Modern Literature Commons^™

Estranging The Novel: Poland, Ireland, And Theories Of World Literature, John A. Merchant

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Katarzyna Bartoszyńska prefaces her innovative project pairing a series of “anomalous” (or “freakish”) Polish and Irish novels with epigraphs from Laurence Sterne's Tristram Shandy on the power of storytelling (“let the people tell their stories their own way”) and Tennessee Williams's A Streetcar Named Desire about Stanley's Polishness (“They're something like the Irish, aren't they? [. . .] Only not so—highbrow?”). The seeming disconnect between these two quotations signals a central tension between the universal and the particular at the heart of Estranging the Novel: Poland, Ireland, and Theories of World Literature. Bartoszyńska's book is organized around four pairs …

Adam Kucharski: Placing Poland At The Heart Of Irishness, John A. Merchant

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Adam Kucharski: Placing Poland at the Heart of Irishness. Irish Political Elites in Relation to Poland and the Poles in the First Half of the Nineteenth Century. (Polish Studies – Transdisciplinary Perspectives, Bd. 29.) Peter Lang. Berlin u. a. 2020. 274 S., Ill., Kt. ISBN 978-3-631-81817-6. (€ 59,95.)

In order for a field of studies to be accepted as legitimate or viable there first needs to exist a collective body of scholarly work that elevates it above that of a niche interest or passing trend. The work under review is the latest in what can be now called without …

Introduction: Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz's The Teacher, Jack Hutchens

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

The Teacher, Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, Jack Hutchens

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

An English translation of the work 'The Teacher' by Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, translated by Dr. Jack J. B. Hutchens.

Hacia La Construcción De Una ‘Ciudadanía Casera’ En Ilegal: Reflexiones De Un Inmigrante Indocumentado (2019), De José Ángel Navejas, Gabriela Buitrón Vera

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

En este trabajo examino el memoir Ilegal: Reflexiones de un inmigrante indocumentado (2019), de José Ángel Navejas. A raíz de una lectura de este texto, exploro las formas en que el narrador describe cómo los inmigrantes mexicanos indocumentados crean espacios de alianza y pertenencia en Estados Unidos. Para eso, parto del concepto de ‘ciudadanía casera’ de Mitchell (2020), quien apunta a que el ‘pertenecer’ no depende de la inclusión cívica o el reconocimiento estatal, sino que es una noción que se construye por medio de las prácticas comunitarias informales. Por ende, sugiero que en Ilegal son espacios de ‘ciudadanía casera’ …

Review: Rethinking Joseph Conrad's Concepts Of Community: Strange Fraternity, John A. Merchant

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

A review of Kaoru Yamamoto, Rethinking Joseph Conrad's Concepts of Community: Strange Fraternity

‘Chismes De La Ciudad Letrada’: Nostalgia, Exilio Y La Construcción Del Canon Cubano En La Ensayística De Cabrera Infante, Ana B. Rodriguez Navas

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Rafael Rojas afirma que Guillermo Cabrera Infante estetiza “los rumores y chismes de la ciudad letrada”. A propósito de la crítica reciente sobre el chisme y del trabajo de Svetlana Boym sobre la nostalgia, planteo que Cabrera aprovecha el placer ilícito del chisme para recircular historias suprimidas y reintroducirse en el canon cubano. Sus chismes se convierten así en saber aceptado, que preservan la memoria de numerosos intelectuales cubanos y consolidan el propio estado de Cabrera en el canon. El autor valida el chisme como acto nostálgico y demuestra su potencial como estrategia narrativa eficaz y no solo como creación …

A Part Le Bonheur, Il N’Y A Rien D’Essentiel: The Transnational Narrative Model In Maryse Condé’S Desirada, Eliana Vāgālāu

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

The chapter contends that Maryse Condé’s novel Desirada has been repeatedly read as an identity quest novel, since the narrative impulse is determined by the protagonist’s search for her father’s identity. It argues, however, that Condé goes one step further by entirely subverting the identity quest narrative and presenting us with an excess, the production of fiction, which becomes something entirely different: a quest for an aesthetic truth rather than a filially determined identity. As such, by presenting us with a pastiche of the identity quest model, Condé’s transnationalism moves from minor to major, as her critique aims to dismantle …

Preface, Cristina Lombardi-Diop

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Teaching Language Courses Online During A Global Pandemic, Maria Robertson-Justiniano

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Edwidge Danticat: The Haitian Diasporic Imaginary, By Nadège T. Clitandre, Ana B. Rodríguez Navas

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Unfreiwillige Wanderjahre Von Egon Schwarz: Erfahrung, Bildung Und Glück Auf Dem Weg Zur Wirkungsmächtigkeit Im Exil, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article chronicles the life and career of the Jewish Austrian-American Germanist Egon Schwarz through his autobiographical writings and other sources. Following Schwarz’s travels and studies in South and North American exile, the author asks what account of free will or external determination is most fitting for Schwarz’s meditations on exile and identity.

Filial Descent: The African Roots Of Postcolonial Literature In Italy, Cristina Lombardi-Diop

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

The essay concentrates on two seminal postcolonial novels by authors of African descent: Cristina Ubax Ali Farah’s Madre piccola (2007) (Little Mother: A Novel) and Gabriella Ghermandi’s Regina di fiori e di perle (2007) (Queen of Flowers and Pearls). It argues that these works give expression to an African diasporic urban generation that is changing the literary legacy of the Horn of Africa. The co-presence of multiple genres, with orality appearing as a strong influence on their written narrative forms, places these novels within the larger formation of a black African literary tradition. By looking at …

The Absurd: Postwar Reception And Wartime Echoes At Yale French Studies, Julia Elsky

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Writing Strategies To Develop Literacy Skills For Spanish Heritage Language Learners, Clara Burgo

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Heritage language learners (HLLs) need to be exposed to different genres of academic texts (Chevalier, 2004; Correa, 2016) and instructors need to find resources to maximize HLLs’ learning experiences. There are multiple gains in improving HLLs’ writing to create an awareness of the power of the HL through the use of authentic resources with a meaningful goal. Since HLLs should be able to distinguish between registers and genres (Chevalier, 2004), writing chronicles is an effective way to master their communicative competence (Fuentes, 2018). Finally, HLLs’ writing is assessed holistically through rubrics moving from a focus on content to language.

The Culture We Belong To, Anna Clara Ionta

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Addendum: A Second Poem By Eduard Dorsch On The Occasion Of Humboldt's 100th Birthday, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

In a previously published article in HIN under the title of “Eduard Dorsch and his unpublished poem on the occasion of Humboldt's 100th birthday,” I elaborated on Dorsch's poem that was read in Detroit in front of a German-American audience on Sept. 14, 1869, a day widely celebrated in the US in honor of Humboldt. Although it was not surprising that Dorsch wrote the occasional poem in the first place given his affinities with Humboldt's world of thought, a discovery of a second occasional poem upon further research in Dorsch's voluminous papers was indeed unexpected, in this case read on …

The Redemptive Qualities Of Gottfried Von Cramm, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Texte Aus Dem Nachlass Von Egon Schwarz — “Lebe Wohl Südamerika” Und “Dank An Die Emigration”, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Review Of Border Lampedusa, Cristina Lombardi-Diop

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Die Romantrilogie Des Argentinisch-Österreichischen Schriftstellers Germán Kratochwil: Das Große Im Kleinen Patagoniens, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Germán Kratochwil, born in Austria in 1938, soon emigrated to Argentina, but came late to literature after a long career as a sociologist. Meanwhile three novels in German have appeared : Scherbengericht (2012), Río Puro (2013) and Territorium(2016). Since the setting for all three is Patagonia, one could speak of a trilogy of Patagonian novels. Hand in hand with a considerable arsenal of characters, the motives remain constant in the confrontation between past and present, in attempts at social ascent and in the effects of international conflicts in a Patagonia far from the world, only apparently. Through a precise …

‘Leb Wohl Südamerika’ Und ‘Dank An Die Emigration’ – Texte Aus Dem Nachlass Von Egon Schwarz, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Als der österreichische Exilant und weltweit anerkannte Literaturwissenschaftler Egon Schwarz im Februar 2017 verstarb, ging sein Nachlass an das Deutsche Literaturarchiv in Marbach, wobei es bereits auch einen Vorlass gegeben hatte. Eine Kopie des Nachlasses wird ebenfalls von der Olin Library an der Washington University in St. Louis aufbewahrt, wo Schwarz zweiunddreißig Jahre lang als Professor tätig gewesen war.

Robert Schopflochers Eine Kindheit (2018): Die „Herzstücke“ Aus Seinen Erzählbänden, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Early Guaraní Printing: Nieremberg’S De La Diferencia And The Global Dissemination Of Seventeenth-Century Spanish Asceticism, D. Scott Hendrickson

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

This article examines both how and why the Spanish Jesuit Juan Eusebio Nieremberg’s (1595–1658) once famous treatise De la diferencia entre lo temporal y eterno (1640) came to be translated and printed in the Paraguay reductions in 1705, the significance it holds in the transmission of Iberian asceticism to the American missions and how Juan Yaparí and other Guaraní craftsmen participated in its printing and enhanced its illustration. It situates the Guaraní imprint within the context of early modern mission practices and the book-trade of Counter-Reformation Europe, and seeks to show how—in what some scholars consider to be a collaborative …

Idle Talk, Deadly Talk: The Uses Of Gossip In Caribbean Literature, Ana B. Rodriguez Navas

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Chaucer called it "spiritual manslaughter"; Barthes and Benjamin deemed it dangerous linguistic nihilism. But gossip-long derided and dismissed by writers and intellectuals-is far from frivolous. In Idle Talk, Deadly Talk, Ana Rodríguez Navas reveals gossip to be an urgent, utilitarian, and deeply political practice-a means of staging the narrative tensions, and waging the narrative battles, that mark Caribbean politics and culture.

From the calypso singer's superficially innocent rhymes to the vicious slanders published in Trujillo-era gossip columns, words have been weapons, elevating one person or group at the expense of another. Revising the overly gendered existing critical frame, Rodríguez …

The Story Of The Predestined Pilgrim And His Brother Reprobate. Alexandre De Gusmão. Trans. Christopher C. Lund. Medieval And Renaissance Texts And Studies 489; Medieval And Renaissance Latin America 2. Tempe: Arizona Center For Medieval And Renaissance Studies, 2016. Xxxvi + 138 Pp. $55., D. Scott Hendrickson

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

The Story of the Predestined Pilgrim and His Brother Reprobate, published in Portugal in 1682, is an allegorical novel originally written in Portuguese by Father Alexandre de Gusmão (1629–1724) in the Jesuit mission territory of Brazil. Subsequent editions were printed in both Portuguese and Spanish in Europe and the Americas. Christopher C. Lund’s translation is part of the Latin America series in the Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies and is the first English-language edition. It is a welcome addition to scholarly work in the fields of colonial Latin American history and Jesuit history.

Forefather's Eve. By Adam Mickiewicz. Trans. Charles S. Kraszewski. London: Glagoslav Publications, 2016. 416 Pp. Notes. Bibliography. €30.30, Hard Bound, $23.50, Paper., John A. Merchant

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

No abstract provided.

Rethinking Ionesco’S Absurd: The Bald Soprano In The Interlingual Context Of Vichy And Postwar France, Julia Elsky

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Rereading Eugène Ionesco’s postwar play La cantatrice chauve (The Bald Soprano) in the light of the original, wartime Romanian version alongside archival materials concerning his political activity in Vichy France allows us to reconsider his role in the theater of the absurd. Instead of staging the emptiness of language in a conformist world, the Romanian play dramatizes how language and language exchange created meaning but also upheld state violence during the Second World War. Although the French version of the play adapts this theme to the postwar context, traces of state power over language remain. This new approach …

Eduard Dorsch And His Unpublished Poem On The Occasion Of Humboldt's 100th Birthday, Reinhard Andress

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

In 1869, the German-American medical doctor and poet, Eduard Dorsch, wrote a poem read in Detroit on the occasion of Humboldt’s 100th birthday. This article publishes the poem for the first time and explores its context within the life and times of its author.

Anthony Bukoski - An Outpost Of Polishness, John A. Merchant

Modern Languages and Literatures: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Isolated both geographically and psychologically, the Polish American writer Anthony Bukoski in his five collections of stories, Twelve Below Zero (1986, 2008), Children of Strangers (1993), Polonaise (1999), Time Between Trains (2003), and North of the Port (2008), as well as a collection of reissued stories Head of the Lakes (2018), assumes a variety of interrelated roles - chronicler, cultural archeologist, coastal guardsman, and spokesman - for the dwindling Polish community in his hometown of Superior , Wisconsin. Bukoski's stories capture the distinct relationship between people and place in Superior, situated as it is the periphery of American life in …