant aux Occidentaux ; cest pourquoi Turabi Efendi noublie pas dajouter sa traduction un petit tableau de correspondance concernant les units de masse. Neet Eren 27 , dont le livre de cuisine lintention des
Il fut longtemps employ seulement dans la prparation du savon et dans lclairage domestique. Lemploi du miel dans la prparation des sucreries tait traditionnel, alors que, du moins pour les poques plus recules, le sucre, notamment celui de canne, tait plus cher et comptait pour un article de lux, rserve aux lites. 27 Neet Eren, ne en 1915, tait la fille de Nzhet Baba, le dernier eyh du tekke Bekt de Rumelihisar, connu sous les noms de Nfi Baba Tekkesi et ehitlik Dergh. Son arrire-grand-pre fut Nfi Baba, clbre lpoque pour la vivacit de son esprit et pour sa bonhomie. Elle passa ses annes les plus tendres dans le tekke de Rumelihisar (habit par sa famille jusquen 1943), o elle eut loccasion de se familiariser non seulement avec les repres du style de vie traditionnel, mais aussi avec la cuisine turque classique : Our home was the headquarters of the Bektai Order of Dervies of which my family were the heads. We lived in a large mansion on a steep hill overlooking the Bosporus. From my window in Europe I could see across to the houses in Asia.
26 25

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Occidentaux paratra cent ans aprs la traduction de Turabi Efendi, semble plus relaxe ce sujet puisque sadressant aux Amricains, elle emploie les mesures de poids anglo-saxonnes (onces, livres, etc.) ; lorsque possible, elle indique des quantits de bon sens , telles une cuillere de , une tasse de , un petit oignon , etc. Ali Eref Dede offre galement des conseils aux cuisiniers, introduits de manire explicite, par le vocable tenbih, litt. conseil ; ceux-ci montrent, une fois de plus, le caractre plutt pragmatique de son ouvrage. En voici quelques exemples : (a) Les poissons et les autres plats cuits en terrine sont plus savoureux que ceux qui sont cuits dans des rcipients en cuivre (pp. 7-8) ; (b) La viande prparer par nimporte quel moyen doit tre expose et laisse attendre dans un endroit assez froid et ar, avant dtre cuite. Dautre part, lorsquon grille la viande et lorsque la graisse commence se liqufier, il est recommandable de lenduire, chaque fois que lon retourne les morceaux de viande sur le gril, dune couche fine de farine, afin den faire absorber la graisse (p. 10) ; (c) Il est recommandable de rouler les poissons dans de la farine avant de les mettre sur le gril (p. 11) ; (d) Lodeur dsagrable dgage par certains espces de poissons, tels le mulet et le maquereau, lorsque mis sur le gril disparat sils sont plongs lavance dans de leau bouillante (p. 11) ; (e) Le citron et le jus de citron ne sont point recommandables pour la prparation chaud, car ils entranent un got dsagrable ; en change, ils peuvent tre remplacs par le vinaigre (p. 11) ; (f) Un certain ingrdient peut tre remplac par un autre (par exemple, dans le cas de helv-y shakiye, on peut substituer la farine de riz lamidon p. 30). Sy ajoutent dautres remarques sur les qualits fortifiantes de certains aliments ou plats, surtout en hiver (pp. 34-35), ou sur les manires de cuisson dittique (Ali Eref Dede prcise plusieurs reprises que certaines mthodes de cuire les aliments ou les sucreries sont plus convenables la digestion). De surcrot, le eyh Mevlev prcise parfois que certains plats ou certaines recettes proviennent du palais imprial (comme il advient, par exemple, dans le cas dune mixture fort conseille pour augmenter son immunit en hiver, prsente par la formule Saray- Hmayundan muhare memzuc skkeri yumurta, mixture sucre aux ufs issue du Palais Imprial p. 34). Le vocabulaire du trait est assez simple et direct ; on y remarque, par endroits, un certain soin dviter les rptitions fcheuses, pourtant ncessaires pour la clart de lexpos. Le turc ottoman (osmanl), avec son htrognit intrinsque, permettait souvent la substitution dun terme dorigine turque par un synonyme dorigine arabe ou persane, ce qui tait non seulement souhaitable, mais aussi fort conseill et considr dans le registre soign. Ali Eref Dede semble se souvenir
We kept open house day and night to all the members of the sect who came our way. We never knew how many would sit around the table or sleep under the roof. As I think about it now it must have been a veritable challenge to any cook to cater for a constantly unknown number of guests. And we were supposed to serve a good meal. (Eren 1982 : 11).

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LUMINIA MUNTEANU

parfois de cette exigence, puisquil lui arrive demployer des synonymes du mme vocable, tels skker (> arabe) et eker (> persan), pour le sucre ; leben (> arabe), r (> persan) et st (> turc), pour le lait ; rugan-i zeyt (du persan rawgan, huile, graisse, beurre ) et zeyt ya (du turc ya, synonyme parfait de rugan), pour lhuile dolives ; asel (> arabe) et bal (> turc), pour le miel. En conclusion, louvrage du postnin Mevlev dEdirne nous parat comparable aux livres de cuisine contemporains, exception faite du vocabulaire, qui reste fatalement dat, puisque redevable au turc ottoman ; il donne limpression que ce genre douvrages na pas beaucoup chang au cours des sicles. Il apporte, dautre part, une contribution remarquable la reconstitution et, aussi, la prservation de la gastronomie turque traditionnelle, dont la varit et la richesse sont hautement redevables lesprit accommodant, rceptif de la civilisation dont elle est issue.

BIBLIOGRAPHIE

Albertus, Bobovius (1999), Topkapi. Relation du Srail du Grand Seigneur (d.: Annie Berthier et Stphane Yerasimos), Sindbad Actes Sud, Paris. Ald o gan, Yazgl (2011 ), Bekta i Ailesin in Kz , con su lt d an s 10.12 .201 1 : http://www.posta.com.tr/cumartesipostasi/HaberDetay/Bektasi-ailesinin-kizi.htm?ArticleID=91204 Algar, Ayla (1992), Food in the Life of the Tekke , dans Raymond Lifchez (d.), The Dervish Lodge: Architecture, Art, and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey, University of California Press, Berkeley-Los Angeles-Oxford, pp. 296-303. Canim, Ridvan (2007), Edirne Muradiye Mevlevhanesi ve Edirneli Mevlevi airler , Trk Kltr, Edebiyat ve Sanatnda Mevlna ve Mevlevlik (Bildiriler), SMAM Yaynlar : 1 / Bildiriler Serisi: 1, pp. 285-326. Chebel, Malek (1999), Trait du raffinement, Payot et Rivages, Paris. Eren, Hasan (1999), Trk Dilinin Etimolojik Szl, Bizim Bro Basm Evi, Ankara. Eren, Neet (1982), The Art of Turkish Cooking or, Delectable Delights of Topkapi, Abajoli Matbaacilik ve Ticaret Kollektif irketi, Izmir. Faroqhi, Suraiya (2005), Food, Drink and Sociability , dans Suraiya Faroqhi, Subjects of the Sultan. Culture and Daily Life in the Ottoman Empire, I.B. Tauris, Londres-New York, pp. 204-221. Faroqhi, Suraiya, Christoph K. Neumann (d.) (2006), Soframz Nur, Hanemiz Mamur. Osmanl Maddi Kltrnde Yemek ve Barnak, Kitap Yaynevi, Istanbul. Ferdn, Bin Ahmed-I Sipehslr (1977), Mevln ve Etrafndakiler. Risle (trad. Tahsin Yazc), Tercman, Istanbul. Glpinarli, Abdlbki (1953), Mevlnadan sonra Mevlevlik, nklap Kitabevi, Istanbul. Glpinarli, Abdlbki (1977), Tasavvuftan Dilimize Geen Deyimler ve Ataszleri, nklp ve Aka Kitabevleri, Istanbul. Halici, Feyzi (d.) (1992), Ali Eref Dedenin Yemek Risalesi, Atatrk Kltr Merkezi, Ankara. Halici, Feyzi (1992), nsz , dans Halici, Feyzi (d.), Ali Eref Dedenin Yemek Risalesi, Atatrk Kltr Merkezi, Ankara, pp. IX-XII. Huart, Claude (d. ; trad.), (1922), Les Saints des Derviches Tourneurs, rcits traduits du persan et annots, II, ditions Ernest Leroux, Paris. Kiple, Keneth F., Kriemhild Cone Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food I : 2000, II : 1999, Cambridge University Press, New York.

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Kut, Turgut [2011], A Bibliography of Turkish Cookery Books up to 1927 , http://www.turkishcuisine.org/english/pages.php?ParentID=1&FirstLevel=11&PagingIndex=0, http://www.turkishcuisine.org/english/article_details.php?p_id=21&Pages=Articles&PagingIndex=1 (consult : 08.08.2012). Lifchez, Raymond (d.) (1992), The Dervish Lodge: Architecture, Art, and Sufism in Ottoman Turkey, University of California Press, Berkeley-Los Angeles-Oxford. Long, Janet (2000), Tomatoes , dans Keneth F. Kiple, Kriemhild Cone Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food I, Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 351-358. Messer, Ellen (2000), Maize , dans Keneth F. Kiple, Kriemhild Cone Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food I, Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 97-112. Messer, Ellen (2000a), Potatoes (White) , dans Keneth F. Kiple, Kriemhild Cone Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food I, Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 187-201. Ocak, Ahmet Yaar (2002), Trkiye Tarihinde Merkezi ktidar ve Mevleviler (XIII-XVIII. Yzyllar) (Ksa Bir Yaklam Denemesi) , dans Ahmet Yaar Ocak, Trk Sufiliine Baklar, letiim Yaynlar, Istanbul, pp. 148-159. zbil, Alev (2011), Edirnenin Gaziler Helvas ve Helva Sohbetleri , Acta Turcica III, 1/1, pp. 57-62. zl, Zeynel (2011), Osmanl Saray ekerleme Ve ekerlemecileri le lgili Notlar , Trk Kltr ve Hac Bekta Veli Aratrma Dergisi, 58, pp. 171-190. Neumann, Christoph K. (2006), 18. Yzyl Osmanl Saray Mutfanda Baharat , dans Suraiya Faroqhi, Christoph K. Neumann (d.), Soframz Nur, Hanemiz Mamur. Osmanl Maddi Kltrnde Yemek ve Barnak, Istanbul, pp. 149-184. Reindl-Kiel, Hedda (2006), Cennet Taamlar. 17 Yzyl Ortalarnda Osmanl Saraynda Resmi Ziyafetler , dans Suraiya Faroqhi, Christoph K. Neumann (d.), Soframz Nur, Hanemiz Mamur. Osmanl Maddi Kltrnde Yemek ve Barnak, Istanbul, pp. 55-109. Roger, Delphine (1999), The History and Culture of Food and Drink in Asia , dans Keneth F. Kiple, Kriemhild Cone Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food II, Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 1140-1151. Sak, Izzet (2006), Osmanl Saraynn ki Aylk Meyve ve iek Masraf , Tarih Aratrmalar Dergisi, 25 (40), pp. 141-176. Samanci, zge (2006), 19. Yzyln kinci Yarsnda Osmanl Elitinin Yeme-me Alkanlklar , dans Suraiya Faroqhi, Christoph K. Neumann (d.), Soframz Nur, Hanemiz Mamur. Osmanl Maddi Kltrnde Yemek ve Barnak, Istanbul, pp. 185-207. Schimmel, Annemarie (1993), The Triumphal Sun : A Study of the Works of Jalloddin Rumi, State University of New York Press, Albany. Tanyeli, Uur (2006), Osmanl Metropollerinde Evlerin Konfor ve Lks Normlar , dans Suraiya Faroqhi, Christoph K. Neumann (d.), Soframz Nur, Hanemiz Mamur. Osmanl Maddi Kltrnde Yemek ve Barnak, Istanbul, pp. 333-352. Turabi Efendi (d. ; trad.), (1865), The Turkish Cookery Book : A Collection of Receipts from the Best Turkish Authorities, Wm. H. Allen & CO., Londres. *** Trk Halk Kltr Aratrmalar (Turkish Folk Culture Researches) (1990) : 1. Trk Mutfa zel Says (Special Volume of Turkish Cooking). *** A Dictionary of the Worlds Plant Foods, dans Keneth F. Kiple, Kriemhild Con Ornelas (d.), The Cambridge World History of Food II : 1999, Cambridge University Press, New York, pp. 1711-1886.

ANTIQUIT ET ACTUALIT : PERCEPTION DU TEMPS CHEZ GHEORGHE CRCIUN

ALEXANDRA CIOCRLIE

ANTIQUITY AND ACTUALITY: THE PERCEPTIONS OF TIME IN GHEORGHE CRCIUNS WRITING

George Crciuns novel Compunere cu paralele inegale (Composition With Uunequal Parallel Bars) imbricates four modern variants of the antique story of Daphnis And Chloe. His narrative has a contemporary plot, revolving around the theme of couple relationships, and is located in Romania, in the 1980s. He organizes his narrative in a pattern consisting of two parallel temporal dimensions which imply opposite meanings of love in order to contrast the antiquity of contemporaneous world with the utopia of banality. The Romanian author reinvents the most successful Greek novel of love story according to the sensibility of the modern reader. He keeps the flavor of the original writing, but he intervenes by correcting the obsolete and weak parts of the Greek masterpiece. Gheorghe Crciuns erudite and complex Compunere cu paralele inegale is written with an artful style and is meant to be a manifesto against the platitude of the contemporary love stories, by focusing on ideality and depth of feeling. Keywords: Greek novel / modern novel, antiquity / actuality, utopia / banality, intertextuality.

Dans sa Composition aux parallles ingales, Gheorghe Crciun intercalle quatre pures pour Longos en fait des rcritures du roman antique Daphnis et Chlo parmi ses textes qui, inspirs de la ralit immdiate, fixent diffrentes hypostases de la relation de couple dans la Roumanie des annes 1980. Pourquoi avoir choisi loeuvre de Longos? Il sen explique dans le chapitre intitul Cent quatre-vingt minutes: sur quelques pages de son carnet, Vlad tefan, alter ego de lauteur, avoue sa joie davoir dcouvert le charme idyllique de la pastorale grecque qui fait contrepoids labsence dillusions qui pse sur les histoires damour de notre temps : Quel choc pour mes attentes dhomme moderne! Voil un roman damour qui sur nous autres, enfants de notre temps, aurait les meilleurs effets. Trop de convulsions, trop de regrets, trop de souffrance chez les amants contemporains! () O est passe la si ncessaire utopie rotique? Le journal de Crciun (qui va du 4 aot au 2 octobre 1985) confirme son
Chercheur lInstitut dHistoire et de Thorie Littraire G. Clinescu , Bucarest, e-mail: [email protected]

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intention de jouer sur deux tableaux temporels empreints dacceptions opposes de lamour. Le texte respectif figure dans laddenda la seconde dition de la Composition aux parallles ingales qui a t publie en 1999. Dans une note date 21 aot, Crciun envisage de placer la fin du rcit une lettre de Vlad, le narrateur, pour rappeler que la vie moderne est compltement dpourvue de mtaphysique. Une image idale, idalise de lamour simposait. Rcrire le roman antique tait un must. Mme rflexion dans une lettre Mihai Gramatopol (elle sera reproduite dans le journal du 27 septembre) : Crciun avoue que son intrt pour Longos ne doit rien lhistoire, plus probablement la typologie . Ce quil voulait ctait donner une place une autre dimension de lamour dans une constellation de proses qui prsente un monde actuel de conflits, dsarrois, espoirs, insatisfactions et aboutissements, secou de convulsions y compris sentimentales . Tmoin de cette absence totale didyllisme dans le droulement des implications de lamour en version contemporaine , Crciun, une fois son propre livre fini, sent quelques mois plus tard quil doit construire une mtaphysique qui renvoie toute la problmatique dans un espace de plus ample rsonnance et dcide de traiter partiellement au moins le truisme de lamour ternel . Son choix est dict prcisment par lidyllisme naturaliste de Daphnis et Chlo qui lui permettra daccentuer jusqu un paroxysme sublime la condition de lamour libre des contraintes de la civilisation urbaine . Les squences de ses rcritures sont distribues dans des chapitres spars : ce sont des interludes glisss dans ce qui existe dj, censs fonctionner comme des textes antonymes par rapport laspect contemporain du thme mais aussi comme des lieux gomtriques idaux dun vcu sur lequel la pression dun contexte social nagit que trs vaguement . Les rflexions de lauteur sur la composition de son oeuvre nous rappellent sans cesse quentre les deux paliers de son criture il y a un contraste qui traduit la problmatique de lamour dans lAntiquit et dans le monde contemporain. Le 28 aot, Crciun note dans son journal quil ne dsire pas suggrer un lien direct entre les transpositions du roman grec et les textes de son propre livre, tout ce quil veut cest tablir entre les unes et les autres certaines correspondances infrastructurelles . On identifie dans le livre pas mal dimages parallles qui associent, par exemple, la rive vers laquelle Daphnis se dirige en nageant (pure I) et la plage o Dionys attend Tohar (chapitre III) ou encore le nuage que contemple Virgil (chapitre XIII) et celui que Daphnis suit des yeux (pure IV). Ce genre de scnes jettent des ponts souterrains de situations et renforcent limpression de reflet renvers du pass idyllique dans lactualit avilie. Certains procds narratifs, le frquent passage, par exemple, dun expos fait la troisme personne vers un expos la Ire voire la IIe personne sont utiliss dans les deux zones du livre comme pour suggrer une relation discrte et pourtant bien prsente.

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Le 13 septembre, Crciun notait dans le journal une autre justification pour ce savant croisement des deux plans une stratgie de composition : Pourquoi ai-je senti le besoin dinsrer ce texte quelque peu bizarre dane le tissu du premier livre? () Parce que je devais rsoudre un problme de construction. Non point darchitecture du livre mais de mtaphysique du thme. Lauteur pense les pures comme un lieu gomtrique idal du thme du couple . Puisquil est bien connu que lamour, avec toutes ses complications sentimentales, morales, existentielles et sociales obit aux circonstances historiques , Crciun compte sur une mise en valeur rciproque des deux paliers de ses textes : Lactualit sociale de mes couples dans lunivers roumain des annes 80 doit tre mise en rapport avec la mythologie (littraire) du couple Daphnis et Chlo. Le couple grec offre le contrepoids, il est un idal potique, un dnominateur commun par rapport auquel les autres textes peuvent dvier ou que, dans bien peu de cas, ils peuvent confirmer . Le 19 septembre, lauteur du journal revient sur lexplication de lalternance des chapitres ancrs dans lactualit avec des pures du roman antique, ces squences qui ne refltent que vaguement ses inclinations, ses intrts rels : Ce texte ne doit rien ma nature, ma perception du rel. Je viens dapprendre quil y a des situations de construction qui vous poussent crire contre votre gr. Le livre est n, sorti de vous il sen est arrach, partir dun certain moment son cheminement nest plus dict par le plaisir mais par le calcul esthtique . Lauteur sexpose doublement : au risque de voir se produire des ruptures de lecture dues la juxtaposition de deux univers incompatibles et celui de livrer un produit rendu artificiel par le caractre sophistiqu de la composition. Persuad que pour rcrire le roman de Longos dans une vision de profondeur qui fasse de lamour une communion avec le cosmos il devrait sjourner une anne dans lle de Lesbos, il reconnat le 7 septembre les limites de son entreprise. Faute dune documentation aussi sommaire ft-elle, ignorant des lments du dcor, tout ce quil peut livrer cest un texte livresque, datmosphre, superficiel et spectaculaire . Heureusement, le rsultat rpond ses attentes : Je ne demande pas mieux. Au fond, cette prose-l dmontre une ide, un type didalisme, un point cest tout . Les pures de Longos toffent la composition du livre de Crciun en y ajoutant un ncessaire plan de profondeur. Que la Composition aux parallles ingales oppose lAntiquit au prsent et lutopie au prosasme, le constat va de soi. Le livre de Crciun met en valeur limage idale du monde grec en contraste avec la ralit environnante. Craignant de tomber dans la mivrerie , le journal en parle le 13 septembre, il fait prcder chaque pure dune citation relative lEmpire Romain qui, aux IIe et IIIe sicles, englobait lle de Lesbos o Longos place laction de son roman. Le premier fragment, tir de Rome et son destin de Raymond Bloch et Jean Cousin, prsente lhistoire du dclin de lEmpire commencer par Hadrien et jusqu Gordien III. Le deuxime appartient Nigrinos, 15-18, de Lucien et prsente

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Rome comme la cit de tous les vices. Le troisime, tir de Historia augusta, 25-28, 32, raconte des pisodes de la vie scandaleuse dHliogabal, le quatrime, enfin, reproduit la posie En attendant les barbares de Kavafis. Ces sombres passages sont censs souligner la dpravation de lpoque o Longos a compos sa fiction romanesque. Il y a dans le carnet de Vlad tefan une rflexion sur le contraste entre la ralit et sa projection en littrature : bizarre apparition, par son innocence et sa srnit, que ce roman dans une priode de dcadence de lEmpire Romain o le crime, labus, la luxure pouvaient passer pour la normalit mme . Si la ralit imagine par Longos diffre considrablement de lactualit des annes 80 en Roumanie elle nest pas non plus le miroir fidle des IIe et IIIe sicles o lauteur grec place son action. Gheorghe Crciun sait reconnatre les qualits de Daphnis et Chlo, dont la simplicit et la fracheur lui assurent une place de choix entre toutes les oeuvres hellnes similaires, mais il dbusque aussi les faiblesses quil tentera de ne pas reproduire dans ses pures. Dans son carnet, Vlad tefan note ce vague, inexplicable malaise du lecteur moderne que ne satisfait pas le schma passablement abstrait, parsem de dtails peine esquisss en vue dune construction ultrieure . Paradoxalement, cest peine si la nature qui est pourtant le cadre naturel de lidylle est prsente dans loeuvre de Longos. Autre absence regrettable les adjectifs, les accents particuliers et, surtout, lessentiel, la perception . Quiconque voudrait paraphraser le texte antique devrait se souvenir que lamour transforme le monde environnant, que les sens gagnent en fracheur, que les sensations deviennent plus violentes et les reprsentations plus vives . Lobservation se retrouve dans le journal consacr llaboration des pures. Le 27 aot, lauteur dit vouloir composer un texte opulent, centr sur les vcus des deux jeunes amoureux vu son intrt pour lamour et tous ses effets et conditionnements sensibles . Persuad que la perception du monde est plus violente quand on aime , il dsapprouve que tant de nuances sont appeles par Longos par leur nom au lieu dtre suggres . Le 2 septembre, Crciun saperoit quil sest engag dans un texte de lopulence smantique, dans une dure pomatique qui doit tre gnre sans relche, toujours frache mme lorsque les mots semblent avoir puis leurs ressources . Dans sa lettre Mihai Gramatopol, Crciun qualifie son pure de pome en prose dune violente sensualit ce qui entrane la banale observation que les amoureux ont du monde une perception dune fracheur et dune acuit exceptionnelles . Schmatique, le texte antique appelle une compensation : labondance et le concret de sa rplique moderne. Dans son journal de cration, lauteur dit plusieurs reprises son besoin de reconstituer le monde grec dans ses dtails sensibles. Le 21 aot, il sinquite de ces lments difficiles imaginer qui forment le dcor antique : nature, vtements, parler des habitants de lle. Le 27 aot, il dplore une patente absence des informations gographiques, botaniques, zoologiques, vestimentaires et sociales relatives

ANTIQUIT ET ACTUALIT : PERCEPTION DU TEMPS CHEZ GHEORGHE CRCIUN

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lle de Lesbos aux IIe et IIIe sicles. Le 30 aot, il se penche attentivement sur les lments botaniques et zoologiques parpilles dans les idylles de Tocrite et constate, satisfait, quil avait vu juste : Mon imagination ne se fourvoie pas trop . Pourtant, le 13 septembre, il se calme et affirme que les informations fournies par Mihai Gramatopol lui sont plus ou moins utiles car dans le cas de cette perspective pomatique on peut se passer sans trop de mal de la dtermination historique-gographique, du cadre et de la mentalit sociale . Exactes ou pas, les donnes concrtes pimentent le texte moderne effeverscent qui ravive loeuvre antique choisie pour modle. Dautres dfaillances du roman grec sont incrimines par Gheorghe Crciun. Dans son carnet, Vlad tefan inscrit sa dception qui est celle du lecteur moderne savoir un vice de mentalit imputable aux limites de lpoque et des conventions littraires en vigueur . Un homme du XXe sicle trouve peu plausible le final du roman de Longos : les hros, des enfants trouvs et levs par des bergers dcouvrent leurs parents naturels qui sont des gens aiss ce qui fait que leur bonheur est double du moment que leur mariage concide avec une promotion sociale. Cette solution simultane de tous les ennuis arrache un commentaire ironique Vlad tefan : Ah, non alors! Voil ce que jappellerais la preuve irrfutable du caractre de classe de la litrature! Le 22 septembre, Crciun commente dans le journal sa dcision de renoncer lheureux final conventionnel de Longos: Mon intention tait didaliser un sentiment et non une situation. Cest ce qui fait dfaut au monde daujourdhui, une profondeur du vcu individuel, lauthenticit de la participation aux vnements de la vie. Dans Composition aux parallles ingales il nest pas question de la brebis, respectivement de la chvre qui taient en train dallaiter les petits lorsquils furent dcouverts par les bergers. Seules deux allusions sont retenues, relatives leur origine : dans la premire pure, Daphnis se demande un moment donn si Zeus navait pas suc, comme lui dans sa petite enfance, le lait de la chvre Almata et le ptre Dryas qui avait lev Chlo refuse les demandes en mariage des prtendants trop communs car il tait trop fier et trop ambitieux pour accepter que Chlo pouse un sans le sou . A la place du final invraisemblable du roman antique (joies du mariage associes au rtablissement du statut social lev des protagonistes) lauteur roumain plaque une version crdible aux yeux du lecteur moderne : cest Daphnis ayant atteint lge de la vieillesse aprs une existence aventureuse qui la entran dans maintes prgrinations la recherche de sa bien-aime enleve par des brigands. Loin dtre une exception, les errances du hros, inexistantes chez Longos, sont monnaie courante dans les romans grecs de lpoque qui finissent par les retrouvailles des hros que toute une srie de msaventures avaient spars en les jetant dans les coins les plus reculs du monde. Chez Gheorghe Crciun, lex-ptre revient finir ses jours Lesbos aprs avoir t tour tour tanneur Smyrne, vendeur de poisson Sydon, vacher en Thessalie,

26

ALEXANDRA CIOCRLIE

forain Pydna ou scribe Alexandrie. Toute une vie passe dfier les dangers et parcourir, vainement, le monde la recherche de celle qui donnait un sens son tre. Rong par une souffrance infinie il en vient mettre en doute lexistence relle de la femme tant aime, douloureux fantasme, vision de son coeur palpitant despoir, un rve, un chtiment, une ombre de sa jeunesse perdue : se demander si elle a jamais exist pour de vrai (), cette dit suave de tes aprs-midis de ptre amoureux, ton immatrielle Chlo! . Revenu sur sa terre de naissance, le vieux ptre qui un commerant juif de Chypre avait enseign crire entreprend de fixer jamais son histoire damour pour crier tout va cet amour quaucun autre tre sous le soleil navait encore vcu . Au moment historique o Aurlien dcide de retirer son arme devant les invasions barbares, le vieux Daphnis efface un palimpseste pour y copier son oeuvre : son geste rejoint par sa symtrie celui de tefan qui, dans le premier chapitre, arrache des lambeaux au papier peint de sa chambre pour lire les journaux colls mme les murs. Sans exprience aucune, Daphnis ne sait comment crire ni pour qui. Lui, qui jusqualors navait point imagin un dbut son histoire non plus quun cadre pour les faits quil voulait raconter il tche de faire entrer sa vie dans des lignes le long desquelles courraient, ternellement assoiffs de lirrpressible curiosit pour les vies des autres, les yeux de quelque lecteur de nos jours ou, peut-tre, dautres ges . Bien quil net pas pris le temps de peser le pour et le contre de cette tentative et quil net mme pas song qui pourrait servir son exemple, il se lance dans cette exprience insolite avec cette seule incertitude : se pouvait-il que, des annes plus tard, cette beaut amre qui bouillonne dans son coeur aille spancher sous les yeux dun homme incapable de comprendre ce que fut son monde, ce que fut sa vie mais qui, en lisant son livre, saurait sans doute possible quil avait aim une fois pour toutes chaque jour de sa vie . La sagesse transmise sa descendance semble tre : lamour est la seule chose sous le soleil qui ne change pas . Aprs une volution plus spectaculaire que toutes les aventures des hros des romans grecs, le personnage-ptre revt lhabit de lauteur dune histoire damour. A retenir que dans le projet de final que Crciun esquisse dans son journal le 21 septembre, le livre du vieillard revenu Lesbos entre temps il tait devenu grand-pre devait offrir une vision de lamour proche de celle que prsentaient les esquisses sur les couples vivant dans la Roumanie des annes 80: Les noveaux personnages qui peupleront lhistoire de Daphnis ressembleront par leurs traits Teohar, Vlad, tefana, Sena, Luiza, Dania etc. A rappeler quelques vrits inconfortables sur les femmes et lamour. Au cas o lpouse de ce Daphnis vieilli est Chlo mme () elle ne sera point trop diffrente de la Xantipa de Socrate . Le projet est abandonn et Daphnis, le personnage qui prsente des amours dgrades, sera assimil lauteur mme du livre Composition aux parallles ingales.

ANTIQUIT ET ACTUALIT : PERCEPTION DU TEMPS CHEZ GHEORGHE CRCIUN

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Outre les points faibles du roman de Longos quil signale dans les notes thoriques de son livre et dans le journal de cration, Gheorghe Crciun tche de corriger un autre point du texte grec qui nest pas susceptible demporter lunanimit chez les modernes. Dans ses pures il renonce, sans commenter son option, au rhtorisme excessif dont le got de lpoque avait marqu le roman de Longos. Rien dans la version roumaine ne rappelle la prfrence appuye des personnages pour les monologues et discours savamment orchestrs non plus que la construction artificielle qui repose sur des symtries de rpliques et situations o abondent les oppositions, les paralllismes, les reprises. La variante moderne de Crciun brille par son ton naturel l o le roman grec grinait par une expression souvent recherche et artificielle, par sa composition tributaire des rgles des coles de rhtorique. Une note du carnet de Vlad tefan suggre que, dans la vision du personnage-auteur, quoique la rcriture du roman de Longos puisse sloigner beaucoup du texte originaire , elle devrait utiliser, comme de vieilles briques dans une muraille neuve, certains fragments de la traduction de Petru Creia . Et aussi, elle pourrait inclure des passages dautres auteurs grecs, citations, lgrement adaptes lesprit du texte actuel, avec une discrte intgration, l o cest possible, dans le tissu du rcit . Lintention dinsrer dans son ouvrage des fragments des oeuvres antiques est note dans le journal le 28 aot avec la prcision que cette rcriture absorbera, a et l, des citations des textes antiques . Les notes de Vlad tefan rvlent, dans une numration succinte, simple liste des noms, les principales sources employes : Empdocle, les hymnes orphiques, Aristophane, Sophocle, Mimnerme. Un dfi lgrement moqueur est lanc aux lecteurs rouspteurs : H, vous qui tes lafft du plagiat, quelle aubaine! Telle lecture attentive aux sources du texte avec dlimitation des passages viss et indication des rfrences exactes peut donner une ide de la savante construction des pures composes avec une apparente aisance par le disciple roumain de Longos. Rgi par la dernire phrase de lintroduction de Longos puisse le dieu nous aider crire les amours des autres dune pense sereine , le volume Composition aux parallles ingales repose dans son ensemble sur un subtile et compliqu enchevtrement dallusions livresques chres la gnration de 80, adeptes du postmodernisme. Sans signaler les emprunts, les quatre pures englobent avec de lgres adaptations des passages pris la traduction du roman de Longos par Petru Creia et, aussi, des fragments dautres crivains grecs. La premire de ces squences renferme la plus fidle reprise de la narration de lpos grec avec des pisodes spectaculaires tel lenlvement de Daphnis par les pirates et son sauvetage grce au chant de Chlo auquel obit le btail charg sur le bateau. Dans la version moderne, les penses de Daphnis tendu sur le sable reproduisent les considratios dEmpdocle sur le lien quil y a entre linspiration / respiration et la circulation du sang (frg. 275-299 Karsten).

28

ALEXANDRA CIOCRLIE

Lpisode de Chlo rveille par une hirondelle qui poursuit un grillon est rendu dans les mots de Longos, chapitre I, 26. Le monologue de la jeune fille qui dcouvre les premiers symptmes de lamour reprend partiellement le passage I, 14 de la version roumaine du roman. Larrive des pirates tyrniens est dite avec quelques phrases du chapitre I, 32 du livre de Longos. Le chant de Chlo la gloire des nymphes est lhymne orphique XLVIII mme et les rflexions du captif Daphnis sur la prcarit de la vie humaine incluent le fragment Diels 2 dEmpdocle. A la fin de la premire pure, les considrations sur les pouvoirs dEros, le plus fameux larron, se superposent sur la dernire phrase du premier chapitre de Daphnis et Chlo. Le mme mcanisme dinsertion des citations antiques dans sa propre narration est appliqu dautres sections adaptes par Gheorghe Crciun. Dans la deuxime pure, il reprend les paroles de Philtas sur lomnipotent Eros du chapitre II, 7 du roman de Longos. Plus tard, il introduit dans la prire de Daphnis qui supplie la matresse des mers de lui rendre Chlo que les jeunes mtymniens avaient enleve un passage de lhymne orphique XXI consacr Thtys. Linvitation aux oiseaux contempler le miracle des retrouvailles des deux amoureux est incluse dans un fragment du chant de la houppe qui appartient aux Oiseaux, 226-262, dAristophane. La troisime pure contient un hymne la gloire du tout-puissant Eros qui reprend en fait un fragment de lAntigone, 781-791, de Sophocle. Le dernier chapitre, enfin, reproduit quelques vers de llgie de Mimnerme qui mesure lcoulement de lexistence humaine la dure de la brve saison fleurie. Les penses de Daphnis sur leffroyable possibilit de perdre Chlo reprennent une partie du chant dAlcman qui exprime laspiration de se transformer en une mouette qui vole. Mme technique des citations incises dans la squence qui dcrit la vieillesse de Daphnis. Dsireux de mettre par crit lhistoire damour, le personnage utilise un parchemin dont il efface les rflexions dEmpdocle sur laction conjointe des deux principes universels, lAmour et la Discorde (Diels, 17). Dans la rtrospective des aventures de Daphnis sont cites, lorsquil voque son exprience de scribe en Alexandrie, les maximes quil a tires de Sophocle et quil a transcrites lui mme ( La fortune naide pas ceux qui manquent de courage ; Les insenss ignorent quils tiennent le bien entre leurs mains avant quil ne leur chappe ), dAristote ( Lespoir est le rve de celui qui est veill ) ou des prceptes de la Bible ( Celui qui prend garde au vent ne smera point et celui qui regarde les nues ne moissonera point Ecclesiaste, 11; Lherbe est sche et la fleur est tombe; vraiment le peuple est comme lherbe Esaie, 40). Enfin, la dernire phrase de lpure, qui clt dailleurs le livre, reprend les mots de Longos de lintroduction traduite par Creia : Car nul na chapp tout fait et nchappera jamais lamour tant quil y aura de la beaut au monde et des yeux pour la voir . Pour paraphraser le roman grec, Gheorghe Crciun a mis en oeuvre tout un chafaudage de rfrences littraires fondues dans le tissu dun rcit entranant dans lequel les bouts dantiquit ne dparent nullement.

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Partie intgrante des pures, les citations des classiques sont mises contribution dans les chapitres qui parlent des amours des annes 80 pour souligner, on dirait, le ct dprciatif du contexte. Au chapitre X, dans le carnet de Vlad tefan le clbre Eheu fugaces de lode II, 14 dHorace exprime cette fois la mlancolie du personnage qui se rappelle que cest lanniversaire de sa femme. Dans une lettre qui dnonce lillettre, lhrone D. crit son play-boy Relu un vers de Plaute (Asinaria, 495) dans la forme dforme homini homo lupi . Au chapitre XIII, linvitation kitsch au mariage de Graziella et de Tiberiu qui contient lexpression si vis amari ama de lptre IX de Snque Lucilius est commente ironiquement par Virgil par la formule du mme Snque de gustibus non disptandum . Dans tout ce qui a trait a la ralit contemporaine, les mots des crivains antiques semblent creuser le foss entre lexpression leve et la ralit prosaque. Pour la Composition aux parallles ingales lAntiquit nest nullement un lment dcoratif, elle participe de lessence mme du livre. Lauteur roumain rcrit le meilleur roman damour grec en prenant en compte la sensibilit dun lecteur moderne : il en garde la saveur et la fracheur originales et en corrige les faiblesses et les cts dsuets. Vritable auteur dun travail dorfvre, Gheorghe Crciun compose avec rudition et virtuosit stylistique un texte complexe qui fait contrepoids ce qui lui apparat comme la platitude des histoires damour contemporaines pour les parer de profondeur et didalit.
This paper is suported by the Sectorial Operational Programme Human Resources Development (SOP HRD), financed from the European Social Fund and by the Romanian Government under the contract number SOP HRD/89/1.5/S/59758

LE TEMPS DANS LE CID DE CORNEILLE

JOAQUINA LANZUELA HERNNDEZ*

mes amis roumains Toutes les choses ont leur temps. Il y a temps de natre, et temps de mourir. Il y a temps de pleurer, et temps de rire ; temps de saffliger, et temps de sauter de joie. Il y a temps pour la guerre, et temps pour la paix. (Ecclsiaste, chap. III)

TIME IN CORNEILLES LE CID

While writing the tragicomedy Le Cid, Pierre Corneille (1606-1684), who is closely following the irregular drama Las Mocedades del Cid of Guilln de Castro, is forced to remove various scenes and characters in order to adapt it to the rules of the classical dramaturgy, especially to the rules regarding the time unit. Thus, the work gains in terms of concentration and internalization as regards the Spanish model. The time destructs the glorious past and the generational mix allow the perpetuation of the race and the survival of the heroism, relating thus the past, the present and the future. The time has such an important role in Le Cid, because the characters are transforming during the action, being transformed in heroes in the service of the king, of the people, of the country. Keywords: The Kid, time, heroism, concentration, classical dramaturgy.

Pierre Corneille (1606-1684) a crit Le Cid la fin de 1636. Cette pice a t reprsente avec un grand succs au thtre du Marais, au dbut de lanne suivante. Corneille stait inspir dune uvre espagnole publie en 1618, Las Mocedades del Cid ( Les jeunesses du Cid ) de Guilln de Castro (1569-1631). Au XVIIe sicle, la littrature espagnole tait trs la mode en France. Des commerants espagnols avaient gagn les ctes de la Normandie et sy installrent. A Rouen, ville natale de Corneille, staient tablis plusieurs dentre eux qui, probablement, furent dcouvrir Las Mocedades del Cid Pierre Corneille. Un exemplaire tait en possession de Corneille quand il dcida dcrire Le Cid.
*

Professeur de littrature et de langue franaise la Facult de sciences sociales et humaines de Teruel, Universit de Zaragoza; e-mail: [email protected]

32 1. Lunit de temps

JOAQUINA LANZUELA HERNNDEZ

Au milieu du XVIe sicle, les thoriciens franais, suivant la Potique dAristote, connue par le truchement des commenteurs italiens de la Renaissance, commencrent laborer toute une srie de rgles, qui seront recueillies dans le clbre Art Potique de Boileau en 1674. Les principales dentre elles pour ne citer que celles-ci taient les rgles des trois units : de lieu, de jour comme on disait alors et daction. Boileau lui-mme crivait dans le pome ddi la Tragdie :
Nous voulons quavec art laction se mnage ; Quen un lieu, quen un jour, un seul fait accompli Tienne jusqu la fin le thtre rempli. Chant III (vv. 44-46)

Les crivains franais de cette poque devaient adapter leurs uvres aux exigences de la dramaturgie franaise labore par les doctes. En ce qui concerne lunit de jour, la tragdie enfermait laction entre le lever et le coucher du soleil, par contre, dans la tragi-comdie, qui ne comprenait pas la rgle de lunit de temps avec la mme svrit que la tragdie, laction pouvait commencer au milieu dune journe et finir au milieu du jour suivant. Cest le cas de la tragi-comdie de Le Cid cornlien, modifie en tragdie en 1648, par la concurrence de la tragdie. Le thtre espagnol, qui tait beaucoup plus libre que le franais, nobservait pas les rgles. Laction, dans Las Mocedades del Cid, stendait dans lespace de dix-huit mois, par contre, dans Le Cid, bien de personnages pisodiques, bien de scnes qui se trouvent dans le modle espagnol, ont disparu. Corneille a simplifi laction de son uvre et la rduite quelques donnes essentielles, parmi lesquelles se trouvent : la querelle entre les parents de Chimne et Rodrigue et le duel qui ont lieu dans le cours dun aprs-midi ; la bataille de toute une nuit que Rodrigue livre aux Maures ; finalement la victoire sur lennemi, qui se produit laube, conduit le roi Fernand prendre la dcision de faire de Rodrigue le hros national. Lunit daction, pour ne citer que celle-ci, doit se plier aux xigences de lunit de temps (Lanzuela, 1988 : 63-70).

2. La rlve gnrationnelle. Le temps qui passe Mais Pierre Corneille ne se contente pas dobserver avec plus ou moins de rigueur les rgles de la dramaturgie franaise, il otorgue au temps un rle trs important qui sert mettre en relief la destine des hommes et surtout celle du principal protagoniste, Rodrigue. Le Cid commence dans une atmosphre de comdie, ou si lon prfre, comme un conte de fes (Vignes, 1994 : 96). Rodrigue et Chimne saiment avec le consentiment de leurs pres. Mais une dispute sur les privilges aristocratiques

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fait clater le drame. Le comte Gormas, pre de Chimne, soufflette par jalousie don Digue, pre de Rodrigue, qui vient dtre nomm prcepteur du prince et cette offense faite son honneur va mettre fin cette idylle romanesque. Voil comment le problme de la temporalit fait son irruption dans la pice. Ce soufflet inattendu reprsente le dshonneur qui annihile, qui fltrit, dans un instant, le pass glorieux de don Digue. Et sil
fut la mme vertu, La vaillance et lhonneur de son temps Le Cid, Acte II, scne 2, (vv. 399-400)

il est aujourdhui un vieillard offens, humili, outrag dans le plus profond de son me, qui crie son dsespoir :
O rage ! dsespoir ! vieillesse ennemie ! Nai-je donc tant vcu que pour cette infamie ? Et ne suis-je blanchi dans les travaux guerriers Que pour voir en un jour fltrir tant de lauriers ? Acte I, scne 4, (vv. 237-240)

Le sentiment douloureux qui nat de la prise de conscience de la fragilit de la condition humaine, menace sans cesse par le temps qui passe, reapparat, resum, quelques vers plus loin :
O cruel souvenir de ma gloire passe ! uvre de tant de jours en un jour efface ! Ibid. (vv. 245-6)

En effet, lhomme nexiste que dans le temps, il est, chaque instant, remis en question dans son tre, nous dit Serge Doubrovsky (1963 : 90-1), qui reconnat par la suite, devant la suprmatie impitoyable du prsent et lannihilation de ltre par la dure, le noble vieilli est alors perdu, entranant dans la chute et le dshonneur non seulement son pass individuel, mais celui dune race ou ligne. Bien sr, la solution ne se fait pas attendre. Le vieux don Digue, dans le crpuscule de sa vie, sadresse son fils, en qualit de successeur de cette noble race ou ligne dont il est issu, en lui disant :
Viens, mon fils, viens, mon sang, viens rparer ma honte ; Viens me venger. Acte I, scne 5, (vv. 266-7)

Et, puisque le dshonneur souille toute la ligne, les descendants, il insiste encore, toujours par lemploi de la rptition anaphorique, sur cette double ide, cest--dire la rlve gnrationnelle et la vengeance pour rparer le dshonneur familial :

34
[] Venge-moi, venge-toi ; Montre-toi digne fils dun pre tel que moi. Accabl des malheurs o le destin me range, Je vais les dplorer : va, cours, vole et nos venge. Ibid., (v. 287-290)

JOAQUINA LANZUELA HERNNDEZ

Et Rodrigue, avant de courir la vengeance, avant denvisager une issue ce conflit psychologique, provoqu par le coup imprvu du destin malheureux, exprime son dsespoir, partag quil est entre le devoir et lamour, dans un long monologue de stances lyriques qui rompt avec la monotonie de lalexandrin et dont la fonction est de mettre en relief la douleur qui latteint :
Perc jusques au fond du cur Dune atteinte imprvue aussi bien que mortelle, Misrable vengeur dune injuste querelle, Et malheureux objet dune injuste rigueur, Je demeure immobile, et mon me abattue Cde au coup qui me tue. Acte I, scne 6, (vv. 291-296)

Corneille nous fait assister un second conflit psychologique qui vient confirmer, en mme temps, la forte charge dramatique de ces scnes et les observations de la critique sur lintriorisation de laction dans Le Cid, par rapport son modle espagnol. Notre auteur crit Gustave Lanson (1954 : 67) a su placer les vnements hors du temps et de lespace, dans le cur humain. Bien sr, dans Le Cid, tout se passe dans le cur et dans lme des jeunes gens. Corneille a bien vu que lintrt profond de lhistoire rsidait dans le combat psychologique et moral que les personnages doivent dabord livrer contre eux-mmes (Curial, 1990 : 25). Nous y ajoutons les observations que sur le temps dans lIliade, madame Andreea Vladescu a expos dans le cadre de cette Confrence internationale, organise Bucharest en 2011. Pour elle, En tant quintermde chronologique psychologique, le temps subjectif nest pas seulement celui du dbat philosophique sur la condition humaine, mais aussi celui des moments dun profond lyrisme des grandes tensions intrieures, prises sur le vif, En effet, le temps est la synthse de la condition humaine, le sens mme de tout conflit psychologique. Le jeune Irlandais Samuel Beckett, en faisant ladaptation du Cid cornlien, a bien compris lnorme importance que possde le temps dans cette pice. Dans The Kid un norme horloge dcorait la scne. Tandis quun don Digue burlesque, reprsent par Samuel Beckett lui-mme, prononait un discours incohrent, un jeune Rodrigue, press, faisait virer les aiguilles dun gigantesque horloge (Thibaudet, 1989 : 12). Les horloges sont les missaires dinformation. Daprs Norbert Elias, dans ber die Zzeit (1989 : 24), les horloges sont des ralits physiques que les hommes font et disposent pour que,

LE TEMPS DANS LE CID DE CORNEILLE

35

dune faon ou dune autre (par exemple les aiguilles dun cadran) restent incorpors leur monde symbolique. Sans aucun doute, lnergie de la nouvelle gnration remplace une gnration qui manque de lnergie ncessaire laction. La tombe du jour dans Le Cid, comme dailleurs minuit ou une heure dans The Kid, sont des points de rfrence dans le devenir de hommes, des points du temps qui marquent lexistence, le destin des individus. Il nous faut constater que la rlve entre gnrations revt un double aspect : elle est dabord familiale, car Rodrigue, digne successeur de son pre, est aussi lhritier dune race, dune ligne, dont lhrosme se perptue travers les gnrations. Serge Doubrouvsky (1963 : 91) considre que Rodrigue opre, par miracle, la synthse de lindividualit et de la race, du pass et du prsent, rouvrant aussi, du coup, la dimension, un instant ferme, de lavenir. Rappelons encore les paroles de don Digue, Viens, mon fils, viens, mon sang, viens rparer ma honte (v. 266), ou encore celles-ci, o don Digue reconnat la continuit de cette hrdit :
Ma valeur na point lieu de te dsavouer : Tu las bien imite, et ton illustre audace Fait bien revivre en toi les hros de ma race : Acte III, scne 5, (vv. 1028-1030)

Mais elle est aussi sociale, car la mission de Rodrigue, aprs avoir lav le deshonneur de son pre, de sa race, dans le sang de son adversaire, est de remplacer le Comte dans son rle de gnral jusqualors invaincu des armes de Castille. Et cette seconde rlve, la rlve sociale, se produit dans le cadre dune socit aristocratique qui est au service du roi, du peuple et du pays. La victoire de Rodrigue sur le Comte, qualife de coup dessai (v. 431), doit se transformer, par la dfaite des Maures, dans un coup de matre. Et le vieux don Digue, dont le pass est signe de sagesse et dexprience, projette laction de Rodrigue dans une dimension sociale et historique, en lencourageant porter plus haut le fruit de [sa] victoire (v. 1053),
Ton prince et ton pays ont besoin de ton bras. La flotte quon craignait, dans ce grand fleuve entre, Croit surprendre la ville et piller la contre. Les Mores vont descendre, et le flux et la nuit Dans une heure nos murs les amne sans bruit. La cour est en dsordre et le peuple est en alarmes On nentend que des cris, on ne voit que des larmes. Acte III, scne 6, (vv. 1072-1078)

Encore une fois, cest don Digue qui prend liniciative. Lejealle et Dubois, dans Notice, quils ajoutent son dition du Cid (1970 : 17) remarquent que le vieil homme fait de Rodrigue le chef de lexpdition contre les Mores,

36

JOAQUINA LANZUELA HERNNDEZ

pour montrer au souverain que la scurit du royaume nest pas mise en pril par la mort du Comte et que le pays a trouv un nouveau chef militaire qui vaut bien lancien. On constate dans Le Cid, ct de la prsence du temps qui fuit, lnorme pression que celui-ci exerce dans la vie du vieux don Digue, qui, avec linsistance qui le caractrise, sadresse encore une fois Rodrigue dans les termes suivants :
Viens, suis-moi, va combattre, et montrer ton roi Que ce quil perd au Comte il le recouvre en toi. Ibid., (vv. 1099-1100)

3. Le symbolisme du temps et la lutte des contraires Dans une pice, comme celle du Cid, o laction senferme dans lespace de vingt-quatre heures ou presque , les diffrentes intrigues se succdent trs rapidement. Pierre Corneille en est trs conscient et dans son Examen de 1660 crit : Je ne puis dnier que la rgle des vingt et quatre heures presse trop les incidents de cette pice. Les nombreuses indications temporelles de la pice un moment, un instant sont des expressions temporelles qui voquent la rapidit, la brivet avec laquelle se droulent les vnements de la pice. Ainsi nous lindiquent les paroles de lInfante, qui au moment malheureux que naissait leur querelle (v. 454) de Chimne, rpond pour la consoler :
Un moment la fait natre, un moment va lteindre. Acte II, scne 3, (v. 462)

ou lexclamation de don Fernand devant linsistance de Chimne qui demande une seconde fois justice au roi, juste au moment o Rodrigue vient de livrer bataille aux Maures, mais aussi devant limpatience de don Digue qui ne veut plus diffrer la querelle :
Sortir dune bataille, et combattre linstant ! Du moins une ou deux heures quil dlasse. Acte IV, scne 5, (v. 1447 et 1449)

En ce qui concerne le passage des Maures, Corneille reconnat dans son Examen, que leur dfaite avait assez fatigu Rodrigue toute une nuit pour mriter deux ou trois jours de repos. [] Le roman lui aurait donn sept ou huit jours de patience avant que de le presser de nouveau ; mais les vingt et quatre heures ne lont pas permis. Cest lincommodit de la rgle. Dans Le Cid les distances temporelles entre les actions, les actions mmes se msurent en heures. En ce sens, Robert Brasillach (1938 : 101) nous dit : Je connais

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peu de pices o les heures soient mieux indiques que dans Le Cid. Ces notations nous permettent de cerner les accumulations des vnements et par consquence linvitable dcalage entre le temps rel et le temps fictif de la pice. Parfois, quelques heures suffisent delimiter le temps dune action qui se prolonge pendant toute la nuit. Cest le cas du combat de Rodrigue contre les Maures et que lInfante rduit trois heures (v. 1107), signifiant par l, le commencement, le milieu et la fin du combat. Trois sont aussi les tapes essentielles pendant lesquelles la vie de Rodrigue se transforme. La tombe du jour concide non seulement avec le crpuscule de la vie de don Digue et avec la mort du Comte, mais aussi avec les dbuts de Rodrigue, de cet obscur et inconnu personnage jusqualors, qui doit se plonger dans la nuit et leau, pour devenir, laube, la sortie du soleil, le hros resplandissant de gloire que le peuple, en joie, acclame. Le hros se ralise le long de la pice et son action est en harmonie comme on verra tout de suite avec les forces dordre cosmique, clestes et aquatiques. Les signes indicateurs de la prsence du temps qui passe acquirent de plus en plus dans Le Cid un sens plus symbolique que rel. Si le temps est hostile au dbut de la pice, parce quil change le bonheur en malheur, tel est le cas, par exemple, mme si nous sommes dans la tombe du jour de cette nuit si sombre (v. 1013), qui correspond avec lintriorisation du temps dans le cur de don Digue et qui est en parfait accord avec son tat psychologique et animique, la fin de la pice, au contraire, le temps permet la solution progressive des problmes (Scherer, 1984 : 49). Les actions dans Le Cid sencadrent, dautre part, dans une conception de lunivers, constitu par une srie de forces bipolaires, antithtiques, qui alternent de faon cyclique. Dans les vers suivants, o lon voit reapparatre les forces humaines ennemies, les Maures, et les forces naturelles de caractre cosmique, la nuit et le flux, runies,
Cette obscure clart qui tombe des toiles Enfin avec le flux nous fait voir trente voiles ; Londe senfle dessous, et dun commun effort Les Mores et la mer montent jusques au port. Acte IV, scne 3, (vv. 1273-6)

loxymore, obscure clart, reprsente lharmonie et la confrontation de deux manifestations complmentaires et alternantes, connues sous le nom de coincidentia oppositorum. Sans aucun doute, daprs Mircea Eliade, (1971 : 308) les diffrents types de bipartition et polarit, de dualit et dalternance, des dyades antithtiques et de coincidentia oppositorum se rencontrent partout dans le monde, et tous les niveaux de la culture. Ce clbre crivain Roumain, a soulign, plusieurs reprises, (1981: 171-3 et 1952 : 234) que dans la conscience archaque les symboles ont une tendence

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se grouper par une srie de correspondances, danalogies qui forment un rseau de structure cosmique, o il nexiste rien disol et o tout dpend de tout. Et Gilbert Durand, qui suit de trs prs les recherches de lhistorien des religions dans les Structures anthropologiques de limaginaire (1984 : 40-1), emploie de prfrence les termes de convergence et de constellation des symboles. La mthode de convergence dit-il tend reprer de vastes constellations dimages peu prs constantes et qui semblent structures par un certain isomorphisme des symboles convergents. Ou encore, Les symboles convergent parce quils sont des dveloppements d'un mme thme archtypal, parce quils sont des variations sur un archtype. Dans Le Cid, les archtypes des Maures, de la nuit et du flux combins, convergent dans un isomorphisme commun, le devenir temporel. Les tnbres nocturnes crit Gilbert Durand constituent le premier symbole du temps [] la nuit noire apparat donc comme la substance mme du temps (98). Dautre part, Gaston Bachelard (1985 : 122-3), qui voit, comme Hraclite, la mort dans le devenir hydrique, prcise que leau absorve la substance noire des tnbres et de claire quelle tait, devient une eau stymphalise, mme ophlise, qui invite la mort. Voil ce qui conduit G. Durand (104), lecteur de Bachelard, prciser que leau est lpiphanie du malheur du temps. Leau, beaucoup plus que les tnbres de la nuit, est llment du mouvement, de linstabilit, de la fluidit et cette fluidit tnbreuse, qui cache et porte les ennemis jusquau port, reprsente le danger qui jette une partie des habitants de Sville dans un tat moral dpressif. Les Maures, la nuit et le flux, en tant quallis de la temporalit et de la mort, engendrent dans la conscience de lhomme de tous les temps des sentiments tels que la peur et langoisse, lalarme et les larmes, parce quils sont, en definitive, daprs Gilbert Durand (71 et ss.), les visages du temps destructeur, les porteurs du chaos, de la dvastation et de la mort. Reprenons encore une fois les vers cits plus haut,
Ton prince et ton pays ont besoin de ton bras. La flotte quon craignait, dans ce grand fleuve entre, Croit surprendre la ville et piller la contre. Les Mores vont descendre, et le flux et la nuit Dans une heure nos murs les amne sans bruit. La cour est en dsordre et le peuple est en alarmes On nentend que des cris, on ne voit que des larmes. Acte III, scne 6, (vv. 1072-8)

Mais en face de cette ralit biologique universelle qui fait que dans des situations conflictives certains groupes sociaux (Elias : 164) rpondent par une raction dalarme et un comportement de fuite, il existe un autre groupe, lv dans lautodiscipline et le contrle de ses sentiments, prpar pour affronter le danger, pour verser mme leur sang, au nom dun devoir suprieur de service au

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roi et de dfense de lempire. Le courage, lnergie de Rodrigue et ses amis, qui ne trouvent point dobstacle, leur attitude hroque sont les ressorts physiques et moraux dont ils se servent pour affronter, repousser et finalement dominer les visages de la temporalit dvastatrice. Ceux-ci sont combattus au nom dun devoir suprieur, mais aussi au nom dun dsir de survivance et de recherche de transcendance. Il sagit nous dit Gilbert Durand (134) - de mettre ces visages du temps destructeur hors dtat de nuire et pour cela il faut les affronter, les combattre, les repousser, en dfinitive, les dominer. Cette nergie positive, qui contrle et matrise les diffrents aspects du rgime nocturne de limage, justifie lapparition des symboles du rgime diurne de limagination. Cest ainsi que les visages de la temporalit et de la mort sloignent pour laisser leur place aux forces de signe contraire. Rodrigue relate au roi lloignement de ces vieux ennemis. Bien sr, lapparition de la lumire est une victoire sur les ennemis (Leeuw, 1964: 58) :
Et ne lai pu savoir jusques au point du jour. Mais enfin sa clart montre notre avantage : Le More voit sa perte et perd soudain courage ; Acte IV, scne 3, (vv. 1308-1310)

Et il continue :
[] leur frayeur est trop forte : Le flux les apporta ; le reflux les remporte, Ibid., (vv. 1317- 8)

Ces forces du rgime diurne de limage, telles que la lumire et le reflux, qui poussent les vieux ennemis la fuite, sont lexpression de la vie, de la victoire, du bonheur et de la joie. partir du moment, o la situation a compltement chang, un renversement des sentiments se produit qui fonctionne dans un double sens, la joie pntre dans les curs qui taient attrists et la frayeur et lpouvante semparent des ennemis qui fuient en dsordre. Quand vient le jour, crit Bachelard (140) les fantmes sans doute courent encore sur les eaux. Vaines brumes qui seffilochent, ils sen vont Peu peu, ce sont eux qui ont peur. Ils sattnuent donc, ils sloignent. Lune des caractristiques les plus notables du comportement des symboles est leur ambivalence. De mme que la nuit contient en germe dans son sein la lumire dun nouveau jour, leau, qui tait une substance de mort, devient, avec la lumire du jour, une substance de vie (Bachelard : 99). Elle se prsente aussi comme une eau lustrale, baptismale qui lave les fautes de Rodrigue pour faire de lui un homme nouveau. Don Fernand, lui-mme, constate, que Les Mores en fuyant ont emport son crime (v. 1414). Ds lors il sappellera non seulement le Cid beau titre dhonneur qui signifie en arabe, Seigneur mais aussi lange tutlaire et le librateur (v. 1116) de la ville.

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JOAQUINA LANZUELA HERNNDEZ

En rsum, cest par la prsence du coup malheureux du destin, que le temps fait son apparition dans Le Cid. Cest ainsi que les protagonistes de la pice prennent conscience de la prsence du temps qui passe. Il change le bonheur en malheur, il dtruit le pass glorieux de don Digue et de toute sa ligne. La solution au problme de la temporalit se trouve dans la continuit du sang. La rlve des gnrations perptue la race, la survivance de lhrosme, elle permet de relier le pass au prsent et lavenir. Dans Le Cid, tragi-comdie adapte la rgle de lunit de temps, les nombreux rpres temporels nous laissent envisager les accumulations des vnements et linvitable dcalage entre le temps rel et le temps fictif. Ces notations servent encadrer les actions qui gagnent, par rapport son modle espagnol, en rapidit et en brivet, mais aussi en concentration et en interiorizacin et dont les conflits psychologiques, si nombreux dans la pice, en sont un exemple. Mais notre auteur met aussi laccent sur ce double mouvement alternatif de caractre universel, rgulataire des phases successives du cycle vital qui passe sans cesse de la nuit au jour, du flux au reflux, de la mort la nouvelle vie. Chez Corneille, les forces dordre cosmique et les forces de nature humaine ne sont pas indpendantes entre elles, mais solidaires. Tous les rpres temporels de nature cosmique qui existent dans Le Cid, savoir : la tombe du jour ou le soir, la nuit, laube ou le point du jour, ainsi que le flux et le reflux de leau maritime et fluviale, correspondent, dans un isomorphisme commun, avec le destin des individus, les sentiments des hommes et les vnements non seulement sur le plan individuel, mais aussi social et historique. Et cet gard, les recherches de Mircea Eliade, de Gilbert Durand et de Gaston Bachelard nous ont servi de point dappui pour la ralisation de notre travail sur le temps dans Le Cid. Dautre part, et pour conclure, nous sommes daccord avec les affirmations prononces par la critique cornlienne, que nous rappelons la suite. Les protagonistes chez Corneille sont anims par un lan qui les pousse slver vers les hauteurs (Adam, 1970 : 58), vers la grandeur mme. Si le temps est un facteur essentiel chez Corneille, cest parce que ses protagonistes sont en train de se raliser et ils se ralisent toujours dans laction. Sans aucun doute, ils ont une histoire et ils changent au cours de laction (Herland, 1952 : 67). Corneille fait de ses personnages le long de son uvre, de grands hros, des capitaines, des saints (Lagarde & Michard, 1970 : 106), comme il arrive avec Rodrigue, devenu le hros national, surnomm le Cid, et lange tutlaire de la ville.

BIBLIOGRAPHIE

Adam, Antoine (1970), Le thtre classique, Paris, PUF. Bachelard, Gaston (1985), Leau et les rves. Essai sur limagination de la matire, Paris, Jos Corti. Brasillach, Robert (1938), Corneille, Paris, Arthme Fayard.

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Curial, Hubert (1990), Le Cid. Corneille, Paris, Hatier. Doubrovsky, Serge (1963), Corneille et la dialectique du hros, Paris, Gallimard. Durand, Gilbert (1984), Les structures anthropologiques de limaginaire. Introduction larchtypologie gnrale, Paris, Dunond. Eliade, Mircea (1971), Nostalgie des origines. Mthodologie et histoire des religions, Paris, Gallimard. *** (1981), Tratado de historia de las religiones. Morfologa y dialctica de lo sagrado, trad. par A. Medinaveitia, Madrid, ed. Cristiandad. *** (1952), Images et symboles. Essais sur le symbolisme magico-religieux, Paris, Gallimard. Elias, Norbert (1989), Sobre el tiempo, Trad. par Guillermo Hirata, Madrid-Buenos Aires, Fondo de Cultura Econmica. Herland, Louis (1952), Horace ou la naissance de lhomme, Paris, Les ditions de Minuit. Lagarde & Michard (1970), XVIIe sicle, Paris, les ditions Bordas. Lanson, Gustave (1954), Esquisse dune histoire de la tragdie, Paris, Librairie Honor Champion. Leeuw, G. van Der (1964), Fenomenologa de la religin, trad. par Ernesto de la Pea, Mxico, FCE. Lejealle, L. et Dubois, J. (ed.) (1970), Corneille. Le Cid, tragi-comdie, avec une Notice biographique, une Notice historique et littraire, des Notes explicatives, une Documentation thmatique, des Jugements, un Questionnaire et des Sujets de devoirs. Paris, Nouveaux classiques Larousse. Scherer, Jacques (1984), Le thtre de Corneille, Paris, Nizet. Vignes, Maria (1994), Corneille. Biographie, tude de luvre, Paris, Albin Michel.

ARTICLES

Lanzuela, Joaquina (1988), Le Cid y la unidad de tiempo: modificaciones diversas, dans Studium. Filologa, n 4, Colegio Universitario de Teruel, pp. 63-70. Thibaudat, Jean-Pierre (1989), Beckett sest tu, dans Libration, le 27 dcembre, pp. 12-15. Vladescu, Andreea (2012), Temps objectif / temps subjectif dans lIliade, Facult de Langues et de Littratures trangres de Bucharest, le 11 novembre, 2011.

AUTHOR AND HERO (GREGORY THE THEOLOGIAN, BASIL THE GREAT)

IOANA COSTA*

Gregory the Theologian wrote an outstanding panegyric devoted to his lifelong friend, Basil the Great, some years after death had separated them. This eulogy, built as a biographical account, is actually a bifrons portrait of their friendship, meant to continue beyond the end of their earthly life. Just as the enduring monuments of the Christian acts they accomplished prolonged their human presence for the rest of the world, their harmonious affection for each other is to guarantee the transfer to the perennial life, as an undividable unit of human beings and saints. Keywords: panegyric, saints, friendship, authorial ego, portrait, hero, death.

Saint Basil the Great (330 January 1st, 379) and Saint Gregory the Theologian (or Saint Gregory of Nazianzus, 329-389/390) constantly appear to be a unitary presence, either as Cappadocian Fathers (together with the younger brother of Saint Basil, Saint Gregory of Nyssa, 335 post 394), or as The Three Great Hierarchs (together with Saint John Chrysostom, 347-407). The panegyric 1 Saint Gregory composed, entitled Eis ton Megan Basileion epitaphion, belongs to the last years of his life, coming almost one decade after the death of Saint Basil. The writing definitely draws two distinct characters, with individual biographical evolution and displays, nevertheless, the aura of a unique great friendship, lifelong accomplished and lasting far beyond life. They were about the same age and during the years of their adolescence were present together in Athens, as disciples of the masters living here, both of them making efforts to define themselves in Christian and human coordinates. The Athenian episode (the kindling spark of our union, par. 17) is emblematic for each of them separately and, above all, for transforming them into a dual unit, emulating the mythical pair of Orestes and Pylades, or the Molionides. Their harmony is a reminiscent of the chamber with well-built walls and golden pillars of Pindars
* Professor of Classical Philology, University of Bucharest, [email protected]. 1 For the Latin text of the Panegyric, vide Sources Chrtiennes (nr. 384): Grgoire de Nazianze, Discours 43, in: Discours 42-43, Jean Bernardi (ed.), Cerf, Paris, 1992, p. 116-307; the Romanian translation I accomplished is to be published in the collection PSB (Prini i Scriitori Bisericeti), Editura Basilica, Patriarhia Romn; the English translation is available at: http://sttakla.org/books/en/ecf/207/2070069.html.

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verses (par. 20), is a perpetual competition for the second position, leaving the preponderance to the other one: none of them wished for himself the winning prise, but strived fiercely to be the second, as each of them considered his friends glory as his own glory; it seemed that one and only spirit was setting in motion two bodies and, even if not all elements were in all, they proved that one was in the other and one was beside the other. They were both endeavouring to the same aim: virtue in the terrestrial life and hopes for the future life, for which were perpetually preparing themselves, actually living beyond mortality while still on earth. They became to each other stimulus for virtue and rule of living, criterion for discerning right from wrong. Their friendship was simultaneously harmonising two distinct (though alike) characters, choosing the same path in life, assuming Christian faith, facing adversities, accepting earthly departure and hoping for the final reunion. The discourse known as Oration XLIII, the funeral oration on the great Saint Basil, Bishop of Caesarea in Cappadocia, is a delicate and trustful portrait of the deceased; though a real panegyric, the discourse does not remain inside the borders of maximal eulogy. The biographic account is packed with vivid episodes, brought back to life by the recollections of Saint Gregory that functions here not only as a speaking witness, but also as participant or, in dramaturgical terminology, a co-protagonist or deuteragonist. Step by step, from one paragraph to another, the two portraits are more and more clearly defined, from the years of the beginning, the adolescence, in a similar space, belonging to comparable family data and geographical surroundings, to the years they studied in Athens, having as background the confrontation with the Aryanism. The end of the earthly life came earlier for Saint Basil: his friend remained a little more, languishing for the heavenly reunion. Considered as a literary text, the panegyric includes the two characters in the most relevant parts of the oration, in the extremities. The opening is to be read as a captatio beneuolentiae, but the dominant note is theorising the subject chosen for the discourse, as a confirmation of oratorical ability: just as, during his entire life, Saint Gregory used to submit to the oratorical exigencies of his friend (who expected that his writings were more brilliant than his own, par. 1), he accepts now this final test, of choosing as topic the friend himself. The greatness of the chosen character imposes the excellence of performing: the author is overwhelmed by the task assumed. Nonetheless, he elegantly draws a bow: the panegyric is the necessary accomplishment of a duty (par. 1), knowing that a master of the discourse ought to be eulogized by a discourse; the topic equals the qualities of the orator, that would desire nothing else for putting his talent to test; accomplishing this duty is a joy for himself and a stimulus for those around him, as model of virtue. Beyond the two characters (hero and author-hero) is to be contemplated the declared purpose: exhortation to virtue. No matter the oratorical qualities of the opusculum (and this is, again, a literary topos of

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captatio benevolentiae), once accomplished, the panegyric gains beneficent consequences: getting closer to the greatness of its topic, its aim is fulfilled or, by contrary (which is plausible when eulogizing a person like Saint Basil, par. 1), by its own failure, proves that the subject is far beyond words. In the other margin of the discourse (par. 82), the touching account of the final moments Saint Basil lived on earth and of his funeral is the closure of the gift offered him by the friend who stood beside him lifelong, in the same ambience, aging together, step by step, from early youth till the end. If the gift was not worthy, the lonely friend should not be blamed, as he carries the burden of old age, of weakness, of loneliness and longing: his sadness will only be dissipated when meeting again his friend, in the heavenly realms. Until then, it remains unanswered the final question of the panegyric, rising echoes throughout centuries and individuals: who will there be to praise us, since we leave this life after thee, even if we offer any topic worthy of words or praise in Christ Jesus our Lord, to Whom be glory forever? (par. 82). The author uses scarcely the name of the protagonist: it appears only six times. Not without relevance, there is a seventh occurrence in par. 10, regarding the father of Saint Basil the Great and, also, an eighth occurrence, in a plural form, depicting a special variety of admiration, in a mimetic way: so you might see many Basils in outward semblance, among these statues in outline, for it would be too much to call them his distant echo: for an echo, though it is the dying away of a sound, at any rate represents it with great clearness, while these men fall too far short of him to satisfy even their desire to approach him (par. 77). Whenever appears, his name is accompanied by the surname great, that finally becomes part of his standard identification, Basil the Great: par. 1, 16, 27, 56; his name does not have the adjoined element in par. 63 and 82 (the last one being a direct approach, in vocative case, by the end of the panegyric); in paragraph 10, devoted to his father, the name is analyzed in its lexical meaning, with precise emphasis on the grandeur: who has not known Basil, our archbishops father, a great name to everyone. For all the other instances of referring to Saint Basil, the approached modality is as simple as possible, either by using a pronoun or a demonstrative, or implying the equally unadorned and unspectacular term anr: the man, this man, our man, e.g. par. 23, 28, 70, 79. Here and there, the term is completed by the epithet noble: on the other hand, noble is to be found alone as reference to the character (e.g. par. 29). Another appropriate epithet is saint (par. 55) or, in an ampler wording, the holy man of God however, metropolitan as he was of the true Jerusalem above (par. 59); this saint is the appellation in par. 80. Paragraph 24 includes a precise though unexpectedly rare term, covering the bond between author and hero of this panegyric: my friend. The portrait of Saint Basil the Great is accomplished in two perspectives: direct knowledge, which places on the same level the author of the panegyric

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and all the persons he addresses this opusculum, and, skilfully inserted into this background, elements of biographic realities that open to the literature of ancient world. The author gracefully alternates the angles, in a texture so dense that an intentional arrangement is almost imperceptible: the famous examples of classical works and characters come up naturally, as part of a human life. Just as biography and literature are convoluted, the author and co-protagonist (deuteragonist) are one and the same. The friend speaking in front of those living around him brings to the surface memories that many of his contemporaries found in their own past; the memories are brought to life and increased from individual to common recollection, become profound in Christian sensitivity and are fed by ancient culture. From the very beginning to the end, from the biography of the ancestors to the grandiose spiritual standing of the saint, each trait is revealed by references to sacred and ancient texts. From their first encounter in Athens to the final reunion beyond death, each trait finds its resonance in the life of the friend that is speaking now. Athens had brought them together just like two branches of some river-stream, for after leaving the common fountain of our fatherland, we had been separated in our varying pursuit of culture, and were now again united by the impulsion of God no less than by our own agreement (par. 15); driven by Gods will, they were together there and remained as one and single unit, even when life pushed them apart, in remote spaces. The two portraits are shedding light on each other, in vivid episodes scattered all life long, from their adolescence when everything needed to be studied, to the settling of sentiments and knowledge by the age of maturity and, finally, to the wise age. Shyly considering the crossroads of his own life, Saint Gregory contemplates his friend, admires him increasingly and wishes even more to reach the realm he always desired: kept aside by adverse circumstances, he is inclined to ascribe all the inconsistency and difficulty which have befallen [his] life to the hindrances in the way of philosophy, which have been unworthy of [his] desire and purpose (par. 25). He recognizes without a shadow of doubt: this is the source of all the inconsistency and tangle of my life; it has robbed me of the practice, or at least the reputation, of philosophy (par. 59). From the text of this oration emerge, completely stated, the reasons that transform Saint Basil into a paradigm for all around him, during his lifetime and long after that, mostly for Saint Gregory: in a circular construct, he is legitimating this way the panegyric itself when saying he was a standard of virtue to us all [] nor have I thought that to praise him befitted any other more than me (par. 2). Both necessary and legitimate, the oration needed a prolonged gestation period, largely clarified by the author, both in common knowledge and personal motivation. He only arrived at this point, long after many others eulogised, publicly and privately, the beloved memory of Saint Basil, mostly as he had to prepare himself for a proper homage: my first reason was, that I shrunk from this task [] as priests do, who approach their sacred

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duties before being cleansed both in voice and mind (par. 2). Taking a bow to the memory of Saint Basil could be considered, mainly in these opening paragraphs, as a modality of preparing the tangible public, the persons that were about to listen to him; he rendered an oration that minutely elaborated, using the tools he perfectly wielded, as recognized all the people that knew him and were acquainted with the friendship of the two masters of words. Bringing closer this detail, Saint Gregory immediately re-establishes the respectful distance, in a graceful balance between friendship and admiration: I must now proceed with my eulogy, commending myself to his God, in order that my commendations may not prove an insult to the man, and that I may not lag far behind all others; even though we all equally fall as far short of his due, as those who look upon the heavens or the rays of the Sun (par. 2). The entire text is deliberately censored, in order to obey the oratorical exigencies of the distant author, id est Saint Basil the Great: both character and spiritus mouens for the concrete author of the panegyric, Saint Basil continues to exist as part of a unity composed by two beings, acting as dynamic monoliths. The spiritual community of mind, already suggested in the opening paragraphs, becomes a palpable reality as oration proceeds: the author and the hero are permanently exchanging their roles, subtly, almost unwillingly, without claiming public complicity, only by unfolding the biographical threads, touching the Christian faith and building the wording volutes. One example: just after the episode devoted to the parents of Saint Basil (par. 10), the immediate author turns back to the hero of the panegyric, asking for his support in finding the proper words: we only need his own voice to pronounce his eulogium. For he is at once a brilliant subject for praise, and the only one whose powers of speech make him worthy of treating it. Topic and oratorical model, Saint Basil was the only one capable of writing a proper eulogy for a personality like himself: The praise, then, which I shall claim for him is based upon grounds which no one, I think, will consider superfluous, or beyond the scope of my oration. The idea stated here on a theoretical basis is to be found by the end of the oration (par. 60), when considering the text in the light of high criteria, as those Saint Basil taught: I am afraid that, in avoiding the imputation of indifference at the hands of those who desire to know all that can be said about him, I shall incur a charge of prolixity from those whose ideal is the golden mean; for the latter Basil himself had the greatest respect, being specially devoted to the adage in all things the mean is the best, and acting upon it throughout his life. While alternating the two authorial approaches (shyness and superiority), Saint Gregory blurs his presence assuming the role of second to his character, being created by his own hero of the oration. Self-inflicted shyness is always counterbalanced by the confidence in the proper accomplishment of his task, of his duty toward the friend he venerated and to whom stayed firmly aside: I am anxious, and seize this opportunity to add from my own experience somewhat to

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my speech, and to dwell a little upon the recital of the causes and circumstances which originated our friendship, or to speak more strictly, our unity of life and nature; [] so do we linger in our description of what is most sweet to us (par. 14). Stylistic constraints are repeatedly worded, explicitly, just as if the author discusses his own text with someone capable of understanding the subtle texture: this collocutor could not be anyone else but the hero himself, physically (and naturally) absent, but robustly present from all the other possible perspectives: I feel that I am being unduly borne away, and I know not how to enter upon this point, yet I cannot restrain myself from describing it; for if I have omitted anything, it seems, immediately afterwards, of pressing importance, and of more consequence than what I had preferred to mention; and if any one would carry me tyrannically forward, I become like the polyps, which when they are being dragged from their holes, cling with their suckers to the rocks, and cannot be detached, until the last of these has had exerted upon it its necessary share of force (par. 19). Talking about his friend, the hero of the panegyric, the author constantly speaks about himself. The result is strongly visible when commenting an unwanted detour, eulogy of himself transformed in eulogy of his hero, indefinitely multiplying their bonds: I have been unawares betrayed into praising myself, in a manner I would not have allowed in another. And it is no wonder that I gained here in some advantage from his friendship, and that, as in life he aided me in virtue, so since his departure he has contributed to my renown (par. 22). The final three paragraphs (80-82) are the accomplishment of the itinerary Saint Gregory attentively prepared from the first words. The natural ending, biographically predictable (the ultimate moments, the saint body carried by the grieving people, that did not want to accept his departure, struggling to touch the garments or at least his shadow), is the rising of voice in the lonely weeping of the one left behind on earth, as a sad half of a once harmonious unity of two spirits: I, Gregory, who am half dead, and, cleft in twain, torn away from our great union, and dragging along a life of pain which runs not easily, as may be supposed, after separation from him, know not what is to be my end now that I have lost my guidance (par. 80). This loneliness inside the long-ago monolith their perfect friendship could become a stimulus for bringing closely together a community, transferring the bond of two persons into a manifold connection, as Saint Gregory is asking everybody to join him, glorifying the memory of Saint Basil and living in Christian spirit: Come hither then, and surround me, all ye members of his choir, both of the clergy and the laity, both of our own country and from abroad; aid me in my eulogy, by each supplying or demanding the account of some of his excellences; [] all men will [] praise him who made himself all things to all that he might gain the majority, if not all (par. 81). Unfolding the whole oration, Saint Gregory turns over himself a constantly severe glance: from time to time, he softens his severity by accepting the limitation

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brought by the age. The panegyric is put under the sign of recollection and old age, the remembrances of Saint Basil and weakness of Saint Gregory: our feelings [] worn out with age and disease and regret for thee (par. 82). Tribute and incentive, his friend remains for him the thorn in the flesh, given by God, and his own commemoration is to become a new stimulus and a new model. Author and hero are a unit, the roles are performed at turn and the levels are spectacularly interweaved, from biographic episodes regarding one or the other, to philosophical and institutional authority, from assuming teachings to foundation of love.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Grgoire de Nazianze (1992), Discours 43, in Jean Bernardi (ed.), Grgoire de Nazianze, Discours 42-43, Cerf, Paris, pp. 116-307. Gregorio di Nazianzo (2000), Orazione funebre per il grande Basilio, in Claudio Moreschini (ed.), Tutte le Orazioni, Bompiani, Milano, pp. 1030-1121.

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LUCIANA IRINA CRMID (VLUANU)

Feminists have always criticized the treatment of women determined by Confucianism but the relationship between Confucianism and Feminism should be reconsidered in the light of the entire socio-political context of the time. In the early Confucian writings, the Masters of Confucianism did not explicitly put women in a subordinate position. When we judge whether women are inferior to men, we must take into account the fact that, in a patriarchal and highly hierarchical society, not only women but all members had their fixed and clear roles. The flourishing of the didactic literature for women in a period of vigorous thriving of Neo-Confucianism can be interpreted as a wish of control coming from the leading authorities but, at the same time, can be a sign for the gradually growing power of women. Indirectly women were recognized as a mass of people that could influence the well being of an entire society, from the family level to the top. Keywords: Confucianism, feminism, re-interpretation, didactic literature for women, roles, gender.

For the specialists in Confucianism, the juxtaposition suggested by the title of this presentation would have been unimaginable before the 1990s, when the first studies1 on the philosophical affinities between Confucianism and feminism were written. Their authors made significant progress in respect to the work of their predecessors2, effectively breaking the ground for research into the feminine issue of the Confucian ethics and philosophy from completely different perspectives. They attempted to counterbalance the image created by a plethora of scholars, that of a stereotypical woman forever subjugated, powerless, silent and obedient. The theme of the universal oppression of women in ancient China and Japan during the Tokugawa period has known several variations (Raphals, 1998: 1-2), from the sociological to the cosmological and not least, to the philosophical. Both the Chinese and the Japanese social systems were obviously patrilineal and patriarchal, based on the separation of influence and power zones women traditionally belonged to the interior, that is the domestic area, while men were associated with the exterior, that is with governance and business. A
Drd., University of Bucharest, Department of Cultural Studies, e-mail: [email protected] ; this article represents a slightly modified version of an article published before. 1 Chenyang Li, 1994, Henry Rosemont, Jr., 1997, Terry Woo, 1998, Tu Wei-ming, 1998, Karyn Lai, 2000, Sandra A. Wawrytko, 2000, Kelly James Clark and Robin Wang, 2004, Jing Yin, 2006, Xinyan Jiang, 2009. 2 Li Yu-ning, 1992, Dorothy Ko, 1994, Susan Mann, 1997, Lisa Raphals, 1998.

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social organisation of this type implicitly meant women were excluded from public life and deprived of legal rights, from the freedom to dispose of their own bodies and possessions to the ultimate interdiction to use their names. The cosmological grid built around the Yin-Yang principles and used to justify the inferior position assigned to women within family and society has known a progressive evolution: at first, gender analogies emphasised a complementary difference between female and male, then the nuances opposing the two principles developed, and in the end, the order became explicitly hierarchical. This last phase has come to dominate, and ultimately annihilate, the previous tradition. The philosophical and ethical version of this theme was attributed to Confucianism, which, a fact admitted even by its staunchest defenders, undeniably led to a consolidation of womans inferior position as wife, mother or daughter within a markedly hierarchical society. Beginning with the 1990s, the studies focusing on the life and role of women in Chinese and Japanese societies have taken a fresh turn motivated by the desire to achieve balance within the woman persecuted by man model, which until then presented a unilateral view of the negative influence of Confucian doctrine on the female status. With their more moderate approach, several articles3 made the transition to a new style of research. Chinese historian and philosopher Hu Shi, through an article entitled Womens Place in Chinese History (1931), counts as one of the first critics of the Confucian tradition who raises this issue, but, at the same time, suggests that women have nevertheless managed to find themselves a very well defined place within family, society and history, ruling over men and governing empires, contributing to the world of art and literature and educating their sons. (If she has not contributed more, it was probably because China, which certainly has treated her ill, has not deserved more of her) (Hu 1931: 15). Lin Yutang (1939: 139) considers that the gender difference advocated by Zhu Xi, by which the correct position of the husband outside the home and of the wife inside it were prescribed, is not necessarily an attempt at creating a hierarchy, but more of a need resulting from a better division of labour. (Confucianism also gave the wife an equal position with the husband, somewhat below the husband, but still an equal helpmate, like the two fish in the Taoist symbol of yin and yang, necessarily complementing each other) (Lin, 1939: 139). In his opinion, the issue of women in China, oppressed by men or not, presents two major aspects on the one hand, there is clear evidence in the Neo-Confucianism of the Chinese Song and Ming Periods and in the Japanese Tokugawa Period which attests to the different treatment given to men and women in society; on the other hand, Lin is one of the first researchers to state the supremacy held by women within the
3

Hu Shi, 1931, Lin Yutang, 1939, Priscilla Ching Chung, 1981, Richard Guiso, 1981

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family, which, he argues, would make their deprivation of social rights simply unimportant/irrelevant. Richard Guiso (1981: 60), too, despite his criticism of Chinese classical texts, which accepted tacitly or even perpetuated female stereotypes in a patriarchal society, acknowledges the respect shown to elderly, wise or experienced women. Nevertheless, as noted by Chenyang Li (2000: 7), the one who truly held power in the family of the Confucian world was the mother, not the woman, and this type of influence cannot, in fact, be compared to that wielded by men. As regards studies on women from the upper classes, we mention the one written by Priscilla Ching Chung (1981), which stresses the prestige and power attributed to palace women of the Northern Song Dynasty. Following these works we call transitional in the research on women, there came a trend in which scholars reconsidered Confucian values, reinterpreted them in the light of new philosophies and gave novel meanings to classical excerpts, thus highlighting ideas that would, in fact, have led to a better position for women. Li Yu-ning (1992) stresses the importance assigned by Confucianism to equal education and self improvement regardless of social origin and gender. Dorothy Ko (1994) analyses the privileged status held by educated women in the 18th century and the important role allotted to the mother and wife ruling the destinies of a family. Ko tries to explain a complex phenomenon manifested at the level of the elites, by which women actively embraced and internalised Confucian values in order to pass them onto the next generations. Susan Mann (1997), in her study on educated women during the Qing Dynasty (1683-1839), identifies writing not only as a weapon to defend values, but also as a means for them to gain respect and individual satisfaction. Thus, Mann gives them an important and well-deserved position, challenging a century and a half during which Chinese radicals and Western missionaries viewed women as victims of a cultural tradition. In her book Sharing the Light, Lisa Raphals (1998) offers representations of women as agents of intellectual, political and ethical virtues, by analysing the biographies of exemplary women. Despite the fact that these didactic texts had been written with the explicitly stated intention of disseminating the Confucian moral lifestyle at all social levels, they also prove what women are capable of, meaning their power acknowledged and sometimes feared by men. With these works the foundations of, some would think, even more daring approaches are being laid, which end up juxtaposing Confucianism and feminism, in an attempt to rehabilitate this school of though, to adapt this cultural tradition to social and political changes. Some authors highlighted the similarities between the two schools of thought. Chenyang Li (1994) focuses on the aspects shared by the feminist ethics of compassion, of altruism and the Confucian jen ethics, and demonstrates that both exhibit a similar understanding of the self as social construct, that both lie

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a heavy stress on situational moral judgement rather than on judgement based on principals and also that both advocate the importance of compassion in ethics. The concept of jen and that of compassion are equally centred on the system of human relationships. Confucianists as well as feminists see the human being as social, integrated into a system in which it occupies a referential place. Li borrows arguments from the feminist perspective on compassion and quotes the opinions of consecrated authors, such as Carol Gillian and Nell Noddings, in order to support the affinity of these two philosophies, as he calls them. Li identifies the feminist grain in early Confucianism, which, in his opinion, should go back to Confucius and Mencius in order to do away with the later additions and amendments brought throughout history to the concept of female gender, under the influence of various political and philosophical systems. Like all the other authors who have attempted a parallel between these schools of thought pertaining to different epochs and apparently placed in complete opposition, Li also sees them as complementary, remarking on the reciprocal help they could provide in order to acquire new nuances. In his essay Classical Confucian and Contemporary Feminist Perspectives on the Self: Some Parallels and Their Implications (1997), Henry Rosemont Jr. draws a parallel between classical Confucianism and contemporary feminism and brigs arguments in favour of a reconstruction of Confucian philosophy on a new basis, which would inevitably comprise a vision of the equality between genders adapted to the modern world. Terry Woo (1998) suggests, with examples taken from the writings of Confucius and Mencius, that the two were indulgent supporters of traditional norms of sexual segregation and exacerbated masculine authority, rather than misogynists as they have often been labelled. She sees feminism in its active form, as the necessary force in the struggle for equal rights. She cannot avoid noticing the irreconcilable differences between Confucianism and feminism, but at the same time she points out their common principles: an equal opportunity for education and an attitude of flexibility and openness. She also offers a solution for the future an appropriation of jen and a better understanding of the history of Confucianism might offer a sense of cultural recovery (Woo, 1998: 138) to Chinese as well as Western feminists. Tu Wei-ming (1998) is yet another prominent scholar who researched the subject, trying to bring more proof of the acknowledged necessity to establish a dialogue between Confucianism and feminism. Within the frame of the discussion on the five essential relationships mentioned explicitly in the writings of Mencius and the three subordinations of women, Tu Wei-ming discusses the separation between husband and wife based apparently on the reciprocity principle, in view of a better division of labour. A wifes patience and obedience are interpreted as signs of great inner strength and not of weakness, and the author sees woman as equal to man precisely by virtue of her capacity to adapt and to manipulate silently.

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The majority of these texts have their roots in a common tenet, namely a return to the founders of Confucianism, Confucius and Mencius, who, in their turn, preached a rediscovery of the ancestors and a valorisation of lost meanings. The reinterpretation of classical texts in the light of new realities has been considered necessary for formulating the hypothesis on which all modern scholars of classical Confucianism rely, namely that the fathers of Confucianism never openly expressed an oppressive attitude towards women. Yet nor did they advocate the idea of gender equality, mainly because they lived in a patriarchal society which appeared to have already devised a clear place and role for each of its members. Their neutral attitude in this respect is also a subject of discussion, given the sparse reference to women in their works. The Analects have been analysed from many angles and there is even a statistics on the frequency of certain words in the text. One aspect scholars view as revealing is the fact that woman appears only twice and never in direct reference to her status. The fragment which is behind Confucius image as sexist (17:25) has known countless interpretations: (Only nzi and petty people are hard to rear. If you are close to them, they behave inappropriately; if you keep a distance from them, they become resentful.) (Ames and Rosemont Jr., 1999: 17-25). The word used to refer to women is nzi (the characters for woman and child), and its interpretations have led to all manner of conclusions. Those who read simply women underlined Confucius defamatory attitude towards this gender. Others, among whom Chinese linguist Wang Li, took zi, which means child/children, as an adjective to n, the resulting compound word meaning not women in general, but girls. Other interpretations seeking to eliminate the sexist note replaced women and small/unimportant people with servants, both female and male, but this particular decoding is seen as straying too much from the texts original meaning. Others consider that women are compared to unimportant people (the characters for small and man), allegedly the opposite of the Confucian ideal of the superior man, and the accusation that they are difficult to nurture/cultivate yet another meaning ascribed to this word would indeed be serious, were we to analyse the philosophical and pedagogical dimensions of nurturing (in the sense of nurturing the mind), since it would lead to the obvious conclusion that women lack the ability to grow spiritually and intellectually. James Legge, the famous translator of The Analects, felt the need to clarify this term and he said it was a reference to concubines rather than to women in general. He could not help himself from not noticing that we hardly expect such an utterance, though correct in itself, from Confucius (Legge, 1935: 330). Nevertheless, there are some nuances that would give new meanings to the fragment: Confucius would say that it is difficult to cultivate women, not that such a task is impossible, and seeing that he considers the journey to self-cultivation as intrinsically difficult, there would be no discrimination between women and men, who face

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similar challenges. The complexity and ambiguity of this excerpt, the multitude of interpretations possible at all levels semantic, ideological etc. lead us to the conclusion that the scholars who took into consideration only the sexist aspect oversimplified things in the general context of the Confucian view on gender, created by successive additions throughout history. The other fragment in which Confucius refers to women is also considered suffused with discrimination between genders. (Shun had five ministers and society was well managed. King Wu said, I had ten able people as ministers. Confucius said, Is it true that it is difficult to find talent? The Tang-Yu period was a high time for talented people. [Among King Wus ministers] there was a woman; so there were only nine people.)4 This was taken by scholars as proof of Confucius belief in womans inferior status. Even though King Wu counted a woman between his most trusted councillors, thus placing that woman on an equally footing with men, Confucius was keen on correcting his attitude and this is the reason why he said there were only nine people worth mentioning. Such textual debates can continue endlessly but it is important to mention that in the late years different approaches appeared. Some contemporary scholars, like Xinyan Jiang (Xinyan, 2009), see in this fragment that, on the contrary, Confucius admits womans ability to become involved in official matters, building their interpretation on very early comments on the text. Huang Kan (488-545) considers that the woman Confucius speaks of could be King Wens mother, whom he admired and wished to singularise in this way. It is universally accepted that the founders of Confucianism were not the ones who produced this discriminatory vision of women, but later developments of this ethical and philosophical system, notably Neo-Confucianism, which effectively sealed womens fate. In the works by Confucius there is no mention of the three subordinations of woman, which place her successively under the authority of her father, her husband and her son. However, Confucius antifeminist inclinations were considered evident from the fact that he had no female disciples among his followers. But this can also be explained due to the hierarchical structure of the gender relations in the society of his time. We consider that the key to the reinterpretation of the classic texts in relation to the new feministic approaches is Tu Wei-mings remarks that we shouldnt forget there always was a major difference between the social and cultural practice and the Confucian teachings. One clear example to support this affirmation can be found in the didactic literature for women, written in China starting from the Han dynasty and which spread in all the other countries that went under the influence of Confucianism. Illustrated didactic books played an important role in establishing social norms and behavioural ideals, the tracts for girls were meant to stimulate
4

The Analects 8.20 in the translation of James Legge.

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moral values by praising exemplary models and also supported a patriarchal ideology. They expressed a perceived necessity to conceptualize the female gender but the question is whether the portrayals of women in these texts offered as accurate and natural representations of the women as they really existed. Why did this kind of literature flourish in a period when Neo-Confucianism was at its peak? Was didactic literature responding to a recent change based in part on women increasing access to work outside the home and increasing knowledge gained from literacy? Another supposition meant to sustain this theory is that these developments in the lives of common women were so potentially disruptive to the ideal order conceived of by ruling elites that severe admonition was necessary. And here we go back to the remark of Tu Wei-ming who understood the discrepancy between reality and the Confucian principles. Tu Wei-ming also recognized the feminist potential of Confucian thought in that unlike other spiritual traditions, there is no theoretical limitation within Confucianism against educating women or against training generations of women Confucian masters. The tradition does not impose any constraints on this (Tu 1984: 62). It is true that, for example, in Japan, the secularization of education was virtually completed before the end of the 17th century and according to Dore and the best available data, something like 40 per cent of Japanese men were literate by the end of the Tokugawa period but only 10 per cent of Japanese girls were getting some kind of formal education outside of their homes (Dore 1965 : 254). Tokugawa education indoctrinated all levels of society, both men and women, with the goal dictated by Neo-Confucianism to serve the family, the group that one belonged to and ultimately, the country. The relationship between feminism and Confucianism has long been one-sided, with feminists criticizing the status of the women conferred by Confucianism, but recent research tried to contextualize it and discover other aspects related to the socio-political reality of that time. Confucianism cannot be blamed for discriminating women in a patriarchal society in which womens subordination is seen as necessary for the whole hierarchy. It is worth mentioning that the fixed roles were not assigned only to women, but every member of the society should have known his place and should have behaved accordingly. It is said that the function of any philosophy is contextually determined and Confucianism is not an exception. That is why recent research on the classical books tried to redeem the subordinate status of women in Confucianism, as their inferiority, at least as shown in the texts, is seen as contingent and functional rather than innate and biological (Sin 2000: 165). The Confucianism made use of different means for disseminating its conception and one of them was the didactic literature. One majore part of this kind of writing was dedicated to women because the Confucianist thinkers considered necessary that women should be educated and instructed about the family matters. Feminists judged those texts as discriminatory and restrictive, but, at the same time, they re-evaluated and appreciated them for their educative value, even if limited to the domestic realm. The encounter between the Confucianism and feminism enriched them reciprocally and criticism was important and benefic for both of them.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

LUCIANA IRINA CRMID (VLUANU)

Roger T., Ames, Henry Rosemont Jr., (1999), The Analects of Confucius: A Philosophical Translation, Ballantine Books, New York. Chung, Priscilla Ching (1981), Power and Prestige: Palace Women in the Northern Sung (960-1126), in Richard W. Guisso, Stanley Johannesen (ed.), Women in China: Current Directions in Historical Scholarship, Philo Press, Youngstown, New York, pp. 99-112. Clark, Kelly James, Robin Wang, (2004), A Confucian Defense of Gender Equity, in Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 72, 2, 395-422 Dore, R. P. (1965), Education in Tokugawa Japan, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles. Guisso, Richard W., Stanley Johannesen (ed.) (1981), Women in China: Current Directions in Historical Scholarship, Philo Press, Youngstown, New York. Hu, Shi (1931), Womens Place in Chinese History, in Li Yu-Ning (ed.), Chinese Women Through Chinese Eyes, M.E. Sharpe, Armonk, New York. Ko, Dorothy (1994), Teachers of the Inner Chambers: Women and Culture in Seventeenth Century China, Stanford University Press, Stanford. Legge, James (1935), The Chinese Classics, vol. 1, vol. 2, Shanghai: Oxford University Press, reprint Hong Kong University Press, Hong Kong. Li, Chenyang a. (1994), The Confucian Concept of Jen and the Feminist Ethics of Care: A Comparative Study, Hypatia: A Feminist Journal of Philosophy, 9:1 Li, Chenyang b. (2000), Introduction: Can Confucianism Come to Terms with Feminism?, Chenyang Li (ed.) The Sage and the Second Sex: Confucianism, Ethics, and Gender, Open Court Publishing Co., Illinois. Lin Yutang (1935), Feminist Thought in Ancient China, Li Yu-ning (ed.), My Country and My People, The John Day Company, New York. Mann, Susan (1997), Precious Records: Women in Chinas Long Eighteenth Century, Stanford University Press, Stanford. Raphals, Lisa (1998), Sharing the Light: Representations of Women and Virtue in Early China, The State University of New York Press, Albany, New York. Rosemont Jr., Henry (1997), Classical Confucian and Contemporary Feminist Perspectives on the Self: Some Parallels and Their Implications, in Douglas Allen (ed.) Culture and Self: Philosophical and Religious, East and West, Westview Press, Boulder, Colorado. Sin Yee Chan (2000), Gender and Relationship Roles in the Analects and the Mencius, in Asian Philosophy: An International Journal of the Philosophical Traditions of the East, 10:2, 115-132. Tu, Wei-Ming a. (1984), Confucian Ethics Today: The Singapore Challenge, Curriculum Development Institute of Singapore, Singapore. Tu, Wei-Ming b. (1998), Probing the Three Bonds and Five Relationships, in Walter H. Slote, George A. De Vos (ed.), Confucianism and the Family, The State University of New York Press, Albany, New York. Wawrytko, Sandra A. (2000), Kongzi as Feminist: Confucian Self-Cultivation in a Contemporary Context, in Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 27:2, 171-186. Woo, Terry (1998), Confucianism and Feminism, in Sharma, Arvind, Katherine K. Young (ed.), Feminism and World Religions, The State University of New York Press, Albany, New York. Xinyan Jing (2009), Confucianism, Women, and Social Contexts, in Journal of Chinese Philosophy, 36.2: 228-242. Yin, Jing (2006), Toward a Confucian Feminism: A Critique of Eurocentric Feminist Discourse, in China Media Research, 2(3), 9-18.

TIME AND CHRONOLOGY IN TERTULLIANS ADVERSUS IUDAEOS (VIII. 8-15)

LEVENTE PAP

Although early Christians attempted to reject the heritage of the Antiquity, they could not succeed in this, therefore this legacy survived together with the Hebrew values they were deeply attached to. This duality characterizes the works of Tertullian as well. In Adversus Iudaeos, he uses The Book of Daniel, one of Bibles eschatological prophecies to prove that the Christ founded Christianity himself and he was the expected Messiah, his advent having already been foretold. In order to support these assertions, Tertullian enumerates the rulers of the ancient world, calculating the years of the prophecy by seven-year long septennial years. His major goal was to prove the authenticity of the prophecy, and nonetheless a strict historical accuracy this could be the reason why he uses malleably both the Jewish approach to time and the Greek linear concept of time in the treatment of time and dates. Keywords: Tertullian, time, Daniel, Christianity, emperors.

Man is unable to perceive time directly. Therefore, we form our concepts of time with the help of spatial ones. We live in time, and we approach its changes by the concepts of motion in space, observing its pulsation from our own perspective. Everyone is situated at a certain point of a temporal vector, with his face towards the future and with his back towards the past. In approaching time in this way, we are the followers of the ancient Greeks. The Hebrew conception of time is a completely different one. In its foreground there stand not the duration, direction, or its movement, but its content and meaning. Its nature is determined by the fact that, contrary to the Greek way of thinking, dealing primarily with things, the Hebrew way of thinking focuses on the characteristics and meaning of the events, and on their relationships with each other. Consequently, in the Hebrew language time is expressed not with the help concepts of space, but through the forms of everyday activities. It is natural that while we can form quantitative terms about space, the nature of the events is described in qualitative terms. Rkai (2000: 70-72) The Ecclesiastes says: A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up. (Ecclesiastes 3:2-3.)
University Lecturer, Sapientia Hungarian University of Transylvania, Romania, [email protected]

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The dating according to the years of reign was the typical method of determining time in despotic monarchies, not only in the ancient Orient, but also in Hellenistic monarchies, in the Byzantine Empire and in medieval feudal kingdoms. It expressed the view that the person of the actual ruler primarily determined the character of a particular year. A different way of dating emerged in societies governed in a non-despotic manner, or where the memory of an earlier primitive democracy was stronger. Eponymous dates consist in the fact, that each year was named after the annually changing person, usually fulfilling a sacerdotal (but in any case a highly esteemed) office, the dates bearing his name. This eponymous system formed the basis of the Greek record of years as well. Each Greek city-state possessed an own system in this respect. In Athens, the year was defined by the name of the archon. This title was worn by the leader of a nine-member archonic body, who therefore was later conferred the title of archn epnymos, the eponymous archon. The Roman Republic also followed the eponymous system, counting the years according to the consuls. Each year was marked by the names of the two consuls. Even the omnipotent emperors of the fourth century emitted their decrees dated according to the consuls. Only Justinian abolished the office of the consulate in 537 and restored the ancient Oriental and Hellenistic pattern of dates according to the years of reign. Hahn (2004) The ideological basis of developing Christian world-eras were the eschatological approach i.e., regarding Doomsday as the final goal of the history of mankind and, respectively, one of its forms of manifestation, chiliasm. According to this very approach, the history of the world forms a closed unity, which, from the beginning from the creation of the first man advances throughout vast milenial ages (chilioi = thousand, hence chiliasm) according to a divine schedule towards the ultimate outcome, the eschaton, i.e. the final divine judgment. Hahn (2004) First of all, we should posit a generally accepted principle. While Greek thinking was static, in other words, the Greeks were looking for real, authentic existence in an unchanging permanence, taking only the unchanging and resting phenomena as real, Hebrew thinking was concerned with motion, action and the event itself. For the Hebrew thinking of the Old Testament, real existence is to be found in the events, in change. For this thinking, real existence means dynamism. From this position, we can comprehend the concern of Hebrew thinking for history, alongside with its positive approach to time. Here time serves as the unitary and universal framework for actions and events. The Greeks, like other European nations, cannot imagine time without associating it with space. In other words, when there is mentioned a duration, a date, a period or an interval, these mean a certain spatial order in every instance. We perceive time, tempus in this spatial order. The past is what is behind us, the present is the very point we stand at, while the future has to be ahead of us. When a Greek is speaking about time, he divides it into past, present and future, thus also making it abstract and even relativising it. The Hebrew, on the contrary, does not emphasize the measurability and quantitative importance of

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time, but rather its quality, the events taking place in it. For him, time does not exist merely in itself. He does not possess such an abstract image of time. He is not able to separate time as an abstract concept. Instead he always perceives it as closely related to events and happenings. Adorjni (2000: 2) Early Christian thinking, wanted to deny pagan Roman world, however, it could not succeed in this, because without the culture of the Antiquity this religion would have been condemned to death. The values of Hebrew culture were also an integral part of the new religion. Thus, they could not omit the Greek-Roman culture, while they were attached to Hebrew culture as well. This duality characterized early Christian literature and, accordingly, the works of Tertullian as well. The prophecies of the The Book of Daniel have always been an interesting gleam in the series of the Bibles eschatological prophecies. Hammer (1976) The events of the 1st century BC had increased the interest of the Jews in this topic. This was the time of the actual split of the unity of Hebrew religion, new directions have appeared, trying to provide newer and newer explanations of this prophecy, and have excelled in its precise calculation. Without attempting to discuss here the period of its edition in a more detailed manner, in which the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls provided nevertheless an undoubtedly important support, The Book of Daniel is now important for us rather from the aspects of its content. Vermes (1998) The origins of this book are also linked to an important event, since it was written when the army led by Cyrus the Great conquered the capital of the Babylonian empire. In addition, this was the year when Cyrus allowed the Jews to return home and build their Temple. Collins (1994) Let us see the text: It was the first year of Darius son of Artaxerxes, a Mede by race who assumed the throne of Chaldaea. In the first year of his reign I, Daniel, was studying the scriptures, counting over the number of years as revealed by Yahweh to the prophet Jeremiah that were to pass before the desolation of Jerusalem would come to an end, namely seventy years... When your pleading began, a word was uttered, and I have come to tell you. You are a man specially chosen. Grasp the meaning of the word, understand the vision: 'Seventy weeks are decreed for your people and your holy city, for putting an end to transgression, for placing the seal on sin, for expiating crime, for introducing everlasting uprightness for setting the seal on vision and on prophecy, for anointing the holy of holies. Know this, then, and understand: From the time there went out this message: "Return and rebuild Jerusalem" to the coming of an Anointed Prince, seven weeks and sixty-two weeks, with squares and ramparts restored and rebuilt, but in a time of trouble. (Dan 9, 1-2; 23-25)1 Daniels prophecy speaks about the building of the Temple, about its destruction and about the Messiah. Along the centuries, various explanations were born regarding this issue, but a unified position did not exist, therefore the highly respected Rav stated in 246: All the settled points of the end of times have already passed, the thing now depends only on repentance and on good deeds. Ruff (2006)
1

Translation from: Wansbrough (1985)

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In the Middle Ages Maimonides wrote the following about this, Daniel has elucidated to us the knowledge of the End Times. However, since they are secret, the Wise, may their memory be blessed, have barred the calculation of the days of the Messiahs coming so that the untutored populace will not be led astray when they see that the end times have already come but theres no sign of the Messiah. For this reason the Wise, may their memory be blessed, have decreed: Cursed be he who calculates the End Times. But we cannot assert that Daniel was wrong in his reckoning. Santala (1992: 24), Davidson (2005) Ruff T. has an appropriate remark to this in the concluding part of his article cited above: Anyway, the prohibition did not have enough results: both the Jews and the Christians are still often preocupied with Daniels prophecy. Ruff (2006). All these are valid also for the early Christian era, since this question raised a general interest namely to what extent the prophecy can be related to the birth of Christ (John the Baptist, Paul the Apostle, etc). These approaches were not uniform, but their essence was the same: when should the Messiah arrive, and did Christ actually arrive within this interval? Tertullian2 in this debate tries similarly, to exploit the argumentative potential of Daniels prophecy in his work Adversus Iudaeos.3 Accordingly the times must be inquired into of the predicted and future nativity of the Christ, and of His passion, and of the extermination of the city of Jerusalem, that is, its devastation. For Daniel says, that "both the holy city and the holy place are exterminated together with the coming Leader, and that the pinnacle is destroyed unto ruin." And so the times of the coming Christ, the Leader, must be inquired into, which we shall trace in Daniel; and, after computing them, shall prove Him to be come, even on the ground of the times prescribed, and of competent signs and operations of His. Which matters we prove, again, on the ground of the consequences which were ever announced as to follow His advent; in order that we may believe all to have been as well fulfilled as foreseen. (Adv. Iud. VIII. 8-10)4 It is an important matter that he should demonstrate to his debate partner, of course, with the help of the Bible again, that Christ had to be born,
2 Tertullian was born in Carthage c. 160 and died before 240 AD. He is a controversial personality from several points of view. There exist many controversies regarding his life (including the date of his birth and of his death), his qualification and profession (whether he was a lawyer or not), his theology, his argumentative methods, and his style as well. This controversy also persisted throughout his entire further reception. While he had brought an enormous effort in the defence of the Christian faith, he could not enter the ranks of the Church Fathers. While the Decretum Gelasianum condemned his writings, none of these Fathers of the Church could have ignored them. His works are still subject to divergent approaches throughout the world, both by ecclesiastic and secular scholars. 3 This work was written around 197; its authenticity is being debated even nowadays. Its major objective was to prove to the Hebrews that the Christ himself, who was also the expected Messiah, had founded Christianity and the prophets had already foretold the advent of Christianity. This work uses the text of the Old Testament in order to persuade his opponents (retorsio criminis), and is aiming to prove at the same time that Christendom had replaced the Hebrews in being the chosen people of God. 4 English translation by: Thelwall (1870)

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moreover, he even had to have to suffer, and all these were consummated in their due time. Besides, he also wanted to prove that the prophecies also speak about the destruction of the Temple, and that the Jews will become outcaste, and their homeland will be burnt up, which actually came true in the early spring of 70 AD Pap (2008). In order to support his arguments, Tertullian, enumerates the rulers of the ancient world and the calculation of the years of the prophecy. He starts the enumeration exactly from the (end of the) reign of Cyrus the Great (559-530), which can be considered logical, since, as already mentioned, Cyrus made important concessions toward the Jews, and therefore his reign is a real milestone. The prophet made his predictions in the time of Darius, who in 519 BC allowed the Jews in line with the previous decree of Cyrus to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem. It made sense that he should start his calculations from the end of the reign of the great king, respectively from the beginning of Darius reign. The series of the rulers living before Christ ends with Augustus, whose reign is supposed to be of 46 years, and even though as Tertullian himself also asserts survived with 15 years the birth of Christ, his whole reign should entirely be added to the reign before Christ, because this leads to the completion of the foretold 62 and half septennial years that should elapse until the coming of Christ: Let us see, therefore, how the years are filled up until the advent of the Christ: For Darius reigned XVIIII years. Artaxerxes reigned Xl and I years. Then King Ochus (who is also called Cyrus) reigned XXIIII years. Argus one year. Another Darius, who is also named Melas XXI years. Alexander the Macedonian XII years. Then, after Alexander, who had reigned over both Medes and Persians, whom he had reconquered, and had established his kingdom firmly in Alexandria, when withal he called that (city) by his own name; after him reigned, (there, in Alexandria), Soter XXXV years. To whom succeeds Philadelphus, reigning XXX and VIII years. To him succeeds Euergetes XXV years. Then Philopator XVII years. After him Epiphanes XXIIII years. Then another Euergetes XXVIIII years. Then another Soter XXXVIII years. Ptolemy XXXVII years. Cleopatra XX years V months. Yet again Cleopatra reigned jointly with Augustus XIII years. After Cleopatra, Augustus reigned another XIIII years... For, after Augustus who survived after the birth of Christ, are made up XV years. To whom succeeded Tiberius Caesar, and held the empire XX years, VII months, XXVIII days. (In the fiftieth year of his empire Christ suffered. being about XXX years of age when he suffered.) Again Caius Caesar, also called Caligula III years, VIII months, XIII days. Nero Caesar XI years, IX months, XIII days. Galba VII months, VI days. Otho III days. Vitellius VIII months, XXVII days. The problem of the 15 years should not be considered a complete anachronism, since, Tertullians list of rulers, as it was mentioned earlier, assigns a determining role to the years of the rulers from the point of view of counting the septennial years and not from that of the exact dates of the significant events during these reigns. This seems to be supported also by the fact that Theodotions version of Daniels prophecy operates with intervals and not with exact dates. If we take

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this into account, then the argumentation seems to be logical; even if it may seem ahistorical at certain points we should not forget that it was not the sequence of the events that was important, but the justification of the Christian narrative of redemption embedded into this series but his argumentative deduction is logical. Pap (2008:89-92) Even to that extent that afterwards he can easily demonstrate that the fall of the Temple in Jerusalem and the dispersion of the Jews were foretold exactly with the same precision. The following chart attempts to provide a summary of this:
RULER Darius Artaxerses Cyrus the Great Argos Darius Melas Alexander the Great Soter Philadelphus Euergetes Philopator Epiphanes Euergetes Soter Ptolemy Cleopatra Anthony & Cleopatra Augustus Septennial years Tiberius Caligula Nero Galba Otho Vitellius missing Claudius included YEARS 19 41 24 1 21 12 35 38 25 17 24 27 38 37 22 13 43 437 437*12=5244+5=(5249/12)/7=62.5 22 3 11 7 8 9 7 3 8 42 5,6 7,5 28 13 13 6 5 28 93 5 MONTHS DAYS

36 (36*365+42*30+93)/365/7=5.6 (49*365+42*30+93)/365/7=7.5

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The emperor list of the chart clearly shows that the name and reign of Claudius are missing. This could be assigned to the author's inattentiveness, however, as the calculations show, their sum total should also contain the reign of Claudius, because the required seven and half septennial years will be complete only this way. The dates of the reign of none of the emperors would be appropriate we would need 13 years since Augustus himself also reigned 15 years after the birth of Christ, according to the calculation of Tertullian, therefore he would not fit into the formula. Vespasian, whose reign, according to the former logic, according to which only the reigns of those rulers are enumerated, when important events took place, relevant for the prophecy is rightfully missing, reigned for 10 years. Why is Vespasian omitted from the list? Or what is more, why is also Claudius? From a mathematical point of view Vespasians reign would have been uncomfortable in the process of argumentation, but Tertullian could have left it out, without any particular explanation, because the war waged to defeat the Jews, together with the mobilization against Jerusalem, had already begun, also during the former emperor's reign, and the decisive victory had not even been fought by the emperor himself, but by Titus. The omission of Claudius can probably be traced back to a lacuna, a copy mistake, as Trnkle also notes, not naming this lacuna explicitly, although his interpretation does not rule out this possibility. Trnkle (1964) Although the explanations do not seem documented enough, sometimes, we can conclude that Tertullian actually had a single important goal: to prove the authenticity of redemption and the rightly adverse fate of the Jews, and nonetheless a complete historical accuracy. Of course, in the centre of this enumeration Christ himself stands as a cardinal argumentative point of this issue. This is also a reference point in the prophecy of the prophet, dividing it into two parts, being inserted between the time of building and the Temple and that of its destruction the Jews will be punished because of their sins; they will lose the divine grace, represented by the destruction of the Temple. However, this is a historical fact which could not have been denied even by the Jews of Tertullians age, as it was also a historical fact the reconstruction of the Temple after the Babylonian captivity, and therefore between these two events the coming of Christ should be regarded also as a similar historical fact, having been mentioned by the prophet Daniel. In the treatment of time and dates, Tertullian uses malleably both the Hebrew approach to time (see the case of Vespasian) and the Greek linear concept of time (most obviously in the enumeration of the rulers). The Christian literature of this age was mostly characterized by this duality, until it succeeded to acquire its own voice, which naturally would also be an alloy of these two.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

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Adorjni, Zoltn (2000), A bibliai idszemllet, in Keresztny Sz, tome XI, no. 10, pp. 2-6. Collins, John Joseph (1994), Daniel: A Commentary on the Book of Daniel, Hermeneia: a Critical and Historical Commentary on the Bible, Fortress Publishers, Augsburg. Davidson, H. A. (2005), Moses Maimonides: The Man and his Works, OUP, Oxford. Hahn, Istvn (2004), Naptri rendszerek s idszmts, Neumann Kht., Budapest., accesat n 2012-02-29, http://mek.niif.hu/04700/04744/html/naptarirendszerek0004.html Hammer, Raymond (1976), The Book of Daniel, C U P, Cambridge. Pap, Levente (2008), Tertulliani Adversus Iudaeos, in L. Pap L., Zs. Tapodi (eds.) Kzssg, Kultra, Identits, Scinetia, Cluj-Napoca, pp. 89-103. Rkai, Mikls (2000), Az id a zsid kultrban, in F. Zoltn (ed.), A megfoghatatlan id. Tabula knyvek, 2., Budapest, pp. 70-84. Ruff, Tibor (2006), A Messis-kd, Dniel elrejtette knyvben a megvlts dtumt, in Hetek, tome X, no. 24, accesat n 2012-02-29, http://www.hetek.hu/hit_es_ertekek/200606/a_messias_kod Santala, Risto (1992), The Messiah in the Old Testament in the Light of Rabbinical Writings, Keren Ahvah Meshihit, Jerusalem, p. 24, accesat n 2012-02-29, http://www.ristosantala.com/rsla/OT/index.html Thelwall, S. (1870), Adversus Iudaeos, ANCL vol. III., T. & T. Clark, Edingburgh, pp. 201-208. Trnkle, Hermann (1964), Q. S. F. Tertulliani Adversus Judaeos, Franz Steiner, Wiesbaden. Vermes, Gza (1998), The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English, Penguin, London. Wansbrough, Henry ed. (1985), The New Jerusalem Bible (NJB), Darton-Longman & Todd and Les Editions du Cerf, London-Paris.

FOR IMMORTALITY IS BUT UBIQUITY IN TIME: MOBY DICK ON THE HORIZON OF MYTH
IRINA DUBSK

The present study aims to offer a glimpse of the White Whale as an expression of an Absolute Presence, for, as Theodor Adorno writes, time fixed into space creates the illusion of an Absolute Presence. Moby Dick is declared by some superstitious whale-men not only ubiquitous, but immortal (for immortality is but ubiquity in time) (Moby Dick). As Mircea Eliade writes in Images and Symbols, a myth is something unfolding in illo tempore, actually in the space where time is no more, for illud tempus is synonymous with eternity and with the Principle. The whales ubiquity in time (Moby Dick) places it on the horizon of myth, in illo tempore, where time turns into space, where the alchemical squaring of the circle is accomplished. Sequentiality, the defining trait of the elusory dimension of being, is foreign to Moby Dick. The whale is true in that it exists in simultaneity. The conjoining of these attributes points to the mythical nature of the whale. Myths, being rooted in the realm of essential truths, dwell simultaneously in two different worlds, in the same way as the whale does. Therefore, myths are two-faceted: one face is turned towards the sublunary world, while the other one looks upon the sphere of the fixed stars. Correspondingly, the whale is a double-faceted entity: its face is analogous to the unseen side of myth, whereas its tail is related to the visible manifestation of myth in its lower aspect. Keywords: time, ubiquity, myth, whale, timeless, chronology, sequentiality.

William Shurr acknowledges Melville as the most intellectual and philosophical of the [American] canonical writers, (371) a description which masterfully grasps the awe-inspiring complexity of the Melvillean Opus. In his absorbing study of Melvilles reputation and of Melville as a literary criticism construct, Paul Lauter discusses his students response to the writer and their resistance to reading his work:
You really feel belittled when you are reading Melville, one said. I know this is art, and I cant understand it. You feel, another added, that somethings wrong with you; that youre missing something (2).

Professor Lauter assesses that his students feel ignorant before the dense web of Melvilles allusive, syntactically intricate style and his convoluted plotting (2). Moreover, they seem to actively dislike Melville as a consequence of their being humiliated by his prose (2).

Spiru Haret University, Bucharest, e-mail: [email protected]

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In fact, what is so unsettling and intellectually disquieting in Melvilles texts is his handling of the mystery with his visible hands (Moby Dick 131) and his agonizing struggle to put into writing the glimpses () of the mortally intolerable truth (Moby Dick 105) which he catches during his wandering to and fro to quote Hawthornes description of his friends intellectual inquiry throughout the vast expanse of the known and the unknown. As the author of The Scarlet Letter insightfully remarks, Melville has a proclivity towards reason[ing] of Providence and futurity, and of everything that lies beyond human ken (qtd. in Bartlett 112-113) which is sure to account for the esoteric aura of his work, which, in its turn, explains the discouraging and humiliating effect his writing has upon some segments of both his contemporary and modern readership. In fact, Melville identified himself with his quest what D. H. Lawrence terms the last hunt, the last conquest (235) the quester and the quest fusing together to strive for the ultimate. This mystic conflation of subject and object in Melvilles vision has also been noted by Martin Bickman who writes that the paradox () Melville seem[s] to be confronting is that one cannot seize the mystery of life consciously, but must allow oneself to be seized by it(Bickman 77). Melvilles artistic and existential status as a herald and interpreter of the mystery of life sealed him with a mark of excellence which cut him off from his contemporary cultural environment and his reading audience. His discomfort with and alienation from the culture in which he found himself (Schneider 193) pervade most of his work and are reflected in the centrality of his position in the American literary canon. Melville cross[ed] the frontiers into Eternity (Mosses 295) or, as a literary scholar most poetically phrases it, Melville, through his living vision, has killed or conquered time (Wolf 92). The squaring of the circle, the transmutation of time into eternity, is the corner-stone of Melvilles literary edifice, a fact illustrated by his preoccupation with the circle image (Wolf 29). The idea of eternity possessed by man in time has been identified as a recurrent theme in the work of Melville and other great writers of the Romantic () era (Poulet 673). The Alchemical Opus is carried to perfection in the Athanor of Melvilles writing; his knowledge certainly outstrips that which is conveyed in his literary art, for he professed that he clung
to the strange fancy that in all men hiddenly reside certain wondrous, occult properties () which by some happy but very rare accident () may chance to be called forth here on earth not entirely waiting for their better discovery in the more congenial, blessed atmosphere of heaven (Hawthorne and His Mosses 300).

The wondrous, occult properties of Melvilles vision have been called forth on earth and materialized in his art, but they are still waiting for a better discovery. Thus, he reveals the magnitude of his spiritual insight and his intuition of timelessness which Ren Gunon describes as the awareness of eternity: what can time do against those who carry within themselves the awareness of eternity? the esoteric writer asks rhetorically (Etudes sur l'Hindouisme 25-26).

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If unvanquished by time, those who carry within themselves the awareness of eternity are tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote"(Moby Dick 7) and they are destined to wander to and fro over these deserts (Hawthorne; qtd. in Bartlett 112-113) of unanswer/-ed/-able questions. Melville himself, as the hero of an existential adventure, was a seeker, not a finder yet a phrase he used to grasp the essence of Hawthorne's artistic stance which can also function as a most felicitous illustration of the perpetual pilgrimage his own work embodies. Melville is a kind of wizard. He writes of strange and mysterious things that belong to other worlds beyond this tame and everyday place we live in a contemporary reviewer for the New Bedford Mercury most aptly observed (qtd. in Beecher 95). These strange and mysterious things that belong to other worlds pertain to the realm of the esoteric, of knowledge transcending the sphere of the immediate and the ordinary. Ishmael, the narrative voice of the Melvillean epos, makes a memorable statement which encodes an essential dimension of the whaling tale, namely, the lack of common measure between the worlds within whose boundaries the action unfolds:
So ignorant are most landsmen of some of the plainest and most palpable wonders of the world, that without some hints touching the plain facts, historical and otherwise, () they might scout at Moby Dick as a monstrous fable, or still worse and more detestable, a hideous and intolerable allegory (Moby Dick 203).

By pronouncing the unenlightened landsmen to be ignorant, Ishmael points to their condition as prisoners of that ignorance which in the Vedantic scriptures is referred to as avidy, () the cause of bondage () [which] is not intellectual ignorance but spiritual blindness (Radhakrishnan 21). However, fables and allegories are the most adequate means of encoding truth, for, whatever they mean, they certainly do not mean what they seem to mean (Mller 157). In his Essay on Compensation Emerson reveals the quality of fable as a vehicle for secrecy, as a way of concealing the wonders of the world for, he writes: the voice of fable has in it somewhat divine () it comes from thought above. And yet, the ignorant landsmen, confined to the common dimension of existence in a state of spiritual bondage, are unable to grasp the wondrous quality of the White Whale because of the lack of common measure between Moby Dicks level of being and theirs. In order to comprehend what is beyond the bounds of their reality, the ignorant try to anchor the core realities into the limited world of plain facts; thus, their perception gets utterly distorted and, in their eyes, the Absolute assumes the shape of a monstrous fable, or () a hideous and intolerable allegory. Therefore, the fable of The White Whale imparts the light of the above to the landsmen, revealing and re-veiling the wonders of the world. The above-quoted excerpt from the novel makes direct reference to time understood as a means of mapping a familiar territory, as a way of making the wonders of the world comprehensible to the unenlightened who need historical (...) hints in order to accommodate the unknown into the patternable known.

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Moby Dick counterposes two modes of temporality: the linear, the sequential and the limited versus the vortical simultaneity of timelessness. The human world is governed by time limitations which are underlined with mathematical accuracy in the text. When it comes to describing some plain fact, bearing upon the mundane and the temporal, the narrator resorts to exact time phrases such as one hundred years, more than two centuries past, some three centuries ago:
It is the whale which for more than two centuries past has been hunted by the Dutch and English in the Arctic seas (134). (...) originally in the old Dutch Fishery, two centuries and more ago (...) (142) And some three centuries ago, an English traveler in old Harris's Voyages, speaks of a Turkish Mosque built in honor of Jonah (...) (364) I opine, that it is plainly traceable to the first arrival of the Greenland whaling ships in London, more than two centuries ago (408).

The narrator emphasizes his awareness of both the a-temporal and the temporal. Moreover, he reveals the connection established between humanity and temporality, the former being regarded as a source of the latter. He describes the pre-temporal state as a wondrous period in implicit contrast to the undesirable transience which governs the human world:
I am, by a flood, borne back to that wondrous period, ere time itself can be said to have begun; for time began with man (Moby Dick 454).

In decided contrast to the transitory stands the world of a-temporality to which the text speaks abundantly in terms of a million years, billion years, antiquity, Eternities, many millions of ages and the list may continue. The narrator equates timelessness with the awe-inspiring reality of the whale which presides over time itself as well as over the history of the human race:
I am horror struck at this antemosaic, unsourced existence of the unspeakable terrors of the whale, which, having been before all time, must exist after all humane ages are over (454).

These words point to the unbegun and unfinished state of the whale, seen as a non-temporal reality. Projected against such a backdrop, the humane ages bear the seal of the fleeting unreality of the here and the now, standing for a parenthesis in a state of permanence which transcends the common temporal and spatial determinations. The text contrasts the puniness of mankind and its endeavors with the incomprehensible vastness of the whale reality some centuries versus millions of ages:

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THAT for six thousand years and no one knows how many millions of ages before the great whales should have been spouting all over the sea, and sprinkling and mystifying the gardens of the deep, as with so many sprinkling or mistifying pots; and that for some centuries back, thousands of hunters should have been close by the fountain of the whale, watching these sprinklings and spoutings (367).

The perspective the narrator offers upon the a-temporal is in harmony with the majesty of the eternal, being expressed in grandiose terms:
Nor must there be omitted another strange attestation of the antiquity of the whale, in his own osseous post-diluvian reality (...) (455). The universe is finished; the copestone is on, and the chips were carted off a million years ago (9). This whole act's immutably decreed. 'Twas rehearsed by thee and me a billion years before this ocean rolled (554). INASMUCH, then, as this Leviathan comes floundering down upon us from the head-waters of the Eternities (...) (455) (...) for six thousand years and no one knows how many millions of ages before the great whales should have been spouting all over the sea (...)(367)

The underlying opposition which the text foregrounds through the contrast between the mathematical exactness of the time phrases versus the expressions of the uncountable is that between discontinuous quantity, which is represented by the number per se and continuous quantity, mainly represented by spatial and temporal measures (Ren Gunon, Le Rgne de la Quantit 24). This polarity further suggests the indefinite, immeasurable quality of Moby Dick seen as a container of potentialities, the very head-waters of the Eternities (Moby Dick 455). If projected against the background of the chronological flux, generation necessarily entails destruction. However, this implication does not hold true in the whale dimension for, in the long course of his generations, he has not degenerated from the original bulk of his sires (Moby Dick 455). These references to the immortality of the whale anchor its reality into the mythical time of the beginning. What Melville depicts as the head-waters of the Eternities (455) coincides with the cosmogony, the foundation of the worlds, contemporary with the Leviathan in its extra-temporal dimension. This is what Mircea Eliade describes as a primordial history, placed in a mythical time (Eternal Return 155). The unsourced existence of the whale is suggestive of what Ernst Cassirer refers to as an absolute past:
What distinguishes mythical time from historical time is that for mythical time there is an absolute past, which neither requires nor is susceptible of any further explanation (qtd. in Short 166).

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Hans Blumenberg locates the source of this binary opposition between mythical time and identifiable, describable chronology in the Greek thought:
The Greek mython mytheisthai [to tell a 'myth'] means to tell a story that is not dated and not datable, so that it cannot be localized in any chronicle, but a story that compensates for this lack by being 'significant' [bedeutsam] in itself (149).

Moby Dick holds a double function, being concomitantly part of substance and part of essence. Melville captures this dual condition in a masterful description: the whale live[s] in this world without being of it, remains warm among ice and cool at the equator (). It retains in all seasons a temperature of [its] own (Moby Dick 306). In other words, the Leviathan is equal with itself, and remains undefiled and unharmed by the shifting conditions of the corporeal. If regarded from an existential perspective, the whale is essentially true in the esoteric sense of the word, as opposed to illusionary. According to one of the teachings contained in Corpus Hermeticum
() all that alters is untrue. It does not stay in what it is, but shows itself to us by changing its appearances into one another. All that is subject to genesis and change is verily not true (Mitchell 45).

Sequentiality is the defining trait of the elusory dimension of being. The orderly succession of phenomena may be taken as proof of the unreality of phenomena in themselves (Gaskell 383). But sequentiality and fragmentariness are foreign to Moby Dick. The whale is true in that it exists in simultaneity: Moby Dick is not only ubiquitous, but also immortal; for immortality is but ubiquity in time (Moby Dick 179). In this statement the text encodes an essential quality of time, namely, time can be evaluated only in spatial terms, by spatializing its interpretation. The whale emerges as a continuous, homogenous mode of reality beyond the Cartesian discontinuity which claims that time, and implicitly existence itself, are nothing but a series of discontinuous moments. These attributes reveal the mythical nature of the whale: it is ubiquitous (Moby Dick 179) and immortal (Moby Dick 179), participating in the foundation of the Cosmos, being substantially identical with the realm of myths. According to Mircea Eliade,
A myth is something unfolding in illo tempore, actually in the space where time is no more, for illud tempus is synonymous with eternity and with the Principle (Images and Symbols 168).

The whales ubiquity in time (Moby Dick 179) places it on the horizon of myth, in illud tempus, where time turns into space, where the squaring of the

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circle is accomplished. And yet, to the stare of the profane, the whale appears like that geometrical circle which is impossible to square (Moby Dick 346). The squaring of the circle, a synonym for Magnum Opus, equates with the attainment of spiritual enlightenment. Moby Dick launches a challenge to the postulant to try to perform this hermetic operation. In his essay on Wagner, Theodore Adorno masterfully captures the idea that time fixed in space generates the illusion of an Absolute Presence (33), an idea which most aptly describes Moby Dicks timelessness. This understanding of Moby Dick as Absolute Presence, as overwhelmingly present, yet elusive, reinforces the mythical dimension of the whale. The transmutation of time into space is encoded somewhere else in the text in such a way that it bears reference to the overpowering quality of the whale: the Polar eternities reigned supreme when the whole world was the whales, while the perpetually rejuvenated eternities of the deep, the abode of the same leviathanic being, become the very foundation of the world. The spatial meaning is enhanced by the plural form of the word eternity:
Here Saturn's grey chaos rolls over me, and I obtain dim, shuddering glimpses into those Polar eternities; (...). Then the whole world was the whale's (...) (454). (...) and among the joyous, heartless, ever-juvenile eternities, Pip saw the multitudinous, God-omnipresent, coral insects, that out of the firmament of waters heaved the colossal orbs (413).

The end of the story is crowned by the closing vortex (Epilogue), symbolic of the Spherical Universal Vortex which is an all-absorbing spiral, whose center is simultaneously nowhere and everywhere, pure absence, yet self-evident omnipresence (Mitul 124). These mutually-exclusive attributes (absence and ubiquity) are also displayed by Moby Dick. The whale exhibits both muteness and universality as the narrator points out in his description of The Whiteness of the Whale - that is, absence (muteness) and ubiquity (universality). Furthermore, Ishmael depicts the whiteness of the whale by making use of the apparently paradoxical locution visible absence, which is evocative of the absent ubiquity of the center. Thus, Moby Dick possesses qualities based on binary oppositions which trigger the analogy between the whale and the Universal Vortex, a force generating simultaneity and canceling the dominion of unidirectional chronology. The spirals of the VORTEX of timelessness when projected upon the human level into the soul of man(364) which acts as a receptacle of eternity take on the shape of what the narrator portrays as one insular Tahiti, a genuine oasis of immortality:

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In the soul of man there lies one insular Tahiti, full of peace and joy, but encompassed by all the horrors of the half known life. God keep thee! Push not off from that isle, thou canst never return! (364).

Thou canst never return is a warning against the irreversibility of the temporal flux which governs all the horrors of an existence circumscribed by the indomitable rule of becoming. The mythical time in which both the White Whale and the spot of peace and joy are lodged unfolds in circularity linearity and measuring are foreign to it. As the Old Testament scholar Brevard Childs pertinently observes in relation to the quality of illo tempori
There is no actual distinction in mythical time between the past, the present, and the future. Although the origin of time is projected into the past, to the primeval act of becoming, this is only a form in which an essentially timeless reality is clothed. Time is always present and yet to come. It transcends the modern categories of empirical time. Moreover, the mythical time is in no sense an abstraction by which relations between temporal things are measured in terms of space as, for example, 'length of time'. Rather, it is substantialized as a concrete reality which is identical with its content (72-73).

In his provocative study of Patagonia and its place in the American literary imagination, Julian Cowley identifies the whiteness of the whale as a classic desert space of American literature (309). Ishmael embarks upon the expedition lured by all the attending marvels of a thousand Patagonian sights and sounds (Moby Dick 6). In Patagonia Revisited Bruce Chatwin remarks that Patagonia "lodged itself in the Western imagination as a metaphor for the Ultimate, the point beyond which one could not go"(7). And indeed, the climax of Ishmaels journey is the very boundary of spacelessness and timelessness, namely, the vortex in which polarities are resolved in motion and binary oppositions dissolve into kaleidoscopic, polychromatic reality (Cowley 309). The description of Moby Dicks head, which contains a certain mathematical symmetry (Moby Dick 327) masterfully illustrates the whales emblematic role as the union of opposites: The sideway position of the whales eyes (Moby Dick 328) is a peculiarity; therefore, it must be able to analyze two distinct prospects in exactly opposite directions at the same time. This marvelous quality is further proof of the Leviathans mastery over duality and capacity to transcend binary oppositions; contraries can dwell in it without clashing. Moby Dick stands for the Center where opposites are resolved in a harmonious way. It is emblematic of the unity which harmonizes the discord. Harmony is the bond which unites the opposites and causes them to be productive. The whale exhibits the indivisibility of the Principle. The peace of Oneness develops into the strife of the manifold, of the generations pouring/From times of endless date (Melville, Selected Poems 41). Chronological linearity is also circumvented through the force of the ritual. An emblematic ritualistic scene is that of the dark oath the crew of the Pequod are made to take as a response to the nefarious urges of captain Ahab.

FOR IMMORTALITY IS BUT UBIQUITY IN TIME: MOBY DICK ON THE HORIZON OF MYTH

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In the memorable episode of the oath, Ahab asks his mates to cross their lances full in front of him so that he can touch the axis(Moby Dick 163-164). The axis is emblematic of Axis Mundi linking the three worlds the underworld, the Earth and Heaven thus establishing the cosmic hierarchy. Ahabs gesture is symbolic of his reaching the core of being. It is a ritualistic gesture laden with mystical value: by touching the axis, he places himself in the center of the world which marks the opening of the tangible into the invisible. As Mircea Eliade writes in The Myth of the Eternal Return:
the time of any ritual coincides with the mythical time of the 'beginning.' Through a repetition of the cosmogonic act, concrete time (...) is projected into mythical time, in illo tempore wherein the foundation of the world occurred. Thus the reality and the duration of a thing made are assured, not only by the transformation of the profane space into a transcendent space ('the center'), but also through the transformation of concrete time into mythical time (21).

By this symbolic reaching of Axis Mundi Ahab attempts to project himself ritualistically onto the same existential level as the White Whale, by transmuting the here and the now into the transcendent. Still, he fails in his enterprise, for he has already pushed off from that isle of peace and joy (364) severing himself from the harmony of the circle
Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; (...); from hell's heart I stab at thee; (...) still chasing thee, though tied to thee, thou damned whale! Thus, I give up the spear!" (565)

Ahabs gesture of giving up the spear while still chasing the whale is tantamount to a violation of the sanctity of the circular through the aggression of the linear: thus, chronology wages war on immortality. However, the denouement asserts the supremacy of the non-temporal over the flux of time: then all collapsed, and the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years ago (566). The continuity between those primeval times when Adam walked majestic (188) and the time of the story, moments related through unidirectional chronology is ensured through the permanence of rolling, suggestive of the undulating spirals of the mythical Universal Vortex, of which the White Whale is a token.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bartlett, Irving (1967), The American Mind in the Mid-Nineteenth Century, Thomas Y. Crowell, New York. Beecher, Jonathan (2000), Variations on a Dystopian Theme: Melville's Encantadas, in Utopian Studies 11, pp. 88-102. Bickman, Martin (1980), The Unsounded Centre: Jungian Studies in American Romanticism, University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, NC.

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Blumenberg, Hans (1985), Work on Myth, Trans. Robert M. Wallace, MIT Press, Cambridge. Chatwin, Bruce, Paul Theroux (1986), Patagonia Revisited, Houghton, Boston. Childs, Brevard S. (1960), Myth and Reality in the Old Testament, Alec R. Allenson, Naperville, IL. Cowley, Julian (1996), Pataphysical Patagonia: Bruce Chatwin's Distantly Interrogative Somewhere, in Critique, 37, 4, p 312. Eliade, Mircea (1961), Images and Symbols: Studies in Religious Symbolism, translated by Philip Mairet, Sheed Andrews and McMeel, Kansas City, KS. *** (1954), The Myth of the Eternal Return, Pantheon Books, New York. Emerson, Ralph Waldo, The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, New York: Sully and Kleinteich, 1883. Gaskell, G. A. (1981), The Dictionary of All Scriptures and Myths, Gramercy Books, New Jersey. Gunon, Ren (1946), Apperus sur linitiation, Les Editions Traditionnelles, Paris. *** (1968), Etudes sur l'Hindouisme, Editions Traditionnelles, Paris. *** (1989), Le Rgne de la quantit et les signes du temps, Gallimard, Paris. Lauter, Paul (1994), Melville Climbs the Canon, in American Literature 9, pp. 1-22. Lawrence, D. H., The Symbolic Meaning: The Uncollected Versions of Studies in Classic American Literature, Ed. Armin Arnold, Fontwell, England: Centaur Press, 1962. Lovinescu, Vasile (1999), Mitul Sfisiat (Mesaje Stravechi), Institutul European, Iai. Melville, Herman (1952), Moby Dick: Or, the Whale, Luther S. Mansfield, Howard P. Vincent (eds.), Hendricks House, New York. *** Hawthorne and His Mosses (1954), in Clarence Arthur Brown (ed.), The Achievement of American Criticism: Representative Selections from Three Hundred Years of American Criticism, Ronald Press, New York, pp.289-301. Melville, Herman, Henning Cohen (1991), Selected Poems of Herman Melville, Fordham University Press, New York. Mitchell, Michael (2006), Hidden Mutualities: Faustian Themes from Gnostic Origins to the Postcolonial, Rodopi, Amsterdam. Mller, Max (1881), Chips from a German Workshop, IV, New York. Poulet, Georges (1962), Timelessness and Romanticism, in Philip P. Wiener, Aaron Noland (eds.), Ideas in Cultural Perspective, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, 658. Radhakrishnan, S. (1960), The Brahma Sutra: The Philosophy of Spiritual Life, Harper & Brothers, New York. Schneider, Herbert N., Homer B. Pettey (1998), Melville's Ichthyphallic God, in Studies in American Fiction 2, pp. 193-202. Short, Bryan C. (1992), Cast by Means of Figures: Herman Melville's Rhetorical Development, University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst. Shurr, William H. (1986), Melville's Poems: The Late Agenda, in John Bryant (ed.), A Companion to Melville's Studies, Greenwood, New York, pp. 370-385. Wolf, Jack C. (1986), Hart Crane's Harp of Evil: A Study of Orphism in the Bridge, Whitston Publishing, Troy, NY.

WHITMANS SONG OF MYSELF AND THE MYTH OF OSIRIS

ANCA RONCEA

Walt Whitmans influence in American poetry is perhaps one of the strongest. His work has been included in the canon of Western literature and discussed from humanist, transcendental, realist points of view. This paper will try to analyze the influence of Egyptian mythology on one of his most well known poems, Song of Myself where he employs the myth of Osiris to suggest a different manner of seeing the connection between nature and man. In this great poem of him there is a strong plea for man to allow himself to be reconnected to nature through the experience of the the poem itself. I will try to show that Whitman tried to do so by including the ideological framework of the myth of Osiris into Song of Myself, showing man as fragments of the natural world. Keywords: Walt Whitman, myth of Osiris, ecocriticism, shamanism, poetry of nature.

Walt Whitmans influence in American poetry is perhaps one of the strongest. His work has been included in the canon of Western literature and discussed from humanist, transcendental, realist points of view. This paper will try to analyze the influence of Egyptian mythology on one of his best known poems, Song of Myself where he employs the myth of Osiris to suggest a different manner of seeing the connection between nature and man. Though not always drawing inspiration from the Egyptian myths, Whitmans interest in Egyptian philosophy was quite strong throughout his life. If we consider the historical context in which he lived the fascination of the West for Egypt was becoming increasingly widespread within both America and Europe. It had started with Napoleons conquering of Egypt when Europe became interested in discovering the legends and philosophy of Ancient Egypt. At the time that Whitman lived there was already a great deal of historical research carried on about Egyptian civilization and mythology and thus he had many sources both modern as well as translations of classics such as Plutarch available at hand. Stephen Tapscott notes in his article Leaves of Myself: Whitmans Egypt in Song of Myself:
Whitman showed a marked interest in Egyptian lore and myth throughout his life. Evidence in his notebooks shows that he knew, either through books and lectures or through conversations with professional Egyptologists, the work of several of the most

Faculty of Foreign Languages & Literatures, University of Bucharest, e-mail: [email protected]

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prominent writers on Egypt, including Champollion. Whitmans Life Illustrated article of 1855 suggests that by then he was familiar both with the scholarly work of other major authorities, such as Rosellini, Wilkinson, Lesius, and also with popularized versions of Egyptology, such as George R. Gliddons book and lectures which Whitman also mentioned in other lectures.(Tapscott, 50)

Whitman was therefore fully aware of the myth of Osiris, one of the most important in Egyptian mythology when writing Song of Myself and, undoubtedly, there are references to it however unnamed. The myth of Osiris has spread around the world as the pieces of the Egyptian god around the land. It is the story of the god Osiris who, as Plutarch recounts, attracted the envy and rage of his brother, Set who deceived him and threw him in a box which he threw into the Nile. As the story goes, his wife, Isis, found the coffin in a tree trunk in which Osiris was dead already. She managed to hide the body but Set found it and tore it into pieces which he scattered all over Egypt. After a while, however, Isis managed to gather all of the pieces of his body, except for his phallus, and gave him a proper burial. Impressed by Isis devotion the gods resurrected Osiris as the god of the underworld. In Egyptian mythology Osiris has always been associated with the yearly flooding and retreating of the Nile and also with the fertility of the crops in Egypt. Thus the cult of Osiris was one of the most important in Egypt since he was considered to influence the essence of Egypts well being. One of the most important ideas that springs from this myth and one which Whitman uses in Song of Myself is that of man as scattered around the natural world. Although Osiris was considered a god his body was represented as human and its spreading all over the environment stands for a unification of man with nature. It is one way of endowing nature and the environment with a sense of sacred but at the same time it explains the bond that man has with the land and shows that man is part of nature and that his own body is in life as it will be in death merged with the natural world. Man will be reborn just as nature goes on through cycles of death and regeneration but at the same time he will contribute to the regeneration of nature through his bodys return to the ground. This is one interpretation of this myth which Walt Whitman took in writing Song of Myself. It is a complex poem with many philosophical implications on the status of man in the universe as well as in his own society, while at the same time through it Whitman shows us his view on the status of man in relation to the environment and implicitly to nature. Throughout the poem we see Whitmans description of the poet-Self as a model for man blending with natural elements. In order for man and nature to merge in this way he first begins by deconstructing man into fragments either material or spiritual which he then places into the environment surrounding him. In his shamanistic experience he associates himself with every other man in the world and implicitly with his reader whomever he may be. He assumes this role in the

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26th stanza of Song of Myself while deconstructing himself into my own body, or any part of it, translucent mould of me, shaded ledges and rests while finally declaring with Hands I have taken, face I have kissd, mortal I have ever touchd which he all transcends to his listener in a phrase that he repeats over and over again in this section it shall be you. This dissipation of the self in all material and spiritual form comes in the representation of the self as Osiris who also rejoined the environment and nature after being split into pieces. Whitman will do the same thing with his split self and will unify its pieces as included into the environment.
The smoke of my own breath, Echoes, ripples, buzz'd whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and vine, My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing of blood and air through my lungs, The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and dark-color'd sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,[] Walt Whitman, a kosmos, of Manhattan the son, Turbulent, fleshy, sensual, eating, drinking and breeding (Whitman, 5)

As we can see from these lines in Song of Myself in order for the self to reach nature it must first blend into the environment in which it exists, including both nature and the urban realm, the latter being that which the self would transcend in order to reach the natural world. Whitman suggests that man be absorbed by nature and allow himself to become once again part of it despite the urban reality in which he now finds comfort. This idea is created through the constant representation of man as being absorbed by water, an element which represents nature and the fluidity of this bonding, an image that served Whitman well in creating the feeling of nature as encompassing every part of the self.
Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore,[] Where are you off to, lady? for I see you, You splash in the water there, yet stay stock still in your room. [] The beards of the young men glisten'd with wet, it ran from their long hair, Little streams pass'd all over their bodies. (Whitman, 7)

Later in the poem water will be seen as the element through which both the environment and man are able to exist, therefore the basis and connector for all forms of life. Whitmans message is for man to allow himself to be absorbed by nature bit by bit while also absorbing nature within himself. The young men in the lines above seem unaware of how much water is truly part of their bodies and existence now and the poet is the only one who sees and is aware of this.

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As a poet Whitman sees himself as the mediator between the environment, nature and man. He thus assumes the role of the shaman and takes a commanding tone while addressing his listeners. According to Harold Bloom:
[] Emerson was correct in his first impression of Whitman as the American shaman. The shaman is necessarily self-divided, sexually ambiguous, and difficult to distinguish from the divine. As shaman, Whitman is endlessly metamorphic, capable of being in several places at once, and a knower of matters that Walter Whitman, Jr., the carpenters son, scarcely could have known. (Bloom, 257)

This instance in which the poet becomes the shaman exists in the context in which Whitman gives a mythological dimension to his poetry. While using the myth of Osiris in creating the Self, nature is given a spiritual dimension and thus becomes the sacred space sung by the poet. By taking the part of the mediator between this spiritual realm and the material one, Whitman embraces the role of shaman and becomes a conductor of forces (Coupe, 51) who through poetry connects the reader, whomsoever he might be, to the spirituality of the environment. As it has been argued previously by critics such as Harold Bloom, Whitman makes the distinction between the body and the soul, the latter belonging entirely to nature and the former being somewhat alienated from nature; however, in interpreting the poet-Self as a shaman one can say that the soul represents for Whitman that spirituality belonging to nature to which he strives to bring the body by metaphorically deconstructing it and reconstructing it in the natural world.
O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues, And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for nothing. I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and women, And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken soon out of their laps. [] I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth, I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and fathomless as myself, (They do not know how immortal, but I know.) (Whitman, 6, 7)

The poet-Self sees himself as constantly aware of being in contact with this spirituality of nature and as a poet, armored with words to pass on his message he becomes the translator of the natural world to man. He thus gives language a great emphasis and even goes so far as to associate grass with a uniform hieroglyphic (Whitman, 6) to which he goes on and gives an interpretation And it means, Sprouting alike in broad/ zones and narrow zones [] (Whitman, 6). In using the notion of a hieroglyph he suggests that reconnecting to nature is as though the reader must understand a new language while at the same time it is a process which he must be willing to be initiated into in order to understand. A hieroglyph is also a cultural marker attesting the use of elements of Egyptian mythology into the content and the nature of the poem.

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At the same time the word grass in the entire poem is not just a metaphor for the environment or for nature, it is to some extent also a metaphor for man and for the poet-Self, and in this sense Whitman shows that man is contained within this natural world and part of his message is for man to allow himself to be absorbed by his own environment by assuming his identity as a leaf of grass. As a shaman, Whitman also assumes his position in the natural world, as he is aware of this knowledge which he passes on only by being part of the spiritual world which he sings of to man. His senses seem to be exaggerated to the point where he feels everything around himself to the outmost extent. Thus the natural world which he sings in his poetry also becomes experience for Whitman, a world which he can sing because he had the ability to experience it, and at the same time he turns the poem into an experience for the reader through which he can reach the spirituality of the natural world. Also, by constructing the poem as a means for man to experience the spirituality of nature, the poet as a shaman aims this experience towards the soul which may return to nature in this manner and then lead the body in the same direction. In creating a poem as an experience for the one hes addressing, Whitman was aware of the fact that he needed to bring back into poetry a classical element which modern poetry had long left behind, namely music. He clearly sees his poem as being endowed with music or with the qualities of music in poetry. Even the title shows distinctly that the reference is to the classical understanding of poetry as song, and thus as an audible message. In his role as a shaman giving the form of a song to his poem is part of the ritual, as he also suggests in the poem, it becomes an experience exclusive to one who is initiated. He creates lengthy lines of enumerations and repetitions which are mantra verses in the poem as a shamanistic ritual, and though he uses free verse there are frequent alliterations and assonances in his choice of words. But beyond giving musicality to the poem itself he makes frequent references within the poem to music as a means of expressing the environment. Hence music becomes the sound of the environment which the poet-shaman can hear and interpret as such in order to pass it on to man. Man is not included in the environment solely by being absorbed by water, he is also to be brought back to the natural world through its echoes and sounds which if unheard by man are delivered to him by the poet-shaman who declares himself as the deliverer of the voices of the environment.
The impassive stones that receive and return so many echoes, [] What living and buried speech is always vibrating here, what howls restrain'd by decorum, [] I mind them or the show or resonance of them--I come and I depart. [] With music strong I come, with my cornets and my drums, I play not marches for accepted victors only, I play marches for conquer'd and slain persons. (Whitman, 7)

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At times he places nature above all of mans creations and when he declares that A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books., he seems to be condemning the world constructed by man which creates a barrier between him and nature. However, in stanza #26 he asserts himself prepared to listen and To accrue what I hear into this song, to let sounds contribute toward it., and thus in his position as a shaman he is able to perceive everything surrounding him as the sounds that constitute the environment. In continuing this stanza he enumerates sounds which make up an urban space and which he calls Being. It is here that he accepts urban space as part of the environment and withholding as much spirituality as nature, he thus urges man to allow himself to be absorbed by his environment through the music of its sounds, although that environment may be a universe constructed by man. In creating this poetry and urge for man to reconnect to nature and equally to his environment there is also a political purpose which Whitman included in Song of Myself. Historically speaking he was writing this poem in the context of the Civil War which threatened to destroy Americas unity. Thus he employed his poetry to send out a message of unity and democracy to the American people. By urging man to reconnect with nature and with his environment he also called out for a social unification, as there is no greater form of democracy as in nature, while at the same time a return to nature is a return to the paradise which has been lost. In this sense he frequently uses the word democracy as well as naming political figures to help him in carrying on his message. He thus becomes a shaman who hears not only the sounds of nature and of the environment but also of the voices of social injustice and political flaws.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Whitman, Walt, 2011, Leaves of Grass, Classic Books International, New York. Coupe, Laurence, 1997, Myth, Routledge, London and New York. Eliade, Mircea, 1957, The Sacred and the Profane, Harcourt Inc., San Diego. Ploutarch, Isis and Osiris, http://thriceholy.net/Texts/Isis.html ; accessed on October 28th 2010, 10:15 PM. Bloom, Harold, 1994, The Western Canon (Chapter 11 Walt Whitman as Center of the American Canon), Riverhead Books, New York. Tapscott, Stephen, 1978, Leaves of Myself: Whitmans Egypt in Song of Myself, in American Literature, vol 50, no 1, Duke University Press. Killingsworth, M. Jimmie, 2005, Walt Whitman and the Earth: A Study in Ecopoetics, in Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, vol. 22, no. 4, pp. 201-203.

DER JESIDISMUS: EIN BEISPIEL FR RELIGISEN SYNKRETISMUS1

GEORGE GRIGORE

THE YAZIDISM: AN EXAMPLE OF RELIGIOUS SYNCRETISM The Yazidis or Yezidis are adherents of a small religious cult with ancient origins, organized in small villages spread out in Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Georgia and Armenia and are estimated to number in total approximately half million individuals. Early writers attempted to describe Yazidi origins, broadly speaking, in terms of Islam, or old Iranian religions, or sometimes even pagan religions; however, publications in the last fifteen years have shown such an approach to be very simplistic. The religion of the Yazidis is, in fact, a highly syncretistic one: elements from Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Judaism, Christianity and Islam can be found. Also, Islamic mystic influence and imagery can be seen in their religious vocabulary, especially in the terminology of their esoteric literature, but much of the mythology is non-Islamic, and their cosmogonies apparently have many points in common with those of ancient Iranian religions. Keywords: Yazidism, Yazidis, ancient Kurdish religion, Yaravism, Black Book, Yazdan.

Die Jesiden oder Jeziden sind Anhnger eines kleinen religisen Kults uralten Ursprungs, die rund um kleine Ortschaften im Irak, in der Trkei, in Syrien, im Iran, in Georgien und Armenien organisiert sind und deren Anzahl auf ungefhr eine halbe Million geschtzt wird (Tawa, 2005: 10). Die Jesiden gehren zu der kleineren der drei Abzweigungen des Jesidismus. Die beiden anderen, bevlkerungsreicheren sind Alevismus und Yarsanismus, die sich vom Jesidismus dadurch unterscheiden, dass sie die islamische taqiyya Verheimlichung anerkennen. Die drei Zweige sind geographisch abgegrenzt und gegenseitige Kontakte sind selten. Die Jesiden sind im Wesentlichen ethnische Kurden, und beschftigen sich mit Ackerbau oder Tierzucht sie ziehen mit ihren Herden zu den alpinen Weiden und zurck.

1. Ursprung Der Ursprung des Jesidismus ist in der Urgeschichte des Nahen Osten verschleiert. Obwohl die Jesiden Kurdisch sprechen, zeigt ihre Religion wichtige
1

bersetzung ins Deutsche: Lucian Stnescu (Universitt Bukarest). Universitt Bukarest, Rumnien, e-mail: [email protected]

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Einflsse uralter levantinischer und islamischer Religionen. Ihre wichtigste heilige Sttte befindet sich neben Mosul, im Irak. Die eigene Bezeichnung der Jesiden lautet zid oder zd. Einige Wissenschaftler vertreten die Meinung, der Name Yazidi stamme vom alten iranischen yazata Gott, andere wiederum sagen er sei vom Umayyad Caliph Yazid I (Yazid bin Muawiyah) abgeleitet, den die Jesiden als Inkarnation der gttlichen Figur Sultan Ezi betrachten (dies ist nicht mehr weitgehend akzeptiert). Die Jesiden selbst finden, ihr Name sei von Yezdan oder zid abgeleitet, die Bezeichnung fr Gott. Die kulturellen Bruche der Jesiden sind kurdisch, und die meisten unter ihnen sprechen Kurmanj (Nordkurdisch). Ausnahme machen einige Drfer wie Bayqa und Bahazane im Nordirak wo mesopotamisch Arabisch gesprochen wird. Kurmanj ist die Sprache fast aller mndlich bermittelten religisen Traditionen der Jesiden. Whrend des XIV.ten Jahrhunderts werden wichtige kurdische Stmme, deren Einflusssphre bis weit in die heutige Trkei reichte (fr eine Zeitlang auch die Herrscher des Frstentums Jazira) in geschichtlichen Quellen als Yazidi bezeichnet.

2. Der Glaube der Jesiden Obwohl die Jesiden viele eindeutige Besonderheiten aufzeigen, schenken sie ihren Glauben einem einzigen und einmaligen Gott, Khoda. Dieser ist voller unendlicher Liebenswrdigkeit, und doch so weit weg. Er wird hier auf Erden von sieben Engeln vertreten (kurdisch ezad/ezdiyan Engel sg./pl.) die Ihm beistehen. Jeder dieser Engel wird der Reihe nach leibhaftig und herrscht eine Weile ber die Menschheit. Somit hat man eine klare Darstellung wie berhmte Persnlichkeiten, historische oder legendre, als Verkrperungen der Engel betrachtet werden: von Moses bis Jesus, bis Mansur al-Hallaj und so weiter. Dies bietet auch eine passende Erklrung fr die groe Anzahl der Engel die im Pantheon der Jesiden zu finden sind. Von all den Engeln zeichnet sich Malak-Tawus, der Pfau-Engel, ab und unterscheidet sich als der einzige felsenfeste, standhafte Engel. Er ist der strkste, derjenige der all die anderen Engel anfhrt. Anfangs von Gott selbst vertrieben, da er Seine Gottheit nicht verehren wollte, ist Malak-Tawus, der Pfau-Engel letztendlich wieder eingesetzt worden, aber nur nachdem er 7000 Jahre lange bittere Trnen geweint hat. Eigentlich ist es Malak-Tawus, der Pfau-Engel, derjenige, der die Welt regiert. Eine Betrachtung dieser Religion von auen wrde zur Schlussfolgerung fhren, Malak-Tawus sei der Teufel selbst. Er ist die Quelle des Bsen, der Grund allen Unglcks und Leides. Um seinen Zorn nicht zu entfesseln, ist die bloe Aussprache seines Namens zu vermeiden (Tawa, 2005: 11). Malak-Tawus zu verehren ist anders, als Gott zu verehren. Whrend der Pfau-Engel mit Furcht und Anflehung und Demut verehrt wird, erfreut sich Gott

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der Verehrung mit viel Erkenntlichkeit und Zufriedenheit. Trotz dessen war die Furcht, die die Jesiden in sich trugen so erdrckend, dass sie Schritt um Schritt Gottes Verehrung aufgaben. Heutzutage erwhnen die Jesiden Gottes Namen nur ab und zu, und dann nur symbolisch, und haben sich gnzlich der Verehrung des Pfau-Engels gewidmet. Die Erklrung, die sie geben, ist sehr einfach: Gott wrde ihnen, in Seiner Gte und Liebe fr Seine Geschpfe, in keiner Weise je ein Leid zufgen, wobei der Pfau-Engel nur um des Bsen willen existiert. Deshalb muss jeder, der sich Glckseligkeit wnscht, Gott beiseite lassen und Ihn nicht mehr verehren dagegen sollte er den Pfau-Engel verehren, um Barmherzigkeit und Verzeihung flehen um somit das Bse, das Dieser entworfen, auf Abstand zu halten.

3. Jesidismus und andere Religionen Mittlerweile hat es der Jesidismus geschafft, andere Religionen, mit denen er in Berhrung kam, teilweise oder in Gnze einzugliedern. Um dies zu erreichen wurden neue Zweige des Kults gebildet indem die hchsten Persnlichkeiten dieser anderen Religionen in dem jesidischen dynamischen Kosmogoniensystem der fortfahrenden Inkarnationen eingegliedert wurden. Etliche alte und inzwischen verschwundene Bewegungen und Religionen scheinen ihre Existenz auch als Zweige des Engelkults begonnen zu haben, unter hnlichen Bedingungen wie diejenigen, die zur Geburt des Jesidismus gefhrt haben.

4. hnlichkeiten mit dem Zoroastrismus Der Zoroastrismus und der Kult der Engel haben viele gemeinsame Merkmale, darunter auch den Glauben an sieben guten Engeln und sieben bsen, die die Welt in Aufsicht haben, und auch eine hereditre Pfarrerklasse. Diese Gemeinsamkeiten sind das natrliche Ergebnis langer und ereignisreicher Kontakte zwischen den beiden Religionen. Andere gemeinsame Elemente knnten das Ergebnis des religisen Geprges der arischen Siedler in dieser Gegend sein. Die Religion dieser Siedler muss dieselbe gewesen sein wie diejenige, die der Prophet Zarathustra spter reformiert und in den Zoroastrismus umgewandelt hat. Das Symbol des Feuers nimmt einen wichtigen Platz in den Ritualen der Jesiden ein und ist gewiss auch ein zentrales Element der Parsi Ikonografie. Eigentlich wird auch ber die Etymologie des Wortes Yazidi spekuliert es stamme vom avestischen Yazata, das Gottheit bedeutet. Die Mythen zur Schpfung haben in beiden Kulturen viele Gemeinsamkeiten (beide kennen z.B. zwei Etappen der Schpfung) und es gibt auch eine Heptade (amesha spentas) hnlich zum jesidischen haftan. Es gibt des Weiteren sogar entsprechende Feste in beiden Kulturen wie auch den Brauch um das Tragen eines heiligen Hemdes (Kreyenbroek 1995: 57-60).

86

GEORGE GRIGORE

Obzwar die Symbole und Bruche auf einer bestimmten Ebene vergleichbar sind, ist es wahrscheinlicher, dass die Parsi Elemente im jesidischen Paradigma eigentlich Artefakte der Bewegung und Verbreitung einer Variante des Zoroaster Glaubens ber Entfernungen und Zeit sind. Denn es gibt zwischen den beiden auch Unterschiede: die Jesiden (und Ahl-i Haqq) glauben in Reinkarnation im Zoroastrismus gibt es keinen solchen Glauben, auch gibt es keine Parallele zur Idee der Seelendauswanderung, die wir in der Yardanist-Tradition finden. 5. hnlichkeit mit dem Engelkult In The Concise Encyclopaedia of Islam meint Cyril Glasse, dass Ahl-i Haqq Volk des Absoluten, Wahren Gottes nur eine etlicher Sekten ist die kollektiv Ali ilahis Alis Vergtterer bezeichnet wird. Ahl-i Haqq ist ein kleiner, dualistischer Kult, der bei einigen Persern, Kurden und Turkmenen im Irak und Iran zu finden ist. Im Iran sind die Anhnger im Westen des Landes konzentriert, insbesondere um Tabriz, aber kleine Gruppen sind berall zu finden. Diese sind mit den Jesiden eng verwandt, und entfernter auch mit den anderen dualen Sekten des nahen Osten. Ihr Glauben lehrt von sieben Gttlichen Erscheinungen, angefangen mit einer Figur genannt Khawandagar. Des Weiteren sind sie berzeugt, dass der Cousin Ali bin Abi Talib des Propheten eine dieser Erscheinungen war, und diese Serie gipfelt mit dem "Grnder" des Kults, eine Figur namens Sultan Sohak (Ishaq), der im 9ten / 15ten Jahrhundert gelebt hat. In diesem Kult wird der Hahn geopfert, als Symbol des Schwellenmoments des Tagesanbruchs. Daraus wird ersichtlich dass der Hahn als populres Symbol in Religionen erscheint, in denen es eine Licht/Dunkelheit Polarisierung gibt. Die Ahl-i Haqq haben eine Zeremonie, die sie sabz namudar grn machen nennen, die auf den Glauben der Manicher zurckzufhren ist, dass das Gttliche Licht in der Welt in grtem Mae in den Pflanzen konzentriert ist (deshalb waren die Manicher Vegetarier). Der Glauben der Ahl-i Haqq, der von Gruppe zu Gruppe variiert, beinhaltet Elemente die typisch fr gnostische oder manichische Abweichungen sind, die am Rande des Islams, und eigentlich aller Religionen, zu finden sind. Wie die Ahl-I Haqq, glauben auch die Jesiden in die Seelenauswanderung und sogar in die Reinkarnation, die vier Formen annehmen kann (siehe Al-Hasani, 1980: 81): fashkh Reinkarnation der Seele in ein Mineral; rashkh Reinkarnation der Seele in eine Pflanze; mashkh Reinkarnation der Seele in ein Tier; nashkh Reinkarnation der Seele in ein menschliches Wesen. Die Jesiden glauben, gleich anderer Zweige des Engelkults, nicht an Hlle oder Himmel in physischer Form, voll Teufel oder Engel die am Ende der Zeit erscheinen werden, sondern an Hlle und Himmel in figurativem Sinne. Die Gruel der Hlle und Gensse des Himmels finden in dieser Welt statt, da

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die Menschen nach ihrem Tod durch Verkrperung entweder ein Leben voller Wohlttigkeit und Gesundheit leben oder umgekehrt, voller Elend und Armut je nach dem, welch ein Leben sie in ihrem ehemaligen Krper gelebt haben. Niedrigste Form der Reinkarnation ist die eines Minerals, hchste Form die eines menschlichen Wesens. Am Ende der Zeit jedenfalls werden nur die gerechten und vollstndigen "Menschlichen" die es schaffen, die verfngliche Brcke des Jngsten Gerichts zu berqueren (auch mit koranischem al-Sirat al-Mustaqim Der Gerade Weg zu vergleichen), der Ewigkeit des Universalgeistes beitreten. Sie glauben an Metempsychose so sehr, und diese berzeugung ist bei den Jesiden so tief verwurzelt, dass Reiche Leute, die unfolgsame, verschwenderische Shne haben, ihr Reichtum begraben, aus Angst, die Shne knnten es vergeuden. Sie merken sich den Ort und sind berzeugt, dass ihre Seele den Ort wiederfinden wird und sie dann die Schtze ausgraben werden und ein Leben in Schmaus und Braus fhren knnen. Die misslungenen Seelen werden zusammen mit der materiellen Welt fr immer zerstrt. 6. hnlichkeit mit dem Christentum Die Jesiden haben religise Praktiken die nur in der christlichen Kirche wiederzufinden sind die Taufe und die Eucharistie. Es stimmt zwar, dass die Benutzung des Wassers als Ritus auch bei anderen, nicht-christlichen Sekten vorkommt, aber die hnlichkeit diese Sakraments bei den Jesiden ist dem der Christen so hnlich, dass dessen Wurzeln im Christentum liegen mssen, eher als in irgend einem anderen System. Wie auch ihre Nachbarn mssen die Jesiden ihre Kinder so frh wie mglich taufen. Im Ausfhren dieses Brauchs benutzt der Scheich, gleich dem christlichen Priester, Weihwasser. Das Weihwasser der Jesiden entspringt einer kleinen Quelle namens Zamzam, aus dem Lalish Tal in Nordirak. Das in diesem Brauch benutzte Pokal trgt den Namen Jesus-Pokal. Sie benutzen auch eine besondere Erde (genannt baratta), die vom Grab des Scheichen Adi stammt und hnlich mit der Eucharistie der Christen ist. Diese wird den Sterbenden oder Todkranken verabreicht und ist als Allheilmittel gepriesen: Wer ein wenig baratta ber das ganze Jahr hindurch zu sich nimmt wird in Krper und Seele glcklich sein (Grigore, 1994: 47-48). Nicht zu letzt verehren die Jesiden das Christentum und die christlichen Heiligen. Sie achten die Kirchen und Grber der Christen und kssen die Tore und Wnde wenn sie eintreten. Im schwarzen Buch wird gesagt, dass die Braut auf dem Wege zum Hause des Brutigams den Tempel eines jeden Gottes besuchen soll, an dem sie vorbeigeht, auch wenn es eine christliche Kirche ist. Sie verehren auch Isa (Jesus), und zu bestimmten Zeiten waren sie der Meinung, er wre eine der Verkrperungen eines der sieben Engel.

88 7. hnlichkeit mit den Ophiten

GEORGE GRIGORE

Wie auch Habib Tawa (2005: 17) bemerkte, gibt es interessante hnlichkeiten zwischen den Jesiden und den Ophiten (aus dem griechischen phis, Schlange). Die Ophiten waren im Nahen Osten ungefhr zwischen 100 A. D. und 400 A. D. verbreitet, dann wurden sie vom Konstantinischen Christentum vernichtet. Das gemeinsame Merkmal dieser zahlreichen gnostischen Kulte (z.B. Naassener Juden naasch Schlange; Mander, Sethianer, Peraten, Borboriten usw.), die die alten orientalischen, der Schlange gewidmeten Kulte weiterfhrten, ist die groe Bedeutung, die sie der Schlange schenkten. Die Schlange der biblischen Geschichte von Adam und Eva, als Gewhrer der Erkenntnis, als Verbindung zwischen dem Baum der Erkenntnis (von Gut und Bse) und Gnosis. Im Unterschied zu christlichen Interpretationen der Schlange als Satan waren die Ophiten der Meinung, dass der Wegffner fr die Menschen zur Erkenntnis der Herr dieser Welt sei. Da die Bibel die Schlange als nur eine Schlange identifiziert, fanden sich die Ophiten in ihrer Position perfekt gerechtfertigt, und zeigten, dass die Schlange Adam und Eva Zugang zur Erkenntnis gewhren wollte verboten wird diese Erkenntnis von der Figur die Christentum und Judaismus als Gott identifizieren (Legge, 1914). Eines der sichtbaren, doch stillgeschwiegenen Symbole des Jesidismus ist die Schlange, die praktisch in keinem religisen Text der Jesiden (mndlich oder schriftlich) explizit erwhnt wird. Der einzige Ausdruck dieses Symbols ist das zwei Meter groe Bild der schwarzen Schlange am Eingang zum Heiligengrab des Scheichen Adi in Lalish (Asatrian & Arakelova 2003: 7-8).

8. Pantheon der Jesiden Neben der Heiligen Triade die heilige Triade besteht aus Malak-Tawus, Sultan Yezid, und Scheich Adi bin Musafir, eine historische Figur, Grnder des Adawiyya Sufi Ordens, der spter zur Basis der Grndung der Jesidengemeinschaft steht (gem. Asatrian, Arakelova 2003: 4-9) die die sogenannte dogmatische Basis der Religion der Jesiden bildet und sich im Kult und Glauben eindeutig hervorhebt, beinhaltet der Pantheon der Jesiden eine Vielfalt von Gottheiten und Schutzgeister die nicht sehr einfach zu ermitteln sind, aus Mangel an verfgbaren Materialien. Das Erfassen der Identitt der jesidischen heiligen Figuren wird durch Vielfalt und Verschiedenartigkeit der verehrten historischen Persnlichkeiten versperrt Angehrige und Milieu des Scheichen Adi, lokal wichtige Heilige, mit begrenzter Einflusssphre, die Sufi Heiligen (Mansur al-Hallaj, der den berhmten Satz Ana al-haqq Ich bin die Wahrheit aussprach; Rabia Adawwiya, die immer mit einem brennenden Stck Kohle in der Hand umherzog, bereit, den Himmel anzuznden, und einem

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Holzeimer mit Wasser, um die Hlle zu lschen, und somit frei zu sein, Gott ohne jegliche Einschrnkung zu lieben), biblische und Quranische Figuren, wie Ibrahim Abraham, Musa Moses , Isa Jesus, Ali, usw., wie auch einfache Scheiche and Pirs die einen bestimmten Heiligenschein tragen. Zur gleichen Zeit haben sich viele mythische und halb-mythische Figuren, Heilige, oft historische Persnlichkeiten, die aus Kulten verschiedener Religionen aus dem Nahen Osten stammen, z.B. aus dem Islam und insbesondere aus dessen sogenannter hretischen Umgebung, bei den Jesiden groer Beliebtheit erfreut und werden bei diesen zusammen mit den authentischen Gttlichkeiten verehrt. Eine bestimmte regionale Figur dieser Kategorie kann in das Paradigma der jesidischen Gttlichkeiten aufgenommen werden wenn sie sich tief im Volksgedchtnis eingeprgt und an die religise Tradition angepasst hat (z. B. Ibrahim-khalil, Hidir-nabi). Fr die Figuren im Volkspantheon ist es unmglich, die eindeutigen Attribute der Heiligkeit fr eine gegebene Figur zu identifizieren, auch nicht in den Religionen, die ein offizielles Institut fr Heiligsprechung haben (wie das Christentum). Umso mehr ist es mit den Glaubenslehren verbunden, wo die Gottwerdung oder Heiligsprechung informal stattfindet, durch Volkstradition. Im Jesidismus knnen diese informellen Kriterien von einer Figur erfllt werden wenn sie in der mndlichen religisen Tradition vertreten ist, wie auch, in den meisten Fllen, wenn sie in einer legendren Grabsttte in Lalish beerdigt wurden. Heiligsprechung (Gottwerdung) kann auch ber Abstammung von Verwandten oder Untergebenen des Scheichen Adi begrndet werden (Scheich Hasan, Fakhruddin, und Scheich Shams). Die Figuren, die hier als Gottheiten identifiziert werden, sind diejenigen, die diverse Sphren menschlicher Ttigkeit beschirmen oder natrliche Phnomene personifizieren. Diese Liste beinhaltet die sieben Inkarnationen Malak-Tawus nicht: Asrael, Dardail, Israfil, Mikail, Jabrail, Shamnail, und Turail (davon wird Asrael, das angebliche Oberhaupt der Sieben zumeist als Malak-Tawus identifiziert, und die Sieben sind insgesamt Bildnisse des Letzteren), wie auch die meisten ihrer Gegenber im Heiligensystem historische Persnlichkeiten des 'Adawiyya Ordens, und zwar Scheich Abu Bakr (Kurdisch: Sexobakr), Sajaduddin (oder Sijadin, verantwortlich fr die Begleitung der Seelen der Toten in die Unterwelt), Nasruddin (als Todesengel identifiziert; er war der Henker unter Scheich Adi, ttete jeden der sich diesem widersetzte). Als Ausnahmen gelten Scheich Shams, der die Sonne symbolisiert, und Fakhruddin, der mit dem Mond identifiziert wird. Die jesidische shaykhy Tradition meint dass, zum Unterschied von allen anderen Vlker, die von Adam und Eva stammen, die Jesiden nur einen Urvater hatten, Adam: Eva spielte in ihrer Genese keine Rolle. Einst, so erzhlt uns die Legende der Jesiden, behauptete Eva, dass sie alleine Kinder zeugte, und dass Adam keinen Anteil an deren Schaffung hatte.

90

GEORGE GRIGORE

Um diese Aussage zu testen wurden Samen der beiden in zwei verschiedenen Tpfen verschlossen. Neun Monate spter, als diese geffnet wurden, fand man in Evas Topf Schlangen, Skorpione und giftige Insekten, whrend in Adams Topf ein wunderschner Knabe mit Mondgesicht lag. Den Jungen nannte man Shahid bin jarr (im Arabischen Shahid, Sohn des Topfes); er heiratete spter eine Huri und wurde Vorfahre der Jesiden (Spat 2002: 27-56). Diese Darstellung ber die Herkunft der Jesiden wird auch in einem der Heiligen Bcher der Jesiden besttigt, im Schwarzen Buch: Der Groe Gott sagte zu den Engeln: Ich erschaffe Adam und Eva, und mache sie zu menschlichen Wesen. Aus Adams Kern wird Shahid bin jarr erscheinen, und von ihm wird auf der Erde ein Volk entspringen, das spter die Menschen des Azrayil, d.h. Malak-Tawus, zeugen wird, und das sind die Jesiden (Al-Hasani, 1980: 37). Eine andere Version derselben Legende spricht von zwei Kindern in Adams Topf (Al-Hasani, 1980: 50). Was die Gottheiten betrifft, die Naturphnomene kontrollieren, wird von den meisten geglaubt, dass sie diejenigen Krankheiten heilen, die von den entsprechenden Sphren verursacht werden, die unter der Gewalt der jeweiligen Gottheit stehen. Man muss dazu noch sagen, dass die heilende Funktion den Heiligtmern, Grbern und bestimmten Scheichklans zugeschrieben ist, als eines der wichtigen Elemente der funktionierenden Wunder (Arakelova 2001). Die Namen der Gottheiten, Schutzgeister und Heiligen erscheinen zumeist zusammen mit den Titeln der Kaste. An der Spitze der Hierarchie stehen der Scheich (im Kurdischen ex, vgl. arabisch ayh alter Mann), der Pir (vgl. Kurdisch pir alter Mann, synonym mit dem arabischen ayh), und auch der Derwisch. Meistens werden zusammen mit den Namen der Gottheiten, Schutzgeister und Heiligen folgende Beinamen benutzt: malak (vgl. arabisch malak) Engel, xas (vgl. arabisch khass besonders), auserwhlt, edel, xudan Meister, Beschtzer, Patron, mer (vgl. kurdisch mer Mann) heiliger Mann, aziz (vgl. arabisch aziz mchtig, geachtet) heilig, wali (vgl. arabisch wali Freund) geliebt, nahe [zu Gott] heilig, qanj (vgl. kurdisch gut, stattlich) heilig, Heilig (im Ausdruck qanje Xwade Gottes Heiliger), usw. Die Gtter, Gtterinnen, Heiligen und Schutzgeister der Jesiden scheinen hauptschlich in Ritualen zu existieren und werden zumeist in bestimmten kultischen Ereignissen, die mit ihrem Kompetenzbereich in Zusammenhang stehen, beschwrt. (Asatrian; Arakelova, 2004: 233). Dementsprechend sind im jesidischen Pantheon, nebst Gttern und Heiligen, zustzlich zur Heiligen Triade, folgende Figuren zu bercksichtigen: der Donner-Gott (und eine Anzahl quivalenter Figuren); der Herr des Windes und der Luft; die Ur-Mutter der Jesiden und Schutzheilige der Frauen in den Wehen; die Herrin der Schwangeren und der Kleinkinder; die Gottheit des Phallus; die duale Gottheit der Rinder; der Gott der Erde (Unterwelt); der Beschtzer der Wanderer; der Geist der Furche, der Geist des Haushalts; der

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Geist des Bettes; der Herr der Grber; die universelle Gottheit (Khidir-nabi); Gottes Freund (Ibrahim-khalil); der Herrscher der Genies; der Geist der Baumeister; die Gottheiten der Sonne und des Mondes, und die des Gewands (kiras). Hier sind ein paar dieser jesidischen Gottheiten: Birus (auch Malak-Birus genannt, Der Engel Birus) ist von birusk Blitz abgeleitet. Das ist aber nicht der einzige jesidische Gttliche der den Donner und hnliche Phnomene kontrolliert. Ba-ra Geist des Orkans (wrtlich Schwarzer Wind) sind Namen derselben Gottheit, mit unterschiedlichen Eigenschaften: strmender Hagel, schleudernd (Blitz), blinkender Blitz (oder Wolken-Blitz), und Orkan, Wirbelsturm (Asatrian; Arakelova, 2004: 234). Das Beiwort Ra(o) (vgl. kurdisch, ra) bedeutet schwarz, Farbe die oft benutzt wird, um die Namen berirdischer Geschpfe zu definieren. Die Bezeichnung des jesidischen Geistes des Windes, Ba-ra, benutzt auch die Partikel ra, schwarz, als Attribut zu ba Wind, und heit schwarzer Wind (Asatrian; Arakelova, 2004: 235). Sex Mus-sor Roter Scheich Moses eine atmosphrische Gottheit, die die Winde und die Luft kontrolliert. Wird dann aufgerufen, wenn am Dreschboden mit der Getreideschwinge gearbeitet wird und man Wind bei gutem Wetter bentigt, um Korn von Heu zu trennen. Dann werden wir fr dich rotes gebackenes Brot zubereiten (Kreyenbroek, 1995: 106). Sex Mus-sor wird zumeist mit dem Titel Sor-soran, d.h. Der Rote der Roten verherrlicht. Das Attribut sor rot knnte hier die Heiligkeit unterstreichen, da rot im Gegensatz zu blau steht und blau bei den Jesiden die Farbe der Abtrnnigkeit darstellt. Sultan Yazid benutzt dieses Attribut auch: Siltan Ezid Sor Sultan Yazid der Rote (Asatrian; Arakelova, 2004: 242). Verschiedener Legenden zu Folge gehrt die Kontrolle ber den weien Wind auch Sexisin Scheich Hasan, der angeblich auch Herr der Tafel und des Griffels ist. Somit drfen nur seine Nachkommen unter den Jesiden die Fhigkeit zu lesen und zu schreiben besitzen. Obwohl eigentlich Sex Mus-sor (Sor Soran Der Rote der Roten) Herr der Tafel und des Griffels htte sein sollen, genau wie sein Gegenber unter den Ahl-i Haqq, der Erzengel Pir Musi, erinnert das Motiv klar an die biblische Erzhlung mit Moses, der die Tafeln mit den zehn Geboten von Gott erhielt. Die Verschiebung der Funktionen von Sexmus zu Scheich Hasan fand durch die Kontaminierung der Bilder statt, was auch zur Verflechtung der Krfte zur Kontrolle des Windes und der Luft fhrte. Scheich Hasan, der einen historischen Archetyp hat, ist eine Randfigur zwischen den jesidischen Heiligen (Asatrian; Arakelova, 2004: 243). Das Bildnis Moses in der Tradition der Jesiden muss eine doppelte Durchschlagskraft gehabt haben, vielleicht eine parallele: ein Mal als Sexmus, als ein Gott, und ein Mal als ein Charakter aus der Folklore, Musa Pexambar, d.h. der Prophet Moses; ihm wurde sogar eine Hymne gewidmet Qawle Musa Pexambar (Cell; Cell, 1978: 366-368, 438-439).

92

GEORGE GRIGORE

In den religisen Konzepten der iranischen lndlichen Gemeinschaften ist der Prophet Moses eine populre Figur, die viele lokale Figuren primitiver Verehrung ersetzt hat. Die Ahl-i Haqq sehen Pir Musi als eine Inkarnation des Engels Israfil (Ilahi; Mokri, 1966: 24, 28). Pira-Fat ist die Herrin der Schwangeren und der Kleinkinder: sie beschtzt sie vor der bsen Dmonin (Asatrian 2001). Eine gebrende Frau bittet Pira-Fat um Hilfe: Y Pr-Ft, l min bika! Oh Pira-Fat, hilf mir! Die Anwesenden uern ihre Hoffnung fr die Hilfe der Gttin: r Pr-Ft b hawara ta! Mge der Samen Pira-Fats dir helfen! (Cell; Cell, 1978: 434). Das Wort ar in dieser Formel bedeutet Samen, Bedeutung die sich aus der ursprnglichen Mittel, Mglichkeit entwickelt hat, ber die zwischenzeitliche Bedeutung Flssigkeit, Medizin (vgl. kurdisch ara Medizin, Lsung). Dieser Satz drckt den Wunsch der Frau aus, einen puren Jesiden zu gebren, vom Originalsamen des Volkes der Jesiden da Pira-Fat die traditionelle Beschtzerin dieser Samen ist. In hnlicher Weise beschwren sie diesen Samen wenn sie sich auf eine Reise begeben: Y Pr-Ft ra ta sar ma Oh Pira-Fat, lass deine Hilfe (Samen) mit uns sein. Pira-Fat ist eigentlich die Urmutter der Jesiden, denn sie hat diesen Samen, aus dem das Volk stammt, vor Zerstrung gerettet. Der Name dieser Gottheit, Pira-Fat, bedeutet wrtlich alte Frau Fat, und ist anscheinend zurckzufhren auf den Namen der Tochter des Propheten Mohammed, Fatima. Diese Persnlichkeit hat viele Charakterzge vor-islamischer Gottheiten der Fruchtbarkeit und Familie in sich vereint, und wird in der ganzen muslimischen Welt verehrt, insbesondere bei den Schiiten (Asatrian; Arakelova, 2004: 245). Die Jungfrau Maria (Maryam) hat im Islam fast dieselbe Funktion, und gebrende Mtter beten im Regelfall beide Heiligen an (Donaldson 1938: 31). Dass Fat eine Form von Fatima ist zeigt sich durch die Benutzung beider Namensformen, in besonderen Kontexten, fr die Tochter des Propheten. Die Hymne, die Ali gewidmet ist, Gottes Lwe (Bayta Ali er Xwade), gibt dazu einen klaren Hinweis (Cell; Cell 1978: 403). Die Abkrzung des Namens Fatima oder, um genauer zu sein, der Wegfall der Endsilben ergibt sich offensichtlich aus der kurdischen Interpretation des Namens: Fatima war als izafet Konstruktion verstanden Fatima Fat-i-ma, d.h. unsere Fat. Die Hand der Fatima, das Symbol der fnf Hauptpersnlichkeiten in der Schia der Prophet Mohammed, Ali, Fatima, Hasan und Husayn ist ein Hauptelement der Talismane und Amuletten die vor bsen Geistern und Dmonen schtzen (Budge, 1961: 467-472). Eine metallene Darstellung der Hand der Fatima ist ein wichtiges Accessoire in jedem gottesfrchtigen Schia Haus, nebst einem Portrait von Ali, dessen Bildnis zugleich bestimmte Charakteristika alter iranischer Mystiker angesammelt hat von Verethregna bis Rostam. Der Heilige Engel ist, wie zu erwarten, auch in den Hochzeitsbruchen zu finden. Die Jesiden schmckten einen der Bume vor des Brutigams Haus und legten einen Stock in phallischer Form zwischen den sten. Bevor das neu vermhlte Paar das Haus betrat, standen sie eine Weile unter dem Baum, und die Freunde des Brutigams schttelten diesen und sprachen: Mgen Brutigam und Braut so fruchtbar sein wie dieser Baum.

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Der Name dieser Figur, Xudane-male, kann als Meister des Hauses bersetzt werden. Er verkrpert das Wohlergehen fr Haus und Familie, untersttzt die Moral der Familie, frdert die Vermehrung der Rinder und gute Ernten. Xudane-male wohnt in der Feuerstelle,* aber manchmal nimmt er die Form einer Schlange an und verlsst das Haus. Deshalb stellt das Tten einer Hausschlange eine groe Snde dar, die das Glck abwenden kann und rger und Not bringen kann. (Christensen, 1941: 83-84; Seferbekov, 2001: 140-141). Die Verehrung fr Khidr, den grnen Mann, ist eine allgemein akzeptierte Praxis unter den muslimischen Kurden. Khidrs heilige Sttten sind im Kurdistan berall neben natrlichen Quellen zu finden. Die Muslime haben die berlieferungen zu Khidr mit denen ber den Propheten Elija verbunden, denn beide sind unsterblich, da sie aus dem Brunnen des Lebens getrunken haben. Ein Geist der Erde und des Wasser, der unsterbliche Khidr lebt in den tiefen Wassern der Seen und Teiche. Er nimmt verschiedene Gestalten an und erscheint Menschen, die ihn um Hilfe bitten, um deren Wnsche zu erfllen. Khidr (im kurdischen Xidir-nabi der Prophet Khidr), hat offensichtlich muslimische Wurzeln (ein Andeutung an ihn, vielleicht ohne ihn beim Namen zu nennen, erscheint im Koran: XVIII, 59-81). In der Tradition der Jesiden ist er einer der Shne des Scheichen Sham; er ist in erster Reihe ein himmlischer Krieger, ein Reiter auf einem weien Pferd (haspe siyare boz) (Al-Hasani, 1980: 73). Ibrahim-Xalil (vgl. arabisch khalil naher Freund) in das Pantheon der Jesiden aufzunehmen ist gewiss ziemlich vorlufig, denn er hat keine klaren Einflusssphren und auch keine Rollen in der Praxis des Kults. Dies ist vielleicht ein vergtterter Heiliger, der whrend eines Mahls, insbesondere eines rituellen Mahls adressiert werden soll. 9. Abschlieende Bemerkung Die Religion der Jesiden ist eine sehr synkretische: man kann darin Elemente des Zoroastrismus, des Manichismus, des Judentums, des Christentums und des Islams finden. Zur gleichen Zeit erkennt man den Einfluss des islamischen Mystizismus und der Symbolik im religisen Wortschatz, insbesondere in der Terminologie der esoterischen Literatur, doch groe Teile der Mythologie sind nicht-islamisch, und die Kosmogonien scheinen viel mit denen der alten Religionen aus dem Iran gemeinsam zu haben. Frhe Studien haben versucht, die Wurzeln des Jesidismus allgemein im Islam zu verankern, oder in alten Religionen aus dem Iran; wurde manchmal sogar als heidnische Religion eingestuft Verffentlichungen der letzten fnfzehn Jahre haben aber gezeigt, dass diese Angehensweise sehr simplifizierend ist.

94
LITERATURVERZEICHNIS

GEORGE GRIGORE

al-Hasani, Abd ar-Razzaq (1980), Al-yazidiyyuna fi hadhirihim wa madhihim, Al-Umma (Verlag), Bagdad. Arakelova, Victoria (2001), Sufi saints in the Yazidi Tradition, in Iran & The Caucasus, vol. 5, 183-192. Arakelova, Victoria (2002), Three Figures from the Yazidi Folk Pantheon, in Iran & The Caucasus, vol. 6, 1/2, 57-73. Arakelova, Victoria (2004), Notes on the Yazidi Religious Syncretism, in Iran & The Caucasus, vol. 8, 1, 19-28. Asatrian, Garnik, Victoria Arakelova (2003), Malak-Tawus: The Peacock Angel of the Yazidis, in Iran & The Caucasus, vol. 7, 1/2, 1-36. Asatrian, Garnik, Victoria Arakelova (2004), The Yazidi Pantheon , in Iran & The Caucasus, vol. 8, 2, 231-279. Cell, Ordixan, Cell Cell (1978), Zargotina Kurda, vol. 1-2, Nauka (Verlag), Moskau. Christensen, A. (1941), Essai sur la dmonologie iranienne, Ejnar Munksgaard (Verlag), Copenhagen. Donaldson. Bess Allen (1938), The Wild Rue. A Study of Muhammedan Magic and Folklore, in Iran. Luzac & Co. (Vrerlag), London. Drower, Ethel Stefana (1941), Peacock Angel. Being Some Account of Votaries of a Secret Cult and their Sanctuaries, John Murray (Verlag), London. Grigore, George (1994), Slujitorii Diavolului; Cartea Neagr; Cartea Dezvluirii, Clin (Verlag), Bukarest. Kreyenbroek, Philip G. (1995), Yazidism: Its Background, Observances and Textual Tradition. Edwin Mellen Press (Verlag), New York. Legge, Francis (1914), Forerunners and Rivals of Christianity. From 330 B.C. to 330 A.D., University Press (Verlag), Cambridge. Ilahi, Nur Ali, Mohammad Mokri (1966), L'sotrisme kurde. Aperus sur le secret gnostique des fidles de vrit, A. Michel (Verlag), Paris. Seferbekov, R. (2000), On the Demonology of the Tabasaranians, in Iran & The Caucasus, vol. 5, 139-148. Tawa, Habib, Les Yezidis, www.edph.auf.org/IMG/pdf/Tawa-Yezidis.pdf

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VA BNYAI

In my study I examine Zsolt Lngs novel entitled Bestiarium Transylvaniae IV. The Animals of the Earth in the light of transition narratives, highlight the following aspects: How do the geocultural specificities, the border tensions of alterities influence the poetics of memory? How is the transition from ritual coherence to textual coherence represented, how is it textualised? To what extent are the language of objects and the language of concepts determining from the viewpoint of understanding the novel, are they comprehensible also for those who live outside the social and spatial perspective of the novel, heavily relying on geocultural bonds? Keywords: geocultural narrative, border identity, cultural memory, chronotopic coordinates, name maps.

The prose trend which I call prose of the turn is becoming a pronounced element of contemporary Hungarian prose. A major characteristic of novels or short story volumes which I consider as belonging to this trend is that they try to grasp, to describe, to speak about the Romanian turn of the eighties-nineties of the past century through language, they try to transform the turn into narration. I emphasize the tendency of formation, as the structure and construction of the various literary works are also influenced by the story, the Romanian regime change: the problematization of the possibility of rendering through words the preceding totalitarian regime and the subsequent turn. The narrow scope of the topic is especially traceable in four volumes: Zsolt Lng: Bestiarium Transylvaniae IV. The Animals of the Earth (2011), Andrea Tompa: The Hangmans House (2010), Sndor Zsigmond Papp: Lives of No Great Importance (2011) and Mrta Jzsa: Until Grandma Turns Up (2007). I examine the above works in the first place, but in a wider spectrum Rbert Csaba Szabs Funeral at Ten in the Evening (2011) and Black Dacia (2012), Gbor Vidas Fakuszs Three Solitudes (2005) and dm Bodors The Visit of the Archbishop (1999), Melissza Bogdanowitzs Footprint (2003) and Verhovinas Birds (2011) as well as novels by Pter Demny, Gyrgy Dragomn and Zsuzsa Selyem, previously already analysed by me, also belong to the trend of transition narratives.
Lecturer at the University of Bucharest, Romania, Faculty of Foreign Language and Literature, Department of Hungarology, e-mail: [email protected]

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In the interpretation of most of the above listed works there emerges the viewpoint of the manifestation of geocultural determinedness. In the prose works implying intercultural experiences, born in an intercultural border-space, the heterogeneity of the cultural space comes to the front, this is why not only the space concept resulting from cultural heterogeneity offers itself for examination, but also the way in which the notion of border identity manifests. Mrta Jzsas essay novel, Until Grandma Turns Up, is related to the authors childhood in Cluj and its outgrowths; the primary purpose of the text is not to present the transition, the turn, but rather to relate its antecedents and partly its consequences, to present the Cluj of the seventies-eighties and of the following years, together with its micro- and macro-social aspects. In Sndor Zsigmond Papps novel entitled Lives of No Great Importance the final days of the Ceauescu regime1 and the transition existence after the turn, with its ambiguity, plasticity and entropy, are revived through the dwellers of the I quote the opening of the novel massive corner house turned into grey-brown of Trekvs street 79, in an unidentifiable Transylvanian town, situated at the border, with allusions to Satu Mare (but bearing characteristics of Cluj). Andrea Tompas book, The Hangmans House, similarly to the novels by Mrta Jzsa (as well as by Pter Demny and Zsuzsa Selyem), is also a Cluj-novel; we are informed about the raging and the final days of dictatorship, about the euphoric atmosphere of the first days after the regime change, the turn (as it has not been called revolution lately) through the stories, memories, reflections and family history of a 17-18-year-old adolescent girl. In The Animals of the Earth Zsolt Lng presents the periods before and after the Romanian turn, also from the viewpoint of a 17-18-year-old adolescent girl, Bori (rendered through a third-person narration throughout the novel), the macho dictatorship from a (slightly) feminine viewpoint (Krolyi 2011). In the present study I will especially focus on the space concepts formed in Zsolt Lngs novel entitled Bestiarium Transylvaniae IV. The Animals of the Earth, paying attention to geocultural aspects; in my approach I will mainly resort to Kornlia Farags geocultural theories (Farag 2009), and I will spatialize the following set of questions: How do the geocultural specificities, the border tensions of alterities influence the poetics of memory? How is the transition from ritual coherence to textual coherence represented, how is it textualised in the above mentioned prose text? To what extent are the language of objects and
1 The problematic character of narration is indicated by a pronounced feature of these novels, namely that they refrain from writing down the name Ceauescu, in the same way as we used to refrain from uttering it; in Papps novel it also occurs only once, in the rest of the novels it does not occur at all or it occurs rarely, being mentioned as secretary general or the leader of the nation, etc. With the plural I indicate my subjective involvement in the interpretation, which I experienced, throughout the reading and interpreting the novels, As if all this had happened to me (Bodor 1999: 49).

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the language of concepts determining from the viewpoint of understanding the novel, are they comprehensible (that is, does the linguistic-poetic construction provide interpretation) also for those who live outside the social and spatial perspective of the novel, heavily relying on geocultural bonds? The exploration of the latter set of questions can be of utmost importance from the viewpoint of geopoetics: in the text displaying well-determined time segments, explorable by means of strong topographical markers, of a concrete town map or one displaying ambiguous, floating places, we can also highlight the permanent topic of totalitarian regimes, namely the nature and landscape of fear, depicted in its incomprehensibility and difference, rendering the occurrences of the end of the eighties in Romania from an adolescent perspective. The text construction, structure formation out of memory mosaics also has a poetic relevance; it is materialized in the language of the writings, it is embodied in various linguistic-poetic forms in the above mentioned novels: the fragmented, corrective language schemes or the several-page-long sentence flows also problematize the narration and/or inexpressible nature of the respective turn. As what is common in these stories is the experiment of their narration; in spite of the fact that as a consequence of its undefinability, the existence changing role and special importance of that particular turn, that is, the 1989 event from Romania, is undeniable, still, the Great Story is impossible to narrate, it can only be put together out of mosaics, shavings, memory fragments (at the same time the act of assembling, putting together is also questionable). One aspect of some of the novels, which I regard as highly relevant, can be linked to this, namely the child/adolescent perspective of the narrators; the novel-constructing significance of the adolescent girl viewpoint, the multiply burdened gender perspective (linguistic, social, ethnic, gender etc., minority perspectives), rendering the historical-social-gender turn(s) from the turning point of the own life, is not at all ignorable. In the case of all the four novels the definability of the chronotopic coordinates has a text constituting character (in a narrower angle: it can be determined in each case that the text space is constituted by a Romanian, Transylvanian town and the period of time narrated in the novels can be restricted to the eighties in Romania as well as to the turn, to the transition), consequently, the co-texts, the influx of external worlds into the texts also determine the context of the textual world. Earlier I examined space concepts manifesting in prose writings (by dm Bodor, Zsolt Lng, Gyrgy Dragomn, Gbor Vida and Sndor Zsigmond Papp) in the case of which the cultural spatial embeddedness and spatial dependence had a text constituting force, but all this was relevant with respect to the relativisation of referenciality and the importance of highlighting the act of being created in language; however, most of the above mentioned texts are not afraid of the effect of decreasing the aesthetic value of referenciality, they are not afraid of the impediment of recognizability (as there is no reason for it).

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What Jan Assmann formulates in his volume entitled Cultural Memory in connection with the transition from ritual coherence to textual coherence (Assmann 1999), can be encountered in Zsolt Lngs novel, in its textual construction. In it we witness an example (but not a parable) of the literary construction of the twentieth-century Romanian totalitarian regime and one of its striking and relevant aspects is geocultural narration, the novel being a depository of linguistic and non-linguistic documents, revealing the culture in which it came to light.2 The novel (expected for a long time) is the manifest (also expected for a long time) of the transformation into text of seemingly undiscussable, unspeakable events, of ritual determinedness (not only in the Romanian) public sphere. Geocultural narratology becomes significant, in the first place, in the description and manifestation of fictitious ideas pertaining to the spatialization of culture, turning attention to spatial dimensions hidden in the treatment of the issues of historical situatedness manifesting in them, as well as in the prefix geo- of geoculture and especially to border motions, transitions (Farag 2009: 8). In the novels under discussion, and especially in The Animals of the Earth the process of reading is guided by referencializable chronotopic coordinates. The temporal layers similarly to spatial ones are multilayered, on the one hand, there is a relatively linear thread of storytelling except the dialogue of half idiots opening the novel, socialising the reader into its world , the action starts on 13 May 1989, and apart from the ten-page, one-sentence closure unveiling the dnouement the story (fetus) evolves in 8-9 months, reinforcing the strong body-poetical parallel. The fragmentary storytelling, the continuously intercalated historical-anecdotical parts are embedded (sometimes not expressly organically) into the loose set of happenings. The space of action can be precisely defined: apart from a few parallel, anecdotical digressions (pointing towards Cluj and Trgu Mure), it takes place in Satu Mare, thus, the space of a north-western Romanian town constitutes the space of the novel. As Kornlia Farag also states, the world to be narrated, which becomes presentable through the geocultural narrative, is unnaratable from one single cultural viewpoint (Farag ibid.). In other words, it resists the strategies of homogeneous narratability; heterogeneity, a multilayered and many-coloured perspective becomes indispensable. The geocultural perspective also presupposes and entails the distancing from it, that is, from itself. Thus, not a single characteristic can be identified: the poetic construction creates a network of relations and viewpoints. In Lngs novel this becomes relevant, on the one hand, in the many-colouredness of narration and speech styles, in the continuous
Cf.: Reading places the various perspectives into roles completing each other; a kind of assembling thinking, the mosaic-method known from the specialist literature of anthropology can lead to the whole. We can consider the narration theories of a geocultural foundation important due to the turn into the textual. (Farag 2009: 7)
2

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alternation of the narrative modes and in their adjustment to the style of the language of narration, on the other hand, in the continuous presence of ethnic and cultural multilayeredness, in the (re)presentation of their past and present differances, in the emphasis on otherness. What is that provides the particularity, the identity of belonging to the cultural area simultaneously with the differences in these novels, that is, in geocultural narratives? It is, on the one hand, the pronounced feature of nationality, ethnic distinction (Hungarian vs. Romanian; extended to the Central-EasternEuropean space concept it could be Slovakian, Serbian, Ukrainian, etc.), on the other hand, from the angle of the others, of those observing from outside, a kind of landscape spirit, some kind of unknowable space formation which, as a cultural space, is unapproachable from the perspective of one single nationality (Cf. Farag ibid.). Thus, in the narratives discussed here the space, the landscape, the earth are not means to express national identity, belonging there, identity, but rather they form a cultural space, a multilayered, hybrid identity, one attribute of a kind of border identity, formed through various relations, in which cultural meanings and values are encoded. Thus the interpretation of space in the examination of which border and periphery come to the front , of culturally interpreted landscapes (Mitchell 1991: 30) becomes indispensable, as they constitute basic features of geocultural narratives. The spatial layers of Lngs volume are superimposed out of the layers of the past, of story and history; the access to the past and to memory is multiply problematized, all this being complemented by a temporal stratification, connected to the several-century-old historical turns, transitions. The chronological layers of space construction start with the foundation of Szatmr/Satu Mare (with Zotmrs story, full of ironical comments otherwise characteristic of the whole novel; for instance, the potential name giver, Burebista, is also included in it), and continue with the end of the nineteenth century, with squares and street names, the period after World War I, World War II, stories of totalitarian regimes, 1989 May to December, then indicate the town square after the turn the latter closes the text in form of the texture of a ten-page sentence flow. However, these are not clearly distinguishable, precisely identifiable chronotopes; changes, transitions, turns and their consequences are narrated, such as the history of the building of the gendarme post; the space change is defined in terms of the smell of foreigners who moved into the houses emptied after the Jews had been deported from the town or in terms of the absence of earlier smells.3 At the same time, the renaming of the squares, of the space is also indicated by the small culture-historical essay on the act of symbolic territorialization, acquiring
Smells have an important role as identity indicators; the tight spaces, apartments, which can be linked to the different ethnic groups, can be distinguished based on smells. At the same time see dm Bodors The Smell of Prison (2001) the smell of fear sometimes compared to the smell of drains is identified as a text constituting attribute.
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completeness in time, which can be read on pages 17-18 and which includes the history and culture of the town. It is culture that is spatialized and spatializes it is the spatializing force of culture that forms geoculture. The relations of naming (which in my interpretation result in name maps in several masterpieces of contemporary Hungarian prose) are significant elements of geocultural narration; however, in the above indicated part names are not the indicators of stability, but due to symbolic territorialization, they are indicators of transition, transformation, changeability (or the perpetuation of transition), of permanent metamorphosis. The names of certain characters from the novel also belong here, Vizi from Vzi, Carica (pronounce: kariks) from Kariks, Deacu (pronounce: deku) from Dek, in the case of which the absence of the historical, cultural background knowledge also adds to the (possible) lack of knowing the Romanian language, as the pronunciation or the sounding of these names is (roughly) the same as the original name, but this interpretation is not provided by the reading according to Hungarian grammar.4 These names do not only designate, but they also activate spaces of association, they create relations, forming a geocultural narration instead of national identity. As the regions belonging toghether geoculturally can never achieve the stabilization of certain names, and here and now I am not only thinking of the pseudonyms from dm Bodors Sinistra District, where identification is made problematic from the start by the fact that every character has a pseudonym received from the authorities, the names of the representatives of power also change (sometimes in an unreasonable and deceptive way), but also of the toponyms. Thus the issue of name change, of the double or plural name use also reinforces the presence of border identity (referring to the impossibility of fixing, grasping identity). Geocultural experience makes its effect felt in the differenciation of understanding: due to the use of various linguistic and objectual attributes, distinguished, localized narratives and interpretations are born. That is, the interpretation of those who live within the cultural and linguistic boundaries differs from the one of those who live outside.5 One feature of these texts is musealisation: objects conceived as cultural signs, various immaterial artefacts as well as culture collecting aspects fulfill the role of text organization (Farag 2009: 16). Thus, the transition from the ritual coherence to the textual
This is why the text provides assistance with the instructions in brackets. It is a memorable locus of the irony and parody characterizing the whole novel when the instruction urges the reader to pronounce as desired the unpronunceable Dacian sentence. (Lng 2011: 261) 5 A given literary text is read differently by those who dispose of communicative memory about the spatio-temporality rendered by the text, at least about one segment of this temporality, and in whom every name, notion and object opens up a past, inner world segment; they can read their own stories, their own former questions into them. And it can be understood totally differently by those who read it in the absence of biographic memory, and their new questions are born within the time of reading. (Emphasis in the original.) (Farag 2009: 42)
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one is created by these cultural museal pieces and textual loci, the presence of which also influences the role of the poetics of memory, as it compels the reader to apply various collating strategies by resorting to the poetics of recognition. According to Kornlia Farag, these things, objects, immaterial artefacts do not only belong to space, but they are themselves the geocultural spaces. For instance, the Krpci without filter6 with Lng, Dragomn and Papp (with each writer it occurs differently, with a different spelling), or wearing the hateful, detested school uniform and matriculation number in Lngs and Tompas novels, together with presenting the act of not wearing them or wearing them differently, are besides emphasizing otherness the signs of latent resistance in all cases, while they can be interpreted as the geocultural motifs of dictatorship. The idioms identified as geocultural brand names7 also belong here: for instance, the expression they took the light away, which provides insight into the degree of exposedness during the totalitarian regime, but the one who does not have first-hand experience of the respective period, interprets it, in the best case, as an incorrect grammatical formulation or ignores it. The poetics of musealization has a role of indicating space and time, of depicting the age: the novel contains series of relics of the totalitarian regime: the screw-top jar as a scarce commodity; queuing (and its social-psychological aspects); buying food in exchange of food tickets; the greengrocers at the corner; nylon bag; the resistants are taken to the [Danube] Canal; people wearing leather coats; the Szabad Eurpa [radio programme] is disturbed; Gyorgyudzs [Gheorghiu Dej]; the big boss stays in streets where even the street lamp is armored; the party secretary is expected by the crowd; cabinet no. II; patriotic work; harvesting corn; cars allowed to be used only every other Sunday, etc. As Kornlia Farag states: The geocultural meaning components can be especially recognized in the zone where even the outside reader belonging to the same language culture is characterized by uncertainty and loss of orientation; s/he has to recognize that s/he does not fully understand everything and that for him/her the co-texts are not fully readable or are fully unreadable (Farag 2009: 21). I would remark in addition: the interpretation becomes problematic also for the inner interpreters not disposing of biographic memories, as the young generation, born in the narrated time, the generation of the present students, can get to know (or recognize) the respective period only from the narratives of the parents or grandparents.8
Carpai fr filtru a sort of cigarette without filter. But lets think about these brand names in the absence of the denoted thing: without the knowledge of the meaning-background of the discourse, without the cultural background knowledge and in the absence of cultural memory not even the possibility of misunderstanding or wild reception can occur. The reduction to the name presupposes the referential sameness of the interpretive plane. (Farag 2009: 11.) 8 The lack of knowledge related to the basic terms of the period can be a relevant example of the way of reading and (mis)understanding in the absence of biographic memory: when I put down the first notes with the purpose of writing the present study, I encountered the following situation in the
7 6

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At the same time, that emphasized layer of the novel which can be approached from the poetics of the body, can address the young generation, Boris generation from the novel: besides the social-historical turn, the mapping of the female body (mainly) from a female perspective, the depiction of the turn in the sexual (maturation) process acquires a special role. The Animals of the Earth is a border novel: not only due to its geographic position, but also because of the border existence of adolescence and sexuality. The space, Szatmr/Satu Mare is also articulated as a female town the architecture of unfulfilled love culminated in the construction of the town (Lng 2011: 152); the town built upon Zotmrs grave is the town of the woman, it is indestructible, those many who tried to destroy it all perished. The memory of the bitter and sweet love contoured the labyrinth swallowing the enemy. But the town also revolted against the tyranny of its own dwellers; and even if the oratories can repress the desire for freedom for a while, the subconscious of the town will erode the dictators pedestal, the bark of the applause square, polished out of cheap marble, will collapse under them. (Lng 2011: 153154) Boris attitude to her own body is similar to the town space formed through the desire of love. The absence of the discourse about the body, the fantasizing about sexuality gets completed with the compulsory gynecologic examination, which indicates that corporeality cannot be withdrawn from the confinement, emanating fear, of the all-controlling dictatorship; the gynecologic lamp correlates with the interrogator lamp of the Securitate, this is why it is important to highlight the liberation-story from the end of the novel, which is, both concretely and figuratively, the stepping out, the liberation from the drains: getting out from under the ground Bori notices that light has inundated the square; she experiences freedom as orgasm: a light has lit up also in the brain. The previous outer as well as inner confinement has been replaced by the freedom of spirit and body.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Assmann, Jan (1999), A kulturlis emlkezet [Cultural Memory], Atlantisz, Budapest. Bodor, dm (1999), Az rsek ltogatsa [The Visit of the Archbishop], Magvet, Budapest. Farag, Kornlia (2009), A viszonossg alakzatai [Figures of Correlation], Forum, Novi Sad. Jzsa, Mrta (2007), Amg a nagymami megkerl [Until Grandma Turns Up], Noran, Budapest.

Szabadsg, the daily newspaper from Cluj: when translating a piece of news taken over from the Romanian newspapers, the translator and the editor proved that they had probably not been socialized before the turn, as the widely known UTC (Uniunea Tinerilor Comuniti, Union of Young Communists) had never been the Fiatal Kommunistk Egyeslete (Szabadsg, 29 February 2019), but KISZ (Kommunista Ifjak Szvetsge). The latter mosaic word also occurs in Zsolt Lngs novel.

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Krolyi, Csaba et al. (2011), S Kvartett [S Quartet], in let s Irodalom, 27, p. 8, http://www.es.hu/;es-kvartett;2011-07-08.html [2011. 09. 10.] Lng, Zsolt (2011), Bestirium Transylvaniae IV. A fld llatai [Bestiarium Transylvaniae IV. The Animals of the Earth], Kalligram, Bratislava. Mitchell, W. J. T. (1991), Birodalmi tj. Tzisek a tjkprl [Imperial Landscape. Theses on Landscape], in Caf Bbel, 1, pp. 25-42. Papp, Sndor Zsigmond (2011), Semmi kis letek [Lives of No Great Importance], Libri, Budapest. Tompa, Andrea (2010), A hhr hza [The Hangmans House], Kalligram, Bratislava.

DAS INTERKULTURELLE POTENTIAL DER PROSA RUMNIENDEUTSCHER AUTOREN NACH 1990

DANIELA IONESCU-BONANNI

THE INTERCULTURAL POTENTIAL OF THE PROSE WRITTEN BY ROMANIAN AUTHORS OF GERMAN EXPRESSION AFTER 1990

Intercultural competence is one of the most important skills for any individual who wants to succeed on the job market. Political and development sciences researchers have shown how literary products are invaluable sources of cultural knowledge and emphasize their inclusion in special management training. In terms of content, literary products are so profoundly interconnected with cultural features that literary fragments with a strong biographical element are increasingly used to exemplify theoretical knowledge about a foreign country. But since we live in a global world, one particularly interesting question arising in this context is whether literary productions can be understood correctly without any references to the cultural background from which they emerge. In this respect it is valuable to examine how literary products by German authors with a Romanian background may be read or even misread because the appropriate cross-cultural background is lacking. After Herta Mller won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2009, the intriguing question is whether a far-reaching imagination or more a mixture of images from different cultures lend such literary productions their unique intercultural dimension? This paper will take a closer look at literary fragments by some German authors with Romanian backgrounds such as Herta Mller, Richard Wagner, Franz Hodjak and Dieter Schlesak. The purpose is to investigate whether their meaning can be influenced by such a lack of cultural background, and also in considering their provocative images whether we can find explanations for this literary output in the specific content of Romanian culture. Keywords: German literature, inter- and cross-cultural communication, Herta Mller, Romanian background, cultural dimension.

Ich trume schwarzwei. Wenn ich aufwache, spreche ich Rumnisch mit der toten Lerche auf dem Balkon, nachdem ich, kurz zuvor, im Schlaf noch Deutsch gesprochen hatte [...]1

Dieses Zitat aus Franz Hodjaks Roman Ein Koffer voll Sand ist symptomatisch fr die literarischen Texte der rumniendeutschen Autoren das Leben zwischen kulturellen Rumen ist eine zutiefst prgende Eigenschaft ihrer Persnlichkeiten und ihrer Schriften. Die einschlgige Literatur verzeichnet zahlreiche Studien, in denen die Entwurzelung, die Heimatlosigkeit oder die Unfhigkeit in irgendeiner
Dozentin fr Neuere Deutsche Literatur an der Universitt Bukarest, Rumnien, e-mail: [email protected] 1 Hodjak 2003, S. 14.

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Kultur anzukommen und sich zurecht zu finden thematisiert werden2. Jedoch gibt es meines Erachtens einen genauso interessanten Aspekt, der sich erst im gegenwrtigen Diskurs einer interkulturell angelegten Literaturwissenschaft zu konturieren vermag. In absentia einer Heimat, um die sich sonst der Dialog mit der spezifischen Fremdheit anderer Kulturen entfaltet3, bilden die rumniendeutschen Autoren in ihren Werken hybride Kulturrume, die sowohl im spezifischen, sozialen und kulturellen Kontext ihres Herkunftslandes, Rumnien, als auch im kulturellen Kontext der Urheimat, Deutschland, verankert sind. Meine These ist, dass ein hoher interkultureller Lerngehalt hinter diesen Texten steht, der auch fr die entstehende Literatur im europischen Raum von hoher Bedeutung sein kann. Das Ziel des vorliegenden Aufsatzes ist eine kulturanalytische Betrachtung der Prosatexte rumniendeutscher Autoren nach 1990. Eine solche Absicht kann man nicht fern von den existierenden Diskussionen durchfhren, was die Berechtigung einer interkulturell angelegten Literaturwissenschaft anbelangt. Demnach zuerst eine kurze Bestandaufnahme und die eigene Positionierung in diesem Forschungsfeld. Konkrete berlegungen zu einer interkulturellen Literaturwissenschaft kann man heutzutage meines Erachtens nicht von der zuweilen etwas berstrapazierte Diskussion ber das Phnomen der Globalisierung trennen. Ausgehend von einer primr negativen Definition von Globablisierung als keinen in sich gesttigten, von strenden Einflssen abgeschotteten Vorgang 4 sondern vielmehr als Interaktion von [...] lokale[n] und globale[n], differenzierende[n] und generalisiserende[n] Faktoren auf allen Ebenen des gesellschaftlichen Tuns und somit auch in der Literatur 5 werden wir schnell auf die Erklrung stoen, warum es absolut notwendig ist, auch die rumniendeutsche Literatur aus dieser Perspektive zu beleuchten. Es ist eine Literatur von Kulturbegegnungen, in denen die Dominanten: Internationalitt, Pluralismus, Heterogenitt, Differenz, Inter- und Multikulturalitt, Inkohrenz und Interdependenz, Widersprchlichkeit und Vielfalt6 bestens vertreten sind. Horst Steinmetz beschreibt in seinem Aufsatz Globalisierung und (Literatur)geschichte, wie transnationale berlappungen entstehen und damit Vernderungen der literarischen Topographie. Besonders bei den rumniendeutschen Autoren ist dieser Aspekt stark ausgeprgt. Die Literatur ist extrem wenig reduzierbar auf objektive Reprsentationen sondern die Welt stellt sich:
[...] immer durch Kulturen gebrochen dar, so da es verschiedene Welten und Wirklichkeiten gibt, die alle den gleichen Anspruch auf Anerkennung, nicht aber auf Alleingltigkeit erheben drfen. Auch in der Literatur begegnet man dieser Einsicht. [...] Vgl. hierzu die umfangreichen Verffentlichungen des Instituts fr Deutsche Kultur und Geschichte Sdosteuropas (IKGS) an der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universitt Mnchen. 3 Vgl. Ertler 2006, S. 137. 4 Schmeling/ Schmitz-Emans/ Walstra 2000, S. 6. 5 Ebd. 6 Siehe Steinmetz 2000, S. 190.
2

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Regionalitt kennt ihre Grenzen, ohne darum ihren eigenen Universalismus aufzugeben, der einen anderen regional fundierten Universalismus nicht bestreiten, sondern sich mit ihm vergleichen will.7

Fhrt man diesen Gedanken weiter, kann behauptet werden, dass durch das Zusammenspiel des Besonderen und Regionalen sich das Universale herauskristallisiert, was widerum fr die neue europische Literatur eine wesentliche Rolle spielen wird. Selbstverstndlich hat es Interkulturalitt in der Literatur schon immer gegeben. Das, was allerdings neu ist, ist die Hufigkeit des Phnomens und die wachsende Bedeutung in der heutigen Zeit. In einer Zusammenfassung der Forschungsschwerpunkte einer interkulturellen Literaturwissenschaft fhrt Karl Esselborn vier groe Hauptbereiche an. Nach der Literatur der deutschen Auswanderer nach bersee, der Literatur der Arbeitsmigration in Deutschland, der der Umgesiedelten und Heimatvertriebenen ist die letzte Gruppe die der Minderheitenliteraturen im Ausland, beziehungsweise der weitgehend nach Deutschland vertriebenen rumniendeutschen Literatur8. Jedoch setzt Esselborn hier seine Gedanken fort in dem Sinne, das die Grenzen zwischen dieser Literatur und der von ihm so benannten auslnderdeutschen Literatur relativ klar gekennzeichnet seien. Ich hingegen whle einen Ansatz, der an die dekonstruktivistische postmoderne Haltung von Aglaia Blioumi9 anlehnt, denn meines Erachtens weist die Literatur rumniendeutscher Autoren viele Gemeinsamkeiten mit der Literatur auslndischer Autoren in Deutschland auf. Gemeinsam ist nicht nur der Auenseiterstatus, sondern auch die Situierung in einem Zwischenraum, den auch Immacolata Amodeo fr die sogenannte Gastarbeiterliteratur folgendermaen beschreibt:
Spracherwerb und Sprachverlust gehen nebeneinander her. Der Ablseproze von den alten Wurzeln, der Status zwischen zwei Kulturen, wird immer als Gefhrdung, als angstbesetzte Persnlichkeitskrise erfahren.10

Ohne der rumniendeutschen Literatur ihren Sonderstatus absprechen zu wollen, sind die hnlichkeiten doch verblffend. Auch nur die Tatsache, dass zwei unterschiedliche Autoren, einerseits die rumniendeutsche Literatur als fnfte deutsche Literatur 11 andererseits die Gastarbeiterliteratur 12 als solche angeben, ist ein Beweis dieses Sachverhaltes. In der Diskussion um eine interkulturell angelegte Literaturwissenschaft wendet sich Immacolata Amodeo
7 8 9 10 11 12

Ebd., S. 198. Siehe Esselborn 2001, S. 343. Siehe Blioumi 2006, S. 14. R. P. Carl zitiert nach Amodeo 1996, S. 37. Vgl. dazu Ritter 1981, S 632 ff. Vgl. Amodeo 1996, S. 40.

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insbesondere gegen die ersten Theorien in den achtziger Jahren von Harald Weinrich und Irmgard Ackermann, denen sie ethnozentristische und kolonialistische Ansichten vorwirft. Ohne auf diese Polemik eingehen zu wollen, gibt Amodeos Untersuchung jedoch interessante Hinweise auf die Perspektive der Autoren, die sich teilweise mit denen der rumniendeutschen Autoren decken. So wird zum Beispiel das Gefhl der Heimatlosigkeit und der Unzugehrigkeit genannt, das oft eine Rolle spielt 13 . Immacolata Amodeo spricht ferner von einer Hierarchisierung und von dem Bestreben der Autoren auf den Status einer Minderheitenliteratur zu kommen was die Schlussfolgerung nahe legt, dass diese als qualitativ hher eingestuft wird 14 . Diese Betrachtung wrde eine Diskussion ber Wertung in den Fokus rcken, die aber im Rahmen des vorliegenden Aufsatzes nicht geleistet werden kann. Der Unterschied zu den von Gilles Deleuze und Flix Guattari benannten kleinen Literaturen15 besteht allerdings laut Amodeo in der Tatsache, dass es sich um keine klar umrissene und homogene Literatur handelt, was auch durchaus stimmt. Die Vielfalt der Manifestation dieser Unzugehrigkeit, gegeben durch die Entstehung und Steigerung verschiedenster kultureller Begegnungen, und die immerzu wachsende Bedeutung interkultureller Bezge knnen als gemeinsame Nenner dieser Literatur betrachtet werden16. Somit liegt es nahe, dass man bei den Minderheitenliteraturen und den gegenwrtigen Literaturproduktionen von Autoren mit Migrationshintergrund gemeinsame Nenner herausarbeiten knnte. Ich bin der Meinung, dass ein kulturwissenschaftlicher Ansatz fr diese Untersuchung adquat ist. Die von Thomas Gller vorgeschlagene Methode fr eine kulturvergleichende Literaturwissenschaft sollte dabei wegweisend sein, denn erst eine Herausarbeitung der kulturspezifischen Charakteristika gewhrleistet den Texten eine wesentliche Bedeutung17. Ein solcher vergleichender Blick wird auch mit diesem Forschungsvorhaben beabsichtigt: es gilt es zu untersuchen, in wie weit das Verstndnis und die Interpretation literarischer Texte rumniendeutscher Autoren nach 1990, durch ihr interkulturelles Potential beeinflusst werden kann. Genauer wird die Untersuchung sich auf zwei Aspekte konzentrieren. Auf der einen Seite werden Bilder der Interkulturalitt untersucht dort wo in den literarischen Texten bewusst mit Stereotypen und kulturellen Gehalten gearbeitet wird. Auf der anderen Seite gilt es Textstellen ausfindig zu machen, in der eine fehlende Kenntnis des kulturellen Referenzrahmens leicht zu berinterpretation fhren
Ebd., S. 52. Siehe Amodeo 1996, S. 53 ff. 15 Das 1976 erschienene Buch von Gilles Deleuze und Flix Guattari Kafka: fr eine kleine Literatur spielt im Rahmen der interkulturell angelegten Literaturwissenschaft eine Pioniersrolle. 16 Siehe Amodeo 1996, S. 86 ff. 17 Vgl. hierzu Gller 2001, S. 35.
14 13

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knnen. Fr beide Aspekte wird es eine besondere Rolle spielen, wie diese Texte in Deutschland wahrgenommen wurden. Selbstverstndlich hat jede Rezeption und jede Interpretation ihre Berechtigung, es handelt sich stets um eine legitime Deutungsvielfalt bei einer fremdkulturellen Rezeption 18 , ich erhoffe mir jedoch interessante Beispiele, der daraus entspringenden Pluralitt. Umso wichtiger ist die direkte Verbindung zu der Rezeptionsforschung, der auch Norbert Mecklenburg eine fundamentale Rolle in der interkulturell ausgelegten Literaturwissenschaft zusprach19. In diesem Zusammenhang ist der Mechanismus, der sich bei der Erschlieung von Leerstellen bei der Lektre fremdkultureller Texte einstellt interessant. Uta Schaffers spricht in diesem Sinne von einem Zwischen in dem sie nicht im Gadamerschen Sinne den Ort der Hermeneutik sieht20, sondern einen positiven Ort der kulturellen Begegnung, der interkulturellen Verstndigung in einer transterritorialen Sphre:
Mit einer Rezeptionshaltung, die universalisierend den eigenen Kontext absolut setzt, wird ein mglicher Rest von Unverstehbarkeit, der aus der kuturellen Differenz resultiert, >berlesen< und die Bedeutungszuschreibung vollzieht sich unter Verweigerung der Anerkennung von Differenz. Der Rezipient liest in das Unvertraute Vertrautes hinein, und eignet es sich, so weit es geht, an: Er fllt die Leerstellen, die der Text ihm bietet, mit seiner Erfahrungswelt und bersetzt die sperrigen Textstellen als ungewhnliche Darstellung von eigentlich vertrautem. Das Andere wird angeeignet, assimiliert.21

Es geht also lediglich um die Konstitution von verschiedenen Bedeutungsebenen und deren Vergleich. Nicht unwesentlich wird dabei sein, wie sich die Schriftsteller selber zu diesen Sachverhalten positionieren. Im Sinne einer interkulturellen Germanistik und einer kulturdifferenten Auslegung literarischer Texte charakterisiert Thomas Gller im Anschluss an Dieter Krusche die Leerstellen als zweierlei: diejenigen, die ein kulturelles Vorwissen erfordern und diejenigen, bei denen die eigene Bestimmheit des Textes suspendiert ist22. Letzteres ist fundamental fr die differentierte Wahrnehmung von Texten. Gller erweitert im Anschluss an Scheifele diesen Begriff der Leerstellen auch dahingehend, dass ihr Effekt bei der Rezeption von spteren Lesern aus einer fremden Kultur gar nicht einzukalkulieren ist23. Infolge der vorangehenden Betrachtungen empfiehlt sich fr die Zwecke einer kulturanalytisch geprgten Literaturwissenschaft die Definition von Kultur als einer Dimension, einem Feld, einem Teilsystem der Gesellschaft, mit den Worten Norbert Mecklenburgs als gesellschaftliches Feld symbolischer Formen und Praxis, als signifying system24, das sich konsequent in der Literatur widerspiegelt und sich stets verndert.
18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Siehe Ebd., S. 33 und Steinmetz 1992, S. 386 ff. Vgl. Mecklenburg 2008, S. 23. Vgl. hierzu Schaffers 2003, S. 356. Ebd., S. 353. Vgl. Gller 2001, S. 14. Ebd. Mecklenburg 2008, S. 15.

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Innerhalb der Minderheitenliteraturen spielt die rumniendeutsche Literatur eine ganz besondere Rolle durch ihren ausgeprgt transnationalen Charakter zumal Forscher wie Karl Esselborn von der Gegenwart als einem Zeitalter der transnationalen Literaturen25 sprechen. Die systematische Analyse des interkulturellen Potentials dieser Literatur kann demnach einen interessanten Beitrag zur gegenwrtigen Forschung leisten. Wenn auch mitunter die Wirkung rumniendeutscher Literatur auf dem bundesdeutschen Buchmarkt als enttuschend dargestellt wird 26 , so ist es jedoch allgemein anerkannt, dass die rumniendeutsche Literatur in diesem Zusammenhang eine wichtige Ausnahmerolle spielt, nicht zuletzt weil sich ihre Literatur zu zersetzen27 droht, genauso wie die Minderheit selber. Besonders wichtig scheint mir dabei die Bemerkung, dass die Literatur hier nicht erst durch berschreitung der Herkunftsgrenzen interkulturell geworden ist, sondern dass es sich dabei um eine interkulturell geprgte Literatur per se handelt, durch den kulturell-geschichtlichen Kontext, dem sie entspringt. Sie ist in dieser Hinsicht modern und wegweisend, denn in einem vereinigten Europa wird es hchstwahrscheinlich der gemeinsame Nenner der zuknftigen literarischen Produktionen sein, hnlich wie in den multiethnischen Staaten zuvor. Norbert Mecklenburg uert in seinem Buch Das Mdchen aus der Fremde. Germanistik als interkulturelle Literaturwissenschaft eine interessante Bemerkung, da er festzustellen meint, dass es bei Celan eindeutige interkulturelle Bezge gibt, whrend es sich bei Herta Mller seiner Meinung nach um einen Sieg der poetischen Alteritt gegenber der kulturellen handele 28 . Nach Mecklenburg spiele es bei einer Celan Lektre durchaus eine Rolle, ob man etwas ber die NS-Zeit wei oder nicht, whrend es bei Herta Mller, wegen der Metapherndichte weniger wichtig ist. Eine adquate Leseart wre in diesem Fall mit oder ohne Kontext mglich. An diesem Punkt mchte ich Mecklenburg widersprechen und unterstreichen, dass auch fr das Verstndnis der Texte von Herta Mller das Hintergundwissen eine bedeutende Rolle spielen kann. In dieser Hinsicht weise ich auf den Aufsatz von John J. White hin, A Romanian in Germany: The Challenge of Ethnic and Ideological Identity in Herta Muller`s Literary Work29, in dem der Autor die Wichtigkeit der tglichen Erfahrungen fr das Verstndnis eines Textes hervorhebt. Meine These ist, dass man dem Text interessante Metaphern zuschreiben kann, wenn der kulturelle Kontext nicht bekannt ist, ohne dass die Bilder poetischen Metaphern entsprechen. Um diese Behauptung zu sttzen mchte ich an dieser Stelle zwei Erzhlung anfhren, in denen die rumniendeutsche Schriftstellerin und inzwischen Nobelpreistrgerin Herta Mller auf ihre eigene Interkulturalitt hinweist.
25 26 27 28 29

Siehe dazu Esselborn 2001, S. 336. Vgl. Mecklenburg 2008, S. 454. Vgl. Ebd., S. 457. Siehe Mecklenburg 2008, S. 459 ff. Vgl. White 2002, S. 75.

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Im ersten Beispiel handelt es sich um die Erzhlung Die Insel liegt innen die Grenze liegt auen30. Anhand des Begriffes Insel verdeutlicht Herta Mller in dieser Geschichte die ganz unterschiedlichen Leseweisen der Bundesdeutschen und der Rumniendeutschen. Wenn die Ersteren sagen: man sei reif fr die Insel, meinen sie einen Ort der Flucht, ein entspannendes Exil, whrend fr die deutsche Minderheit gerade dieser Status einer Insel im rumnischen Kulturraum traumatische Zge aufweist, genauso wie die kommunistische Vergangenheit:
Das Wort Inselglck hat fr mich zwei auseinanderstrebende Teile. Das Wort Insel lsst das Wort Glck nicht zu. Ich habe ber dreiig Jahre in einer Diktatur gelebt, jeder war fr sich eine Insel und das ganze Land noch einmal. [...] Ich kenne aus der Kindheit das Inselunglck. Alle bestehen daraus: die im Haus, die im Dorf. Die Nachbardrfer waren zwei rumnische Drfer, ein slowakisches und ein ungarisches Dorf. Jedes fr sich mit einer anderen Sprache, seinen Feiertagen, seiner Religion, seiner Kleidung.31

Das zweite Beispiel stammt aus der Erzhlung Bei uns in Deutschland und erlutert, wie man mit einer innerdeutschen Interkulturalitt bei alltglichen Beschftigungen, wie dem Blumenkauf, auf ernchternde Weise konfrontiert werden kann:
Zweimal kaufte ich Blumen im selben Laden. Die Verkuferin, eine Frau um die Fnfzig, behielt mich vom einen zum anderen Mal im Gedchtnis. Da suchte sie mir zur Belohnung fr meine Wiederkehr die schnsten Lwenmulchen aus dem Eimer, zgerte ein wenig und fragte: Was fr eine Landsmnnin sind Sie, sind Sie Franzsin? Weil ich das Wort Landsmnnin nicht mag, zgerte ich auch, und es hing eine Schweigen zwischen uns, bevor ich sagte: Nein. Ich komme aus Rumnien. Sie sagte: Na, macht ja nichts., lchelte, als htte sie pltzlich Zahnschmerzen. Es klang gtig, wie: kann ja passieren, ist ja nur ein kleiner Fehler. Und sie hob den Blick nicht mehr, sah nur noch auf den eingepackten Strau. Es war ihr peinlich, sie hatte mich nmlich berschtzt. Schon als ich Lwenmulchen verlangte, mute ich mir denken: In meinem mitgebrachten Deutsch, in Rumnien heien diese Blumen Froschgschl, in der Dorfsprache von zu Hause ganz direkt Quaken, also nur das Gesinge, welches die Frsche von sich geben. Der Unterschied zwischen Lwen und Frschen knnte nicht grer sein, der Vergleich beider Tiere ist abwegig. Das deutschlanddeutsche Lwenmulchen ist ein grotesk berschtztes Froschmaul oder Froschquaken. Genauso wurde ich ein paar Minuten spter berschtzt.32

Wre diese Erzhlung von Herta Mller anders ausgefallen, weniger berichtend, und htte es im Text lediglich das Wort Quaken gegeben, wre es durchaus mglich gewesen, es ohne Kenntnis der Gepflogenheiten im Banat, als Metapher zu deuten und sich in der Interpretation zum Beispiels auf eine mgliche Synsthesie dieses Bildes zu beziehen, das seine Wurzeln allerdings
30 31 32

Mller 2008 (1), S. 160 f. Ebd. Mller 2008 (2), S. 177 f.

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nur in einer sprachlichen Verschiedenheit zwischen dem Hoch- und dem Rumniendeutschen hat. Ich fhlte mich in meiner Hypothese besttigt, als mir ein rumnischer Student, der als DAAD Stipendiat in Tbingen war, berichtete, welche Frage bei einer Lesung Herta Mllers im November 2009 gestellt wurde: der Gesprchspartener, Prof. Jrgen Wertheimer, fragte, ob sie Wrter wie Meldekraut und Herzschaufel (es ging um den Roman Atemschaukel) erfunden htte. Die Deutung des Professors war naheliegend, er vermutete starke Metaphern dahinter. Die Antwort war aber ganz berraschend fr ihn nein, sagte Mller, diese Wrter gibt es tatschlich. Sie erklrte sogar, welche Funktion die Schaufel mit dem herzfrmigen Blatt habe, und zwar die greren Stcke Kohle mit der scharfen Spitze brechen zu knnen. Demnach kann man behaupten, dass sprachliche Elemente ein gutes Beispiel fr das interkulturelle Potential der Prosatexte rumniendeutscher Autoren nach 1990 darstellen. hnliche Bilder wie aus den Texten von Herta Mller finden sich auch beispielsweise in der Prosa von Franz Hodjak, so auch in seinem Roman Ein Koffer voll Sand, in dem die Hauptgestalt, Bernd Burger, durch das Bewusstsein, er verwendet in seiner Muttersprache Wrter, die es im Duden de facto gar nicht gibt, erst zum Sprachschpfer wird:
Bernd Burger konnte den Ha nicht begreifen, der in diesen Stzen steckte. Die Stze platzten vor Mord und Totschlag, und die Worte rechtfertigten alles. Whrend Bernd Burger nachdachte und nicht wute worber, buserierte33 ihn eine Fliege. Dieses Wort buserieren, aus dem er dann ein Hauptwort Buseration ableitete, lie er sich genlich auf der Zunge zergehen, weil es in keinem Wrterbuch verzeichnet war, und vor Freude, da es in keinem Wrterbuch verzeichnet war, erfand Bernd Burger Worte wie Tschutschu oder Gurkulu, oder Pupunusch [...].34

In einem weiteren Roman von Franz Hodjak liegt das interkulturelle Potential nicht im Bereich der dialektalen Unterschiede, sondern in den geschichtlichen Gegebenheiten. Grenzsteine ist 1995 erschienen, also relativ schnell nach der bersiedelung des Schriftstellers in die Bundesrepublik, und der Text scheint in erster Linie ein Roman der Verarbeitung jngster kommunistischer Vergangenheit, der Dezember Revolution 1989 und der so genannten rumnischen societate de tranzitie, der bergangsgesellschaft. Die Problematik der Grenze, die schon im Titel aufgeworfen wird, ist zunchst die einer politischen und ideologischen Grenze, die durch territoriale Beschrnkungen verstrkt wird. Der Roman beginnt in einer Auf- und Abbruchsstimmung. Die Hauptgestalt, Harald Frank, entscheidet sich alle Zelte seiner bisherigen Existenz abzubrechen und sie gegen ein kleines enges Zelt vor der Deutschen Botschaft in Bukarest
Das Wort buserieren gibt es im Hochdeutschen nicht, man verwendet es allerdings laut online-Wrterbuch in sterreich [http://www.oesterreichisch.net/oesterreich-1068-buserieren.html abgerufen am 15.11.2010] 34 Hodjak 2003, S. 124.
33

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einzutauschen, in dem er sich einquartieren will, um sich irgendwann in den Westen begeben zu drfen. Hier handelt es sich auch nicht um eine Metapher, wie man vielleicht annehmen knnte, hnlich wie in den Texten Herta Mllers, sondern um eine Realitt der bereits angesprochenen bergangsgesellschaft. Somit beginnt der Roman nicht etwa mit der Erffnung von Spannungsfeldern oder Problematisierungen, sondern mit der bewussten Akzeptanz einer bergangssituation in einem zwischenterritorialen Raum, der allerdings spter im Roman vielsagende ideologische Zge annimmt. Trotz der Ekelgefhle die ihn anfangs auf der Reise befallen, passt Harald Frank sich, im Zeltlager angekommen, den absurden Bedingungen und Spielen perfekt an, und nimmt es sich fest vor, alles zu berwarten35, indem er sich mit dem Zelt als neue Heimat abfindet und mit der Sturmlaterne seines Grovaters wappnet. Der Raum vor der Botschaft wird zu einem exemplarischen Schauplatz grotesker Bilder politischer Gegenwart: die ablehnende und abwertende Haltung der Botschaftsvertreter, die Bergleute als Staatsmacht, politische Parteien die sich blitzschnell, je nach Interessen und Absichten, unter den Wartenden bilden, all dies ist in der rumnischen Geschichte der frhen neunziger Jahre nachweisbar:
Ein Reporter rannte herbei. Er wurde sofort festgehalten. Im zelt bildeten sich etliche Parteien, die eine war der Meinung, man solle den Reporter laufenlassen. Die andere verkndete hartnckig die Ansicht, man msse ihn totschlagen, die dritte Partei machte den Vorschlag, wenn man ihn schon gefangen habe, solle man ihn berreden oder zwingen, das spiele im wesentlichen keine Rolle mehr, Spenden zu organisieren, die restlichen Parteien enthielten sich, indem sie erklrten, sie seien in der Opposition.36

berhaupt ist die Art der Darstellung dieser Episode im Roman bezeichnend fr Franz Hodjak gekonnt grotesk stellt er die fragwrdige Rolle politischer Parteien dar, sowie die endlosen Diskussionen, die sich anhand lcherlicher Belange in solchen spannungsgeladenen Situationen entfalten. Dennoch, kennt man die rumnische politische Wirklichkeit der frhen neunziger Jahre nicht, entbehren diese Zeilen eines Resonanzbodens und werden sicherlich ganz anders verstanden und gedeutet, wie bereits im Falle der Texte von Herta Mller vorher beschrieben. Ein weiterer wichtiger Aspekt dieser Analyse ist die Untrennbarkeit des Phnomens Interkulturalitt von dem der Identittskonstituierung. Bettina Baumgrtel widmet diesem Thema ihre Dissertation, wo sie fr die Migrantenliteratur folgendes festlegt und dadurch das wichtige Potential der Literatur im interkulturellen Diskurs37 unterstreicht:
35 36 37

Hodjak 1995, S. 11. Ebd., S . 18. Vgl. dazu Baumgrtel 2000, S. 320.

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Der Zugang zu Identittskonzepten in der modernen deutschsprachigen Literatur kann also nur im Spannungsfeld einer zweiseitigen Ausrichtung stehen, zum einen auf ihre Validitt im interkulturellen Diskurs, zum anderen auf ihre kulturspezifische, anamnetische und wirkungsgeschichtliche Bedeutung hin.38

Die Identittskonstituierung gestaltet sich in den Texten rumniendeutscher Autoren ausnahmslos schwierig. Gerade in der neu in der ffentlichkeit entfachten Diskussion ber Integration und Migration kann dies ein interessanter Beitrag sein denn diese Autoren mssten eigentlich ber die besten Voraussetzungen verfgen, um sich integrieren zu knnen: sie sprechen Deutsch als Muttersprache und leben nun schon seit Jahrzehnten in Deutschland. Und dennoch fllt es auf, dass in keinem einzigen Text die kritische Gegenberstellung des Mitgebrachten und der Zielkultur, die eigentlich die eigene sein sollte, und sich dennoch verschliet, fehlt. Ein sehr schnes Beispiel dafr finde ich die Erzhlung Bei uns in Deutschland von Herta Mller, in der die Autorin zu ihrem fr bundesdeutsche Verhltnisse leicht ungewhnlichen Sprachgebrauch Stellung nimmt:
Deutsch ist meine Muttersprache. Ich verstand von Anfang an in Deutschland jedes Wort. Alles durch und durch bekannte Wrter, und doch war die Aussage vieler Stze zwiespltig. Ich konnte die Situation nicht einschtzen, die Absicht, in der sie gesprochen wurden. Ich ging den flapsigen Bemerkungen wie Ist ja lustig nach, ich verstand sie als Nachstze. Ich begriff nicht, dass sie sich als beilufiges Seufzen verstanden, nichts Inhaltliches meinten, sondern blo: Ach so oder Tja. Ich nahm sie als volle Stze, dachte, lustig bleibt das Gegenteil von traurig. In jedem gesagten Wort, glaubte ich, mu eine Aussage sein, sonst wre es nicht gesagt worden. Ich kannte das Reden und das Schweigen, das Zwischenspiel von gesprochenem Schweigen ohne Inhalt kannte ich nicht.39

Noch intensiver ist das Gefhl des nicht Ankommens in der Urheimat in den Werken Richard Wagners. Explizit gestaltet er in seinen Texten interkulturelle Spannungen, deren Grnde sich aus Stereotypen nhren. So auch in der Erzhlung Begrungsgeld, wie es folgendes Zitat beweist:
Stirner wusste nicht, wie er sich verhalten sollte. Ich kenne die Umgangsformen hier nicht, sagte er. Ich habe stndig den Eindruck, mich falsch zu verhalten. [...] Es ist zuviel, sagte sie, wir sind berfordert. Sie saen in der Berliner Wohnung, und sie kamen sich vor, als wren sie allein auf der Welt. Sie bersetzten an der Welt, aber die Welt blieb, was sie war.40

Oft whlt Richard Wagner interkulturelle Ehen, um die Stereotypen besser im Kontrast darstellen zu knnen. So beispielsweise in seinem Roman Miss Bukarest,
38 39 40

Ebd., S. 33. Mller (2) 2008, S. 177 f. Wagner 2002, S. 101.

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in dem die interkulturelle Ehe zwischen Lotte, der Deutschen, und Dino, eigentlich Dinu, dem Rumnen dargestellt wird. Der ganze Roman zeigt die Gegenberstellung eigentlich unvereinbarer Lebens- und Kulturmodelle, angefangen von der Rollenaufteilung in der Familie und bis zu erzieherischen Ansichten. Auch hier, spielt das Verhalten bei einem Begrbnis eine wichtige Rolle, und Wagner zeichnet ein vielsagendes Bild der seit Jahrhunderten herrschenden kulturellen Unterschiede:
Der Ordnungssinn der Lehrerin macht sich in allem bemerkbar. Deutsche Ordnung haben wir frher in Rumnien gesagt. Man konnte es bis zu den Begrbnissen hin beobachten. Die Deutschen in den siebenbrgischen Drfern schritten diszipliniert in Reihen hinter dem Sarg her, die Rumnen liefen wir ein ungeordneter Haufen. Ein sympathischer ungeordneter Haufen, ber den die Geschichte hinweggeht.41

Somit knnen solche Texte auch als Quelle kulturellen Wissens42 fungieren und sind umso ergiebiger, wenn sich der Widerspruch und die Gegenberstellung so explizit realisiert, wie im Falle dieses Fragmentes von Richard Wagner. berhaupt wre eine ethnologisch orientierte interkulturelle Analyse der Darstellung des Todes ein sehr interessanter Aspekt der Forschung. Zeigen sich doch diese Bilder oft in den Texten der rumniendeutschen Autoren. Franz Hodjak gestaltet in seinem Roman Grenzsteine ein originelles Todesbild in der Gestalt eines alten kleinen Weibleins, das der Hauptgestalt Harald Frank nach einer Irrfahrt mit dem Zug in einem Zwischengrenzgebiet, in einem transterritorialen Raum, am Ende seiner Reise begegnet. Erst in Anwesenheit dieser Gestalt reflektiert Harald Frank ber seinen Status. Im letzten Dialog entdeckt er die absolute Identittslosigkeit, die ihm durch den ewigen Zwischenstatus auferlegt wurde:
Bevor das alte Weiblein die Autotre zumachte, fragte es, Sabine43, sag mir jetzt, ist es dir egal, wo du stirbst? Ja, sagte Harald Frank. Und ist es dir ebenso gleichgltig, in welcher Erde du begraben wirst? Ja. Hast du berhaupt eine Identitt? Nein. Das Weiblein ksste Harald Frank auf die Stirn und sagte, Sabine, dann bist du glcklich. Jede Identitt ist ein Fluch, der dich bis ans Ende des Lebens verfolgt, da kannst du machen, was du willst, es hilft nichts, der Fluch lsst nicht locker, keinen Augenblick.44

Wagner 2001, S. 34. Julianne Roth vom Institut fr Interkulturelle Kommunikation an der LMU, Mnchen ist dieser Frage unter anderem in einem Hauptseminar im WiSe 09 nachgegangen. Ich erhoffe mir auch im Rahmen dieses Forschungsaufenthaltes in detaliierten Gesprchen mit ihr zu eruieren, zu welchen Schlussfolgenrungen, sie inzwischen gelangt ist. 43 Die Hauptgestalt Harald Frank hatte sich zuvor als Frau verkleidet und die Identitt Sabine angenommen. 44 Hodjak 1995, S. 198.
42

41

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Die Reise in Franz Hodjaks Roman endet somit in einem Raum der Zeitlosigkeit, der frei von Zugehrigkeit jeder Art ist, sei es eine gesellschaftliche, politische oder religise. Es ist ein abstrakter weier Raum der durch die Entkoppelung, auch Erlsung und die Freiheit bringt, nach der Franz Hodjaks Hauptgestalt sich immer gesehnt hatte. Hier sind nur einige wenige Beispiele angefhrt Ziel des Forschungsaufenthaltes ist eine umfassende Darstellung dieser Problematik in der Prosa rumniendeutscher Autoren nach 1990, die interdisziplinr ausgerichtet werden soll und deren Ergebnisse anhand der Rezeptionstexte berprft werden. Ich mchte des Weiteren explizit darauf hinweisen, dass diese Art der Auslegung keinesfalls die Absicht verfolgt, die Texte rumniendeutscher Autoren auf ihren kulturellen Hintergrund zu reduzieren, sondern lediglich einen Beitrag zum aktuellen Stand der Forschung im Bereich interkutureller Literatur zu leisten, in dem Sinne, dass ich glaube, dass man sich eines immer komplexeren Instrumentariums der Analyse bedienen muss, um solche Texte zu interpretieren und auch dass im Falle dieser Autoren eine besondere Bercksichtigung ihres kulturellen Hintergrunds unumgnglich ist, deswegen auch die Bedeutung der konkreten Aussagen der Autoren. Ich sehe diese Problematik vor allem in einem greren Zusammenhang einer Neupositionierung der Diskussion um kulturelle Rume und Interkulturalitt in einem Europa nach 1990, in dem die Mobilitt eine zentrale Rolle spielt und umfangreiche Verschiebungen stattfinden. Nicht unwichtig ist, dass sich die Autoren der rumniendeutschen Literatur teils selber so sehen, wie es folgendes Zitat aus Erwin Wittstocks Roman Das jngste Gericht in Altbirk zeigt:
Ich gestehe, da mich bei Dichtern, die heute viel genannt werden Nietzsche, Ibsen, Strindberg, Zola usw. manches fasziniert. Was se schauen. Was sie knnen. Ihre Kunst, Schlsse zu ziehen. Ihr Sozialismus genaosu wie ihre aristokratischen Auffassungen. Doch kaum, da ich etwas von ihnen gelesen habe, komme ich von ihnen auch schon ab. Sie knnen mir bei meiner Aufgabe nicht helfen. Sie schrieben fr zahllose fr Millionen Leser, die in ihrer Vorstellung eine gleichartige gestige Haltung,gleichartige Lebensform und gleichartige Ideen haben. Ich aber lebe im Land der Unterschiede von Tr zu Tr, Haus zu Haus und Volk zu Volk. Wer mich verstehen will, mu meine Elastizitt im Denken und Fhlen besitzen, die ihm ermglicht, unsere Vergangenheit und Gegenwart in ihrer besonderheit zu verfolgen und zu dem Besonderen zu verbinden, das mir als Spiegelbild unseres Daseins, mit allen Freuden und Nten, fr mein Volk vorschwebte.45

Wenn man dieses Zitat liest, merkt man, dass es eigentlich auch auf viele andere deutschsprachige Autoren unserer Zeit zutreffen knnte, die alle ganz unterschiedliche Hintergrnde und Lebenswege haben: Zafer Senocak, Yoko Tawada, Sevgi zdamar, Ilja Trojanow oder auch Catalin Dorian Florescu, um nur einige der Namen zu nennen.
45

Wittstock 1972, S. 127, zitiert auch in Mecklenburg 2008, S. 466.

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Norbert Mecklenburg vertritt in seinen Ausfhrungen die These, dass regionale Literaturen den allgemeinen Geltungsanspruch gerade daher gewinnen, dass sie sich ins Besondere versinken46, und gerade das wird meines Erachtens auch der gemeinsame Nenner, der in Europa produzierten Literatur sein das Besondere wird durch die Mischung interkultureller Elemente gegeben. Was Mecklenburg heute noch als symptomatisch fr die Minderheiten und Migrantenliteratur angibt, wird immer mehr Bedeutung gewinnen und nicht nur in der deutschsprachigen Literatur:
Damit bietet sich fr den Begriff der Interkulturalitt in Hinblick auf Minderheiten- und Migrantenliteratur nicht nur ein literaturhistorischer und soziologischer, sondern auch ein literaturkritischer Gebrauch an: verstanden nmlich als interkulturelles Potential literarischer Werke, als ihr Vermgen, fr Kulturunterschiede zu sensibilisieren, Vorurteile und Stereotype in Frage zu stellen, fr Menschen anderer Kulturen Verstndnis und Achtung zu wecken. In diesem evaluativen Sinne ist deutschsprachige Literatur im Ausland als eine Regionalliteratur in multikulturellen Regionen, ebenso wenig von Natur aus durchgngig als interkulturell anzusprechen, wie deutsche Migrantenliteratur in einer multikulturellen Gesellschaft. Ein interkulturelles Potential muss am einzelnen Text erschlossen und bewertet werden, und zwar als Teil seines poetischen Potentials. Kulturelle Alteritt wird angemessen nur als poetische Alteritt literarisch ins Spiel gebracht.47

Somit knnte man die rumniendeutsche Literatur nach 1990 nicht nur als fnfte deutsche Literatur, als Subkultur charakterisieren, sondern auch als eine Literatur der kulturellen berlagerung, die im Kontext des neuen europischen Raums zum tragenden Merkmal wird48. Auch hier wre es interessant weiter zu verfolgen, in wie weit diese berlagerung nach der bersiedlung in die Bundesrepublik prsenter wird. Sozusagen das berschreiten der Grenze als Bewusstwerden der Alteritt und als Beginn des Kampfes der Individualitt. Dies wre sicherlich nicht zuletzt im Rahmen der aktuellen Integrationsdebatte in Deutschland interessant wenn man bedenkt, dass diese Autoren die besten Voraussetzungen haben, sich komplett zu integrieren und man dennoch ausnahmslos in allen Romanen sprt, wie schwierig es sich mit dem Thema Integration verhlt, um auf die Episode im Blumenladen in Herta Mllers Erzhlung Bei uns in Deutschland zurckzukommen. Die logische Schlussfolgerung der vorangehenden Betrachtungen ist somit, dass der kulturelle Rahmen fr die Rezeption der Texte rumniendeutscher Autoren nach 1990 eine wesentliche Rolle spielt, ohne dabei in irgendeiner Form auf eine Kategorisierung in richtig oder falsch zu verfallen. Die Resultate der Betrachtungen sind genauso gltig wie vielfltig subjektiv. Diese Texte sind Texte, in denen wir Zeugen einer Abgrenzung zwischen den Kulturen aber auch eines abwechselnden Lernprozesses werden. Sie sind Ausdrcke der Vielfalt, in
46 47 48

Vgl. Mecklenburg 2008, S. 467. Ebd., S. 473 f. Siehe auch Mecklenburg 2008, S. 473.

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der eine ethnozentrische Isolierung undenkbar ist und gar nicht erst berwunden49 werden muss. Bezeichnenderweise malt Franz Hodjak in seinem Roman Ein Koffer voll Sand karrikierte Bilder einer authentischen Internationalitt in einem historisch multikulturellen Gebiet: Siebenbrgen. In einer Episode des Romans geht es um einen erfolglosen Bahnhofvorsteher, der am Ende seines Arbeitslebens gezwungen ist, da sein Bahnhof stillgelegt wird, auf einem Friedhof zu arbeiten. Es wird zu seiner grten Genugtuung, zuerst die Kreuze und dann sogar die Leichen der unterschiedlichen Minderheiten zu vertauschen, ohne dass der Missstand entdeckt wird. Es ist seine Art eine Gemeinsamkeit, eine Transnationalitt zumindest in der Transzendenz zu erreichen in der Absicht einen wahrhaftigen Internationalismus zu erzeugen:
Er vertauschte diskret die Grabsteine und Kreuze auf den Grbern, weil er sich sagte, jeder soll fr den Toten des anderen beten, nur so kommt Internationalismus auf. Schlielich ging er so weit, da er nachts in der Leichenhalle jeden Toten aus seinem Sarg umbettet in einen anderen Sarg und so beerdigte jede Trauergemeinschaft einen anderen Toten. Er war der Meinung, nur so kann taschlich Frieden auf Erden sein. Dabei blhte er buchstblich auf. Acht Jahre hat er das gemacht [...] und als er starb, lag so viel Zufriedenheit in seinem Blick, eine Zufriedenheit, die grer war als das vereinte Europa, von dem wir nun sprechen.50

Eine interkulturelle Leseart solcher Texte kann nur aus der Verbindung unterschiedlicher Perspektiven entstehen. Einem Text mit einem komplexen kulturellen Rahmen wird man nur gerecht, wenn man versucht diesen Rahmen in verschiedene Spiegel zu reflektieren. Und so eine Vorgehensweise, wie sie beispielsweise von Hans Gehl fr die Belange der multiethnischen Gebiete OstEuropas beschrieben wird51, wird in einem Europa, in dem die Kulturkontakte stndig zunehmen, zur adquaten Herangehensweise. Ich mchte hierin explizit solchen Meinungen, wie der von Michael Bchler widersprechen, dass eine kulturdifferente Lektre eines Textes mit Germanistik-Studenten nicht mglich wre52. Meine Lehrerfahrung zeigt, dass nach einer entsprechenden Sensibilisierung und einer gezielten Formulierung einer Arbeitshypothese die Resultate sehr interessant sein knnen. Im Sommersemester 2010 bot ich an der Universitt Bukarest ein Hauptseminar zum Thema: Interkulturelle Elemente in den literarischen Texten
Wierlacher und Eichheim bekunden in ihrem 1992 erschienenen Aufsatz Der Pluralismus kulturdifferenter Lektren. Zur ersten Diskussionsrunde am Beispiel von Kellers Pankraz, der Schmoller, dass eine interkulturelle Germanistik ethnozentrische Isolierung berwinden helfen kann. In: Jahrbuch Deutsch als Fremdsprache, Bd. 18/1992, Mnchen: 1992, S. 373. 50 Hodjak 2003, S. 17. 51 Vgl. Gehl 2002, S. 23. 52 Michael Bchler sollte als Teilnehmer des Workshops Der Pluralismus kulturdifferenter Lektren. Zur ersten Diskussionsrunde am Beispiel von Kellers Pankraz, der Schmoller mit seinen schweizer Germanistik Studenten diese Texte lesen und interpretieren, was er verweigert, mit der Begrndung, Germanistik-Studenten seien sowieso das Generalisieren gewohnt und ein solches Unterfangen wre von vornherein zum Scheitern verurteilt. (Vgl. Bchler 1992, S. 518).
49

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deutscher Autoren mit rumnischem Hintergrund an. Alle 28 Teilnehmer dieses Seminars verstanden auf Anhieb die Problematik, konnten sich fr eine kulturorientierte Lektre begeistern und das Resultat waren sehr interessante Fallstudien, die ohne eine entsprechende referenzielle Rckbindung nicht mglich gewesen wren. In die Texte rumniendeutscher Autoren flieen umfangreiche kulturelle Erfahrungen mit ein, deswegen mssen sie im Anschluss an Doris BachmannMedick und James Clifford als Knotenpunkte, Schnittstellen von Diskursen und Konventionen 53 betrachtet werden. Daher auch meine feste berzeugung der Produktivitt einer solchen Herangehensweise, nicht zuletzt im Hinblick auf eine exponenzielle Steigerung der kulturspezifischen Symbolisierungen in einer europischen Wirklichkeit. Im vereinten Europa schwinden nicht nur die territorialen Grenzen, sondern auch die kulturellen zwischen einem Eigenen und Fremden. Das was entsteht ist eine Welt von Zwischenschaftlern54, die auch fr die rumniendeutsche Literatur nach 1990 symptomatisch ist.
Die eigentliche Fremde liegt nicht (mehr) in der rumlichen Ferne; sie liegt >dazwischen<, direkt nebenan, am Rande der Asphaltpisten.55

BIBLIOGRAPHY Amodeo, Immacolata (1996), Die Heimat heit Babylon. Zur Literatur auslndischer Autoren in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, Opladen. Bachmann-Medick, Doris (2008), Rckkehr des Autors? Literatur und kulturelle Autoritt in der interkulturellen Kommunikation, in rokay, Judit et al. (ed.), Essays in Honour of Irmela Hijiya-Kirschnereit on the Occasion of her 60th Birthday, Mnchen, S. 325-339. Baumgrtel, Bettina (2000), Das perspektivierte Ich. Ich-Identitt und interpersonelle und interkulturelle Wahrnehmung in ausgewhlten Romanen der deutschsprachigen Gegenwartsliteratur, Wrzburg. Blioumi, Aglaia (2006), Transkulturelle Metamorphosen. Deutschsprachige Migrationsliteratur im Ausland am Beispiel Griechenland, Wrzburg. Bchler, Michael (1992), Versuch einer Schweizer Lektre, in Jahrbuch Deutsch als Fremdsprache, Bd. 18/1992, Mnchen, S. 516-535. Clifford, James (2004), ber ethnografische Selbst-Stilisierung: Conrad und Malinowski, in Doris Bachmann-Medick (ed.), Kultur und Text. Die anthropologische Wende in der Literaturwissenschaft, Basel/Tbingen, S. 194-225. Deleuze, Gilles, Flix Guattari (1976), Kafka: fr eine kleine Literatur, Frankfurt am Main. Ertler, Klaus-Dieter (ed.) (2006), Migration und Schreiben in der Romania, Reihe Austria Forschung und Wissenschaft. Literatur, Band I, Lit Verlag, Wien. Esselborn, Karl (2001): Autoren nicht deutscher Muttersprache im Kanon deutscher Literatur? Zur Erweiterung des Kanons deutscher Nationalliteratur um Texte der Interkulturalitt, in Kanon und Text in interkulturellen Perspektiven. Andere Texte anders lessen, Stuttgarter Arbeiten zur Germanistik, nr. 401, Stuttgart, Akademischer Verlag, S. 335-351.
53 54 55

Siehe Bachmann-Medick 2008, S. 328 und Clifford 2004, S. 195. Vgl. zu dem Begriff der Zwischenschaftler Schlesak 1986, S. 217. Schmitz-Emans 2000, S. 299.

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Gehl, Hans (ed.) (2002), Regionale Volkskulturen in Ostmitteleuropa. Abgrenzung- Nachbarschaft Interethnik, Materialien 13, Tbingen. Gller, Thomas (2001), Sprache, Literatur, kultureller Kontext. Studien zur Kulturwissenschaft und Literatursthethik, Wrzburg. Hodjak, Franz (2003), Ein Koffer voll Sand, Frankfurt am Main. Hodjak, Franz (1995), Grenzsteine, Berlin. Mecklenburg, Norbert (2008) Das Mdchen aus der Fremde. Germanistik als interkulturelle Literaturwissenschaft, Mnchen. Mller, Herta (a) (2008), Die Insel liegt innen die Grenze liegt auen, in Herta Mller, Der Knig verneigt sich und ttet, 3, Aufl., Mnchen/Wien, S. 160-175. Mller, Herta (b) (2008), Bei uns in Deutschland, in Herta Mller, Der Knig verneigt sich und ttet, 3, Aufl., Mnchen/Wien, S. 176-185. Ritter, Alexander (1981), Deutschsprachige Literatur der Gegenwart im Ausland, in Manfred Durzak (ed.), Deutsche Gegenwartsliteratur. Ausgangspositionen und aktuelle Entwicklungen, Stuttgart, S. 632-661. Schaffers, Uta (2003), Fremde Literatur Verstehen? Fragestellungen einer interkulturellen Hermeneutik, in Jannidis Fotis et al. (ed.), Regeln der Bedeutung. Zur Theorie der Bedeutung literarischer Texte, Berlin u.a., S. 349-375. Schlesak, Dieter (1986), Vaterlandstage. Und die Kunst des Verschwindens, Zrich/Kln. Schmitz-Emans (2000), Globalisierung im Spiegel literarischer Reaktionen und Prozesse, in Manfred Schmeling et al. (ed.), Literatur im Zeitalter der Globalisierung, Wrzburg, S. 285-315. Sienerth, Stefan (1997), Da ich in diesen Raum hineingeboren wurde ..., Gesprche mit deutschen Schriftstellern aus Sdosteuropa. Verffentlichungen des Sdostdeutschen Kulturwerks: Reihe A, Kultur und Dichtung, Bd. 53, Mnchen. Steinmetz, Horst (a) (2000), Globalisierung und (Literatur)geschichte, in Manfred Schmeling et al. (ed.), Literatur im Zeitalter der Globalisierung, Wrzburg, S. 189-201. Steinmetz, Horst (b) (1992), Kulturspezifische Lektren. Interpretation und fremdkulturelle Interpretation literarischer Werke, in Jahrbuch Deutsch als Fremdsprache, Bd. 18/1992, Mnchen, S. 384-401. Steinmetz, Horst (c) (2001), Sinnfestlegung und Auslegungsvielfalt. Die Rolle des Interpreten und das Gespenst der richtigen Interpretation, in Helmut Brackert, Jrgen Stckrath (ed.), Literaturwissenschaft. Ein Grundkurs, Reinbek bei Hamburg, S. 475-491. White, John J. (2002), A Romanian in Germany: The Challenge of Ethnic and Ideological Identity in Herta Mller`s Literary Work, in David Rock, Stefan Wolff (ed.), Coming Home to Germany. The Integration of Ethnic Germans from Central and Eastern Europe in the Federal Republic, Oxford/New York, S. 173 ff. Wierlacher, Alois, Hubert Eichheim (ed.) (1992), Der Pluralismus kulturdifferenter Lektren. Zur ersten Diskussionsrunde am Beispiel von Kellers Pankraz, der Schmoller, in Jahrbuch Deutsch als Fremdsprache, Bd. 18/1992, Mnchen, S. 373-383. Wierlacher, Alois, Georg Sttzel (ed.) (1996), Blickwinkel: kulturelle Optik und interkulturelle Gegenstandskonstitution, Mnchen. Wierlacher, Alois (1996), Internationalitt und Interkulturalitt. Der kulturelle Pluralismus als Herausforderung der Lietarturwissenschaft. Zur Theorie interkultureller Germanistik, in Lutz Dannenberg, Friedrich Vollhardt (ed.), Wie international ist Literaturwissenschaft? Methoden und Theoriediskussione in den Literaturwissenschaften: kulturelle Besonderheiten und interkultureller Austausch am Beispiel des Insterpretationsproblems. (1950-1990)., Stuttgart, S. 550-590. Wittstock, Erwin (1972), Das jngste Gericht in Altbirk, Bukarest. Zima, Peter (1996), Komparatistik als Metatheorie. Zur interkulturellen und interdisziplinren Perspektive der vergleichenden Literaturwissenschaft, in Lutz Dannenberg, Friedrich Vollhardt (ed.), Wie international ist Literaturwissenschaft? Methoden und Theoriediskussionen in den Literaturwissenschaften: kulturelle Besonderheiten und interkultureller Austausch am Beispiel des Insterpretationsproblems. (1950-1990), Stuttgart, S. 532-549.

TIME, MEMORY AND NARRATION IN W. G. SEBALDS AUSTERLITZ

JUDIT PIELDNER

The present paper investigates the possibility of reconstructing the personal and collective past related to the Holocaust trauma of European history. W. G. Sebalds Austerlitz asserts the ethical responsibility of remembering, but profoundly questions the accessibility of the past due to the act of mediation inherent in it. Besides the temporal references implied by Austerlitzs journey in search for his own self, and besides the epistemological uncertainty arising from the indexicality of photographs inserted into the text, the paper focuses on Austerlitzs strategies of manipulating his own perception of time, experiencing the relativity of time, the epiphanic moments of simultaneity, juxtaposing past and present in a palimpsest-like manner and perceiving time in spatial configurations. The paper examines the narrative and discursive features of Sebalds text, focusing on the tropes of reading which turn the trauma of discontinuity of the self into the pleasure of the text. Keywords: memory, trauma, simultaneity, discontinuity, indexicality.

1. W. G. Sebald, the Emigrant W. G. Sebalds Emigrants I wish to start the present investigation with a time reference: the year 2001 indicates, drastically and unchangeably, the birth of W. G. Sebalds fourth novel, entitled Austerlitz, and the death of the author, unfortunately not merely in the Barthesian sense, but actually, in a road accident. The preoccupation of the novel itself with the complex interconnectedness between life and writing, the huge amount of life accumulated on the pages of the novel call the biographical data back from the exile of contemporary literary theory, and mark the authors death as a significant moment of literary history and literary criticism, when Winfried Georg Sebald (19442001), author of the novels entitled Vertigo (1990), The Emigrants (1992), The Rings of Saturn (1995) and finally Austerlitz (2001), emigrates once and for all from contemporary literature to the realm of the classics. Prior to this moment of emigration, W. G. Sebald used to be an emigrant of German literature: he was born in Wertach, Germany; he worked as a secondary school teacher in Switzerland, then he moved to Norwich, East

University lecturer, Sapientia University, Miercurea Ciuc, Romania; e-mail: [email protected]

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England, where he became member of the university staff. His significant works, both in the field of belles lettres and that of literary criticism, became known after 1990. Thus, for Sebald emigration is both a personal experience and a literary preoccupation, what is more, the boundary between the personal and the literary can never be localized with exactness. It may be due to the migrant character of his oeuvre both in terms of authorial biography and textual reference that W. G. Sebalds prose seems to have had a greater echo in Great Britain and in the United States than in Germany. As Mark Richard McCulloh states: Ironically, despite numerous literary prizes in his homeland, he seems to have struck a chord with English-speaking readers to a greater extent than with his fellow Germans. Part of the reason for this is precisely his Europeanness in the minds of English-speaking readers; his idiosyncratic prose has a distinctly exotic appeal (McCulloh 2003: 25). The predominant feature of his novels is the oscillation between fact and fiction, between memoir-like documentation and imagination, between private memories and the interpersonal heritage of cultural memory. The map of emigration of Sebalds protagonists is in fact the map of Europe, modelling a geo-cultural terrain determined by the continuous confrontation between the self and the other, the private and the collective, the familiar and the foreign. Sebalds heroes seem to be lost on the map of Europe and on the map of their own identity: they desperately try to find themselves and their roots in this territory, which is but a land of foreignness, a land of incurable, open wounds that remind of past traumas. Sebald is preoccupied with the relationship between the collective experience called history and the dramas inherent in personal fates: the events that have become part of the collective consciousness, speak of or more often, repress into deep silence the dramas of individual bodies and personal relations. Similarly, public places allude to the individual atoms that they are composed of. Thus, what survives past traumas undergoes a sea change and becomes, in the best case, a place of cult, a place of obligatory memory. Austerlitz, the spatial reference of the eponymous hero of Sebalds last novel, is such a place: the scene of the Battle of Austerlitz, also known as the Battle of the Three Emperors (1805), one of Napoleons greatest victories, bears the burden of a huge number of dead soldiers, horses and local people; now it is a place of annual feasts, reviving the past in the annual reenactment of the Battle of Austerlitz, but at the same time, definitely blurring the former faces and voices and pushing them back into a never again namable past. Besides, the fact that Sebald gives the name of a place to his protagonist reveals his concept according to which there is a profound interconnectedness between the self and its spatial determination: the space, the unfolded map becomes the living body of memory, the only possibility, in fact, for us to preserve memories and to pass on memories that are not even our own.

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Besides the above outlined predominant feature that W. G. Sebalds novels share, further common thematic, narrative and stylistic features can be enumerated, without risking a too long list: the novels resort to first-person-narration, the (primary) narrator being/resembling the authors figure, Sebald himself, being on the road, allestero, that is, abroad. Thus, the texts conform to the generic requirements of memoirs and travel journals, and employ a flowing, sophisticated, essay-like style, which moves his works towards the boundary between fiction and non-fiction. And, maybe the most interesting feature of the Sebaldian prose is that textual references are completed, counterpointed by illustrations, photos, paintings, drawings, maps, various reproductions that are systematically inserted into the body of the texts. These common features however also make possible certain shifts in emphasis. For instance, in Sebalds prose works preceding Austerlitz blurring the boundary between memoir and fiction is not so emphatic as in his last novel, where this epistemological uncertainty is even reinforced by the insertion of the photos, which contribute, on their own, to further blurring the silhouettes of fact and fiction.

2. Access to Memories: the Mediated Self in Austerlitz The author of Austerlitz, more precisely, its narrator, even more precisely, its (primary and secondary) narrators seem to be most profoundly preoccupied with the transmittedness, the mediated character of storytelling. The storyline unfolds in accordance with the meeting occasions, in various scenes in Europe, of Sebalds primary narrator and Jacques Austerlitz, the secondary narrator, who conveys his own story, often quoting other implied people further implied narrators for the primary narrator to write it down with the implicit purpose of further tramsmitting it to the reader. Obviously, multiple narration is not a contemporary invention (a similar narrative procedure can be witnessed already in Emily Bronts Wuthering Heights), however, with Austerlitz, the reader may have the impression of some kind of novelty and unprecedentedness as concerns the employed narrative technique, as here multiple narration does not serve the introduction of a subjective filter that makes the reader reflect upon the mediated nature, the inaccessibility of reality; here this filter is inserted between the secondary narrator, Austerlitz and his own self, his own past, and the reader is invited to share this experience of inaccessibility. At every turn, at every corner of the text the reader is reminded of the manyfold mediatedness of narration by such formulae as said Austerlitz, said Vra. These embedded narratorial voices further mediate something that is becoming ever closer and ever more distant at the same time, resulting in the dizziness of confusion. Austerlitz desperately tries to find the traces of his own lost past, and as he gets closer, in parallel he

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also gets convinced that the deprivation of memories cannot be cured by a simple act of refilling the tanks of memory. The meeting occasions between the first-person narrator and the third-person Austerlitz transform the repetitive attempts of transmitting Austerlitzs story into a ritual, thus, the act of storytelling acquires a surplus, it becomes a self-imposed rite of preservation, also involving the impression that the ultimate, total conveyance is doomed to failure from the start. Close to the ending of the book, we can read the following sentence: I took the book Austerlitz had given me on our first meeting in Paris out of my rucksack (Sebald 2002: 412). It is not the book that can be regarded here as the sign of transmission, though this could be taken for granted, but rather the rucksack: on one of the earlier pages of the book the reader can see a photo of Austerlitzs rucksack, similar to the one Wittgenstein used to wear; the similitude of the rucksacks alludes to the fact that those wearing them are soulmates, and the Sebald-like primary narrator also joins their spiritual community by taking over the ethical task of remembering and of conveying, writing down Austerlitzs own story: Austerlitz also reminds us that the ethics of memory requires the necessity not of the silence Wittgenstein invokes at the end of the Tractatus (), but of an ongoing journeying into new literary genres (Straus 2009: 43). The own proves to be the most problematic issue for Austerlitz. The absence of memories related to his roots and early childhood urges him to start a private investigation and to explore his past. In the period immediately following World War II he is raised by a couple called Elias in Wales, in a dark and pressing environment that is inexplicably foreign to him. At the deathbed of his step-father he finds out that his real name is not Dafydd Elias but Jacques Austerlitz, however, he gets back nothing else but his name, sounding utterly foreign to him, from his obscure, effaced past. The ambitious adolescent finds out that his name coincides with a placename from Moravia, a battle scene from the early nineteenth century. The adolescent boy turns into a young scholar, who dedicates himself to research, pursued both as a profession and as a personal urge having the ultimate goal of finding himself. His confessions to the Sebald-narrator display the episodes of this quest for the self. However, his previous stage of life, when he lived his life being separated from the memories of his origins and early childhood, cannot simply be replaced by another stage that directly leads to the happy ending of finding oneself. In other words, finding oneself is losing thousands of other possibilities of being other selves. Finding oneself is another trauma: the found identity brings along the burden of collective memories, of the traumatic past of an ethnic community. The act of remembering creates, on the one hand, the illusion of the accessibility of the past, but on the other, due to the very act of mediation, the past remains foreign and, in the last instance, inaccessible. The reader gradually realizes, together with Austerlitz, that closeness and distance,

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familiarity and foreignness, the self and the other are not opposing poles but different terms that label the same issue, the same phenomenon.

3. Archiving the Past: the Spatio-Temporality of Memory Austerlitz, the young scholar doing research into architecture, barricades himself from the mnemic void a black hole that splits him from his origins. Psychoanalytically speaking, he represses his wish to reveal the truth about his origins. He applies a twofold strategy: on the one hand, he accounts for history as if it had come to an end at the end of the nineteenth century, leaving half willing, half unaware the pages of his knowledge about the twentieth century empty; on the other hand, he constructs a huge building of knowledge in himself, as if reviving the scholarly ideals and practice of nineteenth-century positivism, led by the conviction that archiving as much knowledge as possible about the past constitutes the only way that guarrantees the possibility of reconstructing the past. Austerlitz confesses the following to the primary narrator:
As far as I was concerned, the world ended in the late nineteenth century. I dared go no further than that, although in fact the whole history of the architecture and civilization of the bourgeois age, the subject of my research, pointed in the direction of the catastrophic events already casting their shadow before them at the time. I did not read newspapers because, as I now know, I feared unwelcome revelations, I turned on the radio only at certain hours of the day, I was always refining my defensive reactions, creating a kind of quarantine or immune system which, as I maintained my existence in a smaller and smaller space, protected me from anything that could be connected in any way, however distant, with my own early history. Moreover, I had constantly been preoccupied by that accumulation of knowledge which I had pursued for decades, and which served as a substitute or compensatory memory. (Sebald 2001: 201)

Thus, Austerlitzs immense effort of archiving in the manner of a positivist scholar, meant to collect knowledge referring to the past in order to provide the desired access to history, turns out to be a substitute or compensatory activity that is meant to protect him from being confronted with the true knowledge of his own self. In this way, the archive fever (Derrida 1995) proves to be but an artificial substitute of memory, a means of continuous postponement of the moment of completion, in the Derridean sense of the infinite regress of the ultimate signified. J. J. Long defines Austerlitzs personality as embodying the archival subject:
The archive is both a symptom of Austerlitzs lack of memory and, at the moment of discovery that constitutes the provisional telos of the narrative, the resource of the cure. There is thus no escape: Austerlitz seems to represent an extreme example of a subject constituted entirely by the archive. (Long 2007: 20)

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In terms of knowledge, Austerlitz is led by opposing forces; he accumulates knowledge just to keep another set of knowledge apart, however, it is only later on that he realizes his own drives and motivations. He wishes to reestablish his connections with the real dimensions of the burdened European collective consciousness; however, this means leaving the artificially created quarantine behind and risking a profoundly personal confrontation. The gap that has been formed between Austerlitzs present consciousness and his absent past, the split that separates him from his own past (and) self, push the question of time the temporality of existence as well as the perception of time to the forefront. In the building of the Centraal Station from Antwerp the scene of the first meeting of Austerlitz and the Sebaldnarrator , Austerlitz points at the symbols displaying the values of the nineteenth century. Among all, time occupies the highest position:
The movements of all travellers could be surveyed from the central position occupied by the clock in Antwerp Station, and conversely all travellers had to look up at the clock and were obliged to adjust their activities to its demands. In fact, said Austerlitz, until the railway timetables were synchronized the clocks of Lille and Lige did not keep the same time as the clocks of Ghent and Antwerp, and not until they were all standardized around the middle of the nineteenth century did time truly reign supreme. It was only by following the course time prescribed that we could hasten through the gigantic spaces separating us from each other. (Sebald 2001: 14)

The building of the Centraal Station stands as a memento of the nineteenth century, inserted into the present. For Austerlitz not only for the scholar, but also for the individual, if the two can ever be separated buildings bear a special relevance, as they remind us of the past, of a past about which we do not dispose of personal memories; it is the very role of these buildings to convey the spirit of the past for us, and in this way, past becomes part of our own presence, past becomes our own. Besides, buildings also remind us of the functioning of memory, which is not only temporal, but maybe even more significantly, also spatial: we can recollect memories par excellence through moving to and fro in space, through collecting scenes, spectacles, voices and smells, and in this way a Proustian repeated, re-generated spatial and sensory experience will serve as the basis of memories. The railroad stations are highly preferred by Austerlitz (the closure of the novel will reveal the real reason for this preference), they connect space and time, being chronotopes themselves. Austerlitz formulates the idea that time and space share the same nature, which can be experienced on the occasion of a journey: And indeed, said Austerlitz after a while, to this day there is something illusionistic and illusory about the relationship of time and space as we experience it in traveling, which is why whenever we come home from elsewhere we never feel quite sure if we have really been abroad (Sebald 2002: 14).

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At the same time, buildings constitute the upper, visible layer in the actual structure of a city; the previous states are in part revealed, in part concealed, in other words, architecture stands the closest to the logic of memory, sharing its palimpsest-like configuration. This also implies an ethical dimension: what is that should be revealed for the coming generations to remember, and what is to be concealed, as it is a shameful and painful memento of the past? Austerlitz makes reference to the National Library from Paris: it is a building with inhuman proportions, disregarding the real necessities of the visiting reader. As a result of Austerlitzs research into the history of the building, it turns out that prior to the building of todays library, there used to be a huge storehouse in its place. By the end of World War II the Germans used that storehouse to store the possessions expropriated from the Jews. The monumentality and inhumanity of the actual building becomes a way of expression, a possible attitude to the past: repression, ignorance, indifference. Thus, Austerlitzs interest in architecture is nourished by this wish to uncover, to bring to the surface the invisible layers, the unconscious contents. This is the source of his later interest in arcaeology, manifesting itself in his curiosity towards the layered structures of cities to the same extent as in his outbreaking wish to explore his private pre-history. As a real tour de force, Austerlitzs denial of the past turns into a feverish self-archaeology.

4. Perception of Time and Sensing Identity As a strategy of accessing the past (at least apparently in the beginning), Austerlitz manipulates his own time perception, expressing his preference for a non-linear temporal experience. His spiritual, scholarly attitude denying the authenticity of linear time experience can be explained by his above-mentioned archiving effort, by his wish to store every moment of time in a huge storehouse of archived knowledge.
It does not seem to me, Austerlitz added, that we understand the laws governing the return of the past, but I feel more and more as if time did not exist at all, only various spaces interlocking according to the rules of a higher form of stereometry, between which the living and the dead can move back and forth as they like, and the longer I think about it the more it seems to me that we who are still alive are unreal in the eyes of the dead, that only occasionally, in certain lights and atmospheric conditions, do we appear in their field of vision. (Sebald 2002: 261)

According to Austerlitzs perception of time, past and present, what is more, life and death are not some kind of stations successively occurring during a train journey; they should rather be conceived, again, in a spatial, palimpsest-like structure, similarly to buildings constructed one upon the other, in which the

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earlier stage is both effaced and preserved. Austerlitz sharply criticizes the way of life that subdues itself to the power of linear, objective, measurable time, and elaborates the principle of simultaneity, which seems to be, for yet unexplicable reasons, much easier for him to follow:
() if Newton really thought that time was a river like the Thames, then where is its source and into what sea does it finally flow? Every river, as we know, must have banks on both sides, so where, seen in those terms, where are the banks of time? (...) Could we not claim, said Austerlitz, that time itself has been non-concurrent over the centuries and the millennia? It is not so long ago, after all, that it began spreading out over everything. And is not human life in many parts of the earth governed to this day less by time than by weather, and thus by an unquantifiable dimension which disregards linear regularity, does not progress constantly forward but moves in eddies, is marked by episodes of congestion and irruption, recurs in ever-changing form, and evolves in no one knows what direction? Even in a metropolis ruled by time like London, said Austerlitz, it is still possible to be outside time, a state of affairs which until recently was almost as common in backward and forgotten areas of our own country as it used to be in the undiscovered continents overseas. The dead are outside time, the dying and all the sick at home or in hospitals, and they are not the only ones, for a certain degree of personal misfortune is enough to cut off from the past and the future. (Sebald 2002: 142-143)

The principle of simultaneity determining subjective time perception does not leave the wheel of history untouched either. From this perspective, history as such, the historical sense of Western thinking becomes utterly questionable. In his wish to perceive the true nature of time, Austerlitz expresses his hope that
() time will not pass away, has not passed away, that I can turn back and go behind it, and there I shall find everything as it once was, or more precisely I shall find that all moments of time have co-existed simultaneously, in which case none of what history tells us would be true, past events have not yet occured but are waiting to do so at the moment when we think of them, although that, of course, opens up the bleak prospect of ever-lasting misery and never-ending anguish. (Sebald 2002: 144)

Austerlitzs perception of time radically opposing the linear perception of time betrays something essential about identity. Perceiving time from the inside, accounting for it not in terms of duration but in terms of content, the concept of time indicated by the action or event, is basically the specificity of the Hebrew time conception (see a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted Ecclesiastes 3.2), whereas the linear time conception is a Greek-Roman invention. The way Austerlitz perceives and experiences time indicates the fact that his time perception takes place in accordance with the Hebrew time conception before he knows about himself that he is Jewish. It can be concluded thus that identity construction is much more profound and much more elemental that the knowledge pertaining to it. The relativity which overwrites the linear concept of time is revealed in strange moments of revelation, when the sense of simultaneity breaks into the

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realm of everyday experiences. It is such a moment when in the waiting-room in Liverpool Street, London Austerlitz suddenly discovers himself as a little boy, with a rucksack, sitting on the bench.
() in the gloomy light of the waiting-room, I also saw two middle-aged people dressed in the style of the thirties, a woman in a light gabardine coat with a hat at an angle on her head, and a thin man beside her wearing a dark suit and a dog-collar. And I not only saw the minister and his wife, said Austerlitz, I also saw the boy they had come to meet. He was sitting by himself on a bench over to one side. His legs, in white knee-length socks, did not reach the floor, and but for the small rucksack he was holding on his lap I dont think I would have known him, said Austerlitz. As it was, I recognised him by that rucksack of his, and for the first time in as far back as I can remember I recollected myself as a small child, at the moment when I realised that it must have been to this same waiting-room I had come on my arrival in England over half a century ago. (Sebald 2002: 193)

This is a special moment of epiphany in the novel, a manifestation of the Freudian uncanny, when under the accumulated pressure the wall of discontinuity of the self seems to suddenly collapse, and Austerlitz senses, for the first time in his life, a distant scent, a mild taste of his own past. This moment of simultaneity, bringing the past and the present selves into reachable proximity, marks a new start in Austerlitzs life. Austerlitz has often expressed his impression of living the wrong life (falsche Welt, falsches Leben in the original), experiencing a perplexing inauthenticity which, as J. J. Long states, is produced by a specific historical or personal caesura which, once identified, can be overcome in a return to the status quo ante (Long 2007: 158). What has been covered, concealed for Austerlitz, drifts his own story close to the Holocaust trauma of European history, more precisely, to a Central European scene, namely the Prague of World War II, from where Austerlitz is rescued by a train transporting Jewish children to Britain. However, the parents remain in the lethal environment; after finding out about his Central European roots, Austerlitz goes back to Prague along the track of the effaced traces of his lost childhood. His memories seem to be revived, among others, by the patterns of the floor tile of a dwelling-house from Prague; he finds Vra, his nursemaid, and the traces of his mother, Agta lead towards the ghetto from Theresienstadt, where they are definitely lost, whereas he will lose trace of his father, Maximilian in Paris. At the end of the novel, when Austerlitz, brooding over the faade of the Gare dAusterlitz from Paris, from where his father had probably left Paris in the direction one of the Jewish lagers, Austerlitz recalls his earlier memories when he felt as if he had been on the premises of an unretaliated crime. In this moment of simultaneous reflection and recollection the personal name (Austerlitz), also consonant with the sounding of the word Auschwitz, and the placename (Gare dAusterlitz) become metaleptically interchangeable, Austerlitzs private history will stand for Europes collective history. Thus, Gare dAusterlitz, the

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living wound on the body of Europe, will stand as a memento, as the place of memory, not in the sense of cultic, ceremonial recollection, but in that of profound personal involvement and awareness of the ethical responsibility of remembering.

5. Fiction Documented by Photographs: the Temporality of Images J. J. Long considers that Austerlitz is more conventional than Sebalds earlier prose works, as it does not render problematic the relationship between memoir and fiction (cf. Long 2007: 149). However, in terms of the relationship between the text and the photos embedded into it, Austerlitz does become more problematic than Sebalds earlier works, as it conforms to the non-existent, impossible genre of fiction documented by photographs. In accordance with the narratorial intention of the novel, the photographs that accompany the text which is otherwise a textual procedure much favoured by Sebald have been taken by Austerlitz himself. However, while the photos have extratextual referents, indexically pointing at elements of reality, Austerlitz, the protagonist does not have any referent outside the text; he is an utterly fictitious character. In order that the images might really fit into the text, without any ontological break, the reader should either regard the novel as a document of events that took place in reality indeed, or s/he should ignore the indexical function of photographs. Obviously, neither of the two versions is possible as a reading strategy. The only viable possibility is for us to maintain the impossible connection between the verbal and the visual, to accept the Moebius strip of the reading experience offered by Sebald. The photos do not serve as mere illustrations. They do not serve to reveal the ultimate signified the face of the mother, for instance. On the contrary, the idea of deferment is even reinforced by the photographs, which contribute to further obscuring the final referent(s) of Austerlitzs quest. Even when Austerlitz seems to have found his mothers photo, which should mean the ultimate goal of his quest, even when the photo brings an evidence of the mothers having been there in the Barthesian sense of That-has-been1 , Austerlitz cannot experience the euphoria of his full access to the past. An enigmatic pair of eyes, a mysterious look, a deadly silence retains all the answers. Thus, the photographs inserted into the text result in an epistemological uncertainty; their past reference is overwritten by the non-referenciality of
In Camera Lucida. Reflections on Photography (1980) Roland Barthes expounds his views on the simultaneous presence, the superimposition of reality and past on the photograph. The photograph reveals the trace of reality, the photograph serves as a present evidence of a past moment, as what stands in front of the camera lens is never metaphorical, but necessarily real, the photograph attains the quality of testifying the past existence of the represented reality. Photographs carry an indexical relationship to their referents, stating that the thing has been there (Barthes 1981).
1

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fiction. Photos, such as memories, stand for an act of mediation, in this way representation necessarily turns into covering, overlaying, blocking the access to the past instead of rendering it possible.

6. Archive and Narration: the Sebaldian Enigma In drawing a map of the stylistic routes that Sebalds prose perambulates, Mark Richard McCullohs epitomization can be of our help: Sebald may be described as a writer who draws on his knowledge of several literatures and literary periods to create a new kind of documentary fiction that owes much to the expansive unconventionality of Borges, the diction and mood of Kafka, the deliberate narrative density of Bernhard, and the autobiographical sweep of Nabokov and Stendhal (McCulloh 2003: 25). It should be added however that Sebaldian prose is, still, unprecedented in exploring the caves and mines of the imagery of private and collective consciousness, in providing whirls and enigmas that absorb the reader without ever letting him/her away. The Sebaldian enigma pertains to narration, to the so-called authoritative unreliability that manifests itself in a systematic network of coincidences, analogies and interrelated events without being accompanied by any authorial explanation (cf. McCulloh 2003: 22). In this way, not only time, but language, or else, the text itself becomes a spatial construction built in line with an elaborated architectural plan. As Megan Jane Cawood states:
Sebalds text itself is a form of landscape: his narrative technique, with its emphasis on the visual in conjunction with the verbal, presents its readers with a textual landscape (or text-scape) to be perceived. Where architecture works as the mnemonic space in which Austerlitz discovers many of his own memories, the photographs in Austerlitz, and the text which surrounds them, become the space in which these memories are preserved (Cawood 2011)

Austerlitzs archiving efforts are reflected by the archiving character of the Sebaldian narration itself. Austerlitz obsessively collects a vast amount of knowledge in his ambivalent endeavour of erasure/recollection; similarly, Sebalds book itself becomes an archive of a vast knowledge, with endless details of episodes related by Austelitz, with flashes of past images, butterflies, layers of urban architecture, illustrations, enigmatic snapshots, analogous connections among patterns of childhood scenes and those of adult impressions, while certainty, the chance of gaining access to ultimate answers is continuously deferred for the reader to the same extent as for Sebalds narrator, who listens to and conveys Austerlitzs confessions. J. J. Long remarks about the ending of the novel: At the end of the text, Austerlitz sets off in search of his father, following traces that he finds in a

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Parisian archive. The epistemological promise of the archive is never fulfilled, which is why it leaves the end of this particular text open and the subjectivity of Austerlitz in a permanent state of incompletion (Long 2007: 20). However, the open ending invites the reader to experience simultaneity, not in terms of temporality but at a distinct, narrative level: deferment and completion of ultimate meanings in the text become mutually dependent and complementary. As in the case of every open text opera aperta , the promise of completion will unavoidably take place in the readers involvement and self-understanding. What is more, the chance of completion always remains floating in front of the readers eyes, as a desire which transforms us into passionate readers of a passionate text, and which makes possible for us to experience the loss of individual and collective identity, the unprocessable trauma of discontinuity in form of the pleasure of the text, in the Barthesian sense of the term.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Barthes, Roland (1981), Camera Lucida. Reflections on Photography, trans. Richard Howard. Hill and Wang, New York. Cawood, Megan Jane (2011), Sites of Pain: Trauma, Landscape and Architecture in W. G. Sebalds Austerlitz, http://www.inter-disciplinary.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/mcawoodepaper.pdf Derrida, Jacques (1995), Archive Fever: A Freudian Impression, trans. Eric Prenowitz. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, IL. Long, J. J. (2007), W. G. Sebald Image, Archive, Modernity. Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh. McCulloh, Mark Richard (2003), Understanding W. G. Sebald, University of South Carolina Press, Columbia, South Carolina. Sebald, Winfried Georg (2002), Austerlitz, trans. Anthea Bell. Penguin Books, London. Straus, Nina Pelikan (2009), Sebald, Wittgenstein and the Ethics of Memory, in Comparative Literature, vol. 61, no. 1, pp. 43-53.

LE TEMPS MIS SOUS RATURE DANS LA METAFICTION

MIHAELA CHAPELAN

THE TIME PUT UNDER ERASURE IN METAFICTION

The article aims to analyse the triple temporality configuration met in a large category of modern literary texts, the metafictions: the temporality of telling, of writing and of reading, and the way they contradict the premises of French narratology. To achieve this goal, we chose Diderots novel Jacques le Fataliste et son matre, which is a real anthology of metafictional techniques. Space-time indeterminacy is a characteristic feature of Diderots writing, but it is not enough to acknowledge it. Our article demonstrates the important role of this type of temporality within the anticonformism reading pact proposed by Diderot. Keywords: narratology, metafiction, temporality configuration, Diderot, time indeterminacy, reading pact.

1. Un postulat narratologique problmatique Presque tous les thoriciens et les critiques littraires sont daccord sur limportance de la temporalit dans une uvre littraire, le jeu de lcrivain avec le temps constituant lune des ressources majeures du renouvellement de la technique romanesque. Si la critique traditionnelle sintressait surtout la temporalit de lhistoire, la critique moderne et notamment la narratologie, laquelle nous devons la plupart des tudes sur la temporalit de loeuvre de fiction, dcouvre que celle-ci tire sa substance surtout du rapport qui stablit entre le temps de la digse et le temps de la narration. Dj en 1968, Christian Metz affirmait dans un article sur les distinctions entre la temporalit du rcit cinmatographique et celle du rcit littraire que le rcit est une squence deux fois temporelle : il y a le temps de la chose raconte et le temps du rcit (temps du signifi et temps du signifiant). Cette dualit nest pas seulement ce qui rend possibles toutes les distorsions temporelles mais, plus fondamentalement, elle nous invite constater que lune des fonctions du rcit est de monnayer un temps dans un autre temps.

Matre de confrences, Universit Spiru Haret, Bucarest, Roumanie, [email protected]

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Une anne plus tard, Grard Genette signalait lui-aussi cette double temporalit et procdait toute une srie dtudes dapprofondissement:
Par une dissymtrie [...] qui est inscrite dans les structures mmes de la langue nous pouvons fort bien raconter une histoire sans prciser le lieu o elle se passe et si ce lieu est plus ou moins loign du lieu do nous la racontons, tandis quil nous est presque impossible de ne pas la situer dans le temps par rapport notre acte narratif, puisque nous devons ncessairement la raconter un temps du prsent, du pass ou du futur. Genette (1969 : 228)

Si lon veut analyser de nos jours la temporalit dune uvre littraire on ne peut plus se passer de la terminologie et de la perspective narratologiques, mais nous considrons quune approche purement narratologique ne saurait rendre compte de toute la complexit des aspects quelle peut revtir. Malgr lintrt indniable de ses tudes, la narratologie semble navoir abord le problme de la configuration temporelle dans le rcit de fiction qu partir dun postulat inbranlable: la prsupposition dune histoire pralable au discours qui la rapporte. Dans la prface de la traduction franaise de la Logique des genres littraires de Kte Hamburger, Grard Genette posait fermement ce postulat de lattitude narratologique qui implique que le lecteur, comme dailleurs le critique littraire, accepte ou feint daccepter lexistence dune histoire raconter en amont du rcit: Le travail de la narratologie fictionnelle suppose que lon prenne au srieux, provisoirement et par dcision de mthode, la prtention non srieuse de la fiction raconter une histoire qui aurait effectivement eu lieu . Hamburger (1986 : 13) Cest pour cela que lattention du narratologue se dirige surtout vers les discordances entre les traits temporels des vnements de la digse et les traits correspondants du rcit, les trois dterminations essentielles tant: lordre (prsences des anachronies temporelles: analepses ou prolepses); la dure (distorsions de la dure: ampleur ou lenteur du texte, les pauses descriptives, les ellipses); la frquence (rcit itratif / rcit singulatif). On se rend bien compte que ce postulat condamne la narratologie occulter un grand nombre de rcits qui font barrage la reprsentation dune histoire pralable lacte de sa narration. Cest bien le cas de ce qui a t nomm, mtafiction. Le terme de mtafiction, construit sur le modle de celui de mtalangage, a t invent par le critique amricain William H. Gass, qui lutilise dans son essai de 1970, Philosophie et forme de fiction, pour dsigner la nouvelle vague de romanciers amricains qui staient illustrs dans les annes soixante, tels Kurt Vonnegut, Robert Coover, Donald Barthelme, John Barth etc. Un autre critique amricain, Linda Hutcheon lassocie elle aussi au courant du post-modernisme et met en vidence, comme trait caractristique de ce type de textes, lauto-rflexivit ou lauto-rfrentialit. Depuis, toute une srie dtudes critiques affinent cette catgorie littraire ou les crivains eux-mmes inventent dautres termes avoisins, comme par exemple Raymond Federman, qui lance dans les dbats le terme de surfiction, qui nest pas trs loin dune autre catgorie, la mtafiction vide. Les termes sont nouveaux, mais la ralit littraire quils couvrent est ancienne, commencer par les Mille et une nuits, en passant par Shakespeare, Cervants, Diderot, Sterne et beaucoup dautres.

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Nous ne nous proposons pas dentrer dans une analyse des diffrences entre les conceptions de la mtafiction selon les poques ou les diverses approches des critiques. On retient de toutes les dfinitions qui lui ont t donnes ce qui nous intresse plus particulirement, savoir son autorfrentialit dclare et la faon dont cette caractristique gnralement reconnue complique lextrme les rapports temporels de luvre, qui se nouent dans un vritable cheveau, le plus souvent impossible dmler. Dans tous ces rcits mtafictionels, le narrateur sexhibe dlibrment en tant quauteur, ce qui a comme consquence directe le fait quil arrache son rcit la chronologie extra textuelle, dcrdibilisant toute esthtique mimtique. Dans son ouvrage Une potique du post-modernisme , Linda Hutcheon se demandait juste titre si un tel pari est-il possible et si le langage et la littrature peuvent devenir totalement anti-mimtiques et non-rfrentiels et rester, cependant, comprhensibles et lisibles. En fait, en littrature, la rponse tait dj donne, car la plupart des crivains mtafictionnels faisaient preuve dune double postulation : dun ct ils produisaient un discours littraire qui brisait lillusion romanesque, et de lautre, ils tentaient de mnager quelques effets de rels qui russissaient par endroits rtablir lillusion mimtique. Normalement, si les crivains taient consquents avec leur propre dmarche, toute mtafiction devrait tre une narration simultane et se situer uniquement dans le prsent de lcriture. Pourtant, en usant de divers artifices quils ne craignent pas de dnoncer comme tels, ces crivains russissent instaurer des temporalits htrognes, polyrythmiques, divergentes, mme si elles restent plutt spectrales , dans le sens donn par Derrida cette pithte dans ltude intitule Spectres de Marx, cest--dire quelque chose qui ne peut se donner comme prsence pleine, ce qui est pntr par le vide et labsence. Effectivement, lorsquaprs avoir racont sur des dizaines de pages une histoire qui, par suspension dincrdulit, le lecteur aurait pu prendre comme vraie, lcrivain fait irruption et rappelle au lecteur que rien de tel ne sest rellement pass comment pourrait-on encore parler de repres spatiaux ou temporels ? Mme si le langage lui-mme avait instaur une forme de pass, il sagit dun pass qui, tt ou tard, sera mis sous rature1, annul. Pour illustr dune manire plus prcise comment se compose et se dcompose cet incroyable enchevtrement temporel auquel nous nous confrontons dans les mtafictions, nous avons choisi le roman de Diderot, Jacques le Fataliste et son matre, car il reprsente lui seul une vritable anthologie de formules romanesques mtafictionnelles. 2. La triple srie temporelle : de lhistoire, de lcriture et de la lecture Jacques le Fataliste... est construit plusieurs niveaux de fictionalit: un dialogue entre lauteur et le lecteur; ce dialogue sert de cadre au rcit du voyage de Jacques
1

Nous utilisons ce terme dans le sens qui lui est donn par la critique gntique.

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et de son matre dans lequel sont embotes les histoires damour de Jacques et de son matre ou dautres histoires racontes par des personnages rencontrs en route. A ces niveaux secondaires, le postulat narratologique fonctionne et la temporalit peut tre envisage en fonction des trois dterminations essentielles dont parle la narratologie. Ainsi, en ce qui concerne lordre de succession des vnements dans la digse et lordre de leur disposition dans le rcit, il prsente des anachronies assez marques, presque tous les rcits assums par Jacques tant des analepses2 (ex.: lhistoire de ses amours, celle de son capitaine et de son ami, lvocation des annes passes dans la maison de son grand-pre qui lui faisait porter le billon etc.). Il en va de mme du rcit de la vengeance de Mme de La Pommeraye, assum par lhtesse de lauberge du Grand Cerf, de celui des amours du matre pour Agathe, ou des aventures de Richard, le secrtaire du marquis des Arcis. Quel que soit le narrataire qui assume ces narrations ultrieures, elles sont dsignes en tant que telles non seulement dune manire implicite, par les temps verbaux utiliss par linstance narrative (pass simple et imparfait ou prsent narratif), mais aussi dune manire explicite, par la conscience quont narrateurs et narrataires dvoquer des vnements passs, situs dans un temps distinct de celui, suppos prsent, dans lequel ils vivent et racontent. Jusquici il ny a rien dinhabituel, la majeure partie des romans prsente cette double configuration temporelle. Ce quil y a de diffrent dans le roman de Diderot sont les rapports entre ces deux temps distincts. Dans le roman psychologique, par exemple, le prsent plonge ses racines dans le pass et ne peut quen rsulter. Le temps dans Manon Lescaut, affirmait Jacques Schrer, est mouvant parce que Des Grieux pleure aujourdhui en voquant ses malheurs ou ses bonheurs passs. Schrer (1972 : 181) Mais dans Jacques le Fataliste... il y a extriorit absolue entre les deux temps. Celui o Jacques et son matre cheminent nest en rien influenc par les vnements passs, qui alimentent leur bavardage. Le capitaine de Jacques ne ressuscitera pas, ils ne rencontreront ni labb Hudson, ni Agathe ou Denise, ni aucun des personnages dont ils parlent. A dfaut de rencontre physique, il aurait pu y avoir un contact sentimental avec le pass, mais celui-ci ne se produit pas non plus. Cette distinction radicale des deux temps est facteur dirralisation, pour le pass aussi bien que pour le prsent. Un monde o aujourdhui ne dpend pas dhier, o pass et prsent ne parviennent pas se joindre nest pas un monde rel. Vers le mme sens converge une autre particularit de lcriture diderotienne, savoir le refus de lpaisseur et de la longueur du temps. Il ny a pas chez lui, remarquait R. Kempf, de ces obstacles habits par la dure, de ces intermdiaires temporels , Kempf (1976 :137). Les exemples suivants le prouvent suffisamment : Voil lhtesse descendue, remonte et reprenant son rcit , ou lorsque madame de La Pommeraye propose au marquis des Arcis une promenade, tout le voyage tient en une phrase: Les voil partis, les voil arrivs...
Cf. Genette, lanalepse est dfinie comme toute vocation aprs coup dun vnement antrieur au point de lhistoire o lon se trouve.
2

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Diderot abrge ou exorcise la dure. Il labolit dans les choses de lamour aussi, o les instances de temporisation : pudeur, retenue, biensance, apparaissent non seulement comme pnibles, mais aussi incongrues. Ce qui se dcouvre travers tant de raccourcis est un monde en proie au mouvement, une posie de lagitation des corps. Mais aussi, et cela a autrement plus dimportance, cette terrible acclration du rcit impose par Diderot (comme Flaubert plus tard dans le clbre final de lEducation sentimentale), cette excessive disproportion entre une dure certaine de laction et une dure textuelle abolie, mme pas signale par les habituelles formules narratives: aprs ...ans, heures etc., tend faire apparatre lcriture elle-mme. Avec cette rupture radicale du paralllisme des deux axes temporels, si lche et embrouill ft-il, lalibi de lanecdote se trouve abandonn, laxe de la narration tant valoris aux dpens de celui de lhistoire et de la sorte le roman indique quil cesse dtre lcriture dune histoire pour devenir lhistoire dune criture . Ricardou (1967 :166) Cette modalit subtile de saper ce qui pouvait tre pris, lillusion aidant, pour un prsent rel et qui savre ntre quun prsent de papier o vivent et parlent des tres de papier, est renforce par une autre, plus explicite. Pour le rcit du voyage de Jacques et de son matre, Diderot adopte les procds narratifs traditionnels: rcit impersonnel, troisime personne, temps du pass spcifiques au rcit. Un texte ainsi rdig forme un systme bloqu qui ne tolre la premire personne et le prsent que dans le dialogue des personnages ou dans des confessions intercales. Il est vrai que dans le roman de Diderot, le pass simple et limparfait, temps du rcit, alternent avec le prsent lorsque la situation devient dun plus grand intrt dramatique et le rythme narratif sacclre, comme dans le passage suivant :
Cette espce de rapt ne se fit pas sans donner des soupons aux parents et lpoux. Ils lui rendirent visite. Hudson les reut avec un air constern. Comme ses bons gens taient en train de lui exposer leur chagrin, la cloche sonne; ctait six heures du soir; Hudson leur impose silence, te son chapeau, se lve, fait un grand signe de croix et dit dun ton affectueux et pntr: Angelus Domini nuntiavit Mariae Et voil le pre de la confiseuse et ses frres honteux de leur soupon qui disaient en descendant lescalier lpoux: Mon fils, vous tes un sot. Diderot (1981: 205)

Mais dans tous ces cas, il sagit dun pseudo-prsent, le prsent narratif, et aucun lecteur, aussi peu avis soit-il, ne risque de sy mprendre et de se sentir dsorient lorsquil doit le placer sur un axe temporel. Ce qui plonge par contre le lecteur dans un vrai labyrinthe temporel se sont les intrusions du narrateur extradigtique situ au premier niveau. Et cela se passe frquemment, car chez Diderot le discours menace continuellement la puret du rcit. Ainsi, il suffira que le narrateur extradigtique (qui est une figure dauteur et se dclare tel quel) prenne la parole en nom propre pour quun nouveau prsent, celui de lcriture, sinsre dans le rcit et le sape. Ce passage brusque du rcit au discours, de limpersonnel au personnel, est aussi le passage dune esthtique de lillusion, qui supprimait lauteur, une esthtique o lauteur, intervenant, supprime lillusion.

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Comme dans un jeu de miroirs, ce prsent de lcriture renvoie une autre srie temporelle, celle de la lecture, qui, logiquement, devrait tre spcifie comme postrieure et trangre et au temps de lhistoire et celui de lcriture.

3. Les mtalepses Mais dans Jacques le Fataliste et son matre les niveaux de fictionalit ne sont pas indpendants. Ils se chevauchent constamment et les mtalepses (dfinies par Genette comme des interfrences entre des niveaux qui ne devraient pas pouvoir communiquer) sont frquentes. Il ne sagit pas dune simple interruption par le passage dun niveau de fictionalit un autre, mais dune concidence spatiale et temporelle qui stablit parfois entre les niveaux et gomme les frontires logiques qui les sparent. A certains moments, il sagit dune simple interprtation, dailleurs fautive, qui rapproche Jacques et le lecteur:
Ils entendirent quelque distance derrire eux du bruit et des cris [...]. Vous allez croire que ctaient les gens de lauberge, leurs valets et les brigands dont nous avons parl [...] Jacques le crut. Diderot (1981: 205)

Dautres fois il sagit de la prsence inexplicable du narrateur extradigtique dans lunivers de la digse, signale par la transgression subite de la technique de la narration impersonnelle, la troisime personne, la narration personnelle, marque linguistiquement par le pronom dictique je:
Jacques et son matre avaient atteint le gte o ils avaient passer la nuit. Il tait tard; la porte de la ville tait ferme et ils avaient t obligs sarrter dans le faubourg. L, jentends un vacarme...Ibid. (36)

Le lecteur fictif proteste vivement contre cette intrusion et oblige le narrateur se reprendre, du moins apparemment, et se retrancher derrire un on impersonnel: Vous entendez! Vous ny tiez pas; il ne sagit pas de vous! Il est vrai! Eh, bien,... on entend un bruit. Ainsi Diderot renverse les plans narratifs et dconstruit la convention littraire de lutilisation du on impersonnel, en dvoilant qui se trouve en fait derrire ce pronom-camlon qui peut recouvrir tant didentits diffrentes : savoir le couple auteur lecteur. Aprs cela, il peut se permettre de le rutiliser, car lutilisation dune convention dj dnonce en tant que telle ne peut plus rtablir avec la mme force lillusion romanesque et ainsi, la perce hors de lhorizon dattente du lecteur est opre. Mais il existe dans Jacques le Fataliste... des interfrences temporelles encore plus pousses. Ainsi, lorsque le narrateur dit plaisamment : Tandis que

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je disserte, le matre de Jacques ronfle comme sil mavait cout. (Ibid :187). Certes, la cause du ronflement du matre est dnonc ici de manire ironique, par lintroducteur hypothtique comme si, mais la concidence temporelle qutablit tandis que nest pas conteste. Dans dautres exemples, la superposition stablit dune faon encore plus nette entre les trois sries temporelles: le temps de lhistoire, le temps de lcriture et le temps de la lecture:
Lecteur, tandis que ces bonnes gens dorment, jaurais une petite question vous proposer et discuter avec vous: cest ce quaurait t lenfant n de labb Hudson et de la dame de la Pommeraye [...] vous me direz cela demain matin [...]. Ce matin, le voil venu, et nos voyageurs spars Ibid (219)

Le roman de Diderot, comme toute mtafiction, interrompt la reprsentation dune temporalit extra-linguistique au sein de laquelle se produiraient les volutions dune histoire prexistante, pour crer une temporalit autotlique, propre au texte et sa seule partition, limage du Grand Rouleau auquel Jacques ne cesse de se rfrer tout le long du roman. Sur ce Grand Rouleau , les vnements ne sont pas inscrits dans lirrversibilit syntagmatique de la succession des squences chronologiques, mais dans une tonnante simultanit et enchevtrement du temps de lcriture, de lhistoire et de la lecture. Tout a t crit la fois , dit plusieurs reprises Jacques et, en reprenant lheureuse expression de Paul Ricoeur, on pourrait dire que cest cela mme qui constitue lenjeu du jeu de Diderot avec le temps.

BIBLIOGRAPHIE

Genette, Grard (1969), Figures II, Seuil, Paris. Hamburger, Kate (1986), Logique des genres littraires, Seuil, Paris. Hutcheon, Linda (1997), A Poetics of Postmodernisme. Kempf, Roger (1976), Diderot et le roman, Seuil, Paris. Metz, Christian (1968), Essai sur la signification du cinma, Klincsieck, Paris. Scherer, Jacques (1972), Le Cardinal et lorang-outan, SEDES, Paris. Ridarcou, Jean (1967 ), Problmes du nouveau roman, Seuil, Paris.

TEXTE DE RFRENCE

Diderot, Denis (1981), Jacques le Fataliste et son matre, dition critique et annote, prsente par Jacques Proust et Jack Undank, Hermann, Paris.

THE READERS PERCEPTION OF TIME IN VIRGINIA WOOLFS NOVELS

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The aim of this paper is to offer a narratological perspective on Joanna Russ claim that nothing happens in Virginia Woolfs novels. Pauses, slow-downs where focus is not on action but on descriptions or characters reflections or non-narrative comments may explain this feeling. What is more, Mieke Bal believes that the reader can arrange the events in chronological order even if they are not presented in such an order at the level of the fabula: Ordering the events in chronological sequence, one forms an impression of the difference between fabula and story. What is the effect of identifying the order of events in time? Does this influence the readers perception of time in these novels? Is chronological order always clear? If chronological order is not clear, we deal with achrony. Keywords: events, chronology, non-narrative comments, fabula, story.

Motivation. Lyric vs Narrative Mode Joanna Russ defines the lyric mode by contrasting it with the narrative mode. According to her, lack of chronology is one of the lyric modes distinctive features. There is also no causation, as the lyric mode relies on associations as far as its principle of connection is concerned. To Russ, lyric mode means various elements (such as images, events, scenes, passages, words) organized around an unspoken thematic or emotional center. Russ also claims that Woolf is a lyric novelist. Lyricism leads to the feeling that nothing happens in her novels. Readers have the feeling that nothing happens in Woolfs novels because of her way of writing. Whether her novels are written in an almost traditional way (such as The Voyage Out, Night and Day, Orlando, The Years, Flush) or whether she uses her stream of consciousness technique more (To the Lighthouse, Mrs Dalloway, The Waves, Jacobs Room, Between the Acts), she makes use not only of action or events alone. It seems that Russ claim that nothing happens in Woolfs novels refers to events in her novels. However, events are not the only elements making up a narrative text. A narrative text also consists of opinions, descriptions, or a disclosure on the part of the narrator which is not directly connected with the events [] (Bal 1997:8), all situated outside the fabula.
Junior teaching assistant (English), Technical University of Civil Engineering Bucharest, Department of Foreign Languages and Communication; e-mail: [email protected]

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The modern novel focuses on poetical aspects rather than on narrative aspects. However, one does not exclude the other. Woolfs novels belong to this category. She even states her intention to use prose poetically in her diary entry from 1927. Bradbury (1973) is a critic who points out to the new novel which appeared with writers such as Henry James, Joseph Conrad, Ford Madox Ford, D. H. Lawrence, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, and E. M. Forster, a novel which was justified by analogy with the poem, to stress fictions poem-like as opposed to its narrative character (Bradbury 1973: 5). Freedman (1963: 185) sees Modern lyrical fiction as a blending of poetry and prose. The mixture of poetry and prose in the lyrical novel may be reflected in the combination of narrative and lyric mode. The alternation between narration and non-narrative comments (Bal 1997: 31) may also account for the mixture of poetry and prose in the Modernist novel. Such an alternation is common in any novel, yet the non-narrative comments are different when it comes to the lyrical novel. The focus is on the inner world of characters, meaning that characters perception of events, other characters, situations, or their reflections are given more attention than action, than events. Whereas in all novels there are, as Bal claims, passages focusing on reflections, descriptions, opinions, in Woolfs novels such passages usually contain poetic language. Woolfs focus on non-narrative aspects is underlined by means of rhythm, in particular by slow-downs and pauses. Action does not occur at a fast pace, as Woolf spends more time on characters thoughts and perception. Slow-downs and pauses are part of deviations in sequential ordering. The following narratological theories may be relevant for the study of the readers perception of time in Virginia Woolf: a) Theories of action or fabula, which focus on the study of events, action sequences and schemes, functions, actants, characters, settings and the internal laws of narrated worlds (Onega 27); b) Theories of story and narration, which devise modes of analysis of the time structure of the story (order of events, temporal distortions such as flashbacks or flashforwards, duration and selection of scenes, narrative rhythm, etc.) (Onega 1996: 29); c) Theories of reception, which focus on a communicative speech act, a message transacted between a sender and a receiver (Onega 1996: 29). Fabula, Story, Plot Joanna Russ presents only a kind of reading of Woolfs novels. That nothing happens in her novels is only one way of perceiving her novels, only one level of interpretation. A novel, a narrative has several levels of analysis, three according to Onega: fabula, story and plot.

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Bal considers the fabula a bare scheme of narrative events (Onega 1996: 7). A description of the fabula (or action) would omit any temporal or perspectival distortions: there are no flashbacks or variations in point of view at this level of analysis. (Onega 7) Plot means, in this case, according to Onega, a scheme consisting of the structures of action and perception which shape the story (1996: 7). According to Onega, A story is a fabula which has been given a presentational shape: a specific point of view and temporal scheme have been introduced (1996: 8). This is similar to what Onega states about the structure of a narrative, which may be analyzed as follows: according to the series of events that compose it (the level of events) and according to the structure of the representation (Onega 1996: 5-6). Culler makes a main distinction between plot and presentation, or story and discourse, his version of narrative levels (Onega) among other versions of such pairs. Presentation means the way the story is presented (or told). Presentation includes, according to him, variables having to do with identifying the narrator (and his point of view), the narratee, the time when the narrator tells his story, the way a narrator speaks (his language) or the narrators authority (reliability or unreliablity).

The Readers Perception and Interpretation Leaving Bals levels of analysis aside, there are several levels of interpreting Woolfs novels, by taking into account the way they were written and the way they can be interpreted. One of the levels of Woolfs novels is represented by the way she writes her novels, another one by the way the reader perceives them at first sight, and another one by the way the readers rearrange the events, make connections between them, understand the characters personality and motivations. The readers judge her novels while reading them, by paying attention to her version of the story, but also by interpreting them in their own way, by trying to make sense of the story and by identifying her distinctive style as a writer. In their turn, readers may focus on certain aspects in her novels, to which she may or may not offer a long time. Critics themselves may focus and insist on certain aspects of her novels; in this respect, we may say that critics behave like readers, as they offer their own reading of Woolfs novels. It is only at first sight that the reader has the feeling that there is not much action or no action at all in Woolfs novels. The difference between story and fabula can help clarify what goes on in the process of the readers first impressions and his later reconstruction of what happens in Woolfs novels. According to this view, it seems that what Joanna Russ said about nothing happening in Woolfs novels could be related to fabula as an action-scheme.

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Even so, there may be little action in a novel, yet when the readers think of what happened and try to find connection between the events, there is in fact an action-scheme (a fabula). The reader recomposes the story after reading it as a fabula, as a scheme of events, leaving aside flashbacks and also the focus on characters perception. However, in his attempt to have a better understanding of the story, the reader not only orders the events (which are arranged in the fabula in an order which is not a chronological one) but also forms an image of the characters based on their inner world. What is more, as Culler claims, events are not enough to say that we have a story. There must be an end relating back to the beginning-according to some theorists, an end that indicates what has happened to the desire that led to the events the story narrates. (Culler) The reader must thus find all necessary connections between events and characters motivations. Slow-downs on various instances of perception may become summaries in the readers mind as he remembers the story he read. Narratological theory, however, claims that insignificant events (which do not influence the course of the fabula) are usually summarized (Bal 1997: 104). Sometimes, routine events may be presented extensively, not summarized in order to underline boredom, the emptiness of a persons existence in a fabula (Bal 1997: 105). The readers summary, however, does not reflect the importance or unimportance of those passage, but only a simplification in order to have a full view on what goes on in Woolfs novels. Otherwise, in Woolfs novels, events which may not be significant are not usually insisted upon by means of her characters perception. Insignificant events may be seen as parts of moments of non-being, as Woolf called those routine events, which are not lived consciously. The events which are significant for characters are, usually, part of what she calls moments of being or moments of vision. Characters experience moments of insight, which are expressed poetically. Culler identified two ways of thinking about the plot: as events being shaped into a story by readers or writers or as being shaped by narrative into a story. In trying to understand what goes on in Woolfs novels, the reader may be regarded as creating his vision of the plot by shaping the events into a story. The reader tries to understand the fabula, the scheme of events, yet this is not enough. In order to understand a novel, the reader forms in his mind another presentation of the fabula, a presentation which is different from the one made by the writer. It is not enough to say that Woolf in her novels presents events; what matters is also how she presents those events. According to Culler, both readers and writers will try to offer a presentation of the story in a novel, by shaping events into a plot. It is true that readers have their own contribution in putting events together to fill in the story in most of Woolfs novels. The writer, of course,

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creates the story from various points of view, and there is also the narrators style that matters. Cullers view of plot is similar to Onegas view of plot as a story-scheme and thus supports her view.

Action vs Static Aspects According to Onega, Tomashevski opposes static to dynamic motifs. Descriptions, for instance, or unimportant actions, are static, while significant actions are dynamic (Onega 1996: 27). In this sense, Woolfs novels contain more static than dynamic motifs. These terms account for the apparent lack of action in Woolfs novels. The events (regarded as what happens in the novel) are given less attention than descriptions. Woolf views characters perception as important. Because of the focus on her characters reflections, on descriptions, the action lacks dynamism. It is only after the reader finishes the novel that he can think back about the events that have occurred. Action exists prior to any narrative presentation and could be presented in other ways (Onega 1996: 94-95), in Cullers view.

Deviations in Sequential Ordering Deviations in sequential ordering are a common aspect of the majority of Woolfs novels. Deviations in sequential ordering are defined by Bal as the relations [] which hold between the order of events in the story and their chronological sequence in the fabula (Bal 1997: 80). That is, the non-linear chronology presented by the authors which is rearranged in the readers mind to make sense of the story in the novels. The inner world of characters is underlined by means of rhythm, in particular by slow-downs and pauses. According to Bal, the slow-down may work like a magnifying glass (1997: 107), in order to lead to the exciting discovery of what is hardly perceptible (1997: 108). Important moments of reflection or perception belong to the category of slow-downs. Bal views description as a privileged site of focalization which has great impact on the ideological and aesthetic effect of the text (Bal 1997: 36). This is because it becomes an act of subjective perception, the reader having access to a characters view. Pauses include all narrative sections in which no movement of the fabula-time is implied. A great deal of attention is paid to one element, and in the meantime the fabula remains stationary. When it is again continued later on, no time has passed (Bal 1997: 108). Bal mentions that the pause occurs in modernist narratives such as those of Virginia Woolf. According to Bal, many of her novels alternate the presentation of

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slow, unimportant events with lengthy descriptive passage. The difference between the presentation of events and the description of objects is often hard to make out, so that the entire story moves on like a long descriptive flow (Bal 1997: 109). Pauses may thus offer insight with respect to the apparent lack of action in Woolfs novels. The action at the level of the fabula leaves its place to perception. It is no longer action that retains the focus of the reader, but an act of perception. Pauses and slow-downs are aspects of rhythm and are part of deviations in sequential ordering as far as Woolfs novels are concerned. Another aspect of rhythm is summary, which is concerned with less important events or details in a novel. Frequency is also an aspect of rhythm. As far as repetition is concerned, Bal argues that two events can never be the same. This is because they are always told, viewed or interpreted in a different way. Such an example consists in the way other characters view Septimus and Rezia and how each of them perceives reality at the time in the park or in the streets. The event is not the same with all the characters; each of them thinks, feels and perceives reality in a different way. According to Bal, anachrony (chronological deviation) may occur even in emphatically chronological (Bal 1997: 83) novels. Bal states that the beginning in medias res is a convention which allows the reader to be guided from the middle of the fabula into the past, and from then on the story carries on more or less chronologically through to the end (1997: 83-84). Most of Woolfs and Swifts novels begin in medias res. With the exception of Flush and Orlando, which Woolf calls biographies, and which start with the beginning, her other novels begin in medias res. In Mrs Dalloway, the story does not go on according to a linear chronology. Characters go back in time in order to remember and so the reader will try to put the events in a chronological order in order to understand the story. According to Meir Sternberg, [...] the temporal distortion of the chronological order of events is an indication of artistic purpose (Onega 1996: 103). Sternbergs claim about the artistic role of lack of chronological order may account for the purpose of lack of linear chronology in the lyrical novel. Unreal Anachrony Bal claims that sometimes anachronies involve those taking place in the consciousness of a character, when he/she remembers doing something, which is different from the actual doing an altogether different event. She calls this type of anachrony unreal and then points out that it is used almost exclusively in the so-called stream-of-consciousness literature (1997: 87). Bal introduces the term subjective anachrony which, unlike objective anachrony, is an anachrony which can be regarded as such if the contents of consciousness lie in the past or the future; not the past of being conscious , the moment of thinking itself (1997: 87).

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This is the case of the movement in time in Mrs Dalloway. The story is formed of associations which lead the characters to move backwards in time, to remember and reflect on their choices of the past. The reader will try to understand the whole story, to make it whole from what he is told about the characters in the present and from their memories from the past. What is more, the characters themselves go through a similar process. Another situation where there is no real anachrony is represented by retroversion of anticipation particularly when it is in the form of direct discourse. The moment of speech is simply part of the (chronological) story; only in the contents are past or future mentioned (Bal 1997: 87). This is not found in Woolf. Direction From the point of view of direction, the anachrony may be situated in the past or in the future, judging by the moment of the beginning of the fabula and the appearance of the anachrony (Bal 1997: 84). In the case of Woolfs novels, there is only anachrony that lies in the past. We are presented with action at the present time and with action in the past, as recalled by characters. In some cases there are predictions (such as Peter predicting Clarissas future as a perfect hostess or her marriage to Richard Dalloway). Achrony Sometimes, the direction, the distance and the span of a deviation in chronology cannot be determined, due to the absence of enough information. In this case, we deal with an achrony. The reader gets to understand, approximately, where events in the past fit in in order to make up the story whole in Mrs Dalloway. A precise time is not necessary, as the succession of events becomes clear. What led to the present situation is clearly understood. Time Ricoeur analyzes Genettes theories of the time of narrating and narrated time and he adds to these two categories the time of life. The time of life is connected to tempo and rhythm, which brings forth opportunities to new views on aspects of chronology: We move even further away from a strict comparison between lengths of time when, to flashbacks, are added the time of remembering, the time of dreaming, and the time of the reported dialogue, as in Virginia Woolf. (Onega 1996: 132-133) Sternberg believes that there is a time-norm to be found in any narrative. If an element is given a large amount of time, it means it is truly aesthetically relevant (Onega 1996: 103). Thus, if certain thoughts, scenes, various descriptions

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in Woolf occupy quite some time then this may say something about their aesthetic relevance, and of course about their importance. The Narrator. Point of View. Focalization Bal sees the narrator as telling a story, while the focalizor represents an aspect of the story he tells, bringing about a certain perception of events. The focalizor may be the same as one of the characters. Stanzel noticed a difference between who sees and who tells, which was theorized later by Genette and Bal (focalizor) (Onega 1996: 161-162). Focalization, [] the relation between who perceives and what is perceived, colours the story with subjectivity (Bal 1997: 8). According to Bal, events are always presented from a certain perspective. Bal underlines the difficulty of objectivity, considering that perception always depends on the one who perceives. Age, knowledge, familiarity with a certain object interfere with the perception. Bal claims that, in terms of focalization, a first-person narrative does not differ from a third person narrative. This is because When we try to reflect someone elses point of view, we can only do so in so far as we know and understand that point of view. (Bal 1997: 158) According to Bal, perspective is a means of manipulation, in the sense that The point of view from which the elements of the fabula are being presented is often of decisive importance for the meaning the reader will assign to the fabula (1997: 79). The reader is influenced by certain ways of presenting events or characters in a narrative. The passage of time may be thus understood in a subjective way. Characters assign significance to events that may not be given much attention by others. However, in doing so, they focus their attention on certain things for a longer time and they take the reader with them, into sharing their perception. Events Events, as elements of the fabula, are defined by Bal (1997: 182) as processes (changes that occur in, with, through, and among objects). The transition from one state to another state is caused or experienced by actors (Bal 1997: 182). In this sense, the evolution of characters, their changes in time in Woolfs novels may be regarded as events, even if they are not events in the sense of action. Humphrey wonders about the nature of the plot in novels where inner thoughts replace external action: With motive and external action replaced by psychic being and functioning, what is to unify the fiction? What is to replace conventional plot? (Humphrey 1954: 84). Humphrey points out to the possibility of viewing the characters mind as a setting, the characters memories and thoughts as the time range, places where a characters mind goes

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as the place of action and what characters remember, perceive or imagine as action. However, this is just one level of interpretation. This can be seen as the readers first view of Woolfs. This is how Woolf presents her story. The equivalent of action in traditional narratives is the characters mind wandering. However, a plot similar to the traditional one can be reconstructed by the reader. Plot in the Modernist Novels Brooks reflects on the plot of Modernist novels and on the plot itself as something different from a fixed structure. He thinks of plot as a structuring operation peculiar to those messages that are developed through temporal succession, the instrumental logic of a specific mode of human understanding. (Onega 1996: 253-254) Brooks view is similar to Humphreys view on the stream of consciousness novels plot. Bradbury sees the novel as not having a fixed form, a conventional structure. Novels may be of different kinds. In this sense, the lyrical novel is a type of novel that combines narrative and lyrical features. According to Ronald Walker, modernist novels show a different representation of time, character, causation. He gives the example of Clarissas walk which did not readily conform [] to the conventions of the represented action schematized by the Neo-Aristotelian critics. Modernism usually means a different view on reality. It means self-consciousness and non-representationalism. It is also associated with sophistication, introversion, self-scepticism (Bradbury and McFarlane 1991: 26). Stevenson underlines Woolfs different view of the novel as compared to the Edwardian novelists: her focus on subjective perception (Stevenson 1986: 12) With Modernism, the novels move away from linear chronology, from a unitary plot, towards a new vision on reality as fragmentary (Bradbury and McFarlane 1991: 393). The focus is on the inner workings of the mind. The traditional novel was focused on story, setting and character, while the modernist novel is concerned with writing and composition. Bradbury underlines the focus on [] the demotion of the traditional poetics of plot , character , and moral sentiment , and decided unease in the presence of the moral issues that fiction, by its lifelikeness, raises (Bradbury 1973: 8) in modernist novels. Modern texts move away from story, narrative and require an active reader, according to Graff (McHale 2001: 221). Henry James proposes a different view on the novel. He believes that psychology is significant in a novel, in order to better understand characters. Unity of plot is ensured by a perceiving character (a reflector, or a focalizer). With the lyrical novel, as Woolf suggested, fiction should concentrate on poetic features, leaving plot and character into the background, and bringing inner life into the foreground. With modernism, traditional novels did not totally disappear (Stevenson 1986: 26). In fact, Woolfs novels are close to traditional ones, leaving the focus on non-narrative and their lyrical quality aside. With respect to the novel in the 1920s, Bradbury

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states that not all novels and novelists were touched by Modernism. However, many traditional aspects of the novel were generally questioned with the beginning of Modernism. According to Brooker (1992), Woolf did not actually contribute to a general Modernist trend with her theories and her novels. This, however, supports the idea that Modernism may be different with every author. There are no fixed features to be respected by all novelists. Traditional chronological time, the logic of the story, the coherence of the plot which are disregarded in the Modernist novel move the novel towards lyricism. As Joanna Russ defined the lyric mode, as having no chronology or causation, Woolfs manner of presenting her stories is close to the lyric not to the narrative mode. Subjectivity is also a feature of the lyric mode.

Stream of Consciousness Stream of consciousness is used to describe the inner experience. However, there had been introspective novels before the stream of consciousness. Novels focusing on inner experience bring about the readers sympathy for characters due to the amount of information the reader is given about the characters and due to the way this information is presented. (Lodge 1992) Thus, the stream of consciousness contributes to the readers sympathizing with the characters, with the readers manipulation of vision on the characters. The reader himself cant be objective. He is drawn into sharing the characters perception on time and into giving more time to understand characters perception on various situations, on other characters, to their inner world. With respect to consciousness, time is not linear. There is movement back and forth in time. According to Daiches, consciousness may move in time while the subject does not move or spatial elements change while time is fixed. Presence of the author is characteristic of Woolfs stream of consciousness. The novel of consciousness is mainly placed within categories of internal focalization (Genette) or figural narrative (reflector-mode) (Stanzel) (Fludernik 2009: 79).

Conclusions Lyricism lies at the level of the presentation of the story. At the level of the fabula, which readers may understand and compose later, there are no such details. The readers perceive lyricism but they can also think of another presentation of the story after they read the novel, reconstructing all the logical links and coherence of the story in a close to traditional way.

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Woolfs novels contain certain aspects of traditional narrative, but mostly their novels belong to the lyric mode. With the disregard of linear narrative, logical causation, coherence of plot in Modernism, the reader is offered a subjective view on events and characters and he is also manipulated into judging characters in a subjective way, into sympathizing with them. Subjectivity is part of the lyrical experience. Non-linear chronology is part of the inner wanderings of the mind. The authors dont focus on action, dynamism lacks in their novels. The rhythm of the story is slow, as descriptions, comments or reflections are given more time than the action itself. Non-narrative aspects are given more importance than narrative aspects. The reader has the feeling that nothing or not much is happening in Woolfs novels while he reads them due to the slow, detailed presentation of perception. Descriptions of the way characters perceive what is around them, other characters, various situations are given lots of attention by Woolf. The focus is on the inner world of characters, due to which the story progresses usually in a very slow rhythm. Only after the novel is finished can the reader rethink of the whole story and put the events in the right order (Mrs Dalloway) and view the story as a succession of events, while also understanding the characters view of life and inner world by means of their perception.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Bal, Mieke (1997), Narratology. Introduction to the Theory of Narrative, University of Toronto Press. Bertens, Hans (1996), The Idea of the Postmodern. A History, Routledge, London and New York. Bradbury, Malcolm (1973), Possibilities. Essays on the State of the Novel, Oxford University Press, London, Oxford, New York. Bradbury, Malcolm, James McFarlane ed. (1991), Modernism. A Guide to European Literature 1890-1930, Penguin Books, England. Brooker, Peter ed. (199), Modernism/ Postmodernism, Longman, London and New York. Culler, Jonathan (2000), Literary Theory. A very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Currie, Mark (1998), Postmodern Narrative Theory, Palgrave, New York. Fludernik, Monika (2009), An Introduction to Narratology, Routledge, New York. Freedman, Ralph (1963), The Lyrical Novel: Studies in Hermann Hesse, Andre Gide, and Virginia Woolf, Princeton University Press, New Jersey. Friedman, Melvin (1955), Stream of Consciousness: A Study in Literary Method, Yale University Press, New Haven. Genette, Grard (1980), Narrative Discourse. An Essay in Method, Ithaca, Cornell University Press, New York. Humphrey, Robert (1954), Stream of Consciousness in the Modern Novel. A Study of James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Dorothy Richardson, William Faulkner and Others, University of California Press, London. Jahn, Manfred (2005), Narratology: A Guide to the Theory of Narrative, English Department, University of Cologne, http://www.uni-koeln.de/~ame02/pppn.htm Lodge, David (1992), The Art of Fiction, Viking Penguin, USA.

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Lodge, David (2002) Consciousness and the Novel, London: Penguin Books. Martin, Wallace (1986), Recent Theories of Narrative, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, New York. McHale, Brian (2001), Postmodernist Fiction, Routledge London and New York. Onega, Susana, Garca J. A. Landa ed. (1996), Narratology: An Introduction, Longman, London and New York. Prince, Gerald (2003), Dictionary of Narratology. University of Nebraska Press, Lincoln. Ricoeur, Paul, Time and Narrative, translated by Kathleen Blamey and David Pellauer (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), vol. 3. Russ, Joanna (1995), To Write Like a Woman, Indiana: Indiana University Press. Stevenson, Randall (1986), The British Novel since the Thirties. An Introduction, Billings, Worcester, London. Walker, Roland, The Problem of Plot in the Modernist Text, Publication of the Illinois Philological Association, http://castle.eiu.edu/~ipaweb/pipa/volume/walker.htm Woolf, Virginia (1956), Orlando. A Harvest/ HBJ Book, US. Woolf, Virginia (1968), The Years, Penguin Books, London. Woolf, Virginia (1977), To the Lighthouse, Grafton Books, London. Woolf, Virginia (1981), Mrs Dalloway, Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, New York. Woolf, Virginia (1992), Between the Acts, Penguin Books, London. Woolf, Virginia (1994), The Waves, Flamingo Modern Classics, London. Woolf, Virginia (1998), Jacobs Room, Signet Classic, New York. Woolf, Virginia (2002), Flush: A Biography, Vintage Classics. Woolf, Virginia (2003), Mrs Dalloway, Wordsworth Editions Limited, Chatham, Kent, Great Britain. Woolf, Virginia (2003), Night and Day, Mariner Books, New York. Woolf, Virginia (2006), The Voyage Out, Project Gutenberg eBook.

ELEMENTS OF CULTURE SHOCK IN THEIR DYNAMICS IN NEIL BISSOONDATHS THE INNOCENCE OF AGE AND THE SHORT STORIES
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It is common knowledge that the phenomenon of migration in the contemporary world brings along the effect of culture shock due to the incongruence of the forms of expression of cultural values. Bissoondaths fiction raises problems concerning identity and belonging especially for the visible minorities, whose adjustment to a new culture is a process of negotiation with the host culture, based on the idea that culture is about shared meanings (Hall 1). Bissoondath approaches belonging in relation to the characters cultural memories, feelings and attitudes challenged by the diasporic circumstances of Canadian multicultural society. The process of negotiation is imbalanced and both in the short stories and the novel The Innocence of Age there are characters of mixed cultural Indo-Caribbean-Canadian experience who express feelings of marginalization and homelessness characteristic of the traumatic experience of displacement in the postmodern world. Bissoondath also deconstructs race and ethnicity as concepts of difference in the multicultural framework, perceived as encouraging isolation and stereotyping of the cultural groups, whereas focusing on superficial differences at the expense of human similarities. Keywords: representation, multiculturalism, family as cultural value, difference, ethnicity.

1. An Upsurge in Interest Concerning the Study of Values 1.1. Dimensionalist Theories of Values The main directions in the study of values have been established by Geert Hofstede who proposed the theory of the five dimensions of culture, Shalom Schwartz with an inventory of social values which provides national comparisons between cultures to assess the ways of thinking and acting in different countries and last but not least Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel with the revised theory of modernization and postmodernization based on a comparative sociological study on eighty societies. In the recent decades there have been extensive comparative studies of values as for instance European Values Survey and World Values Survey, relevant for the change of societies towards postmodernity. These thorough analyses explain the process of social change from modernity to postmodernity based on cultural arguments. The process of change should be understood in a

Drd., University of Bucharest, Literary and Cultural Studies, e-mail: [email protected]

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larger frame of analysis which takes into consideration the phenomenon of globalisation and the intensification of migrations South-North, East-West. It is important to mention that it has been developed a new connection between the local and the global in relation to culture. The integration or assimilation of migrants require understanding and mutual acceptance of shared values. Values are explicit or implicit conceptions about what is desirable. They are not directly observable, involving cognitive, evaluative and affective elements; they are relatively stable over time and determine behaviour and attitudes; they determine and are determined by other values as they do not exist alone, but in systems of values, an aspect which characterizes both the society and the individual. Thus, values influence peoples behaviour and the characteristics of social environment. There are three major sets of theories of values in the contemporary study of values. The analysis is based on cross-cultural dimensions of values and identifies common values to enable the comparison of cultures regardless of the historical moment of comparison: Geert Hofstedes Theory of the Five Dimensions of Culture; Shalom Schwartzs Inventory of Social Values which provides national comparisons between cultures to assess the modes of thinking and acting in different countries; Ronald Inglehart and Christian Welzel's Theories of Modernization and Postmodernization, as a comparative explanation on eighty societies. The main question is why values are so important for both individuals and cultures. Values are ideas about what is important in life and they guide the rest of culture. Geert Hofstede defines values as a broad tendency to prefer certain states of affairs over others (2000: 4). Hofstede, Schwartz, and Inglehart & Welzel have established dimensionalist models of value interpretation based on cross-cultural studies. Thus, the study of values emphasize that they are situated at the core of these models as they are the landmark of a culture. The theorists research is based on large segments of population from different cultures and draw attention to certain overlaps between the value dimensions. Inglehart and Welzel (2005) identify two dimensions of cultural variation which cover 85% of the worlds population: the first dimension emphasizes the shift from traditional values to secular rational values in industrial societies and the second dimension focuses on the shift from survival values to self-expression values in post-industrial societies. These dimensions correspond to cultural zones which reflect a persistent historical heritage. The majority of the former postcolonial countries are now democratic societies or aspiring to democracy. The development of the social emancipative forces and self-expression values are the most important factors of pressure in democracy. However, in these countries slow economic development determines stagnation at the level of basic human needs, according to Abraham Maslaws pyramid of needs. Their aspirations for freedom are hindered or are not given top priority in the social hierarchy of values. Historical factors as for instance the colonial histories of some countries determine cultural clusters (38) of countries whose cultures

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present certain common aspects. Any change of values takes time and the theorists bring as argument the theory of intergenerational value change based on two hypotheses. The scarcity hypothesis supports the idea that peoples priorities depend on their socio-economic conditions and in conditions of scarcity people give top priority to materialistic goals. The second hypothesis called the socialization hypothesis focuses on the time interval required for intergenerational replacement: Moreover, the older generations in each society tend to transmit their values to their children; this cultural heritage is not easily dispelled, but if it is inconsistent with ones first hand experience, it can gradually erode (98). The theorists underline the necessity of interpreting scarcity hypothesis in connection with socialization hypothesis, as a persons feeling of security depends on the social context and also on the social welfare institutions, which bring in discussion the fact that richer countries tend to feel more secure than poor countries. The aspect of value change also relates to the issue of tradition, how much is transmitted and if the content of this heritage remains unchanged. Tradition, as the wisdom of generations, which provides past beliefs, norms, and values for the present time, can be ambivalent. From the same perspective Inglehart and Welzel relate tradition to socialization, as the main instrument in transmitting cultural traditions. They argue that this process does not necessarily reproduce a given value system unchanged. Fundamental value change takes place gradually; for the most part, it occurs as younger generation replaces an older one in adult population of society (99). This theory also explains why modernization process and development in many former postcolonial countries require a few decades for consistent effects.

1.2. Geert Hofstedes Onion Diagram Depicts the Visible Manifestations of Culture at Different Levels of Depth Based on these models of interpretation, it is relevant to start the approach of Canadian multiculturalism from the onion diagram (10) designed by Hofstede to depict the visible manifestations of culture at different levels of depth. The value model of a society consists of fundamental values, as the hard core element of culture, and then the level of practices (whose meaning lies in the interpretation of the cultural insiders): rituals, heroes, and symbols pictured as the layers of an onion. The core values are values validated uniquely by the community throughout a shared history, therefore not easily changeable. The stability of a national cultural model, according to Hofstede, is given by the societal norms as systems of values shared by the groups of a certain culture, which also lead to a structuring of institutions. Hofstedes model implies that the cultural differences among countries cannot be understood outside the study of the historical context and that change takes place at the exterior layers of the onion diagram.

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Clifford Geerts proposes a reformulation of the concept of culture which does not emphasize the patterns of behaviour depending on place and time, but it focuses on the mechanisms that shape human behaviour: rules, instructions, or recipes. He proposes a control-mechanism view on culture (45) in which the act of thinking is both individual and public as it uses significant symbols, words, gestures, even real objects to give meaning to the experience or the events lived in a community. Without these cultural patterns, which are organized systems of significant symbols, mans behaviour would be virtually shapeless (48). Our ideas, our values, our acts, even our emotions, are like our nervous systems cultural products (50) they are manufactured culturally while there are of course tendencies, capacities, dispositions which we are born with. At this point it is necessary to relate the study of values to the definition of culture from Hofstedes perspective: Culture as mental programming is also the crystallization of history in the minds, hearts and hands of present generation. The origins of cultural differences, if explainable at all, presume a comparative study of history (2000: 12). The paradigm of value change traces cultures along certain vectors or dimensions. G. Hofstede introduces the concept of dimensions of culture (15) based on an inquiry about the philosophical opposition between the specific, the general, the different and the similar in the framework of the comparative study of many societies. He analyzes societies along five dimensions: power distance, uncertainty avoidance, individualism, masculinity, and long-term orientation. Power distance is approached in relation to the problem of human inequality; uncertainty avoidance is correlated to the way societies deal with an unknown future; individualism relates to human rights, political democracy and market capitalism, while collectivism is concerned with group interests; masculinity refers to a societys focus on economic growth and competition, versus femininity which relates to supporting the needy in the country (welfare state) and in the world (development cooperation) and also preservation of the global environment; long-term orientation of cultures expresses pragmatism in politics versus short-term orientation which deals with principles and rights. The relevance of his study to this paper is the aspect that the different cultural profile of different countries can lead for instance to a difficult integration of the newcomers in terms of migration.

2. Cultural Diversity: Intercultural, Multicultural or Transcultural 2.1. Mary Peepre-Bordessa Canadian Literature: a Major Cultural Transformation (53) Not only Canadian society but also Canadian literature as a whole reflects an increasing awareness of cultural diversity, difference and adaptations. It is

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what Peepre-Bordessa calls a major cultural transformation (53). The Canadian writer, as a sensitive voice who comes from a visible minority, can express both here and there simultaneously, in writings which try to internalize and come to terms with the dual cultural worlds from which it derives (52). In doing so the writer goes beyond the cultural barriers, he/she transcends limitations, either national, ethnic, or racial expressing a new kind of pluralistic world-view as well as a fragmented reality which characterizes the postmodern actuality of Canada today (52). For objective reasons Peepre-Bordessa classifies or identifies the so-called narratives of interaction (52) which depict the effects of the encounters between majority and minority cultures within Canada, and Bissoondaths novel The Innocence of Age and the short stories belong to this type of writing. The characters various cultural interactions contribute to shaping their identities through the crossing of barriers which influence the original cultural heritage. In the novel, the characters identities are the result of a constitutive process, but (that) this process itself must be seen as a permanent hybridization and nomadization (Mouffe110). The characters identity is built in various interactions and its elements are interdependent, developing in a cultural space the borders of which are rather porous. Thus identity manifests openness towards the exterior. As any theory about identity relates to other, it is relevant to illustrate the aspect with Chantal Mouffes and Wolfgang Welschs arguments. Chantal Mouffe considers that identity is always a relation with the other based on conflict. On the other hand, Sarup Madans arguments on the crossing of borders involve conflict and mutual understanding, inclusion and exclusion at the same time. She defines the migrant as a person who crosses the border (Sarup 94) whose identity is somehow tied to the concept of home, too: the story we tell of ourselves and which is also the story others tell of us (95).

2.2. Wolfgang Welschs Conceptualization of Cultures Cultural encounters in todays world are also approached by the philosopher Wolfgang Welsch. He discusses the concepts of interculturality and multiculturality in opposition to the traditional concept of cultures as spheres (3). Welsch ranks these concepts and he posits transculturality as a more appropriate term to describe the changes that different cultures undergo nowadays. According to Welsch, interculturality suffers of a structural inability to communicate between cultures, (3) while multiculturality is surprisingly similar to it, except that it addresses to cultures living together within one society (3). To depict the complex dynamics of todays cultures, which are internally interconnected and emerge from one another, Welsch describes the phenomenon based on the concept of transculturality which passes through the classical cultural boundaries of

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homogenizing cultures. Welschs conceptualization of cultures is also related to the aspect of hybridization of cultures which are seen as a network of cultures, or cultures with an altered cultural constitution (4). Transculturality is a different way of understanding cultural diversity, which applies both to the macro and micro level. The individuals cultural identity (understood as detached from the civic identity) has become hybrid in the process of cultural formation, enriched by various influences in a process of unification and differentiation, thus transcultural. This way of interpreting the relations between or among cultures regards identity not as a fixed entity, but as a process leading to the integration of components of different cultural origin. 3. Culture Shock and the Dynamics of Hybrid Canadian Immigrant Identity 3.1. Geert Hofstedes Acculturation Curve: Stages of Adjustment to a New Culture in Terms of Migration The acculturation curve proposed by Geert Hofstede explores the stages of adjustment to a new culture in terms of migration. The first phase of the process of adjustment to a different culture is characterized by the immigrants feeling of euphoria of seeing new places. Then the second phase is actually the culture shock. In the third phase which is the acculturation phase, the immigrant has adjusted to a new environment and integrated in a new social network. The fourth phase corresponds to the stable state of mind, which may remain negative compared to that in the home country, for example if the immigrant continues feeling a foreigner and discriminated against. It may be as good as before, in which case the immigrant can be considered to be biculturally adapted, or it may be better. In the last case the immigrant has gone native he or she has become more Roman than the Romans (426). It is common knowledge that the phenomenon of migration in the contemporary world brings along the effect of culture shock, as a newcomer will judge the new culture by the old values and find it lacking (424). Bissoondaths fiction raises problems concerning identity and belonging especially for the immigrants who belong to the so-called visible minorities, whose adjustment to a new culture is a process of negotiation which should take into consideration the reaction of the host culture, based on the idea that culture is about shared meanings (Hall 1). Bissoondath is interested not so much of where does one belong but how does one belong (Jain 10) and the aspect is also approached in relation to the cultural memories, feelings and attitudes challenged by the diasporic circumstances of a multicultural society. Such a process of negotiation is imbalanced and both in the short stories and the novel The Innocence of Age there are a few characters of mixed Indo-Caribbean-Canadian cultural experience who express feelings of marginalization

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and homelessness characteristic of the trauma of displacement (Mishra 58) in the postmodern world. The Innocence of Age can also be read as an allegory of multiculturalism, in which the metaphor of house is depicted in a dynamic from home to homelessness. In the novel Bissoondath deconstructs race and ethnicity as concepts of difference in a multicultural framework, perceived as encouraging isolation and stereotyping of the cultural groups, whereas focusing on superficial differences at the expense of human similarities. 3.2. Migration, Cultural Change from the Value Perspective and the Effect of Culture Shock in Neil Bissoondaths The Innocence of Age The Innocence of Age is a title which reflects a paradox: the age of innocence is actually the age of maturity which characterizes protagonists like Pasco, the middle aged Canadian whose real name is Gilbert Taggart, or his friend Montgomery Bird, a man in his fifties who left Grenada, his home country to emigrate to Canada sixteen years before. In opposition to this aspect, the second generation, Charlene Bird or Daniel Taggart, who are in their youth, seem to have lost their innocence early in life, for different reasons. Such positioning among the members of a family can easily lead to strained relations between generations. Thus family conflict increases in complexity and intensity throughout the narration as emphasized by Pasco, a character-bound narrator, who belongs to the Canadian mainstream. The story is set in Toronto in the 1970s and 1980s, with flashbacks both in time and space, which offer an insight upon the characters contrasting feelings and identity construction. The fact that not all characters are Canadian born stands for Bissoondaths upsurge in interest in the Indo-Caribbean culture, despite his frequent claim that his fiction is Canadian. Throughout the novel, the evolution of the secondary characters like Sita, an Indo-Caribbean economic migrant , whose country of origin is not directly mentioned by the author, Montgomery Bird and his family coming from Grenada, or Viv and Deanna, a West Indian immigrant couple reflect certain feelings which are expressed in their behaviour as evidence of cultural shock: classic features of IndoCaribbean experience such as feelings of exile, marginalization, homelessness, impermanence and transience (Jain 2005: 28). Montgomery Bird comes to Canada attracted not by the land in itself, but by the perspective of a good job the work and the money, not the place (9). At the beginning of his life in Toronto, Montgomery sees his mailman life as a kind of success (Bissoondath 1992: 15), as he confesses to Pasco during one of their friendly talks at the Greasy Spoon, the restaurant Pasco owns. Montgomery talks about his way of understanding of family as a cultural value with a close friend, also a member of Canadian mainstream. It is an emotional scene in which Pasco explains success in terms of family responsibility as a thorough

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value in life: You provide for your family. Id say thats success (16). Montgomery understands not only his family life but also his work and social relations based on his culture of origin, referring to the inhabitants of Grenada as my people (8). At the same time he hopes that his children will not be narrowly circumscribed by race and class barriers, and an instance concerning this aspect is Montgomerys intention to name his first child Doctor:
I ever tell you I wanted to name him Doctor? Name him what? You hearin me right. I figure that way he was goin to be Doctor Bird all his life, and there aint nothin like a title to bring respect. (14)

In other words Montgomery hopes that by copying or applying a successful matrix or shortcut to a respectful status, the fundamental value will be automatically incorporated. His children and family relations outline are seen by Montgomery in the original family paradigm. He often refers to his family as the Paradise: Where I come from, Pasco, it aint hard to know what a man is He patted the bulge of his wallet in his back pocket. A man is food and a house. And a manis children (212). Montgomery is defined by his role of a loving father and devoted husband and he bears no emotional attachment to Canadian land. It is a principle that guides his life according to a familiar, patriarchal pattern of understanding family as a cultural value: discipline, and good education are the ingredients of success, they can help Montgomerys children make a good life in the world, and be respected by the others. Family as a cultural value is certainly positive as values (being cultural ideals) are always positive (Ester 8), but the practical outcomes in Montgomerys case involve mainly negative effects. Difference in terms of values understanding begins at home and one of Montgomerys children does not share her fathers view on life. His younger child, Charlene, her fathers Nutmeg, Just like the nutmeg spice back home (15) deeply disappoints Montgomery who cannot influence or really communicate to her anymore. The sixteen-year-old Canadian-born girl is nicknamed by her brother Liberty Bell as she keeps talking of freedom to do whatever she chooses to, despite her parents advice. Charlene is exposed to different cultural influences in her private and public life, but her system of values is shaped mainly by Canadian culture where she develops in the pre-adult years. The teenagers behaviour also reflects the cultural shift of Canadian society towards postmodernity. A number of observers of contemporary cultural change point to the fact that this shift has oriented towards individualization. This orientation means personal growth, self-expression, creativity, equality, democracy, personal freedom, gender concerns (Ester 9). For Charlene culture shock takes place in the family life due to the pressure between two conflicting values systems which regard the same reality. Her reaction is to adhere to different values and lifestyles than her parents or she has a different understanding of the same cultural value. Consequently the family bonds do not act as adaptive tools

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anymore, as they are not subject to change and negotiation in the cultural process but remain inflexible. In contrast to his sister Charlene, who is exposed mainly to Canadian culture and feels different from the other members of her family, Montgomerys son has a different trajectory in Canada, mainly due to the fact that he has known the initial cultural system, before the familys emigration. Nutmeg Charlene places herself at a certain distance from the source culture, and in an attempt to confirm her value she denies her roots, ending up a promiscuous woman, rejected by both worlds. Compared to the other rootless characters of the novel, she does not feel the phantom ache in an amputated limb (Sarup 96), although she experiences its social effects. Under these circumstances the characters alienate from one another and the cultural clash of the values leads to tense family relations which weaken the family cohesion and prevents a successful social integration in Canadian multicultural society. Montgomery does not have the adequate instruments to solve the conflicting situations he is faced with: despite the fact that he directly experiences Canadian culture that encompasses a multitude of life styles, he fails to internalize the meaning system of the host culture. Actually Montgomery applies the old cultural codes of understanding the world to Canadian context, which basically remains puzzling to him, both as the laws and social code of conduct. In one of his dialogues with Pasco he admits that his parental skills are limited and cannot hope for success in his childrens education: Sometimes I does think that the trick to being a parent is jus learning how to survive (Bissoondath 1992:16). The character appears enriched by his diverse life experience in Canada, which is characterized by different cultural determinants, but paradoxically he is unable to perform the integration of components of differing cultural origin (Welsch 198). In the process of adjustment to Canadian culture Montgomery performs a mental repositioning accompanied by a feeling of inadequacy as culture shock is a result of the lived or direct experience, actually of the way he perceives the changes in the social conditions. The fact that Montgomery does not easily accommodate to the new culture affects all the aspects of his life and he gets to be charged with assault by his union representative, after drinking a couple of beers at lunchtime at work. Montgomerys failure to adjust to authority in its different forms and such resistance in a new context, due to the patriarchal way of thinking is reflected by other aspects of life as for example Montgomerys work environment. An instance which illustrates this inability can be found at the beginning of Montgomerys Canadian journey, when he also fails to identify and interpret well-known Canadian symbols like the CN Tower which he calls The Seein Tower (Bissoondath 1992: 124). Gradually, he becomes aware of his inability of connecting properly to the realities of a different society and culture and usually shares his frustration with close friends:

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Oh, I see the letters awright, but the idea was aready in my head. The Seein Tower. Everythin was so new, man, I jus didnt connec the two. When you adjustin to a new country, it have a lot of things you doesnt connect. (124)

Once in Canada, Montgomery lives by a model he has designed back home which is the projection of his desires and hopes for a better life for his family. Actually this aspect overlaps with the main characteristic of culture shock: these projections are based on the original culture and cannot match Canadian reality. During the initial steps of the intercultural encounters Montgomery operates at the level of the superficial manifestations of culture: symbols, heroes and rituals (Hofstede 424). The fact that he does not recognize the CN Tower proves that he lacks basic knowledge and understanding of Canadian culture, but also that mere accumulation of knowledge, without a change of attitude and adjustment of the value system does not contribute to a successful integration in Canadian society. Another symptom of culture shock is also the perception of current events based on stereotypes, which applies both to the immigrant individuals or groups and the host society. For instance Pasco associates Montgomery with Harry Belafonte, simply based on the colour of his skin, but he gradually becomes aware of certain differences: But Montgomerry also had knobbier features, a less glaring grin, a stockier build (Bissoondath 1992: 13). Pasco, as a Canadian born person, has forced his perception into a stereotypical image of the people pf colour, but a positive image connected to a hero of colour he has acquired in time. As Pasco seeks constructive interaction, the stereotype does not prevent communication, and it works as its starting point. Pasco becomes aware that he hadnt been able to look past the forest to see the individuality of the tree (13). Paradoxically, not only Montgomery misinterprets the local gestures, but it appears that in turn his gestures are mistakenly interpreted by the representatives of the host society who blame him of mental disorder manifested both at work and at home. Montgomery dies tragically and unexpectedly, along the corridor of his building, shot by Kurt, a young policeman prone to violence, who claims self-defence. The incident escalates in a media event which involves the city officials and anti-racist political activists. Consequently, Montgomerys individuality is dissipated, marked as a cause by the agendas of others (285). Thus Montgomery stands for universal values and Bissoondath depicts him as a character that does not see the world based on the colour of his skin, as his son highlights by the end of the novel:
These people, they wont leave us alone. They see a racist under every bed. One ofem even told my sister that having white skin automatically means youre a racist. Guilty until proven innocent. (306)

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Ironically enough, Toronto, the city of tolerance and multiculturalism spreads racism and pain, which can be interpreted not only as Montgomerys failure to connect to Canadian culture but the reverse also applies, as the act of belongingis also a social act. It entails acceptance by the other (Jain 10). Montgomerys dream of successful immigration ends tragically and the message of the novel goes beyond the individuals destiny to a critique of the Canadian society which treats its newcomers as the Other:
There had been a time when no strangers wandered the streets, for newcomers were quickly absorbed, became familiar. Now people came and went with casual regularity, identities tightly guarded. (Bissoondath 1992: 120)

Montgomery is perceived by Canadian people as a stranger, a process which is accompanied by the cultural exclusion or construction of the unfamiliar as a permanent Other. Thus, Taylor has emphasized that recognition influences self-perception whereas misrecognition can lead to a complex of inferiority and a distorted image of the self, the feelings of inadequacy, discrimination, oppression or inauthenticity which apply to groups and individuals equally (1994: 38 ). The deep meanings of the process are depicted by Sarup Madan who refers to this state of being physically close while remaining culturally remote in an attempt of blurring cultural lines (101-102). This is an aspect of multiculturalism, subtly criticized by Bissoondath, and illustrated by the evolution of the immigrant characters both in the novel and the short stories. The deep problems of multiculturalism as the political accommodation of minorities (Modood 2008: 110) are symbolically expressed by the metaphor of the house, which reveals various forms of the disintegration of the social ties. Sita, an economic migrant from the Caribbean lives illegally in a house situated in a poor area of Toronto, in which marginalized people can afford paying rent for a temporary shelter, maybe the last before their death. Bissoondath depicts this aspect, instrumented by the metaphor of the house as shelter, to give voice to the problems people encounter in a multicultural society: isolation, lack of communication and understanding, as here, human interaction is built in a mechanical way and does not lead to cohesion. Once inside the house the characters experience the darkness of a claustrophobic space which has bare cell rooms and narrow corridors. Similar to the public places the corridor is destined to illicit or anonymous communication, where tenants finally dare to express their anger and lack of hope in vulgar ways. However there is one room whose walls are scribbled with existential issues, a room in which the tenant, a thinker so-called Mr. Bell, always dressed up in a suit, as Sita explains to Daniel Taggart, expresses his frustrations in a different register. It is a silent voice which pierces the sterility of a house characterized by profound absence of life: hed felt it for it was felt, not seen only from his

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mothers corpse (Bissoondath 1992: 132). Coincidentally, Mr. Bell is one of the street people that Pasco Taggart happens to offer meals in his greasy spoon, an interesting character that can pay one dollar for a meal and also leave one dollar tip, without saying a word. These characters maladjustment to Canadian society is also an effect of culture shock at its extreme forms, such as violence. Mr. Bells dignified and humane behaviour turns into a determined reaction against violence through violence, emphasized by an incident in which Pasco is threatened by Emile, a member of a local gang. Mr. Bell or Sklewy, as Pasco calls him, becomes a symbol of humanity and loyalty which people who belong together show to one another. It is part of Bissoondaths message that humanity is a universal value which brings people together, transcending fixed categories of race, class or gender. This is the place where Daniel Taggart, asked to rebuild the house, overhears a scene in which Sita is physically abused by Mr. Simmons, the owner who keeps her in the house against her will, refusing to return the passport and other travelling documents. Thus Sita is subject to commodity trafficking, and this is indicative of multiculturalism weaknesses. Bissondaths message is that multiculturalism, identified with the structure of the house, needs reconstruction so that to ensure equal treatment to all citizens, irrespective of class, gender, or race. Sitas discreet presence in Mr. Simmons house is the presence of a marginalized individual in search of a voice of her own, timidly asking for her rights, basically in an attempt of recovering her civic and cultural identity. Not only Simmons but for a while even Danny locates Sita as the Other. Such a deformed perception of the other is explained by Hofstede as a tendency of members of host cultures receiving foreign visitors, sojourners, or migrants to show psychological reactions that mirror those of the foreigners: They usually start with curiosity the foreigner as a rare zoo animal (424). The recognition of her cultural difference is not beneficial to Sita, on the contrary, it prevents her from becoming an integral part of Canadian society. Sita belongs to the diasporic community of Caribbean immigrants and she experiences oppression in the country which promises the immigrants integration in terms of respect and equality. Meanwhile Sita writes home fantasizing about life in the Canadian haven (Mishra 23). Her behaviour is typical in terms of the expectations of the immigrants and their families: Caribbean immigrants in Canada must keep up pretence of enjoying the fruits of the promised land in Canada, regardless of whatever poverty, exploitation, discrimination or alienation they might actually suffer (Jain 2005: 88). Towards the end of the novel Sita seeks revenge against Simmons and through violence she sets herself free.

3.3. Elements of culture shock in Bissoondaths short stories The same topic of culture shock regarding immigrants adjustment to a multicultural society can be traced in many of Bissoondaths short stories.

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Security and Insecurity are two short stories which deal with Caribbean immigrants in Canada, too. Actually Security which appears in the volume entitled On the Eve of Uncertain Tomorrows (1990) is a sequel to Insecurity from Bissoondaths first volume Digging up the Mountains (1985) in which Alistair Ramgoolam makes plans for immigrating to Canada. Security is a story of cultural adjustment to different circumstances in which uncertainties, distrust, disappointment and loneliness reflect the individual struggle for a place in Canadian society, in which, paradoxically, material security leads to the imbalance of the value system which induces a feeling of insecurity:
The more insecure he saw his island becoming, the more secure he himself felt. From this secure insecurity a new attitude, one of which he had never before been aware, arose in him. The island of his birth, on which he had grown up and he had made his fortune, was transformed by a process of mind into a kind of temporary home. (Bissoondath 1985: 72)

Alistair Ramgoolam experiences disorientation due to culture shock from the moment he sets foot in Toronto. For him Canada is a foreign land which estranged him from his sons, and later on his wife and even from his deep self. All the intercultural encounters show Alistair repeatedly that Canada can not be perceived as his home, as home means for him a point of reference from which they could reassure themselves of their place in the world (93), but most of all home is familiarity and a certain way of doing things. As a solution to insecurity, Mr. Ramgoolam attempts at reinforcing tradition to give meaning to his life in Toronto or fill in the cultural gaps as he is not perceived as the bread winner and the head of the family anymore:
He was single-handedly fighting a war of domestic skirmishes to uphold traditions which, he acknowledged, had meant little to him before but which suddenly, inexplicably, loomed in importance. Challenged by his sons, he could not explain their new value; could not when confronted by his wifes weary hesitation, justify his renewed reliance on them; just knew that in this alien land, far from all that had created him, far from all that he had created, they were vital. (Bissoondath 1990: 107)

Actually he perceives Canada through the prism of what it is not the same as on the Caribbean island or in other words Ramgoolam locates symbolically, not geographically, Toronto and Canada at the other pole of the Caribbean. His identity, as the conceptual framework within which he develops commitments and identifications (Taylor 1989: 40), emphasizes Ramgoolams ethnocentric position towards the Canadians who are the pagans, from his point of view, while the culture on the Caribbean island is superior as practices and perspective on life. For instance, Ramgoolam is not so much afraid of death, but that his soul will not be properly taken care of; he fears assimilation more than death and this can be also interpreted as a step further in his diasporic consciousness (Jain 67).

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It was from this loneliness, this sense of abandonment, that emerged Mr. Ramgoolams deepest worry: would his sons do for him after his death all that he had done for his parents after theirs? Would they and, beyond this, could they, in this country fulfil their cremation duties, feed his hungry and wandering soul, have themselves ritually shaved beside a river, dispatch his soul to wherever with the final farewell ceremony? (Bissoondath 1990: 108)

His cultural lens prevents Alistair, and also Montgomery, from perceiving things as they are, of a different value which comes from this difference in itself. Alistairs and Montgomerys systems of values prove to be inflexible and they cannot build points of connection with the new culture. Therefore their identities are no longer negotiable or domains of difference (Bhabha 2) but essentialist categories. A story of adjustment to a different culture and coming to terms to the characters own culture is depicted by Bissoondath in the short story The Cage from the same volume, Digging up the Mountains. Michi is a Japanese woman in search of her identity who comes to experience Canadian culture on her own choice but in an attempt to escape the familys confinement: Tradition designed my cage. My father built it. Keisuke locked it (Bissoondath 1985: 68). The themes of displacement and dislocation explain her journey to the North-American continent, which is a place completely alien to Miki. She is portrayed in clear opposition to her mother who has completely surrendered to the cultural tradition and the rigors of a patriarchal society: I am, in the end, tangible proof of my mothers failure as a woman (41). The relationship father-daughter is a power relation in favour of the former who makes efforts to transplant the cultural values in her (Prasad 281). She does not share affinities with any relative: Accepting my fathers values would make life easier for me. But I cannot do this automatically. I am not a clock (Bissoondath 1985: 68). As soon as she arrives in Toronto, Michi feels free from the restrictive bondage of the Japanese culture and attempts to find her place in the world. Her look on this different world bears the traces of the home culture as she feels foreign on a foreign land. Actually, her first contact with the wide world has been mediated by a childrens book, a gift from her father:
My father in giving me the book had stressed the obvious: the ugliness of the foreigners, the beauty of the Samurai. But my mind was gripped by the roughness, the apparent unpredictability of the foreigners. The Samurai were of a cold beauty: you knew what to expect of them, and in this my father saw virtue. For me, the foreigners were creatures who could have exploded with a suddenness that was like charm. Looking at them I wondered about their houses, their food, their families. I wanted to know what they thought and how they felt. (42)

In Canada Michi gradually becomes aware of the cultural differences and of the fact that she is perceived as a foreigner. While learning English with a

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tutor she listens to his ideas which are a proof of the stereotypical way the western people perceive the Asians: He insisted that I, being a Japanese person, never eat bread, only rice and vegetables and raw fish and nothing else. He would not believe that I had tasted my first mac in Tokyo (94). Michi chooses to return to tradition and her identity is permanently reinvented, as much as tradition, to match her changing tendencies. Michi discovers that her grandmother from her fathers side, whose name she bears, used to be like her, not submissive to authority in any form, and this connection gives Michi a different understanding of the family value and she chooses to come back home. Thus she comes to terms with the initial the initial value system which is enriched with different meanings and completes and confirms her identity:
I am a woman, I am a Japanese woman I still look to the east when I take a medicine and the ties of tradition still bind me the way they bind Miki. To understand oneself is insufficient. (67)

No man is an island. (66)

Conclusions The paper identifies elements of culture shock in their dynamics in a multicultural society under the influence of globalization in Bissoondaths novel The Innocence of Age and short stories. As it is illustrated in the methodological part of the paper I have approached the concept of culture shock in relation to culture and values, as culture components which help the characters give meaning to their lived experiences. The discussion of the characters cultural identity and the process of adjustment to Canadian society are related to the concepts of interculturalism and transculturalism which reflect the dynamic of the world which changes. The immigrant characters in The Innocence of Age are economic migrants from the Caribbean, although Bissondath does not openly reveal the country of origin. The presence of Caribbean immigrants in Canadian social fabric has become significant beginning with the years 1960s when Canada gradually turned its attention toward non-traditional sources of immigration. By the beginning of the 21st century, the proportion of people with British, French, and/or Canadian ethnic origins (the term was first introduced in the 1996 census) had dropped to below one-half of the total population (46%). This increased diversity was evident in the 2001 census, in which more than 200 different ethnic origins were reported. This aspect of Canadian social reality emphasizes the relevance of my analysis of culture shock, because visible ethnic and racial minorities have become a significant part of Canadian reality. Bissoondaths novel and the short stories reflect aspects of the years 1970s when Canadas approach of multiculturalism has

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often been described using metaphors such as the cultural mosaic or the harmonious interaction between communities. The metaphor refers to the focus of Canadian multiculturalism on accommodating the changing needs of an increasingly diverse Canadian society. Practice or peoples direct perception of multiculturalism reflects serious problems. Most immigrants from developing countries have found in Canada a better life, economically speaking, but they have faced culture shock. One of the reasons is that they come with a different cultural heritage than that of Canadian mainstream. Adjustment takes time until every newcomer finds his/her own way in the existing network of social relations (Geerts 145). The characters main motivation to immigrate to Canada is not the country in itself but the job perspectives, the opportunities of material safety. The paradigm of Montgomerys existence for example is not flexible as it is dominated by a patriarchal way of understanding not only his family life but also work. He bears a wrong perception of reality which prevents him from adjusting to Canadian society and culture. Such a perspective on life is not the only source of culture shock: a different understanding of the same cultural value can lead to frustration and a feeling of inadequacy. The aspect can be observed both at people from different and the same culture, which belong to different generations as it is the case of Montgomery Bird and his daughter Charlene. The dream of successful immigration or high expectations which often fail to be accomplished due to cultural exclusion or the treatment of a newcomer as other amplify culture shock, especially for the first generation of immigrants. This aspect is illustrated in Bissoondaths works, reflecting the route from culture shock to the necessity of a modified behaviour. This puts pressure on the individuals values system which gives meaning and coherence in the interpretation of reality. Members of Canadian society perceive the immigrants as strangers or foreigners and this treatment of difference leads to the latters isolation. The action of the novel and the short stories is set in the city. Living in metropolitan areas corresponds to a tendency of these minorities to join communities of people from the same culture. Canadian cities have gradually become more cosmopolitan but more important is the cosmopolitan attitude of culturally and ethnically diverse people who interact in Canadian multicultural society. Anthony Kwame Appiah supports a position of partial cosmopolitanism (Appiah xvii) which aims at creating habits of coexistence (Appiah xix) by developing a culture of conversation which does not seek total agreement or consensus but cultural exchange in a transcultural conversation. This crossing of borders unites the members of diverse cultures on the level of discursive exchange. Appiah stresses the role of universal values as patterns of interaction or basis of a common humanity (11). They guide people who engage in a constructive conversation which welcome differences and overcome culture shock.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Appiah, Kwame Anthony (2007), Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers, Norton, New York. Abramson, Paul R., Ronald Inglehart (1995), Value Change in Global Perspective, University of Michigan Press, Michigan. Bhabha, Homi (1994, 2007), The Location of Culture, Routledge, London and New York. Bissoondath, Neil (1985), Digging up the Mountains, MacMillan, Toronto. Bissoondath, Neil (1992), The Innocence of Age, Alfred A. Knopf Canada, Toronto. Geerts, Clifford (1973), The Interpretation of Cultures, Basic Books, New York. Ester, Peter, Michael Brown et al. (2006), Globalization, Value Change, and Generations A Cross-National Perspective European Values Studies, Brill, Leiden. Hall, Stuart (1997, 2003), Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices, in Stuart Hall (ed.), The Work of Representation, Sage Publications, London, pp. 1-75. Hofstede, Geert (2000), Cultures Consequences: Comparing Values, Behaviour, Institutions and Organizations across Nations, Sage Publications, London. Inglehart, Ronald, Christian Welzel (2005), Modernization, Cultural Change, and Democracy: the Human Development Sequence, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Jain, Jasbir (2005), Indo-Caribbean-Canadian Diaspora, Rawat Publications, New Delhi. Modood, Tariq (2008), Multiculturalism, Citizenship and National Identity, in Bryan Turrner, Eugen Isin et al. (eds.), Investigating Citizenship: Between Past and Future, Routledge, 2008, pp.109-129. Mishra, Vijay (2007), The Literature of the Indian Diaspora: Theorizing the Diasporic Imaginary, Routledge, London. Peepre-Bordessa, Mari (1994), Transcultural Travels: Essays in Canadian Literature and Society, in Mari Peepre-Bordessa (ed.), Beyond Multiculture: Canadian Literature in Transition, The Nordic Association of Canadian Studies, Lund, pp. 47-59. Prasad, Amar Nath Amar (2002), Indian Writing in English: Critical Explorations, Sarup and Sons, New Delhi. Mouffe, Chantal (1994), For a Politics of Nomadic Identity, in George Robertson (ed.), Travellers Tales: Narratives of Home and Displacement, Routledge, London, pp. 105-114. Sarup, Madan (1994), Home and Identity, in George Robertson (ed.), Travellers Tales: Narratives of Home and Displacement, Routledge, London, pp. 93-105. Taylor, Charles (1989), Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Taylor, Charles (1994), The Politics of Recognition, in Multiculturalism: Examining the Politics of Recognition, Amy Gutmann (ed.), Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, pp. 25-73.

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MONICA OANC

Margery Kempe is considered to be one of the late medieval mystic writers, although her work was very unconventional, as was her life, which was recorded in her work, making The Book of Margery Kempe the first autobiography in English. In the medieval period, time was closely related to the religious calendar and perceived both as circular, following the liturgy, and linear, as the time of an on-going history, but beyond these two dimensions, Christian time also had a teleological dimension, as Christians valued their spiritual salvation more than their material prosperity. I have shown that The Book of Margery Kempe can convey to us unknown insights regarding the way a medieval middle-class mystic woman perceived time and how a medieval illiterate female-author spatially organised her material to produce her own meanings. The lack of linearity in the text invites the reader to search through the book and to recreate time and his or her personal and spiritual understanding of it. Keywords: medieval, mystic writer, autobiography, pilgrimage, hagiography.

Margery Kempe is often considered to be one of the late medieval mystic writers, although her Book was very unconventional, and did not conform to the established genre of mystical works, and therefore it resists characterisation. As Margery Kempes existence in Kings Lynn (at the time Bishops Lynn) is proven by the documents in the archives, and it seems that the Book partly records her life, it is considered an autobiography; on the other hand there are arguments that it can be interpreted as a treatise1 to help other people deal with their divine visions. Lynn Staley is somewhat radical in separating the author, Kempe, from the protagonist Margery, the subject, discussing The Book as a piece of fiction, an approach which I partially follow. In the medieval period, time was closely supervised by the Church, and was given a sacramental dimension, as everything else in nature. The linear time of an on-going history was centred on the Incarnation and Resurrection of Christ and, thus, human history was given an axis and a reference point. But this horizontal aspect was constantly doubled by a circular feature, which was related to the religious annual calendar and equally to the weekly (or daily)
Assistant, Faculty of Orthodox Theology, e-mail: [email protected]. The term treatyse is used several times to characterise the Book: in the proem, in the preface, and in the eighty-ninth chapter of the first part of the Book and in the last (tenth chapter of the second part).
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liturgy, which re-enacted Christs life, Passion and Resurrection. The third and perhaps the most spiritual dimension of Christian time is its soteriological significance. A Christians life was regarded as a temporary state in which he had to prepare himself for salvation, a purpose which offered believers a teleological component of time. All these interpretations of time, from a Christian perspective can be identified in The Book of Margery Kempe, and I intend to show that this work goes beyond this rigid categorisation, that belongs to Jacques Le Goff, and can be found in his study Time, Work and Culture in the Middle Ages, as well as in Dictionnaire raisonn de lOccident Mdival (Le Goff, Schmitt), which has been translated into Romanian (Dicionarul tematic al Evului Mediu occidental).

1. Time in a Religious Community Margery Kempes World One of the most clearly felt ways in which the Church was present in Christians lives was the call to the regular religious services in church. The daily services and the Sunday mass were the bases for communal life and being part of a community meant integrating in its life of worship. Jacques Le Goff mentions the importance of belfry bells, which chimed the hours for everyone to hear (1980: 35), thus urging believers to go to church or sometimes announcing the time so that people could guide their daily activities accordingly. Margery was a woman of her time, assuming her identity as a housewife, and participating in the liturgy and other services in church, yet she was constantly negotiating her place in society, trying actively to elude her predestined static position and create a new situation for herself. She was aware of the mystical tradition, yet she did not contemplate in silence; on the other hand she did not live the equally silent life of a housewife. She was neither an active merchant nor a business woman, although she tried the latter and she failed. She went on pilgrimages and constantly spoke loudly about God and wept and cried loudly, while suffering the rebukes of those who disliked her as a penance. Hence, she had a liminal identity, at the threshold of different social and religious positions (Oanc, 2009: 121-123). She was a mystic, well known and sometimes infamous2, in her native Lynn, a constant participant at Mass (ch. 61, Kempe 190) and received Holy Communion frequently, sometimes weekly (ch. 57 Kempe 178). There was only one parish in Lynn, St. Margarets Church, and besides it there was a priory and Margery usually went to attend mass at the chapel of the
The priest who wrote her Book initially refused to have anything to do with her and her work, because of her bad reputation, yet through divine intervention he experienced a state of grace in which he cried excessively and he read in several treatises about similar manifestations of piety. These incidents made him change his mind and he agreed to write her Book (ch. 62-63 Kempe 192-193).
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priory, but when she was denied the Holy Communion there, she went to the parish church where she was accepted (ch. 57 Kempe 178). She had a close relationship with her confessor (an anchorite, who constantly encouraged her, ch. 16 and ch. 19 Kempe 73, 82), and, when he died, she cried bitterly and repeatedly at his grave (ch. 60, Kempe 186). She chose another confessor (Master Robert Spryngolde), who also supported her when almost everyone rejected her (ch. 63 Kempe 194). Her close relationship with her confessor as well as her dialogue with several acknowledged holy people, like two anchoresses (Dame Julian, in Norwich and an anchoress in York, ch. 50 Kempe 157), show the fact that her revelations were considered authentic. Other priests, besides her confessor, gave credence to her words and supported her (the vicar of St. Stephens Church in Norwich, ch. 17 Kempe 76; the priest who read her many religious books for seven or eight years, ch. 58 Kempe 182; and a White Friar from Norwich, William Southfield, a good man with a holy life, ch. 18 Kempe 76-77). There are many instances in her narrative that show Margerys attempt to conform to the precepts of the Church, and also her effort to integrate into the daily life and the religious feasts celebrated in her community. 3 When she records her participation into such important feasts, she also mentions her spiritual visions, which re-enact biblical episodes, emphasising the circular pattern of Christian feasts and time, a circularity which is not only dogmatically correct, but also central to Christian worship. Another orthodox behaviour was going on pilgrimage, which she did extensively, travelling to Jerusalem, Rome, and Santiago. During her trips inside the country she was accompanied by her husband, and thus she was not only physically protected by him (against robbers or other dangers of the journey), but her travels were in a way legitimized by the presence of her husband, since in a patriarchal society, as late medieval English society was, a woman needed her husbands approval if she wanted to travel. As her husband was always a good and easygoing man with her (ch. 15 Kempe 68), she valued his company4, although sometimes, when she was rebuked by people for her unusual clothes and preaching, he abandoned her. Because of her constant wish to talk to and about God, a desire that sometimes set her apart from the other Christians, she did not want to live a life of lonely contemplation, but rather, she wanted to live together with other people and to share her experiences with them. Writing her memories was also an attempt to explain herself and establish a relationship with other believers.5
For many years she participated in the Palm Sunday processions with other parishioners (ch.78, Kempe 224), in the celebration of Purification Day (ch. 82 Kempe 239), etc. 4 When her children are mentioned, which is very rarely, they appear only as a hindrance, and although her prayers prove that she prayed for them daily, they do not emerge as characters in her memories, with the exception of her eldest son, who might have been her first scribe. 5 When the Bishop of Lincoln advised her to write down her feelings, she was very determined in saying that they should not be written so soon, but immediately pointed out that they would be written some twenty years later.
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This wish to be part of the living Church in this life is further supported by the way she repeatedly defended herself against accusations of being a Lollard.6 She was accepted by many bishops; one of the first to approve of her behaviour was the bishop of Lincoln. On the other hand, he was reluctant to let her wear white clothes or the mantle and the ring as signs of chastity, although her husband was there and professed his agreement to her wish. It was the Archbishop of Canterbury who gave her a letter to recommend her and to testify to her orthodoxy, in spite of her unusual practices (ch. 16, ch. 55 and ch. 57 Kempe 71-71, 175, 178). Margerys most extraordinary habit was weeping excessively and crying out loud, expressing thus her passionate and profound devotion to God. Yet such a manifestation was contrary to the approved and ordinary manner of conduct, and therefore it proclaimed her as an outcast. It was because of this apparently uncontrolled howling that she was often abandoned by her companions during her pilgrimages or by her fellow townsmen at home. Analysing Margery Kempes life as part of the Christian community she belonged to, the reader draws the conclusion that although she was sometimes rejected, she succeeded in creating a place for herself in her native town (ch. 61 Kempe190) and she was accepted as a holy woman by the religious people who got to know her.

2. Transcending the Linear Time of History Another interpretation of Christian time considers historic time, with a linear course that observes natural chronology, yet gives it a new centre, namely the birth of Christ. The appearance of Christ, the fulfilment of the promise, the Incarnation give time a historic dimension or, better still, a centre (Le Goff, 1980: 31). Margerys life was centred on Christ and her frequent dialogues with Him, which are recorded in her Book. The first chapter records her first dialogue with our Saviour, following the birth of her first child, an experience which was traumatic and disruptive, in such a way that only Jesus presence and speech brought her back to her senses.

1.1. Margery as a Prophet Margerys mystical visions create a reordering of reality in The Book, as she records her encounters with Jesus Christ and her revelations, during which
6 She also defended herself against accusations of Lollardy in front of the Bishop of Worcester (ch. 45 Kempe 146), the Abbot of Leicester, and the Dean of Leicester (ch. 48-49 Kempe 152-155), as well as the Bishop of York (ch. 52 Kempe 162-166).

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she witnessed several feasts: the Birth of Virgin Mary, the Visitation, as well as the Nativity of our Lord (ch. 6 Kempe 52-54) and the Crucifixion and Resurrection (ch. 80-81 Kempe 231-238). Although many physical events are recorded such as her trips and her dialogues with real persons, the accent in her episodically told life is on the spiritual dialogues with Jesus Christ, His mother and other saints. These discussions with Him move her reality to a different level, at which time becomes transparent, since the future is visible. There are many instances when she knows whether a person (or persons) will be saved, but besides these soteriological questions, there are also moments when she is straightforwardly told by Jesus Christ whether it is better to sail on a different ship (ch. 28 Kempe 103), or if a sick person will get well (ch. 60 Kempe 185-186), etc. There are also hints, in her visions, about events that are about to happen in the future.7 The reader witnesses thus not only a chronological reordering of reality, but also a transgressing of historical reality, by having mystical encounters and dialogues interspersed with events taking place in the physical reality. Since Jesus Christ is an active character in her Book, in order to follow it, one needs not only patience or curiosity, but also faith. Time in the Book does not depend so much on the narrators memory of events, but rather on her wish to turn physical reality into mystical reality, transgressing, thus, ordinary, physical time. The Birth of Christ, which took place in history and thus created a horizontal temporal axis, does not create, in The Book of Margery Kempe, a certain direction or a point of reference. Although it is placed at the beginning of the Book (ch. 6 Kempe 53), it does not mark an opening or a point of reference, but rather a continuation of Margerys visions in the same way as the Crucifixion.

1.2. Kempe Chronological Fragmentation of Narrative I want to discuss the fragmentation of the text in the light of Lynn Staleys perspective, that the author Kempe is a different agent from mystical Margery (Staley, 1994: 3). Thus we can comment on fictional time in the Book treating the work as a piece of creative writing and giving to the mystical visions a different understanding, that of supernatural occurrences that raise the expectations of the reader in the context of the narrative. This is possible because in The Book the phrase this creature is used to refer to Margery, who therefore does not straightforwardly assume the role of the author, or that of the narrator. Furthermore the recording of her disparate memories was probably influenced by other similar works, as there is plenty evidence that the writer was well aware of many religious books (mystical, hagiographical and collections of sermons).

Hints about her journey to Jerusalem appear long before it was actually organised.

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Readers are told in the Proem that The Book was actually written by several scribes: an English person, who lived for a time in Germany (presumably her older son), whose handwriting was difficult to understand and also another priest who had read letters sent by her son, but still could only read the manuscript through a divine miracle. Therefore the work was written through the mediation of, at least, one other agent, an agent who had some sort of influence on her since he tested her and she felt compelled to answer his questions, in order to make sure she had his cooperation in writing the Book (ch. 24, Kempe 90-91). Consequently, the relationship between Kempe and her scribe was not simple, but rather complex. I will discuss the fragmentation of the narrative pattern, which definitely marks the continuity of the narrative. Most of her chapters start with the phrase another time another day or and on one occasion showing thus the lack of direct continuity with the previous chapter, and moreover suggesting the randomness of the way the events are recorded. Sometimes even in the same chapter there are separate events that are narrated successively, without any apparent connection between them. The chronological order is sometimes implied, but there is no certainty in it; not even the succession of the chapters is certain, as can be seen since at the ending of the sixteenth chapter the scribe writes: Read first the twenty-first chapter and then this chapter after that (ch. 16 Kempe 73). In the following chapters several events are recorded, some in the past and one talking about a prediction she made regarding the future (she predicted an earthquake, because she saw the sacrament moving during the celebration of mass, ch. 20 Kempe 81). Thus it can be said without any doubt that although chronology is implied in The Book, and there are several important events which are told in a certain order (her pilgrimages and her meetings with several bishops), there is no strict timeline and the order of separate events is sometimes reversed.8 The way the events from Margerys life are recorded clearly points to a lack of insistence on chronological order, yet this does not seem to be an artificial artistic device, but rather it is due to the fact that Kempes perception of chronology is sometimes distorted by her emotional reaction to events from Christs life. When after crying in front of a pieta she is told: Woman, Jesus is long since dead she replies (when she can stop crying), His death is as fresh to me as if he had died this same day (ch. 60, Kempe 187). For Margery, Christs life and especially His Passion was not a thing of the past, a centre on an axis, but a continuous present, which intervenes unceasingly in her present life.

In ch. 39 Margery visits the chapel of St. Bridget in Rome, on the 7th of October, but a few chapters above in ch. 35 it was already 9th of November and her mystical marriage to the Godhead in the Apostles Church was recorded. This mystical marriage is a more important event and thus it was given priority in the text.

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The Book of Margery Kempe transcends natural chronology in two ways, firstly because the sequence in which separate events are recorded does not follow their chronological order and secondly, because the narration of natural events is interrupted by her mystical visions and spiritual dialogues, and these interferences shift the centre of the narrative from ordinary time to transcendental experience.

3. The Soteriological Dimension of Christian Time The Book of Margery Kempe as a Hagiographical Work The most important significance of time according to Christian teaching is its soteriological role. Christian life was perceived as a path towards redemption, and salvation was achieved through suffering and hardship, as penance for sins. Margery always regarded the heavy accusations she received and the slanderous words that hurt her as means of redeeming herself (ch. 13 Kempe 63, ch. 14 Kempe 65, ch. 52 Kempe 161, and ch.55 Kempe 175). Reading Margerys story one can witness the contrasting events that show how on the one hand she is rebuked and despised and on the other hand she is asked for advice, about the way Christians should live their lives (ch. 23 Kempe 89), or she is asked questions about whether or not certain Christians will be saved after death (ch. 55 Kempe174-175). In other instances because of her prayers people are helped by God (especially those who travel with her during her pilgrimages, ch. 30, Kempe 111), and other times, because of talking to her, people become better Christians and change their wicked lives. Such an example is Thomas Marchale, who was utterly moved by her words and after repenting for his sins, he blessed the time when he knew this creature (ch. 45 Kempe143). All these instances give the impression that the author might have intended to present Margery as a saint. Margery was several times compared to Saint Bridget of Sweden9, whose cell in Rome she visited and whose servant she talked to (ch.39 Kempe 132). In some instances Jesus told her that her visions were more powerful than those of St. Bridget (ch. 20 Kempe 83). Saint Jerome is also mentioned as he asserts: Blessed are you, daughter, in the weeping that you weep for peoples sins, for many shall be saved thereby (ch. 41, Kempe 136).10 There arises, therefore, the
St. Bridget (1303-1373) had left Sweden and spent more than 20 years in Rome. She had been married, had eight children and one of her daughters, St. Cathetine of Sweden, joined her. She had visions, too, and she recorded them in her Revelationes coelestes (Celestial revelations). She was canonized in the year 1391 by Pope Boniface IX, which was confirmed by the Council of Constance in 1415, during the period when Margery was in Rome. Mary of Oignies, who had the gift of uncontrollable tears, is mentioned as supporting Margerys weeping as a sign of authentic devotion. 10 Other saints also came and talked to her: Sometimes St. Peter, or Saint Paul, sometimes Saint Mary Magdaleme, S. Katherine, St. Margaret, or whichever saint in heaven that she could
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possibility of considering The Book of Margery Kempe as hagiographical writing. Towards the end of the first book, the author mentions the devotion and the faith people had in her, and the fact that her presence strengthened their faith in God (ch. 83 Kempe 241).11 Her association with Dame Julian of Norwich in those days could also be considered an argument for the validation of her visions and implicitly her position as a saintly figure. Her loud crying was related to her relationship with Jesus Christ, and images of His crucifixion drove her to desperate tears. Her close connection with Jesus Christ brings about her excessive and discordant weeping, even during the celebration of mass or during the sermon. And she received communion there every Sunday with plentiful tears and violent sobbings, with loud crying and shrill shriekings (ch. 44, Kempe 144). She also cried for her sins and for other believers sins, asking God for mercy. Her prayers on behalf of other Christians did not remain unanswered and there are many instances when she feels and hears Jesus reply (ch. 23 Kempe). A miracle was also connected with her (ch. 67 Kempe 203), when, because of her fervent prayers and tears, a fire was stopped by a snowstorm and the church did not burn down. There is sometimes an almost conceited confidence in her relationship with God,12 namely when she threatens people with damnation for preventing her from following her calling. 13 Going on pilgrimage was one of her most constant preoccupations, and she went to all the important places of pilgrimage.14 The desire to go on these pilgrimages appeared in her heart long before she could accomplish such difficult and expensive voyages, a sign that it was Gods will for her to go. Thus when someone opposes her, she answers with determination: Sir, if you put me out of the ship, my Lord Jesus shall put you out of heaven (ch. 45, Kempe 146). The concept of time is not enlarged upon throughout the Book, but she does mention it once in her prayers at the end of the Book. Time has, in her prayers, the meaning of present time, which clearly shows that her visions did not deprive Margery of a sense of reality. Yet her priorities in life could differ
think of, through the will and sufferance of God, spoke to the understanding of her soul, and informed her how she should love God... (ch. 87 Kempe 256). 11 ...especially to those who do not doubt or mistrust in their asking, her crying greatly profited to the increase of merit and of virtue, and until she was, through the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ, compelled to believe steadfastly, without any doubting, that it was God who spoke in her, and would be magnified in her for his own goodness and her profit, and the profit of many others (ch. 83 Kempe 242). 12 ... our Lord said to her, Daughter, if he be a priest that despises you, well knowing why you weep and cry, then he is accursed (ch. 63 Kempe 194). Eternal damnation is thus the punishment for deriding or spurning her. 13 Margerys entrance into Jerusalem, riding on a donkey, together with her fellow pilgrims, with whom she had just made peace, resembles Jesus entrance into Jerusalem (ch. 28 Kempe 103). 14 In the second book she is chastised by her confessor for leaving on such a journey without asking for his consent or blessing. Such an instance shows her personal inclination for travelling.

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from other persons. She considered that salvation, hers and other peoples, was the ultimate aim in everybodys life and thus every activity or action should be governed by Gods commandments. Her prayer is that God would speed them in all that they go about to do to your [Gods] worship; (ch. 10 Kempe 294).

Conclusions The Book of Margery Kempe transcends time in more ways than one. Firstly there is a disregard for strict chronology, both because of the fragmentation of the narrative, which is often made up of separate events, and because of the order in which some events are recounted, an order which does not follow a linear rule. On the other hand the general plot of The Book does have a chronology that covers the last years of her life; roughly 20-25 years of memories. Secondly the interest of the author is focussed on her religious development and less on her daily existence and the ordinary details related to it. Her daily participation in the religious life of her parish and her constant struggle to talk and be told about God take precedence over her involvement with her family. Yet, her involvement in the daily religious services brings distress and anxiety among other parishioners and disrupts, because of her excessive weeping, the regular communal prayers. This is again another way in which her understanding of her existence rises above any categorisation, since she perceives her time as a gift from God, and as a consequence she spends the time given to her in her life looking for a confirmation and consolidation of her relationship with Him, so much so that she often overlooks others opinions. Thirdly the most important of her concerns and the purpose of her existence is achieving salvation and time loses its earthly meaning because she spends it talking to Jesus Christ and Saints. The whole Book can be read as an attempt to bring the eternal presence of God into her limited earthly existence. Because of her visions spiritual time intrudes into her physical time, which is, thus, given a vertical divine dimension. The author wants to show that Margerys existence in time is a proof of Gods love for His people, and The Book accomplishes her expectations. After analysing the acknowledged significance of time in the Late Middle Ages, according to Le Goffs categorization, the researcher can draw the conclusion that all these aspects of time are mentioned in The Book of Margery Kempe. Studying the structure and organization of The Book it becomes obvious that it does not remain within the bounds of the traditionally known connotations of time, but transcends any taxonomy and tries to create a unique reality at the threshold between eternal time and daily matters.

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Arnold, John, Katherine J. Lewis (2004), A Companion to The Book of Margery Kempe, D. S. Brewer, Cambridge. Dickens, Andrea Janelle (2009), The Female Mystic. Great Women Thinkers of the Middle Ages, I. B. Tauris & Co, London. Goodman, Anthony (2002), Margery Kempe and Her World. Pearson Education Limited, London. Kempe, Margery (2004), The Book of, Penguin Books, London. Krugg, Rebecca (2009), Margery Kempe, in Larry Scanlon (ed.) Medieval English Literature 1100-1500, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 217-228. Le Goff, Jacques, Jean-Claude Schmitt (2002), Dicionar tematic al Evului Mediu Occidental, Polirom, Bucureti. Le Goff, Jacques (1980). Time, Work and Culture in the Middle Ages. University of Chicago Press. Chicago. Oanc, Monica (2009), The Construction of the Mystic Self: the Book of Margery Kempe, in Writing the Self, Modes of Self-Portrayal in the Cultural Text. University of Bucharest Review. A Journal of Literary and Cultural Studies, Vol. X, No.2/2008, Editura Universitii din Bucureti, p.117-124. Staley, Lynn (1994), Margery Kempes Dissenting Fictions, Pennsylvania State University Press, Pennsylvania. Windeatt, Barry (1994). English Mystics of the Middle Ages, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

THE END OF THE WORLD AS THEY KNEW IT? A VISION OF THE APOCALYPSE IN SHIRLEY JACKSONS THE SUNDIAL
RALUCA ANDREESCU Some say the world would end in fire, Some say in ice. From what Ive tasted of desire I hold with those who favor fire. But if it had to perish twice, I think I know enough of hate To say that for destruction ice Is also great And would suffice. (ROBERT FROST, 1920)

Take twelve people who cannot stand each other, but lead their lives together, in total isolation. Add an old, crooked and unwelcoming villa to accommodate them. Season with two mysterious murders, several unexplainable phenomena meant to shatter the small communitys illusions about domesticity and with an imminent end of the world announced by a ghost. This is the recipe of Shirley Jacksons novel The Sundial (1958), which this paper approaches in terms of a fragmented and comical image of a post-apocalyptic world. I explore the 1950s paranoia of alien invasions, the fascination with outer space and the UFO craze, the visions of utopian futures and nuclear threats, particularly as they mix with the themes of domesticity and failed relationships. The small community which, on a ghosts account, believes its members will be the sole survivors of the forthcoming cataclysm, represents a small-scale reproduction of the entire world, allowing the writer to sketch a critique of the American society in the Tranquilized Fifties. I will argue that Jackson resorts to the founding myths of the American people (the American Adam, the chosen people, the city / house on a hill) and to a presupposed imminent threat of world destruction to satirize the paranoia of Soviet intrusion, to question many Americans beliefs, to point to the dissolution of family and moral values, and ultimately to expose the absurdity of a society ruled by the media and television. Keywords: post-apocalyptic world, ghosts, the chosen people, UFO craze, Americas founding myths.

1. The Only Thing to Fear Is Fear Itself Nameless, Unreasoning The mid-twentieth-century United States was one of the wealthiest nations in the world, on the verge of taking position as leader of the new world

University of Bucharest, e-mail : [email protected]

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order. It was also confronted with a prevalent feeling of insecurity and paranoia due to the realization that what happened in remote corners of the world posed a serious threat to the American national borders. After two cataclysmic wars and a series of scientific discoveries that created conditions for unprecedented technological and societal change, American society was not only dominated by the terror of a Soviet nuclear attack, but was also eroded from the inside by the fear of a communist invasion. Together with the looming threat of the atomic bomb, the Red Scare led in the 1950s to mass hysteria, paranoia, and an unparalleled fear of foreignness at home which distorted severely the image of the Other. The threat coming from outside national borders and the scientific achievements which made the nuclear bomb possible and even promised to send man in space led to the development of scenarios which depicted invasions of the American land by different kinds of aliens: communists, immigrants or, in the more extreme versions, extraterrestrials, zombies, lab monsters, and mutated creatures.1 The dread of nuclear attacks and the lurking threats from the outer space contributed to the ignition of theories of the end of the world. Seemingly, after the Second World War the visions about the end of days became increasingly pessimistic, stressing the imminence of a cataclysmic disaster as much as previous millenarian visions capitalized on the pending arrival of a redemptive new era. In his study on apocalyptic imagery in the United States, Daniel Wojcik contends that the romantic, millennial vision of America as a redemptive paradise or pristine wilderness has been challenged and altered during the latter half of the twentieth century, becoming more bleak and apocalyptic in nature. (Wojcik 1997: 98) The publics appetite for apocalyptic prophesies amplified in mid-twentieth century, not only because the nuclear threat made planetary destruction credible to a much wider audience, but also due to the fact that the apocalyptic messages of preachers were popularized via television, radio and movies (Neal 1998: 7). Church historian Ray C. Petty noted that [T]he emergence of the atomic threat has posed anew the problem of mans future and his end. [A] number of religious enthusiasts now find sudden and unprecedented support for their most frenzied contentions. More than one person not of their persuasion asks whether these wildest predictions may not shortly be translated from the realm of shadowy aberration into the blaze of stark actuality (quoted in Neal 1998: 7). Although apocalyptic images have been traditionally associated with religious eschatologies, the American secular culture has similarly contributed to the stock of expectations about the end of the world. The main difference between the religious and the secular day of doom resides in the redemptive
The Hollywood industry profited greatly from the publics fascination with outer space and fear of foreign intrusion, which led to a major boom of the science fiction genre with notable movies such as The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), The Thing from Another World (1951), Invaders from Mars (1953), It Came from Outer Space (1953), Them! (1954), Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Earth versus the Flying Saucers (1956), The Forbidden Planet (1956), The Blob (1958), Monster (1959).
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possibilities in the aftermath. As Wojcik claims, [i]nstead of faith in a redemptive new realm to be established after the present world is annihilated, secular doomsday visions are usually characterized by a sense of pessimism, absurdity, and nihilism (Wojcik 1997: 97) . Another possible explanation for the outburst of apocalyptic scenarios in the 1950s stems from the very definition of the apocalypse as a mythic narrative about power and authority, which mainly voices the affirmation of a supreme power over the idolatrous claims of state authority, with an emphasis on the question of why the wicked are allowed to rule and how believers may resist their power (Neal 1998: 56). Thus, political authority is depicted in demonic terms and it instigates to uprisings. The teenage horror movies of the period (The Blob, 1958 or The Giant Gila Monster, 1959, for example), which featured creatures of doom and alien invasions, are envisioned as responses to the political, social and familial authority directed toward the American youth in that age of containment and paranoia. Apocalyptic predictions and end-of-the-world set-ups could be used not only to subvert, but also to legitimate political authority. For instance, by constantly playing on the imminent threat of Soviet nuclear attack or Soviet infiltration in the American society, the government justified stricter measures of control in society. Nonetheless, the rhetoric of doom was accompanied by one of optimism and by an urge to lay the basis for a new beginning. Because of the internal crisis, the true American values had to be reinforced in order to preserve the American way of life. The Cold War brought about a new need for rediscovering and redefining the American character, and rekindled the discussion about the uniqueness of the American people and the nations exceptionalism (Mihil 1994: 81). In opposition to Russia and Eastern Europe, which in the rhetoric of the times were depicted as lands of darkness and of unknown threats, America ostracized and was ready to abandon the past, driven by a desire for rebirth which confirmed the American belief in newness as the essence of national identity. And end of the world scenarios were giving Americans just that: the possibility to confirm their exceptionalism through survival and the prospect of starting anew.

2. What is This World?: The End of Days in Shirley Jacksons The Sundial Shirley Jackson was one of the most prominent writers of the 1950s. Some argue that she is a quintessential writer of the 1950s whose work dramatizes the concerns and fears of that decade in ways that are not always immediately obvious (Hague 2005: 74) and that the 1950s became the decade of Jackson (Murphy 2005: 3). Even though the female author is mostly famous for her disturbing story The Lottery (1948) and for her horror novel The Haunting of Hill House (1959), for her focus on the female characters isolation,

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loneliness, fragmenting identities, mental illnesses and inability to relate adequately to the exterior world, Shirley Jacksons scrutiny of the fifties is not limited to exposing the condition of women. Her apocalyptic consciousness, sinister children and scathing portraits of nuclear families and their suburban environments, her depiction of a quotidian and predictable world that can suddenly metamorphose into the terrifying and the bizarre (Hague 2005: 74) reflect a larger preoccupation with the culture of repression, paranoia and containment which dominated the era. Despite its arguable lack of popularity among Jacksons critics, The Sundial (1958) explores the age of fear of Soviet intrusion and nuclear threat comically, denouncing the tensions inherent in the American postwar society and the erosion of moral, community values. Depicted as a fantasy of the end of the world, which parodies the apocalyptic imagination while portraying it (Parks 1978: 74-5) or regarded as an absurdist, satiric, horrific treatment of the domestic (Egan 1989: 18), the novel can be interpreted both as a parody of the American suburban cultures most terrifying nightmare that of foreign intrusion , and as a comical representation of the bomb shelter culture of the 1950s (Hague 2005: 86). When Aunt Fanny, the member of a rather large household comprising three generations of the Halloran family, together with servants and friends, is announced by the ghost of her long time dead father that the world will be soon coming to an end, and that only the Halloran house will remain standing because the father will guard the children (TS2 35), the people in the house start gathering provisions and barricading the mansion. They are convinced that after the final cataclysm they will be the only ones to survive it and emerge into the new world as the sole inhabitants of the earth, responsible for repopulating and restoring it. Although highly reluctant at the beginning, the members of the Halloran estate eventually decide to join Aunt Fanny in her belief that [f]rom the sky and from the ground and from the sea there is danger There will be black fire and red water and the earth turning and screaming (TS 34). They start concocting plans as to what to do and how to wait for the world to end, and how to make sure that their entrance into the new world is as triumphant as possible. Mrs. Halloran, for instance, decides she has to wear a crown on the eve of the apocalypse, so that everyone is sure of her position in the new, postcataclysmic world order. How the world is to end is never mentioned exactly, and the novel ends with the characters waiting for the final blasting event to occur. However, the people in the house have their own visions of the end and their own explanations for it. For instance, Aunt Fanny strongly believes that there will be a night of horror, a night of terror a night of murder and a night of
2

All references to The Sundial are marked as TS followed by the page number.

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bloodshed (TS 116-7) because [h]umanity, as an experiment, has failed and that evil, and jealousy and fear, are all going to be removed from us (TS 45). Maryjane joins in, claiming that [i]t has been a bad and wicked and selfish place, and the beings who created it have decided that it will never get any better. So they are going to burn it, the way you might burn a toy full of disease germs [T]his is what they are going to do with this diseased, filthy old world. Right in the incinerator (TS 46). And even though the ten-year old Fancy insistently asks Who is they ?, neither her mother, nor the others provide an answer, nor does the author mention that the Russians are coming (Hague 2005: 87). While discussing the imminent end of days, the people in the old mansion live with the conviction that as long as they remain indoors, no harm is to be cast on them, with the dead Mr. Halloran watching over his children. Moreover, they fantasize that they will be the sole survivors and that they had been entrusted with the future of humanity:
Those few people gathered in Mrs. Hallorans house would be safe. The house would be guarded during the night of destruction and at its end they would emerge safe and pure. They were charged with the future of humanity; when they came forth from the house it would be into a world clean and silent, their inheritance. And breed a new race of mankind, Aunt Fanny said with sweetness. (TS 44)

What the group fail to consider is that actually the Halloran family has deeper problems than an imminent destruction of the planet announced by a ghost through the voice of a disturbed Aunt Fanny craving for attention. As the narrator implies, it seems that Mrs. Halloran has in fact murdered her only son, by pushing him down the stairs, in order to take over the house. Moreover, her own death in the end of the novel seems to have been caused by young Fancy, the daughter of Mrs. Hallorans son. Depicted as a child who not a servant, or an animal, or any child in the village near the house, would willingly go near (TS 42), and constantly wondering whether she should push her grandmother like she pushed my daddy (TS 5), Fancy is one of the uncanny children Jackson uses to undermine the traditional domestic outlook of the 1950s household (Hague 2005: 87). Tom Engelhardt considers that the parents of the 1950s were becoming aware that the household was threatened from the outside, but also from within, and that the children of the suburban dream were coming to seem both threatened and threatening (quoted in Hague 2005: 87). In a sense, this realization illustrated the convictions and propaganda of the time, namely claims that the Communists were infiltrated everywhere and that the most serious threat was coming from the inside, and not from without. According to Engelhardt, although most often identified as Communism, the enemy of post-war US was actually everywhere and nowhere, inside and out, serving to mock all national boundaries and stories (quoted in Hague 2005: 90). Even though sinister and allegedly capable

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of murder, young Fancy is thus the only one mature enough to signal that if the new world was to be inhabited by the same unhappy, disappointed, selfish, superficial, failed people, the apocalypse would not bring rejuvenation and a purified earth, but a new old world, which, as she claims, would not even be more real than the present:
when I think about it this new world is going to have Aunt Fanny and my grandmother and you and Essex and the rest of these crazy people and my mother and what makes anyone think youre going to be more happy or peaceful just because youre the only ones left? [Y]ou all want the whole world to be changed so that you will be different. But I dont suppose people get changed any by just a new world. And anyway, that world isnt any more real than this one. (TS 171)

The question of real and reality is invoked several times throughout the novel, and it can also be approached in relation to the general climate of the epoch dominated by contradiction and confusion. Much like Baudrillards Disneyland, which is a panegyric of American values and an idealized transposition of a contradictory reality (Baudrillard 1994: 12) which masks the fact that it exists in order to hide that it is actually the real country, the micro-community in the Halloran house, a small-scale representation of the United States, is at times presented as imaginary, ridiculous and, towards the end of the novel, even aberrant and grotesque. Its unreality seems to serve in making postwar Americans believe that their controlled existences are, by contrast, real. Yet Jackson is out to complicate the question of reality. In quipping that that world isnt any more real than this one, young Fancy, whose name mockingly entitles her to be an authority on the question of the real, evidently throws the reality of the present rather than the future world into doubt. The matter of what is and what is not real is raised on several other occasions inside the Halloran mansion, and the most comprehensive approach is arguably offered by seventeen-year old Gloria, herself an alien who infiltrated the house at some point and never left. Her musings are illustrative for the general climate of the age, exposing the fact that people did not know who to trust and considered that outside their homes the peril loomed large. She thus indirectly denounces both the intoxication of propaganda and the mixed messages Americans were getting from the government, and the culture of conformity which dominated the decade. Last but not least, she hints at the condition of teenagers, brought up in isolation and fully controlled both by their families and by the state:
that world out there, Fancy, that world which is all around on the other side of the wall, it isnt real. Its real inside here, were real, but what is outside is like its made of cardboard, or plastic, or something. Nothing out there is real. Everything is made out of something else, and everything is made to look like something else, and it all comes apart in your hands. The people arent real, theyre nothing but endless copies of each other, all

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looking just alike, like paper dolls, and they live in houses full of artificial things and eat imitation food [Y]ou talk about dances and parties I can tell you theres no heart to anything anymore; when you dance with a boy hes only looking over your shoulder at some other boy, and the only real people left any more are the shadows on the television screens. (TS 191-2)

It seems therefore that in her critique of the postwar society Shirley Jackson could not ignore the dreadful impact of media on the American way of life. Television, radio and movies were means of government propaganda, Hollywood brainwashing and meaningless entertainment for a generation that needed a reinforcement of American values. This is why the novel comically alludes to the effects of acute media proliferation, which, together with unusual natural phenomena more common in apocalyptic scenarios , is seen as a sign of the times announcing the end of the world:
freak snow storms, hurricanes, hail from a clear sky. there were cases of death from heat and death from drowning and death from wind in each mornings paper, along with statements that the earths surface was being lowered into the ocean at the rate of two inches a century; a volcano which had been dormant for five hundred years erupted, blasted its surrounding countryside, and fell asleep again forever. A woman in Chicago was arrested for leading a polar bear clipped like a French poodle into a large downtown department store. A man in Texas won a divorce from his wife because she tore out the last chapter of every mystery story he borrowed from the library. A television set in Florida refused to let itself be turned off; until its owners took an axe to it, it continued, on or off, presenting inferior music and stale movies and endless, maddening advertising, and even under the axe, with its last sigh, it died with the praise of a hair tonic on its lips. (TS 207-8)

Given the huge impact of the media and the movies, the American society in the 1950s was also confronted with an UFO craze. The belief that aliens from outer space were trying to contact people on earth led to the rise of the so-called contactee movement and to the establishment of over 150 contactee clubs. The members of these clubs strongly believed that the world was coming to an end and that only aliens could save them.3 Keen on denouncing the absurdities of the postwar era, Shirley Jackson could not have missed the opportunity of mocking the UFO rage of the fifties and she included in the novel a comical episode in which the Hallorans are visited by a group of alien supporters. The True Believers, as they recommend themselves, are convinced that the world is coming to an end and that the only chance they have is to wait for and embark on a flying spaceship that is to come in due time to rescue them before the final blast. The members of the Society had been receiving messages for some time
3 One of the best known accounts of the relationship between people on earth and beings from other planets is George Adamskis Inside the Spaceships (New York: Abelard-Schuman, 1955), in which the author-contactee claims that aliens most important mission is to prevent the atomic war, not only because the bomb threatens life on earth and could trigger the annihilation of mankind, but also because its effects permeate the atmosphere and cause damage to the aliens themselves.

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and they knew all there was to know about their leaving the earth safely. They had been announced by alien voices that they needed to give up eating meat, drinking and wearing metal in order to be accepted on the spaceship which would be bound to take them to Saturn, where they would be translated into a higher state of being (TS 108). However, the Hallorans and the True Believers do not get along and the major clash between their beliefs concerning the end of days and who will survive the apocalypse finally leads to conflict. Determined to put up signs announcing that NO LANDING OF INTERSTELLAR AIRCRAFT PERMITTED HERE UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES (TS 110, capitals in the original) and that, if spaceships disregarded her warning, she would offer the aliens Aunt Fanny and Miss Ogilvie, Mrs. Halloran dismisses the Society and any other attempts of foreign intrusion on the estate. Ever since they were warned by Aunt Fanny that the world would end soon, the group in the Halloran mansion worked toward isolating themselves from the others and making sure that the new world finds them prepared and ready to start anew, exhibiting the fallout shelter frenzy which took over postwar America. It appears that they never considered making the rest of the people aware of the forthcoming cataclysm, nor housing as many as possible, since their mansion was according to the prophecy the only one to remain standing after the event. Wojcik notes that during the era individual initiative and personal survival in the event of nuclear attack were stressed rather than the survival of the larger community and moral debates arose concerning the ethics of sharing ones shelter with negligent neighbors who had not bothered to build one for themselves, and whether gunning them down if they attempted to break into the family shelter was okay. (Wojcik 1997: 104-5) Therefore, in keeping with the rhetoric of the day, the Hallorans barricade the old house, for fear that the peoples crying outside might affect them: We must cover the windows and doors lest the screams of the dying reach our ears and touch us with compassion; or the sight of the horror send us running mad into its midst. Wrong is wrong and right is right and Father knows best. (TS 119) On the one hand, Aunt Fannys intervention mockingly makes reference to a TV series popular in the second half of the 1950s Father Knows Best , which celebrated patriarchy in a society that was arguably dominated by images of (fulfilling) motherhood. On the other hand, her statement reflects how cruel, egotistical and cold the people in the mansion are, not only to the world outside, but also to each other. In this way, the self-isolated group is nothing more than the Riesmanian lonely crowd of individuals that came to be emblematic for the mid-twentieth century United States. Nevertheless, the assembly are convinced that they were chosen to survive the catastrophe and emerge in the new world as the sole rulers. This enables Jackson to reconsider the American founding myths, reactivated in the Cold War era to reinforce patriotism and justify political decisions. Jackson

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takes a group of people united by chance and kept together by a common, ambitious, but superficial and highly selfish goal and uses them to debunk and parody the Puritan myths of America as the new world, the chosen people, the city / house on a hill, and the American Adam.4 Firstly, not coincidentally, the Halloran mansion is located on a hill, overseeing the neighboring village, nowhere other than in Massachusetts, New England. Secondly, the family and friends believe that they will be extremely fortunate to survive the upcoming horrific event and be in charge with the future of humankind, while the rest of the world is going to perish. As Aunt Fanny suggests at one point, [t]hose who survive the catastrophe will be free of pain and hurt. They will be a kind of chosen people, as it were. To which Maryjane answers mockingly The Jews? Werent they chosen the last time? (TS 46-7), thus humorously sanctioning the biblical roots of the Puritan errand. The myths of America as a garden and that of the American Adam that individual emancipated from history, happily bereft of ancestry, untouched and undefiled by the usual inheritance of family and race, an individual standing alone, self-reliant and self-propelling, ready to confront whatever awaited him with the aid of his own unique and inherent resources (Lewis 1955: 5) are made obvious in the fragmentary images of the new world seen by young Gloria in a mirror. When one of the female members of the group decides to use a virgin to get glimpses of the new world in an oiled mirror, the rest join her absurd idea and Gloria starts offering them brief accounts of the other side (TS 77):
I see a country. A nice country Trees, and grass, and flowers. Blue sky. Nice birds. No people. No houses. No fences or roads or television aerials or wires or billboards. No people. Theres a hill, with trees on it, and its like a meadow. Soft Nothing like walls or fences, just soft green countryside going off in all directions. Perhaps thats a river over there. (TS 132)

Glorias vision of the new world is made complete by the fully embodied image of the American Adam taking his inheritance into possession. This hilarious episode both amplifies the parodying of the founding myths and suggests that the young girl sees in the mirror what the others urge her to see:
Wait I can see someone coming, over the hill; Essex, it looks like you, only you arent dressed you havent got any Gloria turned scarlet and put her hands against her cheeks, but she did not sit back. Go ahead, dear, Mrs. Willow said. Were not squeamish. You might try to get me into a lion skin or a pair of bathing trunks, Essex said. I probably dont know there are peeping toms around.
4 Richard Pascal (2000: 109) discusses the legitimacy of applying to The Sundial Sacvan Bercovitchs notion of the anti-jeremiad (the oppositional sub-category of the American jeremiad). Starting from Bercovitchs definition of the term, Pascal claims that the novel can be read as a discourse which implies the denunciation of all ideals, sacred and secular, on the grounds that America is a lie.

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You are could you be hunting? Hunting for what, in Gods name? said Mrs. Halloran. Almost certainly for a pair of bathing trunks, Essex said. Couldnt I, please, stand behind a bush? (TS 132)

Whether their expectations have been reached or not is difficult to tell, as the novel closes with the characters gathered around in the house, behind barricaded doors, expecting that [i]ts going to be a long wait (TS 253). By this time, the twelve self-elected apostolic survivors are down to eleven, after matriarch Mrs. Halloran is killed and her body taken outside, in the storm, and placed on the large sundial on the estate. Her crown has already been passed to young Fancy, the sinister little girl the narrator implies has killed her grandmother. Waiting for the end of the world, some of them play bridge, others discuss movies, and others show signs of boredom or anxiety. By the end of the novel, it appears that what started with the musings of an obviously deranged woman, craving for attention and in open competition with her sister-in-law, finally transformed into a grotesque spectacle. It is arguably because of this dim, ludicrous vision of humanity that The Sundial has been highlighted for its misanthropy. There are critics who claim that although Shirley Jackson is an intelligent and clever writer, there rises from her pages the cold fishy gleam of a calculated and carefully expressed contempt for the human race. (Joshi 2001: 43) Undeniably, the novel features no admirable or even slightly likeable character, and indeed there are no redeeming circumstances for the Hallorans. Mrs. Orianna Halloran is a manipulative matriarch obsessed with controlling and organizing the lives of the others, who apparently killed her only son; her old, weak-willed husband is but a mere shadow of what he used to be; Maryjane, her daughter-in-law, is equally driven by a thirst for power; her grand-daughter is not as innocent a child as she is believed to be, because she seemingly murders her grandmother; Augusta Willow is the image of a matron only interested in marrying her two plain daughters; Essex is a servile, toady individual who constantly flatters Mrs. Halloran in the pursuit of his well-being; and, finally, Aunt Fanny appears as an unstable and confused, unpredictable character, who at times challenges Oriannas authority. The incredible ease with which everyone in the mansion seems to believe Aunt Fannys speculations about the impending end of days testifies for the novel having been regarded as a testament to human stupidity (Joshi 2001: 44). In response to Jacksons being accused of unjustified misanthropy, Joshi argues that her work made it obvious that she had little patience for the stupid, the arrogant, the pompous, the complacently bourgeois, the narrow-minded, and the spiteful in other words, she hated all those people whom there is every good reason to hate (Joshi 2001: 43). The critic argues that for her derisive scrutiny and mistrust of humankind, Jackson should be seen as a twentieth century Ambrose Bierce, who was mostly known for his nihilistic misanthropy and his

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bleak vision of the world. In this respect, it seems that a famous remark about Bierce can easily be used in relation to Jackson: One is almost tempted to believe that one day he decided to instill fear into his contemporaries by hatred, to gain revenge on them (Lvy 1988: 14, emphasis in the original). Joshi remarks that Shirley Jacksons pitiless and sardonic exposing of human weakness make her a horrific satirist who does not require the supernatural to arouse fear and horror. Her icy prose, clinical detachment, and uttering refreshing glee at the exhibition of human greed, misery and evil ought to give her a high rank in general literature. (Joshi 2001: 49)

3. Conclusions Ostensibly threatened by extinction and promised salvation by a ghost, the community in The Sundial represents a small-scale replica of the postwar American society shaken by insecurity and fear of invisible, silent enemies and dominated by the dispersion of apocalyptic scenarios and prophets of doom. The groups hopes and ardent desire for a new beginning and their yearning for purification stand in sharp contrast with their erosion of standards and ideals, and with the hatred they are about to take with them into the new world. In the absence of any other plans with their lives, these alienated and purposeless human beings consider themselves in charge with the future of mankind, although their values have been so corrupted that they are only driven by the idea that the rest of the world is bound to perish. The prophecy is not fulfilled by the end of the novel and yet a sense of doom lingers beyond the possibility that the end of days might actually occur for the Hallorans. Isolated in the mansion upon the hill, they already started killing each other for supremacy. In a critique of the American society during her era, Shirley Jackson demonstrates that, although arguably helpful in case of real nuclear attacks and other cataclysmic occurrences, a shelter does not offer protection against the corrosion working from the inside.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Baudrillard, Jean (1994 [1981]), Simulacra and Simulation, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor. Egan, James (1989), Sanctuary: Shirley Jacksons Domestic and Fantastic Parables, in Studies in Weird Fiction, 1989, pp. 5-24. Hague, Angela (2005), A Faithful Anatomy of Our Times : Reassessing Shirley Jackson, in Frontiers A Journal of Womens Studies, 26, 2, pp. 73-96. Jackson, Shirley (1958), The Sundial, Popular Library, New York.

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Joshi, S. T (2001), The Modern Weird Tale: A Critique of Horror Fiction, McFarland, Jefferson and London. Lvy, Maurice (1988), Lovecraft: A Study in the Fantastic, trans. by S. T. Joshi, Wayne State University Press, Michigan. Lewis, R. W. B (1955), The American Adam: Innocence, Tragedy and Tradition in the Nineteenth Century, University of Chicago Press, Chicago. Mihil, Rodica (1994), The American Challenge, Bucharest University Press, Bucharest. Murphy, Bernice M (2005), Introduction: Do You Know Who I Am? Reconsidering Shirley Jackson, in Bernice M. Murphy (ed.), Shirley Jackson: Essays on the Literary Legacy, McFarland, Jefferson, NC, pp. 1-21. Neal, Arthur G. (1998), National Trauma and Collective Memory: Major Events in the American Century, M. E. Sharpe, New York. Parks, John G. (1978), Waiting for the End: Shirley Jacksons The Sundial, in Critique, 19, 3, pp. 74-88. Pascal, Richard (2000), New World Miniatures: Shirley Jacksons The Sundial and Postwar American Society, in Journal of American Culture, 23, 3, pp. 99-111. Wojcik, Daniel (1997), The End of the World as We Know It: Faith, Fatalism and Apocalypse in America, New York University Press, New York and London.

A POETOLOGY OF MODERNISM: APPROACHES TO WALLACE STEVENS THE IDEA OF ORDER AT KEY WEST
THOMAS SCHARES1

In Wallace Stevens The Idea of Order at Key West the concept of poetic unity is touched, a poetic unity which, as will be described, renders this poem one of the foremost and thorough statements of Modernism. By examining contents, connections to literary traditions, and not least allusions of the intertwined art forms of music and painting by visualizing and auralizing the poem, ways of reading this poem as an art program for Modernism and as an attempt to apotheosis of poetological poetry, the outstanding position of this poem in the register and canon of literary American Modernism will be highlighted. By outlining a synaestetical form of intertextuality, the originality produced by auto- and poly-referentiality in order to create a new artistic credo of Modernism in the fashion of Wallace Stevens will be stated. Epiphany as a central artistic or poetic concept is described and explored in this poem to an extreme point, the poem energizes several centers, around which the possible meanings and interpretations of it orbit. Moreover, the role of the poet in society is also at stake in this poem, one of numerous aspects usually neglected in its scholarly exploration. The papers as well as the poets turning point can be found in the concept of imagination as a driving force for the humane in human beings which, transferred into poetry, gains a constitutive power, that can be found laid down poetologically in the poem discussed . Keywords: Wallace Stevens, ideas of order, poetological poetry, literary modernism, synaestesia, artistic imagination.

1. Introduction It is possible that Wallace Stevens poem The Idea of Order at Key West is one of the most heavily commented and most thoroughly analyzed American poems, its critical fame reaches near, if not close to T.S. Eliots Waste Land. It should be rather obvious to ask then, what more could be said about such a poem, since every thinkable aspect of it has been mentioned, commented upon and scrutinized. It is a central notion in the collected criticism about The Idea of Order at Key West, that critics and commentators tend to stress upon one possible reading of the poem, and pursue and emphasize one way of reading and understanding it, by this neutralizing each other and their diverse approaches.
Lector universitar (DAAD-Lector) dr., University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures; [email protected]
1

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Some see it as a synaesthesia of the arts, some see it as a poem about the solitariness of the artist, some see it as a poem about literary criticism, some see it as an intertextual struggle with romanticism, some others rather stress the poem as a poetological poem and others again point out its autobiographical aspects. This poem is a most powerful and outstanding specimen of its species; that is proved alone by the ongoing criticism about it, and the anthology-attractiveness of it. It is an undisputed and prominent part of the Great American Poetry Book. My argument shall be, that, apart from solitary readings and possible levels or instances of interpretation and analysis, Stevens poem is no more and no less than a program of literary Modernism, that it is, simultaneously, a theoretical account and a practical execution of Modernist aesthetics. In my paper, I will present a number of central aspects of analysis of the poem, which will sum up to an understanding of it as a constitutive approach to aesthetical theory of (American or Stevensian) Modernism. To take separate looks at form and contents of a poem may serve well to gain a first-glance understanding of the examined object, but it will not necessarily elucidate the position of the poem as a well-working or genuine piece of art. Good poetry endeavors to prop the matching form upon the chosen topic, or it endeavors to find the proper contents for a formal pattern which the poet attempts to master. But in ideal poetry, form and contents constitute a unity. Neither form nor contents will serve as a contribution to each other. No deficiency on either side will be perceivable. That Wallace Stevens' The Idea of Order at Key West is such an ideal poem, I shall attempt to demonstrate in the following pages, but I have no intention of thereby stating the obvious. I would rather contextualize this perfectness with its poetic function, in the case of the discussed poem its role as a poetological program. Therefore, in the following chapters, aspects of form or content will seldom be dealt with separately: The dense unity of form and contents of the poem to be discussed asks for an inclusive view upon these aspects of poetic analysis. Light will be thrown upon the poem from several points of view in order to underline the multi-faceted character of it. Although the poem consists of a more or less clearly detectable plot, and the used motifs mingle to form a poetic unity, there are also tensions to be discovered, e. g. the employed traditional motif of the sea: Stevens questions and removes the traditional implications to give this motif a new position in the modernist poetic universe. The tension between traditional and modernist points of view is felt throughout the whole poem. The Idea of Order at Key West is not only a poem of unity but also a poem of disunity. It is a complete and integrate poem written in a time of radical changes in literature, reflecting and preserving them, thus illustrating a reorganization of poetic values. Finally, the major importance of the poem is not embedded in its plot solely: It does not only illustrate a mere epiphany of the poet (which would be

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eclectic romanticism), but it also employs and displays a poetological program. This double dimension of the poem (as only one of numerous equally important aspects or readings of it) is the centre of learned discussion and analysis, but will not be the only hub of the following pages. The poem consists of several centers around which the meanings of it orbit. My perspective of reading and understanding the poem intents to open up a broader view by including aspects of literary heritage and newness, other arts, as music and painting, and discuss minor aspects usually neglected, as e.g. the role of the poet's companion in the poem, Ramon Fernandez. No coherent interpretation of the poem2 will be generated by this method, but the method employed here, not linear, disjunctive, sometimes even contradictory, but always focusing on the central theme, the poet in his mundo, hopefully suits the poem in its ambiguous but still uniform outline better.3

2. The Female Singer, Her Song, the Sea and a Strange Companion: What The Idea of Order at Key West Is About The idea, and the impetus to write The Idea of Order at Key West is rooted obviously in the biography of its author.4 Stevens affection to Key West as his holiday site, as a place of recreation (here in the meaning of the word: Stevens re-creates the world through his poem) presupposes a personal experience probably underlying the poem. But it will be difficult to detect direct connections to a concrete incident in the life of Stevens and the incident of the poem. We will not become acquainted with the speaking poet5 personally or the
C.f. Holmes (1990), 75: Ideas of Order [sic] ... comprises more than one point of view. C.f. Tymieniecka (1985), The theme: Poetics of the Elements in the Human Condition, in: Tymieniecka (1985), xi-xiii, xi: As a consequence of the extreme intellectual refinement of our analytic powers, which have come to dominate understanding and criticism, the authentic significance of literature and fine art has been diffused into innumerable interpretative methods and ultimately lost from sight. Its essential message of relevance for human life is either disintegrated into artificial distinctions or distorted by the intellects destructurizing and inadequately reshaping manipulations. It is an irreplaceable loss; mans creative endeavor brings in the significant guideposts for the specifically human business with life: Mans selfinterpretation in existence. [Authors highlighting]. 4 The assertion of a biographical fallacy (Crowder/Chappell [1987], 40) cannot be maintained, because Stevens does give a number of biographical hints, that may be sparse and obscure but are hard to be ignored. 5 By claiming that the speaker of the poem is a poet and not a mere role I disagree with Crowder/Chappell (1987); I do not adopt their idea that Stevens makes clear that the woman singer, not the speaker, takes on the role of the poet (40), since Stevens as the author of the poem claims the role of the poet at the first instance. The process of word-ordering through the song, the vista of the sea and the artists imagination (the core of the poem), obviously happens to occur in the speakers mind, who, therefore, cannot be located outside of his own poem. The first-person-narrator of the poem offers his reader a comparable effect, as the woman-singer
3 2

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singing girl and Ramon, the two personae appearing in the poem along with the first-person-narrator (or, the Lyrisches Ich). We will witness no utterance of either of the two (except the womans song). We will only witness some strangers being at the seaside, and doing or experiencing something. In reading the poem, we do not get a report by Wallace Stevens about a deep moment in the life of Wallace Stevens. The autobiographical background thin enough serves as a mere surface to a universal experience reported by a poet. Autobiography has a paradox function in this text: Although it presumably has the important function of giving the basis of the poem to the poet, he reduces and obscures 6 the autobiographical element: We actually don't have to know anything about Stevens to understand the poem and its message. The poem has a simple plot which is divided into two sections, which can be subdivided into a scheme of six stanzas of varying length (7-7-6-23-8-5):7 In the first section (stanza 1-4), the poet and his companion watch a girl taking a walk by the sea and singing a song. In the second section (stanza 5-6), the poet and his companion, inspired by the girl's song, walk home in the evening and talk about their experience. They have a momentarily altered view of the world surrounding them, the sensation of sea and song has affected their thinking and their perception of the world. They experience a ... union of the imagination and external reality... (Miller 1987: 473). But there is much more to the poem than the telling of this rather simple story. One central point is, how the poet and his companion acquire their changed view of the world. An important factor determining and initiating this process is the singing girl the first word of the poem is she, and she is mentioned 21 times throughout the text the word with the highest frequency in the text. She has a statistical prevalence which signifies the importance of its signifie. But even though she is mentioned so many times, the reader scarcely gets to know something about her. The only attributes she has, are that she sings and that she is a maker. It is always in connection with one of these two attributes that she is mentioned. She is in fact not separable from the song she sang (15): The Combination she sang appears eight times (1, 10, 11, 15, 20, 38, 38, 43) and it is the phrase repeated most often throughout the poem. The combinations her voice (29, 34) and her song (40) also emphasize the relevancy of this junction. We hardly find more information about her, except that she sings and
offered him and Ramon Fernandez. He is a poet as much as she is, because he does not only have a moment of great insight, but also composes a poem about it. And he indeed has also some resemblance to Wallace Stevens, since, at least, he uses techniques which W.S. himself proposes for poetry. 6 Also in his occasional remarks about the identity of Ramon Fernandez, c.f. below for the discussion of the role and identity of Ramon Fernandez. 7 An ordering principle underlying the poem suggested here will be based on the musical sonata-form, c.f. 3.b; other possibilities of textual division are given e.g. by Holmes (1990): 7-7-6-13-10-8-5; here, the poem is divided into seven stanzas, taking the caesura in vv. 33-34 as a stanzaic division, which I do not adopt into my reading of the poem.

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that she is the maker of her song. She was striding there alone (41) while singing, a vague solitary figure in the distance, barely recognizable. Not her qualities as an individual or a character attract the poet perceiving her, her role in the poem is a more general one: The poet is interested in her quality as a poet, he perceives her making a song that mingles with the rolling of the sea, the world that surrounds them, he perceives her perceiving their world; for her as a poet there never was a world for her/Except the one she sang and, singing, made. (42-43) She is no distinguishable character, she is a prototype poet and her song an original poem. She personifies imagination 8 ; for Stevens, imagination is the central impetus of poetry. To the poet of The Idea of Order at Key West she is even more, since, through her song, she inspires him to write his poem. She becomes his muse. Her song is set against the ...meaningless plungings of water and wind,... (30). While she sings she is not anywhere else but by the sea, and the words of her song mingle with the ocean sounds. It is in this setting, where the poet and his companion first behold her. Her song makes such a strong impression on them, because it is embedded in the shore scene. The poet and his companion perceive two different sounds: The first is the song of the girl and the second the sound of the sea. And it is the difference between these two sounds that focuses their attention and their musings. The whole first section (1-43) of the poem is one large descriptive and meandering passage comparing the meaningful human voice with the empty one of the sea. The poet's literary treatment of the sea here is not traditional, to him the sea is a mere physical appearance, it never ...formed to mind or voice (2). Yet, the sea is another major element of the poem. The word sea appears nine times (1, 8, 14, 16, 21, 33, 38, 49), ocean once (7) and water five times (2, 9, 13, 24, 30) . The sea is no way personified, it is always depicted as a mere physical appearance. Nevertheless, the poet's depiction of the sea is ambiguous, if not paradox: In lines 3-4 he mock-personifies the sea, paraphrasing it as a mindless creature: Like a body wholly body, fluttering/ its empty sleeves. Although inhuman, the sea is capable of producing a cry (5). The poet also employs theatrical metaphors to characterize the sea. Neither the sea, nor the girl, are a mask (8) (as the masks used by the players in classical Greek theater), the sea is also tragic-gestured (16), although ...merely a place by which ... [the girl] walked... (17), only a setting here... The shore atmosphere is composed of theatrical distances (31). To the poet, the panorama of the ocean in itself has something of a mere background in a stage-play. The shore-scene is only comprehensible and meaningful for the poet and his companion via the conveying function of the girl's song. The importance of sea and song, again, can never be separated from each other. Meaning is not to be found in the sea alone, meaning is constituted by the interrelation and interaction between the girl's song and the surf of the sea:

C.f. Weber (1974: 302).

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... And when she sang, the sea, whatever self it had, became the self That was her song, for she was the maker. (38-40)

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Thus, the act of giving meaning to the world is subject to the girl and her song. The world alone is not meaning. Man, through imagination, gives meaning to the world he dwells in:
It may be that in all her phrases stirred, The grinding water and the gasping wind; But is was she and not the sea we heard, (12-14)

Even though the world of the people crowding the poem is somewhat in disorder9, the poet does not fail to implement a formal order already in the first stanza. The sound and movement of the sea are described in verses abounding with alliterations (bold) and internal rhymes (underscored), along with repetition. By alliteration, the lines are also connected in enjambment:
Like a body wholly body, fluttering Its empty sleeves; and yet its mimic motion Made constant cry, caused constantly a cry, (3-5)

By the key-words she and sea the first and the second stanza are woven together in a cross-structure pattern. The underlying structure would be:
stanza 1 1 6
_

She

-----------

sea. (we)

___________________________________________ sea ----------she,

stanza 2

14 she ----------sea (we) ____________________________________________

Fig. 1

Added the third word we, which also rhymes with sea and she, a triadic structure of references going back and forth is set up. The poet approaches his
9 The world the poet perceives is not orderly without imagination added to it nature is not Gods orderly creation any more, it takes man to attach his own idea of order; c.f. Gelpi (1987: 54): without God or the Oversoul, how could mind and nature come into relation?

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topics by what could be called musical variation (c.f. ch. 4): All major motifs are introduced in the first stanza she, sang (for her song), sea in verse one and we in verse six. The first stanza, however, is chiefly devoted to the sea-scene and its movements in the almost onomatopoeically sounding alliterative passage given above. In the second stanza, the girl and her song predominate. Her distinct voice is set against the blurred sound of the sea from the first stanza: Since what she sang was uttered word by word (11). The observations of the first and second stanzas and the observers are being elaborated in the third stanza. Girl's song and sea stand in clear opposition, in an unmistakable statement the girl is the maker of the song she sang (15) and the sea merely a place she walked to sing (17). In the second half of the third stanza the we-element predominates. Introduced as all chief elements of the poem in stanza 1, the we believe that the sound of the ocean (that is not theirs) has no human quality. Only mentioned once in the second stanza they hear her song (14) the we now have a more prominent role in having to ask for the spirit of what they perceive. The listeners thus far not yet defined as the poet and his companion have a faint moment of epiphany, they realize that what they experience is of the spirit we sought (19), but they cannot further explain it. They witness a superior moment in their life but they don't understand what it comprises of. They haven't yet discerned the order of what they perceive. The notion of in all her phrases stirred/The grinding water and the gasping wind (12-13) is not yet explicable. The first set of variations is complete after the third stanza: The first stanza is dominated by the sea, the second with the singing girl, both are brought together in the first half of the third stanza, and in the second half of it, a first rsum is given by the we:
1 = sea; 2 = she; 3 = she/sea we

In the fourth stanza, the second part (the first set of movements as exposition complete with stanzas one to three) of the poem begins. The fourth stanza mirrors the first stanza. The topos of the sea is taken up again. The poet doesn't seem to be content with the idea of the sea as a mere place to walk by. In conjunctive form (If...only [21, 23]) the poet paints an impressionist picture of a sea landscape with pure nature-sounds. Surprisingly the picture is except the bronze shadows (31) completely colorless.10 The waves that color the voice of the sea (21) are more accurately understood as the accompaniment to a melody than strokes of a brush. To adopt the poet's paradox rhetoric here: He paints the sea-sound. The poet, by imagining the sea without the girl's song, finds an endless (without end [27]) and meaningless (30) sound. Yet the picture of the
Compare T.S. Eliots The Love-Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, v.128: When the wind blows the water white and black.
10

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sea painted here is very impressionist and the idea of an endless summer (27), an eternal element inherent in nature, underlines the grave presence the sea has in the mind of the poet. He struggles to grasp this challenging insight: In taking up the issue proposed in the question of the third stanza (Whose spirit is this? [18]), the poet understands that the girl delivers the necessary element through her song, and thereby creates more than sound alone (28):
It was her voice that made The sky acutest at its vanishing. (34-35)

It is the presence of her song which makes the break of dusk more intense. The/This world only becomes the world through her: She was the single artificer of the world/In which she sang. (37). This apotheosizing (or better: demiurgical) formula points directly towards Stevens poetology. The girl as a creator becomes a demiurge.11 The poem as an act of imagination is the one true idea of reality man is capable of putting forth. As stanza four reflects the first one, stanza five reflects the second one. The effect of the girl's song is further mapped: By the song, the sea is transformed into something orderly, which then only exists in the song itself:
...And when she sang, the sea, Whatever self it had, became the self That was her song, for she was the maker... (38-40)

As the maker of the song, even the girl becomes an integrated part of this ordered world:
...there never was a world for her Except the one she sang and, singing made. (42-43)12

The parallel outline of stanzas 1, 2 and 4, 5 is also preserved in the connection between stanza 3 and six. The correspondency of the stanzas is illustrated in Fig. 2.

For the presence of Plato in the poem c.f. footnote 17. In these lines we also have a clear example of social criticism which helps to correct [the] misapprehension about Stevens that [he] was indifferent to social criticism (Vendler 1988: 78): The girl has to create an imaginary world by singing, because in the real world there is no place for her, she sings herself into her own world where no material goods are needed, c.f. also Weber (1974, footnote 22).
12

11

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1: sea 2: she/song 3: (she/sea) we

4: sea 5: she/song 6: we

Fig. 2

In the fifth stanza, the perspective has changed to the poet and his companion; the third "movement" or the recapitulation of the poem begins. In solving the enigma of the we, it focuses on the poet and his companion, who were, thus far, in a hardly discernible background. The poet has watched the singing girl and the sea together with his companion named Ramon Fernandez. Granted that the poet speaking in The Idea of Order at Key West is Stevens himself, it seems too reasonable to take Ramon as a historical person, too. A person named Ramon Fernandez exists in fact, he is a French literary critic with a dubious political background (which of course only manifested long after the poem had been written)13 and Stevens certainly knew him. Nevertheless Stevens has denied any coincidence in slight and contradictory remarks that rather obscure the discussion:
Ramon Fernandez was not intended to be anyone at all. I chose two everyday Spanish names. I knew of Ramon Fernandez, the critic, and had read some of his criticisms but I did not have him in mind.14 I used two everyday names. As I might have expected they turned out to be an actual name.15

Again, the question where autobiography starts and ends is raised. The given name is of no vital importance although for the poem's progression, this intention is supported by Stevens own remarks. In the poetic plot it functions as a mere addressee for the questions the poet poses. But he never grants an answer, and an answer cannot be expected because it cannot be given. The ordering of reality is not understandable, it is only imaginable. Nevertheless, the name, which Stevens calls an everyday name, standing there remains disturbing. Is it really that common? Did Stevens choose it for its sound
13 In spite of Stevens denial, Gelpi (1987: 64) adopts the version of Ramon Fernandez, the aesthetician; also Holmes (1990: 67): in spite of Stevens stubborn denial, the reference is to formalist critic Ramon Fernandez; for a further discussion on the topic Ramon Fernandez, the politically aberrant to-be fascist, and the possible implications (including the visionary tone read into Stevens poem) see Kaplan (2010). 14 Quoted from Ryan (1982: 31). 15 Quoted from Weber (1974: 295).

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qualities?16 It may be a reason to choose it, but not an explanation. The name still has qualities beyond mere sound. The reader unaware of the literary critic may have the picture of an imaginary person of Spanish or Hispano-American origin (not unusual for the setting Key West close to the Caribbean). He might be imagined as a youthful companion to the poet, maybe his apprentice, who grows pale (52) while facing the demiurgical powers of poetry. Mute Ramon seems to be deeply impressed by the lesson his master teaches him.17 It is finally up to the reader to constitute his own version of Ramon Fernandez, who could belong to any world, no matter if imagined or real. The world we live in and the world of the poem, at this point, are mixed up to a high degree. 18 Nevertheless, there has been an ongoing discussion in the criticism about this literary persona and his counterpart in real life. As has been stated in more recent criticism, R. Fernandez was involved in politics in Vichy-France and has, as many of his contemporaries made a progression from left-communist to right-pro-Nazi attitude. He was a supporter of the Germans in occupied France. Some have taken this to read a prophetic insight into the poem Stevens asking his companion a politically revealing question (Kaplan 2010). But in the end, in the text Ramon is the one being asked a question that needs and will have no answers. The answers have to be felt in ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds (56), which hardly allows for any political interpretation. Stanzas six and seven are a rsum of the conversation of the two, following their experience. While turning toward the town, they repeat the question of the third stanza. They already had a talk while watching the girl and the sea (More even than her voice, and ours [29]) and now they approach their epiphany, which has been prepared in vv. 19-20. Catalyzed by the girl's song, they have an insight into the world ordered by imagination: in their eyes The lights in the fishing boats ... Mastered the night and portioned out the sea (47-49). Nature no longer is incomprehensive, chaotic reality to them. For a moment, through the poet's Blessed rage for order (52), the furor poeticus (Weber 1974: 302), the world as they see it is arranged, deepened, enchanted (c. f. v. 51). The girl's song has Mastered the night (49), order[ed] words of the sea (53). The mystery of the genius of the sea (1), usually incomprehensible to man, becomes clear while being an integrate part of the world of imagination, of poetry. The words of the poem/song recur to man and his place in the world, They give an archaic, deeper understanding of ourselves and of our origins (55). The world of man is enlarged through poetry In ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds (56).
As suggested by Ryan (1982: 31): Stevenss choice of the name for the pure sound an flavor of it 17 The idea of a Platonic friendship might not be too far-fetched, considering the otherwise evident presence of Plato in the text which promotes the idea of the demiurge the artificer of the world, see also footnote 11. 18 C.f. Weber (1974: 295): Fiktionalisierung und imaginative Erweiterung erlebter Wirklichkeit
16

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Stanzas four and six contain descriptive passages that powerfully describe the beauties of the sea and the harbor: In the fourth stanza the poet listens to the sounds of the sea and the wind, listens to the dark voice of the sea (21), to the heaving speech of air (26); the auditory channel dominates, whereas visual impressions are recorded in the sixth stanza: The lights of the boats in the harbor portion out the opaqueness of the darkness (46-51). The two pictures painted (one of them rather an auditory picture) illustrate the primeval power of the sea, i.e. reality. The seascape, the shore side contain a merely existing force, that can be detected through man's imagination only and be comprised in the words of a song/poem:
Most of Stevens's poems are based upon images which somehow participate in this primal force of being, and it is the existence of the force in then that he is concerned to demonstrate. (Ellmann 1957: 103)

Imagination in the poem is represented by the girls song. It is an immediate effusion of her poetic imagination, it is the center of Stevensian order-making. But how and why this imagination has an effect on reality, how it temporarily opens up an aperture to deeper understanding that in the end is no question of concern. The last stanza makes clear that an answer to the questions raised cannot be given, it can merely be felt, can only be poetically described. We will never know what the contents of the girls song were, we only learn to know what the girls song was:
The makers rage to order words of the sea, Words of the fragrant portals, dimly starred, And of ourselves and of our origins, In ghostlier demarcations, keener sounds. (53-56)

The Idea of Order at Key West is a poetological poem in the stricter sense, since it basically is one long description of how poetic imagination works. The reader witnesses, how the two protagonists experience an epiphany by listening to a song-poem; and the reader, by reading the poem, again experiences a moment of epiphany.19 The poem produces this double effect, it is felt by the poetic personae as well as the reader, and it manifests itself on the poetic level as well as on the level of reader-reality, or, reception. An order in the realm of poesy has affected maker and reader, singer and listener by art, in The Idea of Order at Key West life has ceased to be a matter of chance. (W. Stevens, Letters, Nov. 15, 1935)
19 Over-emphasizing the role of the writer of the poem Stevens and thereby neglecting the evident fact of the double creation of order happening in the poem might lead to the conclusion of Stevens maintaining a statement of masculinity: Stevens places himself in a textual and hierarchical order above nature, above friend, and above the muse as artificer, inscribing himself as the author/authority of the world in which he sings. Here logo- and phallocentric assumptions of order coincide, forming a textual crux that glosses over the apparent exposure of the fictionality of the poetic word. (Vaught Brogan 1993: 181)

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3. Ideas of Poetry: The Idea of Order at Key West and Literary Tradition The Idea of Order at Key West does not stand isolated in the canon of American and English poetry. It has explicit literary predecessors. The central motifs of the poem, the singing girl and the sea are both frequently used. Critical accounts like Andrews Johnston (1991), Tymieniecka (1985) or Bourke (1954) suggest the shore as a common setting for poetry, and the essential function of the sea as an outstanding exponent of nature for literature in general. The genius loci of the shore serves poets as an aesthetic stimulus, which they attempt to preserve in poetry. Here Stevens' poem is a part of the tradition since his aim in The Idea of Order at Key West is to understand or feel, and to express the magic of the place he has highlighted in the title of his poem: the shore at Key West. Although, at first instance the sea as a place to Stevens meaningless (30), he tends to personalize it in the poem. In the first stanza he employs the scarecrow-image: Like a body wholly body, fluttering/Its empty sleeves" (3-4). Throughout the poem he employs theatrical attributes: At first rejecting the idea (The sea was not a mask [8]), Stevens nevertheless picks it up again (The ever-hooded, tragic-gestured sea [16]; Theatrical distances, bronze shadows heaped [31]). The theatrical images never dominate the poem, but under the surface they appear as a hint to the old theatrum-mundi-topos (Weber 1974: 301). Here, Stevens refers to literary tradition. Stevens sea is chaotic but not an archaic threat 20 like, e. g., in Walt Whitman's On the Beach at Night:
From the beach the child holding the hand of her father, Those burial-clouds that lower victorious soon to devour all, Watching, silently weeps.21

To the poet of The Idea of Order at Key West the sea is not premonitory, he savors the meaningless plungings of water and the wind (30) like a stage-performance of nature. To him the sea is bare of any implication not recurring to itself. Here Stevens leaves the tracks of tradition. As a Modernist poet, he cannot regard phenomena of the world surrounding him as analogies of human life. The sea does not remind him of any incident in human life, it cannot serve as a symbol. The genius of the sea (1) is of a different quality. Foremost, the sea in the poem is the sea, and does not stand for anything else. The poem rather concentrates on the question, what makes the existence of the sea different from human life, why it is so difficult for the human mind to understand the sea. The poet's
20 C.f. Mller-Schwefe (1969: 33): wird das Faktum des bedrohlichen Meeres immer wieder zur begrifflichen Verdeutlichung der Lebenssituation, des Lebens der einzelnen Menschen verwendet. 21 Walt Whitman: Leaves of Grass. Ed. by Scully Bradley and Harold Blodgett, New York: Norton 1973, 259, vv.11-13.

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rationalist view of the sea first persuades to regard it as meaningless (30), but simultaneously he suspects that it is more than sound alone (28). There is more about the sea than its chaotic appearance. The element characterizing the sea here is the moment of (meaningless) eternity (27). The sound of the sea is like a sound repeated endlessly. And it is a positive sound, because it sounds like summer, like an endless vacation (26-28). This static quality stands in opposition to the dynamic coming and going, beginning and ending, of the girl's song. By establishing this opposition, the sea can be defined. It is the contrast of the timelessness of the sea and the transitory quality of the song what makes its perception such a vivid one. It is probably the recognition of this contradiction which enables the poet to apply his idea of order to the scene he has witnessed.22 William Wordsworth's The Solitary Reaper is regarded as a direct literary predecessor to Wallace Stevens The Idea of Order at Key West. By comparing both poems, the distance between the Modernist poem and the Romantic poem becomes evident. The only thing both poems do have in common is the singing girl. No triangular relationship as in The Idea of Order at Key West is evident. The song the girl sings is at the center of The Solitary Reaper: The melancholy strain (6) triggers the empathy of the bypassing stranger. In the whole second and third stanza (half of the poem!) we find musings about the beauty, the nature and the contents of the song. The girl and her surroundings are marginalia. There is no specific relationship between the girl and her environment, she simply belongs to it, is an integrate part of an ordered world. For the poet this constellation is indisputable. The song he beholds simply moves him, appeals to his emotions, but it does not have a conveying or mediating function between poet and world. His world does not have to be unpuzzled, since the Romantic poet communicates more or less directly with the world he dwells in. The central focus of The Solitary Reaper is as the title suggests on the girl and, especially, her song. Both poems share the motive of the solitary singing girl and also share the esteem of the beauty of a song. Otherwise, they do not have much in common.23 The resemblance to another poem William Butler Yeats A Crazed Girl has hitherto not been so widely noticed, but Holmes (1990: 65) outlines its position in between Wordsworth and Stevens, and that it also recalls the Wordsworthian prototype. Stevens uses the traditional patterns of meter and rhyme, but does not use them in a traditional way. He seldom uses end-rhyme: The first stanza only has one end-rhyme: motion (4) and ocean (7). In the second stanza the half-rhymes heard (10), word (11), stirred (12) and again heard (14) appear. The third stanza is framed by the word sang (15 and 20) here a central word of the poem serves as a rhyme. In the fourth stanza sea (38) and we (40) again
22 The poem is full of contradictory phrases like: That was not ours although we understood (8), vv. 12-14 etc. 23 For the paragraph discussing The Solitary Reaper c.f. also: Weber (1974: 302-303).

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important words for the poem and made (34 and 43)24 serve as end-rhymes. The sixth stanza has two end-rhymes: lights (46), night (51) and there (47), air (48) No strophic rhyme-scheme is attachable to this sparse yield of end-rhymes. Rhyme is not used in an ordinary or traditional way to serve as a chief formal pattern to structure a poem. Stevens uses rhyme to accentuate. Often rhyme and repetition correspond with each other as prosodic devices: Stevens knits a dense web of internal rhymes. The three most important words of the poem she, sea and we rhyme and appear in a high frequency throughout the poem (repetition) are, in fact, the words repeated most often. Another formal issue of The Idea of Order at Key West to be discussed, is the proposal of its dramatic form. The poem
...contain[s] all of the standard components of the dramatic monologue: one speaker, a silent listener, and a specific place at which the dramatic action occurs. ... the speaker is communicating his thoughts to the listener at a moment of intense insight or crisis." (Crowder/Chappell 1987: 38-39)

Stevens usage of the blank verse as metrical structure indeed suggests the allusion to theatrical speech. The theatrical images occasionally applied add to that. But the interpretation of the poem as a ...unusual yet authentic dramatic monologue... (Crowder/Chappell 1987: 39) should not be over-emphasized. It is not the only function of the poem to report that The speaker has gained lasting insight into the ability of a poet-singer to shape order out of chaos by stimulating him and Ramon to look more deeply into their own minds,... (Crowder/Chappell 1987: 42). The interaction between she, sea and we in the poem is not that linear and far more complex, as has been shown. It is not the ability of the one to stimulate the other, but the ability has to be a quality contributed simultaneously by all its participants. 25 It would thus be an underpricing of the poem to regard it as a mere report. And, Stevens' poetology applied, the poem itself should also serve as a stimulus to the reader to make use of his own imagination. Stevens obviously and firmly roots in tradition, but traditional elements never dominate his poetry. He uses traditional material rather to demonstrate the differences between him and his predecessors, but, on the other hand, is never forgetful about what tradition contributes to his poetry:
A real tradition is not the relic of a past that is irretrievably gone; it is a living force that animates and informs the present. ...Far from implying the repetition of what has been, tradition presupposes the reality of what endures. It appears as an heirloom, a heritage that This rhyme not detected by Weber (1974: 300) C.f. Porter (1962: 47): The female persona , the narrator, and Ramon Fernandez do not have individual versions of the beach experience; they all share the same experience by the sea and, consequently, the same idea of order. The girls song provides the common ground.
25 24

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one receives on condition of making it bear fruit before passing it on to one's descendants. (Igor Stravinsky, Poetics of Music, quoted from Cavanaugh (1974, xv.))

To Stevens, prosody never is the application of empty formalism. He functionalizes traditional elements.26 His use of the blank verse corresponds to the monological form, the chief rhymes are the key-words of the poem. The structure of the motifs is also chosen appropriately, nothing only contributes, everything is an inevitable part, form and contents in fact constitute a unity. But, finally, in The Idea of Order at Key West contradiction is an equally important factor of composition. The meaning of the employed traditional images is fractured and distorted, before they are being refurbished into a new order. Contradiction is also a rhetorical device in the argumentative flow of the poem.

4. A Song Within a Song: The Idea of Order at Key West, and Music (and Painting)

The Idea of Order at Key West has strong connection to music, issued by its form as well as its contents. This fact has been pointed out above, but will be elaborated upon in the following. Critical studies by e.g. Holmes (1990) and Heller (1986) stress upon the presence of musical issues, and the issue of painting in the poem, it is obvious that the neighboring arts are so prominently present in the poem that they might lead to critical analyses based upon these connections. Regarding the structure of the poem as it has been discussed in chapter 2, I would like to suggest the application of the sonata scheme for an analysis of the poems architecture. An elaboration of the parallel structure inherent in the poem (as given in Fig. 2) results in a sonata scheme as given in Fig. 3.
I. Exposition 1 first movement: 2 second movement: 3 third movement: stanza stanza stanza stanza stanza stanza 1 2 3 4 5 6

II. Development: III. Recapitulation: IV. Coda:

Fig. 3

C.f. Heller (1986: 149): Die Befreiung der Imagination von festen Vorstellungsmustern bedeutet fr den Knstler nicht nur die freie Verfgbarkeit historisch gewachsener Stilformen und Darstellungsmittel, auf die er als Bausteine zu einer neuen Ordnung zurckgreifen kann, sondern darber hinaus auch eine Befreiung vom traditionellen Begriff der Wahrheit als Korrespondenz zugunsten einer kritischen Verwendung eines biozentrischen Wahrheitsbegriffs, der als anarchischer, egozentrischer Individualismus der sthetischen Weltgestaltung bei Stevens sichtbar wird

26

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The thematic outline of the poem fits this scheme nicely, as well as the varying length of the stanzas does correspond with the organizational tenets of a sonata, the long fourth stanza very well serves the idea of a development of the themes, concerning quantity as well as quality. Also, the extensive length of the exposition must not surprise the inherent element of contrast (Encyc. Brit. 20, [1968], 905) attested to the sonata form does also add to the justification of the application of a musical form to the poem. The variation form, attested by Northrop Frye (1976: 276ff.) as generic to Stevens poems, is also a chief principle of composition in The Idea of Order at Key West, as it is constitutive for the sonata form. The central themes she, we and sea are introduced in the first stanza, are going through the first iteration in the second and third stanza (exposition), are labored over in the large fourth stanza (development). The thematic development here also includes the prevalence of one theme, or the other one (c.f. fig. 2). The recapitulation of the fifth stanza delivers a re-evaluation of the variations given in the exposition and the development, and, finally, stanza six serves as the coda: a final comment on the themes and variations. The musical pattern of the sonata form is of course only one of several formal patterns suitable, but it is very deeply rooted in form and contents of the poem, and far from being a superficial mirror image of it. Above all, Stevens use of variation is a dominant characteristic of his poetry, and
takes us deep into Stevenss central notion of poetry as the result of a struggle, or balance, or compromise, or tension, between the two forces that he calls imagination and reality. We notice that in the musical theme with variations, the theme is frequently a composition by someone else or comes from a different musical context. Similarly the poet works with imagination, which is what he has, and reality, which is given him. So from Stevenss point of view, poems could be described as the variations that imagination makes on the theme of reality. (Frye 1976: 277)

Musical allusion in The Idea of Order in Key West go even further than that. The nucleus of the poem is the girls song. It seems to be crucial here, that the girl does not simply recite a poem, but sings a song. Whereas it is never revealed, whether she sings an original song, or if she recites one. Her appearance as a poet, and this is what counts here, is, more correctly, the appearance of a poet-singer. This alludes to the origins of art in myth here being represented by the archetype of the Orphic singer, referring to a time, when poetry used to be reproduced and perpetuated orally, and poetry was sung to an audience (c.f. Holmes 1990: 66). The scope of reference here reaches from ancient myth to the romantic idea of the unity of arts. The magic of music, beyond the plain uttering of words, mingles with the words of the girls poemsong. This marriage of the arts, as it may be called, is what appeals to the two listeners. It is the power beyond plain words, a touch of the unspeakable the musical element of the song which sets free the energies of imagination.

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The poem is not an attempt to replace27 the girls song, not an experiment trying to copy the musical structure of the song into the poem. But the musical structure of the sonata form evident in the poem might be understood as a symphonic approach to a song, like Romantic classical composers, who often took up folk themes and turned them into symphonic variations (two famous examples being Brahms Ungarische Tnze, and Chatschaturjans Sabre Dance). Not very much about the musical and verbal qualities of the girls song are revealed in the poem itself. The poets only concern is the songs effect, which in the end is being described by a poem; a poem-song through a poem with a musical structure. The song is re-created
so da die betreffende Stelle in seinem Werk soweit wie mglich die gleiche Wirkung auf einen Leser anstrebt wie die Wirkung der Komposition auf einen Hrer. Nachahmung mag Analyse oder Deutung einschlieen, aber nur, um ihr eigenes Ziel zu frdern, welches nicht Verstndnis der Musik, sondern ihr Erlebnis durch die Vermittlung der Literatur ist. (Brown 1984: 35-36)

Through this transposition dart, Stevens shares his experience of the creative powers of music and words combined in a song-poem (although the words here seem secondary, since we never get to know them), by re-ordering this folk-art like song structure into a symphonic poetical structure; the connections between music and poetry being constitutive for every step along the way of this process. Although, in my reading of the poem, the recourse on music is much stronger than the presence of other art forms, the affinities apparent to painting should also be taken into account: Descriptive passages of the poem remind many critics of painting, and the different impressions in the poem painted with words remind of different styles of painting: E.g. Burney (1962: 15-17) identifies a Cezanne like paragraph, Monet-like impressionism and Klee-like art. He asserts that
Stevens uses art history, shifting his painting images from romantic to impressionist to post-impressionist to neo-romantic, as a way of rendering his rejection, first, of the rather melodramatic integrity of romanticism (the genius of the sea), and then the merely mimetic theatricality of impressionism (meaningless plungings). (Burney 1962: 16)

Concluding, Burney compares Stevens search for a synthesis of art and reality with concepts of painting by Cezanne. The rich texture of The Idea of Order at Key West invites for approximations to its meaning by applying most heterogeneous tools; above all, the aspects of synaesthesia and poetology seem to be the two recurring forces determining the poems analytical scope. This observation can only lead to the conclusion, that this poem is no less than a poetological program of modernism, as seen through the Stevensian lens.
27 C.f. Brown (1984: 33): Im engeren Sinne scheinen die Verbindungen zwischen Musik und Literatur auf vier grundlegende Mglichkeiten beschrnkt zu sein: Kombination, Ersetzen[replacement], Einflu, Parallele oder Analogie.

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5. Conclusion: A Poem about Poetry The Idea of Order at Key West as a Poetology of Modernism What makes Stevens poetry difficult to many readers is the strict devotion to his poetical principles; the theoretical berbau of Stevens poetry overshadows each of his poems. Wallace Stevens was a poet for whom the theory and practice of poetry were inseparable (Frye 1963: 161) By writing poetry, Stevens considered himself bound to the universal task of the poet to create a surpreme fiction; this has to take place in single and separate poems, of course; but each of these poems is entangled in the poets ultimate work of to create his own epistemological poetic version of reality conceived by imagination.28 The paradox of reality and imagination (Frye 1976: 294), the necessary aporia of composition through decomposition (in Stevens already something genuinely modernist)29 stand for Stevens Modernist, or, as he would rather call it, New Romantic approach to writing poetry. To Stevens
Poetry has to do with reality in that concrete and individual aspect of it which the mind can never tackle altogether on its own terms, with matter that is foreign and alien in a way in which abstract systems, ideas in which we detect an inherent pattern, a structure that belongs to the ideas themselves, can never be. (W. Stevens 1957: 236)

The Idea of Order at Key West bearing a massive weight of thought and feeling that cannot be separated from each other (Beckett 1977: 100) is an outstanding illustration of Stevens poetology (Doggett 1959: 370): At first glance it is, indeed, a poem about poetry, about the methods, aims, and effects of poetry. [I]n Stevens, a reflexive intelligence that cannot evade the knowledge of its own processes is always present. (Vendler 1988: 77). The poem describes the purpose of a poem by giving both cause and effect of one (and, at the same time, of course being itself a poem). To Stevens, reception of and understanding of the world/reality depend on the method of the mental processing of it.
The living creature and its environment, imagination and reality, the mind and the world, this is the simplest and most elementary of all philosophical ideas, as old as subject and object. Here is the fundamental idea of Stevens poetry this duality of mind and world and it permeates most of his writing. (Doggett 1966: 368)

Imagination enables man, and especially the artist as the chosen one, to bring the mind closer to the thing it perceives (Doggett 1959: 372). Imagination,
28 Weak imagination either surrenders to reality (= realism) or runs away from it (= solipsism); imagination has to fight back with a subjective violence corresponding to the objective violence of external pressure c.f. and cit. Frye (1976), 277-278. 29 the artists need to dismantle reality before rearranging it in art. Vendler (1988: 77), c.f. also Frye (1976: 287) and Holmes (1990: 74).

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becoming visible through poetry, is the most valuable faculty of man to Stevens, the Modernist poet. Being of a generation in desperate need and search for values, a generation facing more than a mere loss of values30, he finds more than consolation in poetry. His surpreme fiction is the artistic center of a Modernist recognition and re-evaluation of reality which endeavors to lead out of the threatening emptiness of a 20th century world. The Idea of Order at Key West comprises no less than the whole of this artistic program, Stevens sense of the poem as enacted mental process rather than a statement or narrative (Vendler 1988: 78), rendering the whole thought contained in the poem, along with all of its possible critical readings, into what we rightfully might call a Poetology of Modernism.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Adorno, Theodor W. (1945), Theses Upon Art and Religion Today, in The Kenyon Review 7:4, 677-682 (cited from T.W.A., Noten zur Literatur. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp 41989, 647-653). Andrews Johnston, Sara (1991): Lifes a Beach: The Shore-Lyric from Arnold to Ammons. Chapel Hill: North Carolina UP 1991. Brown, Calvin S. (1984), Theoretische Grundlagen zum Studium der Wechselverhltnisse zwischen Literatur und Musik (German Translation of: Music and Literature A Comparison of the Arts), Athens: Georgia UP 1948. Cavanaugh, William C. (1974), Introduction to Poetry, Dubuque/Iowa: Brown. Crowder, Ashby Bland, Charles Chappell (1987), "The Dramatic Form of 'The Idea of Order at Key West' and 'Peter Quince at the Clavier'", in College Literature 14:1, 38-47. Doggett, Frank (1966), Stevens Poetry of Thought, Baltimore: John Hopkins Press. Ellmann, Richard (1957), "Wallace Stevens' Ice-Cream", in The Kenyon Review 19, 89-105. Frye, Northrop (1963), The Realistic Oriole: A Study of Wallace Stevens, in Marie Boroff (ed), Wallace Stevens: A Collection of Critical Essays, Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 161-176. Frye, Northrop (1976), Wallace Stevens and the Variation Form, in N.F., Spiritus mundi: Essays on Literature, Myth, and Society. Bloomington: Indiana UP. Gelpi, Albert (1987), A Coherent Splendor: The American Poetic Renaissance, 1910-1950. Cambridge and others: Cambridge UP. Heller, Jrgen (1986), William Carlos Williams, Wallace Stevens und die Moderne Malerei: sthetische Entwrfe, Verfahren der Komposition, Frankfurt/M. et.al., Peter Lang. Holmes, Barbara (1990), The Decomposer's Art: Ideas of Music in the Poetry of Wallace Stevens, New York and others: Peter Lang (New Connections: Studies in Interdisciplinarity 1). Kaplan, Alice (2010): Ghostly Demarcations: on Ramon Fernandez, in The Nation, feb. 15, 2010 (online: http://www.thenation.com/article/ghostly-demarcations-ramon-fernandez). Miller, Joseph (1987), "Wallace Stevens", in DLB [= Dictionary of Literary Biography] 54, 471-505.
30

The individual might still be capable of having religious experiences. But positive religion has lost its character of objective, all-comprising validity, its supra-individual binding force. It is no longer an unproblematic, a priori medium within which each person exists without questioning. Hence the desire for a reconstruction of that much praised unity amounts to wishful thinking, even if it be deeply rooted in the sincere desire for something which gives sense to a culture threatened by emptiness and universal alienation. Adorno (1945: 647).

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Mller-Schwefe, Gerhard (1969), Einfhrung in die Gedichtinterpretation: Schlssel zur englischen Lyrik, Dortmund: Lensing. Porter, James E. (1962), Stevens The Idea of Order at Key West, in The Explicator XX, 47-48. Ryan, Michael (1982), Disclosures of Poetry: On Wallace Stevens and 'The Idea of Order at Key West', in The American Poetry Review, 11:5, Sept./Oct. 1982, 29-34. Tymieniecka, Anna-Teresa (ed.), Poetics of the Elements in the Human Condition: The Sea. from Elemental Stirrings to Symbolic Inspiration, Language, and Life-Significance in Literary Interpretation and Theory, Dordrecht and others: D. Reidel 1985 [= Tymieniecka, Anna-Teresa (ed.), Analectica Husserliana. The Yearbook of Phenomenological Research , vol. 19.] Vaught Brogan, Jaqueline (1993), Elizabeth Bishop: Perversity as Voice, in Marilyn May Lombardi (ed), Elizabeth Bishop, The Geography of Gender, The University Press of Virginia, 175-195. Vendler, Helen (1988), The Music of What Happens, Cambridge/Mass., Harvard UP 1988. Wallace Stevens, Ideas of Order, 1936. Wallace Stevens, The Necessary Angel, 1951. Wallace Stevens, Opus posthumous, 1957. Wallace Stevens, Letters (ed. Holly Stevens), 1966. Weber, Alfred (1974): Wallace Stevens: 'The Idea of Order at Key West', in Klaus Lubbers (ed), Die amerikanische Lyrik: Von der Kolonialzeit bis zur Gegenwart, Dsseldorf: Bagel 1974, 292-305.

LENFANCE LE PASS QUI NE PASSE PAS DANS LES ROMANS DE PASCAL QUIGNARD
ANDREEA DIACONESCU

CHILDHOOD THE PAST DOES NEVER PASS IN THE NOVELS OF PASCAL QUIGNARD

The childhood remaining between the times borders shows a certain relationship to the temporality that contributes to the originality of Pascal Quignards approach. Quignards characters cannot completely get rid of this fantastical moment where temporality blocks in a present time of a happy or unhappy fullness, as appropriate. The emotional intensity is in counterpoint with the vectorized time acting ruthlessly on the adult who feels the violence in a painful way. At Quignard, the characters have different views on their childhood, according to two basic affects that have marked them: the happiness and the unhappiness. At the poles there are: Charles Chenogne from Salon du Wurtemberg (The Salon in Wurtemberg) who interrupts very often the well-ordered recall of the period 1963-1986 to dive obsessively in the memories of the childhood spent in Wurtemberg and A. from Carus who is running away from the childhood memories, even if they persist to disturb his memory. Other characters revolve around these poles with some variations: Quoeun from Carus and Ann Hidden have a disillusioned attitude towards the unhappy childhood, while Edouard Furfooz from Escaliers de Chambord unconsciously seeks refuge in the manipulation of toys to forget the trauma of childhood. On the other hand, the protagonists of LOccupation amricaine (The American Occupation) represent a special case due to their premature decision to abandon the French childhood. The oversized temporality of the childhood remains constant in these situations that we intend to analyze. Keywords: childhood, the past, oversized temporality, happiness, unhappiness.

En faisant le bilan des choses longues et des choses peu durables dans le fragment CXXXII de son journal, Apronenia Avitia du roman Les Tablettes de buis dApronenia Avitia note : Parmi les choses qui sont trs longues jajouterai lenfance. (Quignard, 2006 : 116). Charles Chenogne, le protagoniste du Salon du Wurtemberg, a une observation similaire : Quand je retourne Bergheim, je crois rejoindre le site le plus vieux du monde. Ctait lenfance, ctait la mchoire de Heidelberg. [] Ctait la grotte de Schuhrloch. (Quignard, 1995 : 397). En effet, si dans le paradis la temporalit est exclue et que le rve en brouille les limites, lenfance en restant entre les frontires chronologiques dmontre un

Docteur en philologie lUniversit de Bucarest, [email protected]

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certain rapport la temporalit qui contribue loriginalit de la dmarche quignardienne. Les rflexions explicites sur la faon particulire de lenfant de concevoir sa relation avec le temps sont moins marques dans les romans, tandis quelles parsment les essais. Un exemple parlant cest la rflexion qui clt le premier chapitre de La Leon de musique :
Si joublie un instant la mue masculine, lattente, telle est la seule exprience que le temps nous donne de lui-mme. La dure est une rsistance. Le temps est ce qui dure, ce quon endure. [] Lenfant qui sait la vrit [] ne sait pas endurer le dlai. (Quignard, 1998 : 55-57)

Lenfance est donc cet ge magnifique, perdu presquen entier et qui rappelle le chaos originaire par le fait quelle ne connat pas la tyrannie du temps. Le moraliste Jean de La Bruyre le soulignait ds le XVIIe sicle : Les enfants nont ni pass, ni avenir et, ce qui ne nous arrive gure, ils jouissent du prsent..1 Effectivement, lenfant vit sans conscience du pass (qui se dilue dans un hier qui comprend tout ce quil a dj vcu) et sans se rapporter un futur explicite. Son parcours existentiel se dploie dans un prsent perptuel, un prsent de jouissance entire que la chronologie du pass et de lavenir ne vient pas troubler. Source dune indfectible nostalgie , selon lexpression de Quignard lui-mme, lenfance revient dans la mmoire de ladulte par clats ou par clairs.2 Les personnages de Quignard ne peuvent pas se dfaire compltement de ce moment fantasmatique o la temporalit se bloque un prsent de plnitude heureuse ou malheureuse, selon le cas. Lintensit motionnelle est en contrepoint avec le temps vectoris agissant impitoyablement sur ladulte qui en ressent de manire douloureuse la violence. Par la suite, le temps transforme le prsent dans un moment fugace qui se dcompose instantanment en ce qui a t et ce qui sera. Sorti de lenfance, lhomme appartient irrmdiablement au temps, mais il peut en court-circuiter la linarit par le souvenir mlancolique qui surgit son insu, en brisant parfois la dmarche ordonne de remmoration.3 Labolition du temps, propre lenfance, se maintient dans le souvenir quon en conserve. En effet, si la mmoire intervient pour modifier les souvenirs de toutes les autres tapes de la vie, elle reste fidle et immuable pour les souvenirs denfance quon revoit toujours de la mme faon : heureux ou malheureux, confiant ou effray, optimiste ou dsespr.4 Chez Quignard, les personnages envisagent lenfance de manire diffrente en fonction de deux affects essentiels qui lont marque : bonheur ou malheur. Aux ples se situent Charles Chenogne qui interrompt souvent la remmoration
La Bruyre Jean de, Les caractres, Paris, Bookking International, 1993, p. 251. Lapeyre-Desmaison Chantal-Andre, Pascal Quignard le solitaire rencontre avec Chantal Lapeyre-Desmaison, Paris, Flohic, 2001, p. 129. 3 Rabat Dominique, Pascal Quignard tude de loeuvre, Paris, Bordas, 2008, p. 106-107. 4 Tadi Jean-Yves et Marc, Le sens de la mmoire, Paris, Gallimard, coll. Essais , 1999, p. 300.
2 1

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ordonne de la priode 1963-1986 pour plonger obsessionnellement dans les souvenirs de lenfance wurtembergeoise et A. de Carus qui fuit les souvenirs denfance, mme si ceux-ci sobstinent de troubler sa mmoire. Dautres personnages gravitent autour de ces ples avec certaines variations : Quoeun et Ann Hidden ont une attitude dsabuse envers lenfance malheureuse, tandis quEdouard Furfooz se rfugie inconsciemment dans la manipulation des jouets pour oublier le traumatisme de lenfance. En revanche, les protagonistes de LOccupation amricaine constituent un cas particulier cause de leur dcision prcoce dabandonner lenfance franaise. La temporalit surdimensionne de lenfance reste constante dans les cas que nous analyserons ci-dessous. Charles Chenogne profite de la moindre occasion pour voquer divers aspects de son enfance passe au domaine familial de Bergheim, dans le Wurtemberg. Les souvenirs le hlent et il essaie de sarracher leur fascination en saisissant tout prtexte pour les confier au papier et sen librer. Quoiquil ait pass sa petite enfance Paris, Charles dit : Curieusement, je nai pas gard le plus petit souvenir de deux premires annes de ma vie la fin de la guerre, Paris. (Quignard, 1995 : 263). En ralit, il est naturel de se cogner au vide mmoriel, tant donn que lamnsie infantile ne permet pas que les souvenirs les plus anciens ne remontent pas au-del de lge de trois ans. Selon Freud cit par les frres Tadi, les souvenirs des trois premires annes, loin de disparatre sans trace, exercent une influence dterminante pour toutes les poques postrieures . Mais ce que Freud dfinit comme refoulement, dautres attribuent au dveloppement insuffisant du langage ou au fonctionnement de la mmoire qui a encore des carences.5 Dans ce contexte, laffirmation tranchante de Charles : Tous mes souvenirs sont wurtembergeois. (Quignard, 1995 : 263), assigne lenfance une place stable Bergheim. Les enfants Chenogne ne migrent quen t quand ils passent les vacances Regnville ou Coutances. Charles adulte voque nostalgiquement une scne denfance de Coutances qui na rien de spectaculaire, mais qui est importante parce quelle a contribu le rendre conscient de son identit. Cest une brique dans le processus de cration de sa personnalit et cela justifie sa conservation immuable la longue, malgr le banal qui la caractrise. Envoy par sa mre chez le pharmacien pour acheter certains produits, le petit Charles est heureux de la mission que sa mre lui a confie et fier en mme temps en entendant le pharmacien lappeler Monsieur Chenogne ! de manire crmonieuse. Fils unique et le cadet de quatre surs, Charles sent qu lexception de sa mre, toute sa famille comme les domestiques de la maison de Bergheim ont eu de la tendresse pour lui, enfant. Dailleurs, dans le premier souvenir denfance quil voque, Hiltrud, une femme de chambre allemande quil craignait et aimait la fois, dtient le rle principal :

Ibid., p. 297.

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La moindre circonstance, et la plus fortuite, tait comme le grain de levain dans la pte qui reposait, Bergheim, au-dessus du pole de fonte bleue et devant lequel Hiltrud nous demandait de ne pas parler franais de crainte que la pte ne saffaisst. (Quignard, 1995 : 35).

Charles raffirme plusieurs fois son attachement Hiltrud, qui substitue Yvonne Chenogne aprs le divorce : Comme je lavais aime, comme elle me faisait peur ! (Quignard, 1995 : 240). Une raison importante pour laquelle Charles rachte Bergheim et sy installe, cest le salut de son enfance allemande patronne par la figure de Hiltrud quenfant il appelait mutti. O mutti, mutti ! ai-je envie de crier (Quignard, 1995 : 398), pense-t-il en gagnant Bergheim pour vrifier ltat des travaux de rnovation. Hiltrud renvoie limage de la gouvernante de Pascal Quignard qui la arrach la crise autiste quil avait traverse lge dun an. Bergheim est le lieu o a vcu cette femme qui la lev enfant. Limage heureuse de lenfance est lie Hiltrud, Frulein Jutta et ses surs qui limpliquaient dans leurs jeux et dans leurs activits. Charles dvoile la contribution de Luise, la pune, dans la dcouverte de la musique : Cest Luise que je dois daimer la musique. (Quignard, 1995 : 50). Pourtant sa sur prfre, cest Marga, un peu plus ge que lui, qui lui reste proche aussi pendant la maturit. Nanmoins, nous constatons une particularit qui domine lvocation de lenfance heureuse de Bergheim : Charles parat attach plutt au lieu et aux objets qui ornent la maison des Chenogne. Parc, orgue, salon de musique trop jaune, gravures de Cozens, de Girtin ou de Wieland, tous lattirent par leur immobilit qui lui donne limpression que rien na chang depuis son enfance. En y tant de retour, il simagine en Orphe qui retrouve son Eurydice aprs un long et difficile voyage dans les Enfers. Cette fois-ci, Eurydice nest pas une femme, mais la maison aux brise-bise, comme Marga lappelle. Charles parvient la ramnager lancienne dans leffort de retrouver son clat dautrefois. En dcidant de sy installer dfinitivement, il rpond lappel de lenfance : Jai trop souhait de mopposer ce que je suis, aux sons de mon enfance ! (Quignard, 1995 : 396). Cette phrase rsume la particularit identitaire de Charles qui a t oblig ds petit de dceler entre lidentit allemande et celle franaise. En effet, mme si en gnral les souvenirs quil voque ne sont pas dats, lenfance de Charles subit lintervention brutale de la temporalit qui la coupe en deux priodes distinctes : avant et aprs labandon de la mre. Le profond attachement aux objets est donc explicable : ceux-ci ne senfuient pas, ils ne trahissent pas. En revanche, Edouard Furfooz arrive la conclusion contraire : Il avait t le jouet de ses jouets mmes. (Quignard, 2002 : 383). Les jouets lont trahi en le faisant senliser dans un pass gnrique. Giorgio Agamben souligne cet aspect par la prcision que le jouet, en dmembrant et en altrant le pass, ou bien en miniaturisant le prsent, cest--dire en jouant tant sur la diachronie que

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sur la synchronie, rend prsente et tangible la temporalit humaine en soi.6 Dans le cas dEdouard les jouets ont un statut ambigu : ils couvrent un manque en protgeant contre le malheur et contre la solitude, mais en mme temps ils empchent le personnage den devenir conscient. Les jouets sans enfants (Quignard, 2002 : 25), objets qui nappartiennent pas lusage, perdent leur pouvoir aprs la dcouverte de la petite barrette que le protagoniste ne peut encadrer dans aucune catgorie. partir de ce moment-l, des failles apparaissent dans son pass, ce qui permet Edouard de rcuprer le souvenir de lenfance Paris. Le malheur quil ressent en retrouvant le souvenir de la mort de la petite fille le plonge de nouveau dans la chronologie. Cest pourquoi il fait le geste symbolique de renvoyer Anvers le groupe de petits musiciens qui jouaient dans le silence. La raison dexistence des jouets disparat avec la rcupration complte de la mmoire. Si Edouard renonce lenfance quarante-cinq ans, Patrick et Marie-Jos dix ans sempressent de rejeter la leur par lenterrement des jouets franais ds quils dcouvrent les poubelles du camp amricain. Mais tant quils nont pas daccs direct lintrieur de la base, ils ne quittent pas lenfance en entier. Les recherches dans les poubelles les maintiennent dans un temps uniforme, orient uniquement vers le futur proche vu quils attendent impatiemment que la nuit tombe pour les recommencer : Les deux enfants se prirent de passion pour leurs alles et venues nocturnes. Ils rdaient. Ils maraudaient. (Quignard, 2009 : 23). Ds que le sergent Will Caberra lintroduit dans la maison des Wadd, Patrick devient conscient du fait que le temps dsormais fractionn scoule irrversiblement :
Il la vit. Ce fut soudain. Soudain, il fut surpris davoir quitt lenfance. Ce fut une dcouverte qui le prit de court : lenfance tait partie ; tous les liens staient dnous ; la fusion sen tait dcompose. Le temps stait mis en marche sans quil sen ft rendu compte. Toutes choses sappauvrirent dans un instant. Tout devint conscient. Tout devint distant. Tout devint langage. Tout devint mmoire. (Quignard, 2009 : 46)

Patrick associe lenfance une fusion temporelle qui la place hors du temps chronologique et hors de la mmoire. Dans ses penses se mlent deux conceptions opposes de la temporalit : la circularit antique versus lhorizontalit chrtienne. La reprsentation antique du temps comme cercle se restreint dans le cas de Patrick la priode de lenfance perue comme un continuum ponctuel, infini et quantifi, tandis que la ligne droite caractrise la maturit que le jeune homme est en train de toucher. 7 Il y a une coupure nette entre les deux squences de sa vie. Dsormais prisonnier du temps chronologique, le jeune homme ne peut plus revenir ltat dinnocence et lexil est la seule modalit de couper court au harclement de lenfance.
6 Agamben Giorgio, Enfance et histoire, traduit de l'italien par Yves Hersant, Paris, Editions Payot et Rivages, 2002, p. 132. 7 Ibid., p. 164-167.

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Ann Hidden de Villa Amalia se trouve mi-chemin en ce qui concerne la perception de lenfance. La relation difficile avec sa mre cache une enfance solitaire et malheureuse, marque par labandon du pre et par la mort de son frre. Lcoulement du temps et lexil volontaire Paris neffacent pas limpression dtre engloutie par le tourbillon des souvenirs dsagrables de lenfance chaque fois quelle revient en Bretagne visiter sa mre :
Au bout de quelques heures aux cts de sa mre toute la petite enfance revenait. Toute la frustration, la dpendance, lducation, les obsessions maniaques, la dtresse, la haine rafleuraient. Toute latmosphre se tendait de nouveau comme une corde de violon sur la touche. (Quignard, 2006 : 48).

Partageant le mme espace, mais pas le mme temps, Ann et sa mre sont des prisonnires : lune de lenfance, lautre de lattente. Si Ann russit sen dfaire, sa mre y reste dans lespoir du retour de son poux. Cette situation dure depuis longtemps parce quelle est connue par les anciens amis dAnn. Aux retrouvailles avec Georges, cette particularit de la vie de Marthe Hidelstein figure parmi les questions de raccommodement :
Et ta mre vit toujours ? Oui. [] Maman vit toujours l-bas. Et elle attend toujours ? Oui, toujours dans la mme maison. Tous les jours. Toujours. Elle attend toujours. (Quignard, 2006 : 22)

Avec Georges, Ann partage lenfance colire qui scoule doucement, sans laisser de traces profondes dans sa mmoire. De toute faon, comme elle nest pas trop convaincue de la vrit des affirmations de Georges, celui-ci lui montre un cadre o il y avait les six photos des classes de lenfance (Quignard, 2006 : 21). Elle sen souvient en entier en contemplant pour un instant une photo o elle tait assise sur un banc ct de sur Marguerite. (ibid.). Un rang plus haut, Georges, quelle reconnat enfin. Sa mmoire a besoin du support solide de la photo pour recouvrer des souvenirs apparemment oublis. En mme temps, Ann se trouve en contrepoint avec son ancien collgue qui ne peut pas se dfaire compltement de lemprise de son image enfantine : Aux yeux de Georges ctait une petite fille fire, un peu hostile, toujours sur ses gardes, bouleverse par un rien, fragile, inquite, mystrieuse. (Quignard, 2006 : 222). En revanche, Ann ne doit plus faire appel aucun support extrieur pour garder en mmoire limage vive de la petite Lna. Avec celle-ci elle partage lenfance absolue , selon laffirmation de Midori Ogawa.8 Paradoxalement, en
Ogawa Midori, Le solstice dhiver dans Roman 20-50, (Revue d'tude du roman du XX sicle), sous la direction de Franois Berquin, no. 44, dcembre 2007, p. 101.
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tant mre demprunt pour Magdalena Radnitzky, Ann russit vivre une nouvelle enfance remplie de bonheur aux cts de la petite qui sattache dun coup la villa et celle qui, comme un chamane, apaise toutes ses peurs : Naissait en elles une incroyable nergie ds quelles se voyaient. On pouvait presque dire quelles saimaient. On ne pouvait estimer, de lune et de lautre, qui aimait le plus. (Quignard, 2006 : 181). La maison et Magdalena sont les composantes de son paradis dans lequel le temps mme lui donne lillusion davoir fait un arrt. La mort de Lna le remet brutalement en marche. Selon Giorgio Agamben, la mort brise lopposition signifiante entre la synchronie et la diachronie, entre le monde des morts et le monde des vivants.9
La disparition de la petite transforme la villa dans un espace de cauchemar quAnn abandonne pour ne garder dans sa mmoire que le souvenir du bonheur. Chaque fois quelle sen souvient, cest toujours la mme image qui apparat dans son esprit : apaisante, douce, rcurrente en permettant Ann labandon temporaire de la chronologie au profit dun vanouissement temporel : [L]e soir, elles prenaient leur bain avant le dner. Elles taient si belles [] autour de la table, devant leur assiette, toutes propres, toutes roses, leurs cheveux mouills, les vestes de pyjama toutes propres. (Quignard, 2006 : 236)

Si Ann Hidden se rconcilie avec sa propre enfance malheureuse parce quelle a loccasion de vivre en joie une autre enfance aux cts de Magdalena, Quoeun de Carus garde le souvenir dune enfance triste, humiliante et humilie, o la temporalit excde. Il confesse :
Jai le souvenir de lenfance, comme dun long, un interminable sjour trs triste, et sans cesse offens, et qui ne peut que se mpriser des limites, des maladresses, et des fautes dont on ne cesse de lui crier aux oreilles lexistence. La mmoire est un lancinant rappel, en nous, de cet tat, et qui contraint le renouveler (Quignard, 2002 : 198)

Cest le seul moment o ce personnage mystrieux voque son propre pass. Il dmantle limage gnrale de lenfance qui serait normalement pleine de joie et de libert. Par contre, Quoeun ne se souvient que des contraintes et des interdictions quon lui infligeait, de son impuissance de protester et du dsir de sen affranchir. Cest pourquoi il caractrise lenfance par lpithte interminable. On se rappelle que chaque jour Quoeun honore la mmoire dune personnalit clbre, mais il offre trs peu de dtails sur sa vie prive. la lumire de cette confession, nous pouvons affirmer que le culte des morts assure au personnage une sorte de protection contre lenvahissement des souvenirs du malheur de lenfance. En plus, plonger dans le temps ancien, rigoureusement encadr dans le calendrier sert ne plus percevoir le lancinant rappel dun pass
9

Agamben Giorgio, op. cit., p. 152.

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individuel contraignant. Enfin, la confession surprenante de Quoeun sinscrit dans une longue discussion touffue (Quignard, 2002 : 195) sur la notion denfance o tous les participants se mettent daccord sur ltat de dpendance et de faiblesse qui sy rattache. Le temps qui sy dilate dmesurment accentue langoisse enfantine que les personnages retrouvent de faon involontaire travers les cauchemars. Malgr tous ses efforts, A. ne russit pas sarracher la domination de limage de locan de lenfance qui le hante en tant que [s]ouvenirs ou fragments de cauchemars, ou de rves (Quignard, 2002 : 180). Ce qui lpouvante, cest limmobilit du temps par rapport au mouvement de leau qui pressent lorage. La petite Lena de Villa Amalia apprend aimer les orages grce lintervention apaisante dAnn, tandis quA. de Carus ne parvient pas vaincre langoisse provoque par limmensit de la nature dchane. Langoisse se transfre imperceptiblement vers le prsent du personnage dpressif, ce qui le fait voir uniquement du vide autour et lintrieur de lui. Le lent processus de gurison comprend ladoucissement des souvenirs angoissants par le rcit. Bref, A. se rend compte que fuir les souvenirs nausabonds accentue le vide puisquil ne trouve rien qui les remplace. Alors, la solution, cest de les exorciser en les ramenant la surface de la conscience pour les dcrire minutieusement. A. suit son propre conseil :
Se souvenir des morts, se souvenir de ceux qui ne sont plus reprit A. lentement cest--dire se souvenir de ceux qui ont t et qui tout coup ne sont pas, cest inventer de toutes pices des petites images, cest se protger de leur vrai souvenir, car ce qui souvient deux aprs leur mort, vers nous, ce nest pas eux vivants, mais eux morts. (Quignard, 2002 : 157).

Par la suite, A. russit temprer sa peur et revenir entre les frontires temporelles chronologiques. Il est mme capable de disserter sur lenfance au banquet organis par Karl le 1er mai. En essayant de la dfinir, il emploie le mot fantasme qui renvoie discrtement la hantise quelle peut exercer sur la mmoire dun adulte. Lenfance est plus que fantasme (Quignard, 2002 : 196) quon peut vaincre grce au dynamisme mnsique. Cest avec un optimisme modr quA. conoit dsormais lenfance, en sachant que les souvenirs dsagrables ne disparaissent jamais en entier. Enfin, il faut remarquer que, pour Quignard, lenfance est vcue et conue en gnral comme lexprience tragique par excellence : la peur originelle et sans ge qui fait le fond de lenfance de tous ses personnages est aussi poignante quinsense ; mieux, elle est si bouleversante parce quelle est absurde, absolument irrductible toute rationalit. L encore, il faut choisir son camp, dit Stphane Chaudier.10
10 Chaudier Stphane, Les narrats de Quignard dans Frontires de la nouvelle de langue franaise Europe et Amrique du Nord (1945-2005) sous la direction de Catherine Douzou et Lise Gauvin, Dijon, Editions Universitaires de Dijon, 2006.

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BIBLIOGRAPHIE

1. Agamben, Giorgio (2002), Enfance et histoire, traduit de l'italien par Yves Hersant, Editions Payot et Rivages, Paris. 2. Chaudier, Stephane (2006), Les narrats de Quignard in Frontires de la nouvelle de langue franaise Europe et Amrique du Nord (1945-2005), sous la direction de Catherine Douzou et Lise Gauvin, Editions Universitaires de Dijon, Dijon. 3. La Bruyre, Jean de (1993), Les Caractres, Bookking International, Paris. 4. Lapeyre-Desmaison, Chantal (2001), Pascal Quignard le solitaire rencontre avec Chantal Lapeyre-Desmaison, Flohic, Paris. 5. Ogawa, Midori (2007), Le solstice dhiver , in Roman 20-50 (Revue d'tude du roman du XXe sicle), sous la direction de Franois Berquin, no. 44, Paris.
6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. (a) Quignard, Pascal (2002), Carus, Gallimard, coll. Folio , Paris. (b) Quignard, Pascal (2002), Les Escaliers de Chambord, Gallimard, coll. Folio , Paris. Quignard, Pascal (1998), La Leon de musique, Hachette Littratures, Paris. Quignard, Pascal (2009), LOccupation amricaine, Seuil, coll. Points , Paris. Quignard, Pascal (1995), Le Salon du Wurtemberg, Gallimard, coll. Folio , Paris. (a) Quignard, Pascal (2006), Les Tablettes de buis dApronenia Avitia, Gallimard, coll. Limaginaire , Paris. 12. (b) Quignard, Pascal (2006), Villa Amalia, Gallimard, coll. Folio , Paris.

13. Rabat, Dominique (2008), Pascal Quignard tude de loeuvre, Bordas, Paris. 14. Tadi, Jean-Yves, Marc Tadi (1999), Le sens de la mmoire , Gallimard, coll. Essais , Paris.

INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL TIME IN CARIBBEAN BRITISH WOMENS POETRY

MONICA MANOLACHI

This essay deals with the poetry of Grace Nichols, Jean Binta Breeze and Dorothea Smartt, three British poets of Caribbean origin. Starting from several philosophical conceptions of time, it attempts to map the temporal expressions in several poems specific to the feminine postcolonial diasporic experience and their meanings for a multicultural society. First, the essay takes into consideration I. Kants conception of time as a form of intuition, G. W. F. Hegels view that history is nothing else but the manifestation of the spirit in time, M. Heideggers notion of being in time and explores how these women poets coming from the domain of the Other imagine temporality in a postcolonial context. Second, the essay discusses L. Blagas perspective on temporal horizons that may determine a cultural style and M. Eliades distinction between the profane time and the sacred time, to prove to what extent the universality of their perspectives can fit other geographical cultural zones. Third, it reveals the tight connection between the theoretical conception of time, elaborated by feminists such as J. Kristeva and C. T. Mohanty, to show the context in which Caribbean women poets published their work in Great Britain.Through close reading, the essay delineates the stylistic modes in which history turns into personal memory and how personal memory turns into history through poetry and literary texts in general. Keywords: postcolonial literature, Caribbean British women poets, diaspora, philosophy of time, personal memory.

In an essay from 1974 entitled The Muse of History, Nobel Prize winner Derek Walcott draws attention to a fruitless attitude towards history on behalf of some of his contemporary Caribbean authors. In the context of the postcolonial cultural turn, valorized rather as a critical framework than as a historicist construct over the last decades, he writes:
In the New World, servitude to the muse of history has produced a literature of recrimination and despair, a literature of revenge written by the descendants of slaves or a literature of remorse written by the descendants of masters. [...] The truly tough aesthetics of the New World neither explains nor forgives history. It refuses to recognize it as a creative or culpable force. (37)

Walcotts observation is symptomatic for the reasons why the perception of time in the Caribbean experienced a twist in the second half of the twentieth century. Instead of a passive attitude towards the literature of the colonizer, instead of a focus on simply consuming what the West had produced, the

English language teaching assistant, University of Bucharest, e-mail: [email protected]

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postcolonial writers decided to allow time for writing their own versions of history. They often departed from merely imitating the values imposed by the colonial rule, searched forms of expression that left behind mere revengeful attitudes and strived to variously differentiate themselves in terms of style, which resulted in a third space where meaning serves both the West and the Caribbean. This focus on modality has been noticed by many critics. For the purpose of the present study, it is worth mentioning Keya Gangulys synthesis (2004) on the relationship between temporality and postcolonial critique: Temporality has been explored rather more fruitfully in postcolonial studies by approaches that regard the postcolonial not as an epoch or age but as a particular mode of historical emergence. (162) That the tension between history and artistic creativity is a central aspect in Derek Walcotts work is reflected in his poetry as well. For instance, in the volume entitled The StarApple Kingdom (1980), he imagines a dialogue between a European visitor of the islands and a local man, in which history takes center stage:
Where are your monuments, your battles, martyrs? Where is your tribal memory? Sirs, In that grey vault. The sea. The sea Has locked them up. The sea is History. (123)

As a leader of his Caribbean generation of poets, Walcott had the intuition to represent history in a way that avoids easy nationalist or regionalist conceptions of time. In line with the Hegelian view that the world history represents the development of the spirits consciousness of its own freedom and of the consequent realization of that freedom1, Walcott, as well as some other Caribbean poets of the subsequent generations, has built a type of highly reflexive attitude towards history, based on a balanced perspective on the rapport between culture and nature, be it natural environment or human nature, rather than on aspects of objective time. This tendency of focusing on subjectivity in relation to the temporal dimension has significantly oriented the focus of the creative expression towards different personal views of the world, which is one of the reasons why the Caribbean has produced a great number of writers in the West in the second part of the twentieth century. The Caribbean ethos and the Caribbean British experience of migration have been the source of a specific corpus of transgressive literature, which has had effects on how the temporal dimension has been tackled. The contact zone between the Caribbean and the British cultures has been a site of a continuous negotiation regarding a type of hybrid subjectivity, where the poets have become active postcolonial agents of cultural transformation. As a place of memory, to use French historian Pierre Noras phrase, the history of the
1

Nisbet, p. 138.

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Caribbean has been void of monuments and historical archives for a long period of time. In contrast with the case of France, where the places of memory mean celebration based on man-made material heritage to a great extent, the absence of material memory in the West Indies has determined many Caribbean British poets to reinvent the past, especially the long history of loss specific to the slave trade era. In this process, language (Standard or Creole) probably plays the most important role and is a living proof of historical transformation. At textual level, these authors construct characters with very powerful voices, the poetic I is usually omnipresent, they rewrite forgotten stories by doing research in the archives of British and other European libraries, use rhythms that suit the tropical lifestyle, dwell extensively on the specificity of the Creole English and even propose new vocabulary for things that might have existed several centuries ago. The reinvention of the past in this sense is then an intuitive act that makes possible the recuperation of presumed psychological phenomena that the blacks and the mulattos might have felt in the past. In an anthropological fashion, they propose that the Kantian idea of the raw man, which the Western philosophy theorized during the Enlightenment, should be reread from new perspectives that are more suitable to the present and can open new horizons for the future. In this way, the external reality has been processed internally and the resulting postcolonial literature confirms that there is a specific form of postcolonial temporality, at least in the fact that, in a sense, temporality has become more subjective because writers have become more aware of their own role in time. The development of internet technology over the past decades can be viewed as being determined, at least partially, by the fact that the former centers of power cannot locate their Other in the former colonies anymore, because the Other has already learned the Western lessons. Similar stances can be found in the works by the three Caribbean British women poets selected for this article. They are Grace Nichols from Guyana, Jean Binta Breeze from Jamaica and Dorothea Smartt from Barbados. While the first two migrated from the Caribbean to Britain when they were already adults, the third is born and bred in England and belongs to the second generation of immigrants. What follows is a close reading and a cultural contextualization of several poems, taking into account several conceptions of time developed by Western philosophers, (postcolonial) feminists and Romanian thinkers. It is a transcultural exploration of how these perspectives are reflected in the poems, which aims at distinguishing significant particularities of approaching time, specific to the Caribbean history and geography. As it will be shown, the specificity of postcolonial time is a debatable aspect even among the critics who study postcolonial culture. Grace Nichols has published seven books of poetry and several others for children and has been celebrated by literary critics in numerous articles and thematic studies. The poem Holding My Beads quoted below is taken from her first

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volume entitled I Is a Long Memoried Woman (1983). The main poetic voice in the whole book belongs to a feminine character that is several centuries old and thus covers several historical periods, ranging from the beginning of life on Earth up to the present. She addresses an implied audience that most probably represents the Western world but not only. Her perception of time involves time-space compression 2 and simultaneity, as expressions of postmodernity, suggested by the comparison of the numerous lives evoked with beads on a string:
Unforgiving as the course of justice Inerasable as my scars and fate I am here a woman . with all my lives strung out like beads before me It isnt privilege or pity that I seek It isnt reverence or safety quick happiness or purity but the power to be what I am/a woman charting my own futures/ a woman holding my beads in my hand (86)

Nowadays, the poem is a typical example of asserting what feminist theorists have formulated as her story in contrast with the unilateral History of the West. Indeed, the 1980s was a decade when a few critical essays on (postcolonial) feminism made a difference regarding other past formulations on the relationship between history and gender. In Womens Time (1981), Julia Kristeva was drawing attention to the Nietzschean concepts of cursive, linear and historical time versus the monumental, supranational and ahistorical time and to how women experience them as repetition (cyclical rhythms, gestation etc.) and as eternity (myths of resurrection). In Kristevas view, these conceptions of time are connected with female subjectivity and maternity, but they are not simply feminine, but closely interconnected with masculinity. The importance of her intuition for the postcolonial world resides in the statement that: the time has perhaps come to emphasize the multiplicity of female expressions and preoccupations so that from the intersection of these differences there might
David Harvey explored this idea in the contexts of modernity and postmodernity and their relationship with capitalism. Caribbean poets response to this concept has been a form of withdrawal, yet not a tragic one, but as search for new types of postmodern discourse that still preserve strategically useful traits of modernity. Many poems delve into personal histories that can restore the significance of forgotten times. While poets create forms of subjectivity that defy time and space, they also manage to create both a sense of place in the Caribbean or in Britain as well as to conceive a transnational form of bearable belonging. The shortcomings of immigration take affirmative discursive articulations in Caribbean British womens poetry.
2

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arise [] the real fundamental difference between the two sexes [] productive of surprises and of symbolic life (863). Implicitly, Kristeva points out a postmodern conception of gender and its relation with any other possible category, as a condition for better understanding the complexity of our contemporary world. Moreover, as Rosemary Marangoly George (2004) notes, postcolonial feminist theory, emerged beginning with the 1980s, distinguishes by a number of characteristics: the fashioning of cautionary signposts, the disclosure of absences, an insistence on what cannot be represented in elite texts, an emphasis on the more than purely literary, and the persistent embedding of gendered difference in a larger understanding of race, nationality, class, and caste. It is not only a condensed theory of decolonization but a methodology especially invested in examining culture as an important site of conflicts, collaborations, and struggles between those in power and those subjected to power (212). Although Marangoly Georges approach starts from a historicist view on the postcolonial, the other dimensions she takes into account imply a richer perspective on it involving location, language or nonliterary expression. In this context, because of their contestatory, ironic and subversive, yet tenderly feminine tone, Grace Nicholss first volumes are in line with the ideas vehiculated in the essays that deal with the role of the women writers coming from the former colonies to the West. To take into account a Romanian theory of time, it is significant that Nichols has a slightly different perspective on the past than what the philosopher of culture Lucian Blaga formulated in his essay entitled Temporal Horizons3 (1935), drawing on the fluid conception of time. The latter proposed the metaphor time-waterfall to designate the past time that becomes less and less inferior in relation to a heroic origin. In his view, only a ritual and the belief in miracles can make sure that time will not stop. In contrast, Nichols has a less pessimistic attitude. Instead of dwelling on a descending direction of time, she invests each of her invented mythical past lives with the same monumental value. Time is then a subjective routine that is not deteriorated by its passing and its traumatic effects. In the poem quoted above, the beads represent a metaphor of value in the context of the slave trade, because possessing them involved gaining a certain social status. The poem acts as a declaration of independence in relation to the literary critics who might expect a type of poetry that prolongs an exotic specificity. As a metonymy of mnemonic religious rituals, colonial trade and feminine beauty, the trope of the beads engenders a hierophany of black feminine self-determination. The circularity of the bead chain suggests that temporal reversibility is possible for the purpose of a higher level of self-awareness. The condition that sustains such a view is a particular form of will, courage and strength, which can also ensure continuity and, as the
3

L. Blagas notions are translated by the author of this essay.

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poet writes, the power of charting my own futures. Her choice and its plural character question the conception of temporality in its multiplicity. It is not only the present that counts. Its value rests upon a matrix of connections with other temporal forms, be they past or future, linear or circular, objective or subjective or of any other type, and the awareness of this matrix. In her fourth volume of poetry, entitled Startling the Flying Fish (2005), Nichols addresses again the problematic of time, memory and the necessity of remembering. After two other volumes in which she tackled two main stereotypes regarding the black woman in general, being fat and being lazy, to a great extent related to the immediate experience of immigration, the fourth volume presents another several centuries old feminine character, named Cariwoma, who is meant to celebrate the memory of the Carib and Arawak tribes, decimated by the European conquerors in the first part of the fifteenth century. According to this character, history is a matter of time compression that can be rewritten at any moment: Yes, I Cariwoma watched the history happen / like a two headed Janus, / however far apart heads can be (11). Because the omnipresent figure of the dead is out of time and, therefore, it is not normally a being in the present time, its exteriority allows her the necessary detachment and calm attitude towards existence. The result is that we can talk about a Weltanschauung of hope rather than about one of despair. With the mask of the atemporal bicephalous Cariwoma, the poet addresses ancient Greek, African and Amerindian gods and heroes and proposes a new cosmogony based on identifications that connect various parts of the world. For instance, Zeus is evoked as though he is a contemporary man, if one takes into consideration the Creole grammar at the end of the following fragment:
And why shouldnt I let myself be possessed by the gods? Why shouldnt I open myself to their amorous advances? They who never think that a woman is past it they for whom whiling away some time with a mortal is but a drop in eternitys ocean Zeus, Zeus, whatever happen between us is we business. (50)

Instead of wailing over a history of war and plunder, the poet proposes a spirit who does not bear any grudges, but is able to transgress it, which eventually creates a sense of belonging to a fruitful self. She calls it Sea self and it has a Sea memory, which raises the possibility of adding another metaphor of time to

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Blagas view on temporal horizons. According to his proposal, time-fountain represents the future, time-waterfall the past and time-river the present and history gains a more profound meaning according to the stress on the above possible perspectives. In this context, time-sea or time-ocean represent perspectives that can avoid temporal irreversibility and make possible the simultaneity of various temporal dimensions. In other instances, Nichols connects the irreversibility and the circularity of time to produce a hybrid conception that involves the whole universe:
The way the red sun surrenders its wholeness to curving ocean bit by bit. The way curving ocean gives birth to the birth of stars in the growing darkness, wearing in its path to cosmic smoothness. The impulse of stones rolling towards their own roundness. The unexpected comets of flying fish. (73)

In plus, the comparison of the temporal flow with the cyclical character of water provides a more complex view on the temporal dimension, which, up to a point, is in line with the Nietzschean idea of the cyclicity of time, but transcends it because it proposes a focus on the transformative nature of temporality itself. The sun, often used as a metonymy of empire in postcolonial poetry, is here a symbol of objective, cyclical time. Its surrender implies the imperial decline and the subsequent historical change, which is followed by a new cosmic zone that influences the life on earth, as the metaphor in the last line suggests. The flying fish is specific to the Caribbean and stands for what Edouard Glissant called the poetics of relation, relation between submerged memory and visible history, earthly matters and cosmic possibilities. Such transtemporal experiences are also depicted in the second volume by Dorothea Smartt, entitled Ship Shape (2008). It tells the story of Samboo, a black young man brought by sailors from Africa to Lancaster in the seventeenth century. In reality, he died within days after his arrival and was buried in a local cemetery. The poet reimagines his inner life, his feelings and hopes, his fears and distress, while he travels from the African coast to Barbados and then to England. In gender and postcolonial terms, it is significant that, in contrast with the other two women poets selected here, Smartt writes in her second volume much less about her story in contrast with History, but more about his story, an attitude which differs from the general trend of postcolonial feminist literature, centered on specific experiences of women. Mamas Bangles is a poem in which the personal memory of cultural trauma and its powerful effect on the present count significantly more than the whole history of slavery:

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Sounds like a bell Mama bangles pounding yam, Timbuktu tinkling in my Uncle, the young Imam, gift to she. Bangles like nobodys in the village, bangles that ring out where she is to clay-faced men before they took me. Perhaps she still living, still at home looking fuh me? Holing out she palms to rub mhead, An mek she bangles chime? Perhaps she in Allah paradise or she wid dole gone-before-people? Lef tone side fuh dmagic markings of Allah, Were dole Gods angry, like our fathers said? Did they send the clay-faces? Did they Send me way from Mama to punish she, me, we? I miss my mama, but want she here with me to wuk de canes? To tek dlash? To run wid she hans all between she legs From dwhiteman, to chime in wid dnight screams...? NO! NO! That would be all wrong! They woulda treat she like a beast. No. I glad she not here wid me. Glad, I cry at the sounds like a bell. (51)

MONICA MANOLACHI

Even though the memory of the mother sold into slavery is at the root of the story, the poet traces several subsequent moments which mark an untold chain history of submerged resistance: from the Bantu civilization in the Western Africa (the history of Timbuktu) and the Oriental world (Allah paradise), existing at the time of the European Renaissance; to the slavery era in the Caribbean when (women) slaves experienced abuse; to the days when black men like Samboo were brought to Europe; and eventually to the modern days suggested by the frame of the first and the last lines, which include no sign of Creole English. Although it reminds of a horrific past, it allows the main character to eventually choose his present. It is a type of present perfect which is not linguistically but culturally formulated. It can be called cultural present perfect, because it displays the past as a tapestry of experiences, it evokes the present and it is a fundament for a possibly better future. However, the author shows that no matter how great Samboos will of survival might have been in reality, his experience of migration to a land where people spoke another language, the very different climate and his race, which was not really welcome, could and still can have tragic consequences. The nostalgia of innocence that Samboo represents is not an easily inhabitable chronotope in the context of the slave trade. To creatively reconsider the meaning of an unexpectedly interrupted life becomes then a mode of re-living an archetypal existence. To use the

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distinction made by Mircea Eliade (1959), anxiety, sufferance and death in a profane time gain new meanings in a sacred time. At this point, one could ask what makes time sacred. Is it the simultaneity of tenses? Is it the capacity of human mind to strike the balance between objective and subjective time? Is it the capacity to process external time, that is History, to turn it into internal time, into a visionary temporality, so that the future should be better graspable? In any case, the search for an other time, as Ganguly (2004) terms it when trying to clarify if there is a specific postcolonial time or not, the quest for another dimension of it, be it cultural or technological or of any other type, seems to have been a constant issue ever since man split time in categories. Smartts Samboo is not simply an evocation of the real man who is buried in a cemetery in Sunderland, England. Renamed Bilal, he represents both the past and the future, because his fragile destiny stands for the cultural fragility that connects the West and the Orient in the context of the contemporary multicultural Great Britain, Europe and world in general, which needs permanent fine tune, support and clarification. Another example that reflects the distinction between time-river and the possibly wider time-sea is Jean Binta Breezes poem entitled Mermaids, a short ballad in free verse from her volume Spring Cleaning (1992), in which a feminine character meets her rivers wide and eventually the river, the latter being a possible personification of time. The river is depicted as a dangerous masculine creature who steals womens lives:
now on the edge a woman cries her rivers wide cups a hand and drinks her sisters hairs are in her throat her sisters dreams wake in her veins in swift recoil she curls the ground around her the river whispering wash your hair rushes over banks caressing o lover do not ask one more let her voice be wind as it was before do not bring down her waters (29-30)

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The fragment reveals that the relationship with the souls of the dead sisters mirrored in the waters is meant to increase self-awareness and to equate the Heideggerean philosophical notion of being in time with making right choices, a recurrent theme present in the Jamaican writers work. The antagonism between the river and the mermaids as creatures of the sea suggests that a linear perspective on the world may be too constraining and could generate uneasiness, which may act like an unsurpassable fate. Eventually, the personage is slipping from / her lovers arms and chooses her own fruit. In The Fifth Figure (2005), a work part memoire, part poetry, part prose, the writer explores to a wider extent the sociocultural conditions that led to a break with the hubristic past of her family tree and to a more positive vision upon what possibilities life can offer and how to enjoy them to the full as an artist. To the histories of the past that constitute external temporality, the author opposes her own perception of time, rooted in the present, but not before dismembering the untold stories of her family tree. The second poem by Jean Binta Breeze selected here is entitled I Poet, a typical example of her story in contrast with the History. In contrast with the previous poem, the author chooses to use Creole English as a sign of belonging to the Caribbean and as a mode of distinguishing her style form what is usually considered the English or even the British canon. Differently than in Nicholss and Smartts poems, I Poet does not make any reference to a mythical time or to a bright future. Instead, its simple style and the subtle use of Creole spelling convey the effects of the present time on the poets personality:
ah was readin readin all de time fram book fram play fram t.v. fram life in odder words fram yuh all befo ah was writin ah was readin yuh all neva did know who yuh all was but ah was full a love ah give it here ah give it dere neva see no harm in a likkle share of de warmes ting ah have sista, bredda, older, younger neva matta jus love like evrybody was preachin

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ah was readin ah was lovin befo ah was writin ah read all yuh poems ah read all yuh plays ah read all tea leaf, palm, anyting wid a good story even if it didnt always have a happy endin an evryting ah read, ah sey, but how come I know dis story aready? or I do dat yesterday I see dat last night I live troo dat so I stap readin fi a while stap lovin fi a while jus befo I start writin I stap evryting jus fi a moment an I sey, maybe, (I humble) I sey, maybe it was you readin me all de time so doah I was well hurt inside wen yuh all did sey I wasnt no poet I never mind cause I sey I was poet all de time so I start write an I tankful to madda an fadda dat ah did read an love firs fah I know when I writin I poem is you all you (88)

As it is the case with other authors, the use of Creole English often allows language games within what Bill Ashcroft (2009) has called the metonymic gap 4 . For instance, if in the first part of the poem the pronoun in the first person singular is spelled as ah, it becomes Standard English in the second part, which subtly expresses the importance of the burden of language difference. The final I, which replaces the indefinite article a at the end of the poem, reveals the initial statute of the Caribbean poetry within the literary
Drawing on Barbadian poet Kamau Brathwaites poetry, Ashcroft introduces a new concept into discussion11: the language is metonymic of the culture, that is, linguistic variation stands for cultural difference. This sets up what can be called the metonymic gap the cultural gap formed when writers (in particular) transform English according to the needs of their source culture (174).
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canon and the tribulations of being recognized as a poet before the multicultural turn of the 1980s. The monologue above stages a moment of high awareness regarding the authors position as a writer among other writers, which is instrumented by tense and aspect play. The lines ah was readin / readin all de time have an ambivalent meaning that mix an active and a passive attitude to reading: readin can be taken as both a part of the past continuous form of the verb and the passive form of the phrasal verb to read in. When the moment of revelation comes and the poet writes I stap evryting / jus fi a moment / an I sey, maybe, (I humble) / I sey, maybe / it was you readin me all de time, the ambivalence of readin raises again the question of who is reading whom. The contrast between just fi a moment and all de time shows how the subjective time acts upon the objective time, whose representational value is often taken for granted. The moment of self-reflection enables the comparison between being no poet and being poet all de time, as well as a type of serenity, wisdom and power to overcome misunderstandings. The theme of being and time leads us once more to the Heideggerean discussion on subjectivity. The main point Caribbean British women poets make when they tackle the issue of time is to claim recognition, which is related to issues such as dignity, consistency, originality, wisdom or a strong sense of hope. This process involves thorough revisions of history, literary history, cultural history, history of knowledge and contemporary conceptions of otherness. Their views often differ from those of the Western feminists who initially, in the aftermath of the 1960s cultural change, were not able to place themselves in the shoes of the black women or mulattas of what was called then the Third World. Immediately after the 1980s, when multiculturalism became an issue in the academic world and when Caribbean poetry gained momentum, Chandra Talpade Mohanty (1991) mapped the feminisms of the third world women (black, mullatas, white), with divergent histories and social locations, as an imagined community, drawing on Benedict Andersons formula, and as the way we think about race, class, and gender the political links we choose to make among and between struggles (4). One of the four ideas that is characteristic to the collection of essays edited by Mohanty is the significance of memory and writing in the creation of oppositional agency (10), which the poets discussed above were very aware of at the time when they wrote their volumes. The focus on memory, as a subjective expression of temporality, and on plurality and difference form then one of the most powerful strategies of striking the balance between internal and external temporal experience, between (trans)personal and (trans)cultural identity. In the context of the postcolonial identity, it has challenged the linearity of time and resulted in a performative perspective on it, based not only on its cyclical but also on its derivative character.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ashcroft, Bill (2009), Calibans Voice. The Transformation of English in Post-Colonial Literatures, Routledge, London and New York. Blaga, Lucian (1994/1935), Temporal Horizons, in Horizon and Style, Humanitas, Bucharest. Breeze, Jean Binta (1992), Spring Cleaning, Virago Press, London. *** (2005), The Fifth Figure, Bloodaxe Books, London and Northumberland. Eliade, Mircea (1959), The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion, Willard R. Trask (trans.), Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, New York. Ganguly, Keya (2004), Temporality and Postcolonial Critique, in Neil Lazarus (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Postcolonial Literary Studies, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 162-179. Harvey, David (1990), The Condition of Postmodernity: an Enquiry Into the Origins of Cultural Change, Oxford University Press, Oxford. Hegel, G. W. F. (1974), Lectures on the Philosophy of World History: Introduction, H. B. Nisbet (trans.), Cambridge University Press, Cambridge. Heidegger, Martin (2005/1962), Being and Time, Blackwell Publishing, Oxford. Kristeva, Julia (1997/1981), Womens Time, in Warhol, Robyn R. and Diane Price Herndl (eds.), Feminisms An Anthology of Literary Theory and Criticism, Macmillan Press, Houndmills, pp. 860-879. Lawson Welsh, S. (2007), Grace Nichols, Northcote, Tavistok. Marangoly George, Rosemary (2004), Feminists Theorize Colonial/Postcolonial, in Neil Lazarus (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Postcolonial Literary Studies, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp. 211-231. Mohanty, Chandra Talpade et al. (eds.) (1991), Third World Women and the Politics of Feminism, Bloomington, Indiana University Press. Nichols, Grace (1990/1983), I Is a Long Memoried Woman, Karnak House, London. *** (2005), Startling the Flying Fish, Virago, London. Smartt, Dorothea (2008), Ship Shape, Peepal Tree Press, Leeds. Walcott, D. (1998/1974), The Muse of History, in What the Twilight Says. Essays, Faber and Faber, London, pp. 36-64. *** (2007), Selected Poems, Edward Baugh (ed.), Faber and Faber, London.

SPATIAL AND TEMPORAL STRUCTURE IN A CONTEMPORARY HUNGARIAN NOVEL FROM ROMANIA

SUSANA MONICA TAPODI*

Lszl Bogdn's 1400-page trilogy entitled Kintrekedtek [The Exluded] (Tatjana [Tatiana], 2008, A vrs krben [In the Red Circle] 2010, Kt boldog fnygombolyag [Two Happy People] 2011) is of a hybrid genre. Its magical realism is typical of Hungarian minority literatures, and its complicated action refers to minority existence. However, at the same time it represents a transition between a travel, adventure, picaresque, a sci-fi, fantasy and detective novel, with parts resembling pornography and many transtextual games. We can find references to the present, to the era of Romanias dictatorship and transition period, suggestions to a small city from Transylvania (Saint George), to Bucharest, but Tatianas memories are linked to Budapest and Moscow, and in gradually widening circles, we reach together with the heroes Vienna, Venice, Ravenna, via the Adriatic islands we arrive in the U.S.A. The heroes participat in a global anti-poverty programme of an Italian millionaire philanthropist named Eduardo de Sica (reminiscent of George Soros). With the help of memories, dreams and parapsychological experiments of the immortal hosts, the two week action, which takes place in the autumn of 2004, expands in time and space to the age of Caesar and Ovid, the Middle Ages, old (Alatir, Nekrromikon) and new myths (yeti, Star Wars) are referred to. Objective and subjective time, fantasy, fiction, and specific Eastern European political and social problems (Chechen hostage-story, veterans of Afghanistan, terrorism, the oppressive machinery of the dictatorship, the interception methods of the Securitate, corruption, mafia, drug trafficking, poverty) are mixed in this exciting series of novels, which has an international cast and dissects the multifold issues of identity. Keywords: minority literature, objective and subjective time, space, transtextual games, Eastern European political and social problems. Long novels written today are perhaps a contradiction: the dimension of time has been shattered, we cannot love or think except in fragments of time each of which goes off along its own trajectory and immediately disappears. We can rediscover the continuity of time only in the novels of that period when time no longer seemed stopped and did not yet seem to have exploded, a period that lasted no more than a hundred years. (states Italo Calvino in 19791)

The spatial and temporal structure of Lszl Bogdns 1400-page trilogy A kintrekedtek/The Excluded (Tatjna avagy kifel a frfikor nyarbl/ Tatiana or Leaving the Summer of the Era of Men, 2008, A vrs krben/ In the Red Circle, 2010, A kt boldog fnygombolyag/ Two Happy People, 2011) follows
* Sapientia University, Department of Humanities (email: [email protected]). The study was created within the framework of the one-year group research programme entitled The Narratology of Space, supported by the Institute of Reasearch Programmes of Sapientia University. 1 Calvino, Italo, Ha tli jszakn egy utaz [If on a Winters Night a Traveler], Eurpa, Bp. 2011, 12.

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the course of fragments heading in different directions. The hybridity of the genre strengthens the experience of being shattered. Its magical realism and complex plot point at a certain minority existence which is typical of the Hungarian minority literatures. At the same time it represents a transition between travel, adventure, picaresque, sci-fi, fantasy and detective novels, with parts that touch upon pornography, containing various transtextual games. The chronotopes partly refer to the present, the Romania of the dictatorship and of the transition years, to a small town in Transylvania (Saint George), to the capital Bucharest, but Tatianas memories are also connected to Budapest and Moscow. Space widens in gradually expanding circles, after Vienna, Venice and Ravenna via the Adriatic islands the heroes arrive in the U.S.A. The heroes take part in a global anti-poverty programme of Eduardo de Sica, an Italian millionaire philanthropist who reminds us of George Soros; in the last volume they are going to escape from him. With the help of memories, dreams and parapsychological experiments of the immortal hosts, time and space of the two week action, which takes place in the autumn of 2004, become expanded: the age of Caesar and Ovid, the Middle Ages are mentioned, the old (Alatir, Nekrromikon) and new myths (yeti, Star Wars) move the action towards the realm of the fantastic. Not only the mythical and historical past receive their place within the narration but also, due to the immortals, distance measured in light-years and mythical future as well. Objective and subjective time, fantasy, fiction, and specific Eastern European political and social problems (Chechen hostage-story, veterans of Afghanistan, terrorism, the oppressive machinery of the dictatorship, the interception methods of the Securitate, corruption, mafia, drug trafficking, poverty) are mixed in this exciting series of novels, which has an international cast and dissects the multifold issues of identity. The main narrator, who bares certain traits of the authors biography2, is the lawyer Jnos Asztalos; he is the one to tell the story in volumes I and III, partly in first-person narrative, partly in the third person. He also lets Tatiana, his new love, talk about her childhood in Moscow and university years in Budapest. The main narrator of volume II is Attila Szab, a Hungarian actor from Transylvania, who, being a drug smuggler, together with his love, Anna, seeks refuge from the mafias fury on Eduardos yacht. They are being accompanied by Annas half-sister, the Romanian actress Laura ChelaruKellner and her Arabian art collector love Ahmed, who are also being chased by the international mafia. Thus, the narration of the recent past events and the unraveling of the present mysterious plot restarts. The dreams and memories keep interrupting the story, thus it is not only the plot that loses its linearity, but also personality becomes disrupted: identity
2 School years in Bucharest, talent in writing poetry, his love, Viola leaves Romania and dies later on in a motorbike accident in Italy etc. see Az n tveszti [The Labyrinth of the Self] Lvtei Lzr Lszls interview with Lszl Bogdn in Szkelyfld. 2011/9.

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will be a pile of divergent stories, conscious and unconscious desires, it is made up of texts, just like in the case of Umberto Ecos hero who tries to recreate his own self by means of the texts read in his childhood. 3 The problem of identity turns into the key question of the trilogy: it is not only the intellectuals, who having become guinea pigs, now have to face their own and others past traumas hidden in the subconscious; they have to define their individual goals and find the way out of the collective nightmares that have been forced upon them, they have to discover who the immortals playing with them are. The mysterious hosts do not know either who they themselves really are. Only towards the end of volume III, A kt boldog fnygombolyag/Two Happy People, when Tatiana succeeds in organizing their escape, do we discover that before having taken up their immortal earthly bodies, Eduardo and the others had been the representatives of a civilization from another planet who had lost in a cosmic battle. The immortals have only been in possession of a memory since they overtook the body of a human being killed with force. They themselves have to fight to find their own identities, just like the people with whom, out of boredom or some hidden purpose, they conduct their psychological experiments.
We are different, it is no fraud, no delusion, we are human, but not human at the same time. By all means our genes do not resemble that of human beings, probably the strangers who invaded us two thousand years ago, completed upon the genes of the original specimen the mutations that made us immune and immortal. () If I had only for a while succeeded to get somehow separated from the parasite, the way I called it, that was leading and dominating me, I would have probably gone mad, my personality would have been shattered since during those two thousand years not only had the former Roman warriors memories faded, but also his personality had disappeared. Eduardo complained (Two Happy People 389).

Part of the chronotopes refers to the city of Saint George before the change of regime and at the beginning of the 21st century: the Sugs garden, the Kripta restaurant etc. The main character of and the first person narrator in volume I, the lawyer Jnos Asztalos studied in Bucharest but starts off from a provincial town, hitchhiking in front of the Romanian liberating soldiers statue passing through Brasov, Szeged and Vienna on his way to Venice. There he meets his love, Tatiana and joins Eduardo de Sicas group, in order to go on a voyage around the islands of the Mediterranean, this is also a journey into his own and his Russian loves inner, mental sea. The main narrator of volume II, Attila Szab, the actor who leaves his job behind, also goes on his smuggler trips to Bucharest starting from within the same small town. He often recalls his teacher who was driven to committing
Umberto Eco, Loana kirlyn titokzatos tze [The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana], Eurpa Knyvkiad, Bp. 2007
3

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suicide and whose character evokes the tragic-fated rpd Visky from Saint George driven into death by the Securitate. In volume II Jnos tells us one of his 1984 memories when he was interrogated by a Securitate officer. (In Saint George that year under the pretext of an exploding statue the secret police badgered many Hungarian intellectuals with questions.) These places function as narrative tropes, they are text parts which fulfill a narrative function that lets us draw the picture, the map of the place itself. In the first two novels the ironically depicted excerpts are being repeated, on his journey to Bucharest the hero encounters the aggressive, nationalistic disposition of his Romanian fellow passengers. E.g.:
We do not want autonomy based upon ethnical principles! a lady said. We do not want Hungarian conclaves You mean perhaps enclaves corrected her the strict soldier. (Tatiana 14) The Hungarians want to take Transylvania back. They have never given it up and will never give it up. Really now, my dear lady and I get back lest the wildly gesticulating lady, building up should accidentally prick my eye and then there will be one more single-eyed Hungarian. Transylvania is not like a nut at all that we can put in our pocket out of lordly moodiness and leave with it. And where could we take it, tell me, where? (In the Red Circle 44)

Next to the irony there is also self-irony, the single-eyed Hungarian could refer to the writer Andrs St who in 1990s black March was left without one of his eyes by the enraged Romanian crowd. The novel also offers us a realistic picture of the relations in Bucharest and the whole of Romania before and after the regime change. Laura and Anna take refuge from the mafias attack in the Intecontinental hotel. On his smuggler trips Attila also stops at the hotel to hand over the suitcase he has been carrying. In the 80s the Securitate officer interrogates the intellectuals he watches in the restaurant Capa. The same colonel Badea appears now on Eduardos yacht as a CIA agent and, paradoxically, it is his estate on the island of Lake Erie that the protagonists flee to from the immortals at the end of part three. The plots present events always point at further things as well. The CIA and KGB agents questioning on the yacht Tatiana knows the latter, Ferenc Kondor from Budapest before the change of regime sheds light on the fact that Eduardo and his mates aim at world power. They conduct the psychological experiments on their guests because they are analyzing how they could erase humankinds desire for power and possession in order to establish some sort of a utopian society. The intricate storys principles at micro level can be extended and extrapolated onto the macro level too. (In the past the heroines were either

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nearly or really raped, the first loves of the male heroes fled the communist Romania or both died in an accident.) The open or hidden violence and the resulting desire to escape, to flee are among the main motifs of the text. Volume III renders us a detailed description of the methods of tapping used during dictatorship in Romania, the fear the Securitate implemented on individuals or the terror in schools. Not only do we get a picture of the Ceauescu and post communist Romania but also of the whole Central Eastern Europe stumbling among the difficulties of transition (the sad situation of the Afghan veterans, the issue of homelessness, beggars, drug smuggling, mafia, corruption, poverty etc.). The plots present is spelled out in the middle of the trilogy, more precisely in volume II: the frame story takes place during 3 weeks in early autumn of the year 2004 when the protagonists follow the broadcasting of the Chechen hostage crisis. After a thousand pages and the shifting of different spatial and temporal levels, in reality/real time there have only passed two weeks. The specific means to extend the coordinates of time and space is transtextuality: real time and space are permeated by the time and space of fiction. Just like Umberto Eco when writing The Name of the Rose, Lszl Bogdn included many educational elements in the adventurous plot. Interpretations of Shakespeare and translation critique, paraphrasing Petronius, Kafka, Poe, Joyce, Dosztojevszkij, Bulgakov, Pessoa, Caragiale, Borges, Cortzar, Vargas Llosa, Garca Mrquez, Stanislav Lem, Umberto Eco, parodies, quoted and interpreted Vogul bear songs, Homeric Hymns, quotes from Fard ad- Dn Attar, Baudelaire, Catullus, Ovidius, Petrarca, Puskin, Rilke, Dsida, Mandelstam, Salamov, Ahmatova, the analysis of the Orphic tradition and of the Dionysus cult, the interpretation of Monteverdis music, the Ravenna mosaics, Canaletto or Francesco Guardis paintings, Lao Ce, Tao Te King or Wittgensteins thoughts are all incorporated within the body text. The quotes taken from Vaszilij Bogdanov and Ricardo Reis works, reminding us of Ecos postmodern games, create a labyrinth text. Vaszilij Bogdanov, whose poem translations are being published by Lszl Bogdn, is a lyrical counterpart if we decode the name. In the volume Ricardo Reis on Tahiti (2007) he continued to write the adventures of Pessoas heteronyms and poems. The main characters of the trilogy The Excluded all dream about visiting the Reis on Tahiti. There is a certain stereotypy at work when choosing the heroes nationality: next to the Romanian nationalists and Hungarian resistance we encounter gipsy burglars, Arabian art collectors doing suspicious business and Armenian mafia. At the same time the Hungarians fit well into the picture: the drug smuggler group is international but the unknown consigners write to the actor-dealer in Hungarian. Jnos, the lawyer wants to divorce his wife because it turns out that while he was defending the political prisoners, his wife had

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become an informer for the Securitate. Moreover, it was the idea of the Securitate colonel tailing him that in 1988 the wife also a spy of his friend who was being accused of high treason, asked him to defend the prisoners. At the end of volume III the plot is interrupted by an exciting turn, it is precisely the colonels house that represents a refuge to the protagonists. Orthodoxy, one of the main elements of foreignness, which is the most prevailing sign of cultural otherness in the works of contemporary Transylvanian writers, does not play an important role here: the activity of the immortals is endowed with the mystical aura of Eastern religions, Shamanism and Buddhism included, using for example well-known sacred places (the monastery in Suzdal) and characters taken from Russian literature like Father Mitrofan, who had more than once been in the Siberian lagers and whom Tatiana remembers of many times. What we have here is a true piece of minority literature, in which the discontinuity between place, language and the self is being rendered both thematically and, due to the break in linearity, also formally we encounter dreams, nightmares and memories which disrupt the flow of the text. Thus, the trilogy brings out the characteristics of a postcolonial existential situation. The incorporated themes of the popular genres (sex, yeti, primordial beings protruding through worm tubes, the rush) hide the trilogys ideological guiding principle, which is the battle to maintain the integrity of ones personality, of ones identity, the battle for freedom. This fact is very much consistent with the traditional value system of Hungarian literature in Transylvania.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Bogdn, Lszl (2008), Tatjna, avagy kifel a frfikor nyarbl [Tatiana or Leaving the Summer of the Era of Men], Mentor, Marosvsrhely. Bogdn, Lszl (2010), A vrs krben [In the Red Circle], Mentor, Marosvsrhely. Bogdn, Lszl (2011), A kt boldog fnygombolyag [Two Happy People], Mentor, Marosvsrhely. Calvino, Italo (2011), Ha tli jszakn egy utaz [If on a Winters Night a Traveler], Eurpa, Budapest. Eco, Umberto (2007), Loana kirlyn titokzatos tze [The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana], Eurpa Knyvkiad, Bp. Lvtei Lzr, Lszl (2011), The Labyrinth of the Self, interview with Lszl Bogdn in Szkelyfld, 2011/9.

THE PLAIN IN THE SLOVAK LANGUAGE LITERATURE IN ROMANIA

DAGMAR MARIA ANOCA

The author presents the image of the plain (as a Pannonic archetype in the vision of Professor Michal Harp from the University of Novi Sad, Serbia) in the literary works (poetry, prose) of the Slovak writers living in Romania (Ivan MiroslavAmbru, Pavol Bujtr, tefan Dov, Pavel Husrik, Adam Suchansk, Peter Suchansk, Ondrej tefanko). Keywords: Slovak minority living in Romania, Slovak writers living in Romania, Michal Harp, the image of the plain, the anthropologic significance.

The reflection regarding the Slovak language literary phenomenon has begun at the moment when the anthology Varicie was published at the Kriterion Publishing House in 1978 thanks to the efforts of Professor Corneliu Barboric from the Bucharest University. The Slovak language literature in Romania is a complex phenomenon and may be studied from several points of view. 1 Culturologically and ethnologically it may be considered as a cultural sub-system of the Slovak culture in general. From the point of view of literary theory and comparatistics, applying different criteria (geographic-political or state-related, national, linguistic criterion, or the criterion concerning the aesthetics of literature, the conscience of the creating ego 2 we may speak of an autochthonous context which coexists in other literary contexts, respectively it is integrated in other, more ample contexts. From the point of view of literary history, obviously, in the run of the time, it presents more stages, sub-stages of development, which we derive, according to the traditional methodology, from folkloric roots, but
University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, e-mail: [email protected] Obviously no matter what methodology might be applied, it, too, represents a deformation, the adopting of a pressure and force from outside the researched object in a way a violation which could lead to a limitation in approach, the way some researchers question the justness, justification and the possibility of application of any methodology in the literary sciences. But for us these problems seam counterproductive, because our aim is to describe the topic, no matter how relative, approximate or traditional it may be. veda (2008: 7-8). 2 The system of contexts was elaborated by the slovacist from Serbia, Michal Harp based on the comparatistic theory of the Slovak comparatist researcher Dionz uriin from Slovakia.
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also from the tradition of the cultivated creation of literature in its larger meaning. Using the historical and also thematic criterion, we consider that this phenomenon has its beginning in 1853, the year when the first written book was published in a place that is now in Romania, dealing with relations between environments inhabited by the Slovaks. At that time the Slovaks constituted communities formed by people displaced within the Hapsburg, respectively Austrian-Hungarian Empire. To offer necessary work force in these areas, but also to offer them living resources. Ever since 1918, passing through different events, the Slovaks (the Slovak Diaspora living in Romania) represent one of the national minorities in Romania. The period that may be really considered as being the period of the Slovak language literature in Romania is the one coming after 1918, when they created the Romanian unitary national state, the kingdom of Greater Romania, including the Slovak communities of the Western parts of the country (Satu Mare, Bihor, Slaj, Arad, Banat, Cara-Severin counties). But the mid-war period is characterized by discontinuity and modest conditions as for number and value, the phenomenon gaining vigor only in the 8th decade, when the Ivan Krasko Literary Cercle was born in Ndlac town, Arad county, which was to become the cradle of several vigorous talents. Prose writers such as Pavol Bujtr, tefan Dov, poets such as Ondrej tefanko, Ivan Miroslav Ambru, later on Adam Suchansk and others constituted and consolidated the autochthonous literary context and soon awaringly passed to its integration into the Romanian national (state) context and also into the Slovak one. Simultaneously the resuscitation of the Pannonic diaspora context begins thanks to the affirmation of Slovak language writers in Hungary and the setting up of cultural-literary links with the Slovak writers of the former Yugoslavia. After 1990 this approach amplifies, being sustained by changes in literary and cultural thinking of that time, the Slovak spirituality becoming increasingly more open to recognize all literary facts due to co-nationals or written in Slovak as organic part of a single body of the Slovak national culture which includes, besides the literary production of the mother country, all the cultural values created by the Slovak diaspora. Officially, the Slovak language literary phenomenon in Romania was recognized at the Conference of the Romanian Writers in 1981 (Tezele...; Raportul...). Most Slovak language writers live in Ndlac, which led Florin Bnescu, a writer from Arad, to speak of a Nadlac phenomenon, mentioning them several times as the Musketeers of the Western Plain Bnescu (d). 3 Indeed, the Western Plain of Romania is a permanent topic of their prose or poetry, as well as in the works of the artist Maria tefanko (1951), especially in her graphical cycles Eye of the Plain and Houses.
3 Florin Bnescu made huge efforts to promote this phenomenon in the literary and nonliteraly press published in Western Romania in different languages: Orizont, Flacra roie, Vrs Lobog, Neue Banater Zeitung. Bnescu (a),b), c).

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As for the topic, i.e. the motif of the Plain in the context of the Slovak diaspora of the Pannonic space,4 Professor Michal Harp from the Novi Sad (Serbia) University elaborated a deep-digging essay, Bsnick paradigmy pannskeho archetypu (The Poetic Paradigm of the Pannonic Archetype; Harp 2004: 62-93),5 by finding similarities between the poetry of the three autochthonous contexts of Slovaks from the above mentioned space (i.e. the Slovaks from Romania, Serbia and Hungary). Because the same elements, archetypes and their attributes occur in the prose creations, as well, in this paper, we shall extend the application of the premises of Prof. Harpa to this field, too. Obviously the focus of our research lies in the works of those writers who constituted the autochthonous context for the first time and who are relevant of it, as I have mentioned before: Pavol Bujtr, tefan Dov, the poets Ondrej tefanko, Ivan Miroslav Ambru, later on Adam Suchansk, Pavel Husrik. According to the preface of Prof. Michal Harp:
The Pannonian peasant archetype may be followed in the framework of the poetry from the Pannonian space through a rich row of topics and motives, but the fundament of this paradigm is the soil, the Plain (NB: the word earth zem- in Slovak is of feminine gender, DMA) and the man the Peasant. They, in fact, constitute correlated archisems, each of them generating its own system of coordination, as well as a reciprocal connection. Both poles offer an unlimited number of concretizations corresponding to each segment of individual experience that depends, in fact, on each creators intentions. Harp (2004 : 63-64).

He continues by showing that the two poles are in reality an ensemble of components. Otherwise, the plain implies other manifestations, too, elements of nature such as water, wind, fog, fire. Thus, the concrete space gets sometimes mythical dimensions. Harp (2004: 64). On the other hand, the pole of the plain represents the static, and the man-peasant pole stands for the dynamical. This pole develops in two classes of functions, considering the division of actions, operations, processes according to the male, respectively female, manwoman, father-mother, the plain/exterior space courtyard/interior space principles. The next two classes may be identified according to the sacred or profane character of different actions/activities. Many times the profane facts transform themselves into sacred at some authors, following their noetics. At the same time, an archaizing tint is involved.
We prefer this term to the Low Lands, meaning Slovak communities from Serbia, Romanias Western Plain. For Hungarys Eastern part / the Plain of the Tisza there is a space for which the existing Slovak culture uses the term Dolna zem. i.e. the low land, low territory, rooted in Romanian in the form of inuturile de Jos this equivalent being usual in documents related to the Hapsburg, respectively Austro-Hungarian Monarchy period up to its end. In the Slovak cultural space (as well as in the Hungarian one, too, the term Alfld) it continues to be used without any negative connotation. 5 The work was first published as an appendix to the Slovak cultural magazine of the Pannonic space, Dolnozemsk Slovk.
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The topic, the motif of the plain manifests concretely, according to the literary historian Harp under three classes of paradigms: the paradigm of space, the anthropological paradigm and the ritualic paradigm. As for the space paradigm, Harp finds that its first, initial step is the taking into possession of the space considering the migration of Slovaks from another area to their present-day habitat. The second step is the motif of the house, of the building up of the house, and especially their becoming aware of the search for a new home, its setting up, their taking it into possession. The feeling of historicity is present in the poem Nae dejiny (Our History) of Ondrej tefanko from the volume Stojm pred domom (I Stay in front of the House, 1980), cycle Rozjmanie v domovine (Meditations at Birthplace), where we may see that Our history is like pincers/ of imagination..., and the persistence of the migrants in the new places is expressed by the attributes of the plain: we persist like the dust of the road. Harp (2004: 67) Then, the exterior and interior attributes of the home are evoked as signs of the plain. We agree with Harp when he states that the verses which explain the essence of the relationship to the plain, house, home are Core is my home/ not shell, not dry leaf, sending a universalized message. Very concrete aspects of this paradigm occur in tefankos first volume, but in the ulterior, modified editions everything refers to the spatial paradigm with concrete elements and attributes of the plain space: the hamlet, the geraniums, the toponyms of Ndlac surroundings. The anthropologic paradigm, as well, has different forms and motifs, such as: enumeration of second names known and emblematic for that space, or through characteristic activities, or through the childhood spent outside in the hamlet. Anoca (2008 b) In a similar way, the space paradigm and the others are to be found in the descriptions and prose works of the Slovak writers. We find the most eloquent examples in Pavol Bujtrs works whose intention of offering a realistic, but also emotional picture of this space is clearly obvious in his novel Pastierik The Little Shepherd (published in 1996, but the authors date is 1960). Let us see how the writer expresses the attributes of the plain, the biologic pulse related to the weather, the annual cycle, vegetation, living creatures, forms of life intrinsic to the plain:
As if the great heat of the last days rampaged on the plains. The crimson poppies wilted very fast. The corn-cockles with their fat cheeks, their flowers the colour of light lilac closed themselves and in their little bellies small black seeds were growing. In the wheat fields quails were wheepling to their many broods to avert them. Bujtr (1996: 63).

In the following fragment we witness the evolvement of the anthropologic paradigm:

The torrid days of June installed themselves. During the day it was hot, sweat was flowing even in the shade. It was mostly people from the neighbouring fields that came to

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the hamlet to take fresh water in their earthenware jugs. In the afternoon those who could afford it would look for some shade totake a winkle of sleep. But there were hardly any who would be so lucky, because those who came to the fields to work straight from the village were in a haste to finish as fast as they could. (Bujtr 1996: 58)

The elements of nature, the forces, water, and wind appear in the introductory passages of the chapters, according to the traditional prose model:
At the end of May, the temperature grew higher. During the nights it would often rain, at daytime it was warm, thus, the vegetation grew fast. In the fields the playful winds were turning pin-wheels over the enormous wheat-fields... The long rows of young corn rustled gaily in the breeze and the pleasant green caressed someones look. The acacias growing around the hamlets were gloriously blossoming. The sweet dizzying smell of the myriads of flowers bestrewed all over the area and there was no person who acknowledged but once in their lifetime that a thing like that, such a perfume and beauty is rarely found in the world. Thousands of bees and other insects became victim of the temptation of the sweetness of the blossoming trees. Bujtr (1996: 45).

But even in poetry the aquatic (the Mure River, the well, mud, rain, tempest) is definitory for the plain. It occurs in the poem Nelada (a title alluding to some fabulous space, a kind of Atlantis) of Ivan Miroslav Ambru from the volume Za cenu itia (With a Lifes Price, 1981): Your senses will be pointed like a tempest/ in the rustling of the leaves/ just like the Mures (in Slovak with female gender Marua- my note, DMA)/ that feeds the earth. The spatial paradigm allows allegoric-mythical images (as Harp calls them) such as the delivering plain (tefanko: The Deliverer is groaning under the hooves of the horse/, she quakes with the iron in her flesh), an ancient image, that is also found in the poetry of Slovaks living in Romania. We find its variant in the young virgins motif of the prose writers. Thus, in the 20th century-like expressionist tonalities Peter Suchansk (Ndlac, 1897-Bratislava, 1979) tries to translate into myths the Western Plain, generally known as Doln zem (Lowlands), in his work Obraz z detstva Picture from Childhood (from the volume Tri snbenice Three Brides, 1934), introducing in the text an interesting opposition between cultural vs. wild (Apollonian vs. Dionisiac; Harp 2004: 71):
You lie like a book from which birds learn their dear songs bringing joy in sad hearts, and loss of anxiety in the joyful ones. You are open like a noble soul in which everybody may look and enjoy the pure immaculateness. He who sees your spaces bathing in the bright sunshine has to sing with a vibrating heart and to save God the Creator for His great work. In summer you are like a noble virgin in love making her up with flowers to please her lover more. In winter like an angry knight breaking spears like straws, you boil of fury and there is no power to stop your untamable, bellicose anger when you take impetus on the open space, you are like a young horse after the long penitence of winter left first time free under the large, blue wheel of spring. Snow is flying in big flakes and in the sky the clouds descended rush and struggle on life and death. Oh yes, this is quite a

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struggle, indeed! It is not like clouds, but living beings thinking with human mind and having human feelings are approaching each other with a mortal decision. Howsoever times I assisted to such a duel, I always had in mind the ancient Roman gladiator, as I would see them in front of the Caesars tribune. Suchansk (1999: 9)

The anthropologic paradigm, presented horizontally synchronically, or vertically, in the diachronic time, may represent steps from the very representations of activities (first of all in Bujtrs prose, but also in that of tefan Dov, ofine trpenia Sophies Nuisances), till the mythic and sacral (as it is in the poem on the work in the fields with the help of the horse a solar hero, in Ondrej tefanko in the volume Dva hlasy Two Voices II. (1987). In the volume I Stay in front of the House the cycle of Reconciliation he presents the evolution in time of his community, but he also expresses the concept of time as a cyclical flow, characteristic of agrarian civilizations, which is found in the book of the prose writer tefan Dov, as well: Sophies Nuisances. The events are ordered according to the seasons and are related to the house. One of the dominating motifs of the space paradigm - but by the stress placed on it, and by its frequency in all authors, it is a characteristic one, we may say. In his work Harp mentions the fact that the anthropologic paradigm from the Pannonic poetry is also characterized by the cult of poverty, as a consequence of the life of these communities until recent times. Doubtlessly the anthropologic paradigm is closely related to the motif of the ancestors (mother, father, grandparents, and grandmother), one of its most expressive realization being in Ambru work, where, in one of his poems, the author presents his grandfather as an eternal entity in his simplicity, in the mere cyclicality of the peasants life:
My grandpa knew nothing of the Titanic/ He woke up at four in the morning/ He cut a piece of bacon/ A slice of bread/ Also filled the jug with water/ Harnessed the horses to the chariot/And went to plow// In the evening when he returned home tired/ He sat on the doorstep of the house/Lit a cigarette/ My grandpa/ Had heard nothing of the Titanic. Ambru (1981: 76)

The ritualic paradigm in which we may follow ethnographic elements, customs etc. are present in the poetry and prose of the Slovaks from Romania to a limited extent and in many cases with altered function. First of all, the poet Husrik uses these motifs to deprive them of the mythical dimension, to deconstruct some ingrained stereotypes which are today out of place. An embroidered fur coat, an object we expected the poet to praise, to appreciate, thus participating in the mythification of the national rituals is an occasion to taunt the love for antiquities, the peculiar attitudes of contemporaries. Contrary to him, Adam Suchansk transforms the funeral into a magic communion with Mother Earth (in the ballad without a title There Are Moments...), In fact, in this poets work, we witness one of the most essentialized statements regarding the

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Slovak mentality and their own image in the poem Acacia Wood Fiddle and Maplewood coffin. Anoca (2008 a). The plain as an existential element, environment of life, a synthesis of space and anthropologic paradigm may represent, from a formal point of view, the base of some artistic procedures and means, such as: the counterpoint, i.e. the following of the same idea, respectively its resumption in different registers. Thus, the natural phenomena, constituting the attribute of the plain like plants, animals, among them evidently the flight of a butterfly - send us to another plan, that of the human beings, they express the experiences and desires of the child in the next example more persuasively:
A middle-aged woman was walking on the serpentine path along the irrigation channel. She was pushing a bicycle with two sacks with corn and pumpkins. Near her, a ten year old boy was bouncing on the autumn field following colorful butterflies. From time to time he reached the channel, purposely dragging his old sandals on the half-dry grass, to his delight, dozens of locusts jumped scared. Reaching the channel he stopped then returned running to the edge of the cornfield, whispering in the breeze, as if approving the mischief of the boy. Suddenly he notices a small butterfly dressed in many colors lingering to enjoy the afternoon suns rays, lazily moving its wings from time to time as it would whisper, in silence, half dreaming: Leave me alone! Leave me alone! The boy approached him carefully with his open hands, stopping here and there and oops! The butterfly was trapped. Feeling the struggle of the little wings the boy turned towards the pathway. Mommy, mommy! Look what a beautiful butterfly Ive got! The woman stopped the bicycle; she supported it with her right leg and tied her scarf. The few wrinkles on her forehead relaxed. Milanko dear, you have plenty of butterflies. But none like this. Its beautiful, colorful, like that from Jarkas textbook. And what do you want to do with it? The boy stood for moment thinking. I let it go, to be free. At the same moment he opened his palms and the colorful butterfly flew away, first up, towards the sun, then it turned to the copper-yellow field until it got lost. If only they released my daddy out of prison, like it... After saying these words he remained embarrassed as if he had said some indecent, forbidden word. The smile went away from the face of the woman, the wrinkles returned to her forehead and all her face was covered by an invisible shadow. She started suddenly, followed by the silent boy. Dov (2008: 22).

The plain with its paradigms and attributes will be the support of some meditations definitory for a way of thinking and of living, and first of all in case of a writer, but also in case of a simple man, belonging to an ethnic minority, what, in a noetic plan, still exceeds the limits of the ethnic:
Each time when I stay in front of the immaculate sheet of paper, when I look around me or when I meditate on anything, I am visited by the genius loci, the spirit of this place, of this space where I grew up and reached my maturity, he surely is close by and whispers to me who I am, my facts, the effusions of my mind, the way I look and listen; he introduces me in the pathways, always the same, traced by me and by those I live with,

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pathways cut not just in the earth on which I rely, but also in what defines me, every time when I praise myself and the others I stop to be myself and I become the executant of the commands of the genius loci no matter how I might oppose it, no matter how much I might protest, I remain his slave, I am unable to act any other way. As if all is given to me, subconsciously, of things and events done in this plain, in this settlement, in these people, all what happened in the past, and today, and yesterday and surely will happen tomorrow, because I may not detach me of myself, of my roots and escape beyond the horizon where sky unifies with earth, that feeling of the infinite which is caused by the look on the plain is incomparable to nothing else, even if unto my death I do not stop shouting, though I always swore, I will not agree with the stifling futility, it does not allow me to breathe, however I humiliate myself again and again in front of the smallest and most senseless gesture, of the psychical process present in all those who live here, the apricot and the little peach survive and will be left behind, a print almost imperishable surviving the apricot-tree and the peach- tree and the nut-tree, they will survive and there will be always traces, traces almost imperishable of their earthy nature... [...] people step next to me, people who met this place, this space, they shaped it, they left here their traces in all what they did and anything they would have done, a richer and richer crop, better and better tools and goods, unsatisfied with what became stale, pushing forward on and on, and the traces and footprints of these people and of this place pervaded me and persist in me because I am convinced that indeed here our genius loci met the universal spirit, indeed here, in our place, and in myself both of them found their home thus creating culture, our culture, the unforgettable, the non-repeating and eternal which was transformed long ago into a trace, we and I just deepen it in this place, in this space, in the world tefanko (1997: 124-127)

The plain, its image, its artistic transformation becomes a reference, a human spot, a pure metaphysical presence.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Ambru, Ivan Miroslav (1981), Za cenu itia, Kriterion, Bucureti. Anoca, Dagmar Mria (2008), a) Pietna spomienka na Bsnika a na segment spolonho asu strvenho vo sfrickom priestore, in Nae snahy plus, V, 3-4, pp. 65-69; b) Cercul refcut, in Arca, 1-2-3(214-215-216), pp. 161-167. Bnescu, Florin, a) O reuit antologie literar, in Flacra Roie, XXXIX, 11332, pp. 2 ; b) Arad und Autoren, in Neue Banater Zetung, XXX, 7472, pp. 4; c) Arader Kurier, 1986, 398; d) n Cmpia de Vest, in Orizont, 34, 12, pp. 4. Bujtr, Pavol (1996), Pastierik, Vydavatestvo Kultrnej a Vedeckej Spolonosti Ivana Krasku, Nadlak, Nadlak. Dov, tefan (2008), Prpad Jara Konpku, in Tu a inde, Vydavatestvo Ivan Krasko, Nadlak, pp. 22. Harp, Michal (2004), Texty a kontexty, Bratislava. *** Raportul Consiliului Uniunii Scriitorilor, in Romnia Literar, XIV, 27, pp. 6-7. Suchansk, Peter (1999), Obrazy z Dolnej zeme a zo sveta, VKVSIK, Nadlak. tefanko, Ondrej (1997), Zo zpisnka kacra nadlackho, VKVSIK, Nadlak. veda, Jn (2008), Koniec literrnej histrie?, in Nov ivot, 7-8, pp. 26-28. *** Tezele conferinei naionale a scriitorilor, in Romnia Literar, XIV, 19, pp. 11-13.

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Alexandra Vrnceanu y Angelo Pagliardini (eds.), Migrazione e patologie dellhumanitas nella letteratura europea contemporanea, Frankfurt am Main-Berlin-Bern-Bruxelles-New York-Oxford-Wien, Ed. Peter Lang, 2012, 265 p.
El tomo concebido por Alexandra Vrnceanu y Angelo Pagliardini a raz de un congreso organizado por los mismos en Roma, en el 2010, recoge trabajos que, desde una generosa perspectiva interdisciplinaria, establecen diversas conexiones entre migracin y discurso, entendido en un sentido amplio, desde la literatura y el cine, hasta los relatos de la experiencia traumtica, en el caso de los refugiados polticos, y las prcticas culinarias como comunicacin identitaria. Un planteamiento de este tipo podra resultar especialmente interesante y motivador para el mundo acadmico rumano, debido a la escasez, en nuestro pas, de los estudios dedicados a la literatura migrante. Cabe sealar, asimismo, la participacin en la antologa de dos profesoras de la Universidad de Bucarest, Monica Spiridon y Alexandra Vrnceanu, la meritoria iniciadora del proyecto. Y, por ltimo, el peculiar inters de este volumen para el campo cultural rumano y sus contactos con otros campos culturales se debe a la presencia, entre los escritores y artistas comentados, de Paul Celan, Elie Wiesel, Mircea Eliade, Constantin Brncui, Panait Istrati, Ana Novac, Aglaja Veteranyi, Dumitru epeneag, Dinu Flmnd y Hertha Mller. De hecho, la mayora de los estudios vienen dedicados a escritores rumanos e italianos. A diferencia de cmo ocurre en la mayora de las introducciones, los dos coordinadores (y, al mismo tiempo, autores de sendos estudios presentes en el tomo) no se limitan a resumir el enfoque o la temtica de los trabajos, siguiendo simplemente la sucesin de estos en la antologa, sino que ofrecen una presentacin tipolgica y racionalizada del material, vertebrada por criterios como la metodologa, el contenido y la problemtica terica o la pertenencia lingstica y nacional de los autores estudiados. A primera vista, el ltimo criterio taxonmico mencionado resultara inadecuado especialmente en una recopilacin como sta, dedicada a unos escritores y a una literatura que destacan precisamente por la trasgresin de las barreras lingsticas, tnicas o nacionales. Sin embargo, la razn de uso de la variable en cuestin reside en que solo tiene sentido tematizar y poner en tela de juicio lo que sigue vigente, a pesar de su inadecuacin o sea conceptos como literatura nacional o monolingismo , puesto que, en una autntica e ideal repblica mundial de las letras, categoras como literatura rumana o literatura migrante seran igual de poco funcionales. La presente resea se ha redactado tomando como punto de partida y gua precisamente el estudio introductorio, muy elaborado y coherente. De hecho, estas mismas cualidades caracterizan la antologa en su conjunto, lo cual es ms digno de aprecio todava si tenemos en cuenta el perfil interdisciplinario, que abarca enfoques procedentes de la literatura comparada, la historia de la literatura, la traductologa, la historia de la lengua, la filmologa, la sociologa, la antropologa (mediacin intercultural), la psicopatologa, etc. En el volumen se mencionan conceptos vehiculados en las ltimas dcadas en el campo investigado literatura del exilio, literatura migrante, literatura transnacional, literatura-mundo, repblica de las letras , cuyos significados, solapados muchas veces, estn todava en construccin. Al fin y al cabo, la hibridez identitaria, cultural, discursiva o meramente lingstica es el rasgo definitorio de la literatura escrita por los migrantes, un rasgo comentado en sus textos por Alexandra Vrnceanu, Monica Spiridon, Francis Claudon, Sebastiano Martelli, Gisle

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Vanhese, Pietro Trifone o Angelo Pagliardini. Todos estos autores instrumentalizan metforas territoriales, smbolos y mitos de la circulacin y de la multiplicidad (Ulses, Eneas, Jano, Babel), al abordar temas diversos, como los posicionamientos de Dumitru epeneag con respecto a los cnones literarios rumano y francs, la representacin literaria del retorno del emigrante italiano y la formacin del territorio cultural europeo, de la literatura del sur o de una transfronteriza y cosmopolita repblica de las letras. Las figuras y las figuraciones de la territorialidad, la circulacin y la multiplicidad (no olvidemos que, etimolgicamente, metfora significa transporte) se relacionan con una propuesta reivindicativa, de abrir fronteras, de romper categoras limitativas como la de literatura nacional, o de viajar entre conceptos polarizados, provocando interferencias y mestizaje. Esta necesidad de mezcla, ruptura, transformacin y movilidad de los clichs conceptuales incentivada por unos estudiosos que asumen tambin el papel de agentes dentro del campo cultural constituye, en realidad, un legtimo intento de adecuar el discurso terico al proceso existencial vivido y reflejado por el migrante. Se trata a menudo de una vivencia dolorosa que deriva en una verdadera patologa especfica, tanto en sentido metafrico-literario, como metafrico-psicoanaltico: el complejo de Jano, definido por Jung e identificado por Danilo De Salazar en la literatura de Aglaja Veteranyi, la personalidad mltiple, heteronmica, percibida por Alexandra Vrnceanu en el caso de Dumitru epeneag o la literatura histrica de Hertha Mller, comentada por Ileana Alexandra Orlich. No obstante, la literatura es, a la vez que representacin del trauma, cura. Este valor teraputico viene sealado por Maria Cristina Tumiati, Maria Concetta Segneri y Adela Ida Gutierrez, desde una perspectiva sociolgica, en los relatos de los refugiados que solicitan asilo poltico. Por otro lado, la funcin curativa del discurso se relaciona a menudo con la autobiografa o, en literatura, con la autoficcin, un gnero hbrido, tpicamente postmoderno e, igual que toda manifestacin comunicativa migrante, transcategorial. El gnero discursivo de las contribuciones recogidas en el volumen es, asimismo, variado, abarcando desde ensayos que abren prometedoras vas de investigacin (como los de Francis Claudon o Monica Spiridon) y elocuentes panoramas o cartografas del tratamiento terico o analtico recibido en la literatura por un tema en concreto (Sebastiano Martelli, Angelo Pagliardini), hasta reveladores y perspicaces estudios de caso, que, al mismo tiempo, cruzan con provecho diversas perspectivas tericas (Alexandra Vranceanu). Considero que lo observado anteriormente es suficiente para justificar la necesidad de la traduccin de este tomo al rumano o, por lo menos, de su amplia difusin en nuestro mbito acadmico. Pero quisiera aadir un argumento ms a favor de la utilidad de la visin propuesta por el libro que constituye el objeto de esta resea: la literatura migrante no es, como podra parecer a primera vista, un tema perifrico, o de nicho, que se refiera nicamente a la actividad literaria de una minora. La circulacin de los tpicos, los modelos y las formas de expresin (lo que Itamar Even-Zohar denominaba repertorio) de un campo cultural a otro o entre estratos distintos del mismo campo ha constituido siempre el fundamento de cualquier corriente esttica o ideolgica, invariablemente mestiza y cambiante, a pesar de su uniformizante y esttica radiografa, consignada en los manuales de literatura. El estudio de la comunicacin migrante no hace ms que traer a colacin unas frmulas de representacin que histerizan y problematizan la hibridez y la movilidad inherentes de toda literatura. Adems, la identificacin, realizada por los formalistas rusos en las primeras dcadas del siglo XX, entre literariedad y extraamiento cobra un significado renovado en los estudios sobre migracin y literatura, que se ocupan, al fin y al cabo, de distintas hipstasis de la enajenacin, de la percepcin de lo ajeno, desde lo propio, y de lo propio, desde lo ajeno. Como afirmaba Julia Kristeva, citada por Ileana Alexandra Orlich, Writing is impossible without some kind of exile. MIHAI IACOB

University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, [email protected]

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Renata Bojnianov, Los bandoleros y su reflejo en la tradicin oral La prosa popular. Comparacin catalano-eslovca, Bucureti, Editura Universitii din Bucureti, 2011, 325 p.
Renata Bojnianova es una hispanista y eslovaquista eslovaca que despus de doctorarse en la Universidad Complutense de Madrid, est desarrollando su vocacin pedaggica en la Universidad Comenius de Bratislava. Con este libro, la autora vuelve al tema que haba tratado en su tesis doctoral, la imagen del bandido en la tradicin eslovaca y catalana, en la literatura oral y culta. Esta vez, sin embargo, el anlisis se centra exclusivamente en la prosa popular pero mantiene la perspectiva pirenaico-carptica. Tal como observa la folclorista Viera Gaparkov, que firma el prlogo del libro, esta misma apertura a la comparacin carptico-balcnica hacia el Mediterrneo Occidental es el elemento de novedad que convierte el trabajo de Renata Bojnianova en una contribucin original que viene a completar el mosaico de la imagen del bandido en el folclore europeo. El libro se compone de dos partes complementarias: el trabajo terico-aplicativo en que se compara el material folklrico sobre los bandoleros eslovacos y catalanes con el fin de demostrar el paralelismo que existe entre los dos espacios culturales y una recopilacin de los textos que sirven como base para esta comparacin y que estn agrupados en unas Antologas comentadas de leyendas sobre bandoleros eslovacos y catalanes. En la introduccin del trabajo terico, la autora expresa el deseo de analizar la imagen del bandolero en la tradicin catalana y eslovaca y compararlas, demostrando que en las dos tradiciones dicha imagen se ha sometido a parecidos procesos de trasformacin. Se trata de aquel proceso mediante el cual la imagen del bandido criminal ha logrado convertirse en la de un hroe idealizado, generoso que quita a los ricos para dar a los pobres. Para llevar a cabo tal anlisis, la autora parte en el primer captulo de la comparacin histrica del bandolerismo en Catalua y en Eslovaquia, fenmenos que se identifican con los trminos del bandolerismo mediterrneo o pirenaico y el carptico, sigue con una reflexin acerca de la figura del bandido en la prosa popular eslovaca y catalana en el segundo captulo en el que se analiza la presencia de la figura del bandido en diferentes gneros de la prosa popular, para luego dedicarse en el tercer captulo el ms extenso a la comparacin de las diferentes figuras de bandidos que aparecen en las leyendas populares. Especial atencin se les concede en este captulo a los dos grandes ciclos de leyendas sobre los bandidos representativos, Jnoik y Serrallonga, sobre los cuales existe mayor cantidad de leyendas. La autora trata de demostrar que las dos imgenes se rigen segn las mismas pautas de la biografa histrica, ya que las leyendas existentes configuran en los dos casos una biografa marcada por los mismos momentos esenciales: 1. la infancia y la juventud (en el caso de Serrallonga se trata ms bien de un perodo anterior al bandidaje, ya que las leyendas sobre su juventud son muy escasas); 2. la poca del bandidaje; 3. la persecucin del bandido; 4. la muerte del bandido; 5. el legado del bandido. Este paralelismo entre las dos tradiciones viene matizado por varios detalles particulares de las dos biografas (por ejemplo, se menciona que en las leyendas sobre Jnoik hay ms elementos fantsticos que en las sobre Serralonga o que este tiene ms rasgos de un hroe urbano que aquel), pero tambin viene completado por las figuras de otros bandoleros eslovacos y catalanes presentados al final del tercer captulo. En el cuarto captulo, dedicado a las conclusiones, la autora expresa su conviccin de que las semejanzas que acaba de presentar no se deben a una influencia directa entre las dos zonas, que son bastante apartadas entre s, sino son de carcter tipolgico. Las llama coincidencias tipolgicas y las define con las palabras de Viera Gaparkov: Coincidencias tipolgicas son aquellas que surgieron de lo parecido de la condicin humana, de las circunstancias vitales parecidas, de una situacin vital parecida y de la similitud de los destinos humanos. La autora explica que en este caso, lo parecido se traduce en los prolongados conflictos blicos y la consecuente inestabilidad de los dos espacios comparados que fueron causa de la crisis econmica,

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de la pobreza generalizada y del desorden social, lo que cre un ambiente favorable para el desarrollo de diferentes formas de bandolerismo en Eslovaquia y Catalua y que solo el progreso econmico y la mejora de las condiciones de la vida que se produjeron de manera ms palpable desde el siglo XIX, han llevado a la desaparicin del bandolerismo (la autora tiene sus reservas con respecto a este tema y en la introduccin del libro hace breves referencias a ciertas formas modernas de bandolerismo como las mafias o la piratera en la red). No obstante, el paralelismo general de las tradiciones eslovaca y catalana es contrarrestado por una diferencia esencial observada por la autora: en las leyendas eslovacas prevalece el contenido social (la imagen del bandolero cuya misin es de contrapesar la injusticia del sistema social quitando a los ricos y dando a los pobres), mientras que en las leyendas catalanas es ms importante el contenido aventurero (una imagen del bandolero que se parece ms a los hroes de novelas de caballera). Tambin hace parte del captulo cuarto una lista de motivos comunes o parecidos en las leyendas eslovacas y catalanas sobre bandidos. Para captar objetivamente estos motivos la autora se sirve del Catlogo de la literatura oral en prosa (Katalg prozaickch podan) de Viera Gaparkov, en el cual se resumen y denominan los motivos conocidos en relacin con los bandoleros carpticos. Adems, y esto es el segundo elemento novedoso del libro, Renata Bojnianova propone una serie de nuevos motivos intertnicos que podran completar el catlogo. As pues, al tratar el tema del bandolerismo, que es l mismo interesante, y al plantearlo desde la perspectiva de la comparacin pirenaicocarptica, pero tambin por proponer una ampliacin del catlogo de motivos folclricos, el trabajo de Renata Bojnianova se convierte en un punto de referencia y lectura necesaria para quien se interesa por el folclore europeo en general o por el tema del bandolerismo en particular. Adems, la publicacin del libro en el editorial de la Universidad de Bucarest podra funcionar como un impulso para los especialistas rumanos a quienes la autora lanza un llamamiento para contribuir a completar la imagen del bandido en el folclore europeo con trabajos similares que incluyan un anlisis del espacio cultural de las regiones histricas rumanas. En efecto, al leer la recopilacin de leyendas que acompaa al trabajo terico el lector rumano encontrar motivos que le son muy familiares ya que aparecen en las los cuentos y las leyendas rumanas tambin, como el motivo de la hierba mgica que abre cualquier puerta o candado (iarba fiarelor) o la prueba de lanzar la maza para demostrar la fuerza y muchos otros. De este modo, la lectura de las antologas de textos sobre bandoleros que forma la segunda parte del libro puede resultar para algunos todava ms interesante que la lectura del material terico mismo. El nico defecto que tiene esta parte es el hecho de que los textos catalanes no vienen acompaados por la traduccin espaola tal como ocurre en el caso de las leyendas eslovacas lo que se debe posiblemente a la presuposicin de la autora de que el texto cataln es suficientemente inteligible para los lectores de castellano. Finalmente, el conjunto formado por el trabajo terico y las antologas de leyendas de Renata Bojnianova es una lectura agradable. Especialistas en el folclore o simplemente aficionados a los cuentos y leyendas populares, los que leern su libro (re-)descubrirn el placer de adentrarse en el fascinante mundo de los bandoleros. PAUL BUZIL

University of Bucharest, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, [email protected]

ANALELE UNIVERSITII BUCURETI (AUB) LIMBI I LITERATURI STRINE

N ATENIA COLABORATORILOR

Pentru o cooperare eficient ntre editori, autori i casa editorial, autorii de articole i de recenzii sunt rugai s respecte urmtoarele norme: Articolele pot fi trimise n englez, francez, italian, spaniol, german, rus. Articolele trebuie s fie trimise pe suport electronic (e-mail sau CD) n format WORD (.doc or .rtf). Articolele trimise trebuie s conin numele i afilierea instituional a autorilor, ca i adresa de e-mail. Articolele trebuie s conin o scurt prezentare bio-bibliografic a autorilor ntr-o not de subsol (cca. 10 rnduri). Articolele trebuie s fie nso ite de un rezumat (10-15 rnduri) n englez, urmat de 5-7 cuvinte-cheie (font Times New Roman, corp 9, la un rand, n englez). Toate articolele i recenziile vor fi redactate cu diacritice; dac sunt folosite fonturi speciale (Fonetic, ArborWin etc.), se va trimite i tipul de font folosit. Formatul documentului: pagin A4 (nu Letter, Executive, A5 etc.). Marginile paginii: sus 5,75 cm; jos 5 cm; stnga i dreapta 4,25 cm; antet 4,75 cm; subsol 1,25 cm. Articolele trimise trebuie tehno-redactate cu font Times New Roman, corp 11, la un rnd. Titlul articolului trebuie s fie centrat, cu majuscule aldine (font Times New Roman, corp 11). Numele (cu majuscule aldine) trebuie s fie centrat, sub titlu (font Times New Roman, corp 9). Rezumatul (nsoit de titlul articolului tradus, dac articolul este n alt limb dect engleza) preced textul articolului (font Times New Roman, corp 9, la un rnd); cuvintele-cheie (Times New Roman, corp 9, italic) urmeaz rezumatului i sunt precedate de cuvntul Keywords (italic i bold). Notele trebuie s apar n josul paginii (cu font Times New Roman, 9, la un rnd). Trimiterile bibliografice, indicarea sursei pentru citate se vor indica n text, dup urmtoarea convenie: (Autor an:(spaiu)pagin) (Pop 2001: 32); (Pop/Ionescu 2001: 32). Se pot utiliza n text abrevieri, sigle (RRL, tome L, nos 3-4, p. 216) care vor fi ntregite la bibliografia final, dup cum urmeaz: RRL Revue Roumaine de Linguistique, tome L, nos 3-4, 2005. Bibliografia va fi indicat dup urmtorul model: (1) Pentru cri, volume, monografii se indic numele, prenumele autorului, anul apariiei, titlul cu italic, oraul, editura (eventual volumul sau numrul de volume). n cazul n care una dintre componentele trimiterii bibliografice lipsete, se vor folosi normele consacrate [s.l.], [s.a.]. La volumele colective se va indica ndrumtorul/coordonatorul/editorul

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prin (coord.) sau (ed.)/(eds.) dup nume i prenume. n cazul n care exist mai muli autori/coordonatori/editori, doar primul nume va fi inversat (Zafiu, R., C. Stan...). Kleiber, Georges, 2001, Lanaphore associative, Paris, Presses Universitaires de France. Zafiu, R., C. Stan, Al. Nicolae (eds.), 2007, Studii lingvistice. Omagiu profesoarei Gabriela Pan Dindelegan, la aniversare, Bucureti, Editura Universitii din Bucureti. (2) Pentru articole din volume colective: Rand Hoare, Michael, 2009, Scientific and Technical Dictionnaries, in A. P. Cowie (ed.), The Oxford History of English Lexicography, Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 47-94. (3) Pentru articole din reviste se indic numele autorului, prenumele autorului, anul, titlul articolului ntre ghilimele, urmat de in + numele revistei cu italic (neabreviat), volumul/tomul, numrul, pagini. n cazul n care exist mai muli autori, doar primul nume va fi inversat. Fischer, I., 1968, Remarques sur le traitement de la diphtongue au en latin vulgaire , in Revue Roumaine de Linguistique, XIII, nr. 5, pp. 417-420. Cornea, P., 1994, Noiunea de autor: statut i mod de folosin, n Limb i literatur, vol. III-IV, pp. 27-35. Toate referinele bibliografice din text trebuie s apar n bibliografia final. Articolele trimise vor fi discutate de o comisie de specialiti n domeniile filologice: lingvistic, literatur, studii culturale i de traductologie. Articolele trebuie trimise la urmtoarea adres de e-mail: [email protected]

THE ANNALS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF BUCHAREST FOREIGN LANGUAGES AND LITERATURES

NOTES FOR CONTRIBUTORS The authors of the articles and book reviews are requested to observe the following publication guidelines: The articles can be edited in English, French, Italian, Spanish, German, Russian. The articles should be submitted electronically (by e-mail or CD) in a WORD format (formats .doc or .rtf). The articles should contain the authors full name and affiliation, along with the authors e-mail address. The authors are requested to supply an auto-bio-bibliography (approximately 10 lines), in a footnote. The articles should contain an abstract (10-15 lines), followed by 5-7 Keywords (Times New Roman, 9, single spaced). All the articles and book reviews must be edited using diacritical marks; if there are special Fonts, these should also be sent. The page format: paper A4 (no Letter, Executive, A5 etc.); The page margins: top 5,75 cm; bottom 5 cm; left and right 4,25 cm; header 4,75 cm; footer 1,25 cm. The articles submitted for publication must be typed single spaced, in Times New Roman, 11. The title of the article should be centered, bold, all capitals (Times New Roman, 11) The authors name (bold capitals) should be centered, under the title (Times New Roman, 9). The abstract (with the translated title, if the article is written in other language than English; Times New Roman 9, single spaced) precedes the text of the article; the Keywords (Times New Roman 9, bold) follow the abstract and they are preceded by the word Keywords (in italics, bold). The notes should be indicated by superscript numbers in the text and typed at the bottom of the page (single spaced, Times New Roman 9). The references or the quotations sources should be indicated in the text, following the format: (Author year:(space)page) (Pop 2001: 32); (Pop/Ionescu 2001: 32). The abbreviations or abbreviated titles (RRL, tome L, nos 3-4, p. 216) can be used in the papers; they will be included completely in the listed references at the end of the article, as it follows: RRL Revue Roumaine de Linguistique, tome L, nos 3-4, 2005. The references should observe the following styles: 1. Books Basic Format: Author, A. (, B. B. Author, C. C. Author), Year of publication, Title of Work, Location, Publisher. Kleiber, Georges, 2001, Lanaphore associative, Paris, Presses Universitaires de France.

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2. Edited Books Basic Format: Author, A. A. (, B. B. Author, C. C. Author)(ed./eds.), Year of publication, Title of Work, Location, Publisher (only the name of the first editor inverted). Zafiu, R., C. Stan, Al. Nicolae (eds.), 2007, Studii lingvistice. Omagiu profesoarei Gabriela Pan Dindelegan, la aniversare, Bucureti, Editura Universitii din Bucureti. 3. Articles or Chapters in Edited Book Basic Format: Rand Hoare, Michael, 2009, Scientific and Technical Dictionnaries, in A. P. Cowie (ed.), The Oxford History of English Lexicography, Oxford, Oxford University Press, pp. 47-94. 4. Articles in Journals Basic Format: Author, A. A. (, B. B. Author), Year of publication, Title of the article, in Title of Periodical, volume number (issue number), pages. Fischer, I., 1968, Remarques sur le traitement de la diphtongue au en latin vulgaire , in Revue Roumaine de Linguistique, XIII, nr. 5, pp. 417-420. All the bibliographical references should appear in the final bibliography. All the papers will be peer-reviewed by a committee of specialists in different philological fields: linguistics, literature, cultural studies, translation studies. The first version of the articles should be submitted to the e-mail address: [email protected]

Tiparul s-a executat sub c-da nr. ../2012 la Tipografia Editurii Universitii din Bucureti

LIMBI I LITERATURI STRINE

COLEGIUL DE REDACIE
Redactor responsabil: Prof. dr. Andrei A. Avram Prof. dr. Mihaela Voicu Prof. dr. Alexandra Cornilescu Prof. dr. Constantin Geambau Prof. dr. George Guu Prof. dr. Yves DHulst (Universitatea din Osnabrck) Prof. dr. Sanda Reinheimer-Rpeanu Prof. h.c. dr. Stefan Sienerth (Universitatea din Mnchen) Prof. dr. Radu Toma Lect. dr. Sabina Poprlan Lect. dr. Ruxandra Vian

Membri:

Secretari de redacie:

Redactor: Irina Hricu Tehnoredactor: Emeline-Daniela Avram

Redacia ANALELE UNIVERSITII

os. Panduri nr. 90-92, 050663 Bucureti ROMNIA Tel./Fax +40 214102384 E-mail: [email protected] Internet: www.editura.unibuc.ro
Librrie online: http://librarie-unibuc.ro Centru de vnzare: Bd. Regina Elisabeta nr. 4-12, 030018 Bucureti ROMNIA Tel. +40 213143508 (int. 2125)

ANALELE UNIVERSITII BUCURETI

LIMBI I LITERATURI STRINE

EXTRAS

ANUL LXI 2012, nr. 2