Od wernakularnej utopii do narodowego kanonu literackiego: metapoezja i epos w słoweńskim odrodzeniu narodowym
From Vernacular Utopia to National Literary Canon: Metapoetry and Epic in Slovenian National Awakening

Summary/Abstract: In Slovenian metapoetry, the imagining of the emerging national literary canon symbolized efforts to cultivate the vernacular language. The indigenization of Parnassus, the topos of canonicity, served as an autopoietic strategy of a nascent literary system (embedded in the Habsburg Empire) to assimilate the cosmopolitan patterns of the classical canon and capitalize on its prestige. Through the process of “worlding,” nations canonized their iconic poets as universal. In the international arena, “national poets” were believed to prove that a given nation – especially when stateless – meets the standards of the world canon. While the novel as a form of modern writing represented the national character of core literatures, the peripheries justified their nationality with the canonical epic genre. Prešeren’s 1836 Byronic poem Baptism on the Savica is a deliberately hybrid national epic. It entered the canon because it embodies the national “essence” in a controversial way.

• Details
• Contents