Abstract
Matthias Freise emphasizes that we should perceive world literature as a field of tensions and not as a set of texts. Therefore, examining it should start from the dynamics of these tensions on their four levels of reader, producer, text and system, which Freise explores successively. For readers, world literature appears mainly as a quantity, but readers should imagine its wide scope not by vainly accumulating quantity, but by transgressing deeply into foreign semantic worlds. For writers, world literature appears as a problem of language or of ideology. The latter is demonstrated by deconstructing David Damrosch’s essay on Pavić’s Dictionary of the Khazars. As a text, world literature appears as a microcosm, and as a system, it serves the internalization of external conflicts into a semantic field.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
In: Readings in Russian Poetics : Formalist and Structuralist Views, ed. by Ladislav Matejka and Krystyna Pomorska, intro. by Gerald L. Bruns, Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1962, pp. 66–78.
- 2.
Witold Gombrowicz, Ferdydurke, transl. by Danuta Borchardt, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000, p. 42.
- 3.
Sartre, Jean Paul : Nausea, Harmondsworth (Penguin modern classics) 1965, pp. 55–56.
- 4.
Anton Chekhov, “Letter to Aleksandr Semenovich Lazarev (pseudonym of A. S. Gruzinsky), 1 November 1889”, in: A. Chekhov , Polnoe Sobranie Sochinenii Pisem v tridsatitomakh, Pis’ma, vol. 3, Moscow, 1976, p. 273.
- 5.
David Damrosch, What Is World Literature?, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2003, pp. 260–279: Chapter “The poisoned book”.
- 6.
In the original “Spomenik Neznanom Pjesniku,” first published in 1967, which I cite from Sabrana dela Milorada Pavića, vol. 7, Beograd: Prosveta, 1990, p. 27–28, we read “укус огња,” which translates correctly as “taste of fire.” “Hearth” therefore is a high-handed interpretation by the translator into English with serious consequences for Damrosch’s reading. Furthermore, the passage cited by Damrosch can be understood only through its ties within the paradigm of five-times-repeated “but my heart…”, following “my eyes…,” “my ears…,” “my tongue…,” “my legs…” and again “my tongue…,” respectively. It is misleading to cite isolated lines from poems.
- 7.
Damrosch , p. 270.
- 8.
Damrosch imputes an allegoric statement on the relations between Serbs and other nationalities in Yugoslavia. The “nation in the north,” however, is part of the “biggest part of the Khazarian Empire” (meaning Serbia within the Yugoslav Federation). In this part “live only Khazars” (i.e., Serbs), but only one district of this part was called Khazaria (i.e., Serbia), while “the other districts” (i.e., the autonomous provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo) “had different names” (cf. pp. 141–142 in Milorad Pavić, Chazarski rečnik, Beograd 1985, translation mine). Therefore, this entry is a statement on the relationships within the Serbian nation. One could argue about the status of A. P. Kosovo, where one finds not only Serbs but also Albanians. However, the Slavic nationality there was Serbian.
- 9.
Miroslav Krleža: “Pijana Novembarska Noć 1918”, In: M.K. Davni dani, Zagreb 1956, translation mine.
- 10.
The novel itself alludes to the medieval theory of the four levels of understanding the Holy Writing. The entry “Al Bekri, Spanjard” differentiates between a first level of literal meaning (avam), a second level of allusion (kavas), a third level of occult meaning (avlija) and a fourth level of prophetic meaning (anbija). The first, literal meaning “Al Bekri does not take into account.” Cf. pp. 101–102 in Milorad Pavić, Chazarski rečnik, Beograd 1985. Translation mine.
- 11.
This is, according to The Dictionary of the Khazars, “the most appropriate or actual meaning, the spirit of the book.” The Khazars themselves “foremost assume this highest level of a book.” Cf. Note 10, ibid.
- 12.
In his oral response to my paper at the Beijing summit.
- 13.
A. Chekhov , Polnoe Sobranie Sochinenii i Pisem v tridsati tomakh, Pis’ma, ed. by N. F. Belchikov et al., vol. 1, Moscow: Nauka, 1976, p. 242, “letter to Nikolaj Chekhov , 1 May 1886”. Translation mine.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Freise, M. (2018). Four Perspectives on World Literature: Reader, Producer, Text and System. In: Fang, W. (eds) Tensions in World Literature. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-0635-8_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-13-0635-8_8
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-13-0634-1
Online ISBN: 978-981-13-0635-8
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media StudiesLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)