Mise en poeme: Epic (Auto)reflexivity and South Slavic Poetry in the Age of Romanticism
Mise en poeme: Epic (Auto)reflexivity and South Slavic Poetry in the Age of Romanticism

Summary/Abstract: This paper deals with the discursive phenomenon of reflexivity in the epic poetry of South Slavic romantic poets around the middle of the 19th century. Reflection is here understood as a kind of poetic self-formation procedure of romantic literary subject and his efforts to renovate epic mode in its original form. Starting with concept of “epic Romanticism”, in a way specific to South Slavic literatures, the author proceeds by distinguishing basic modes: explicit, implicit, and intertextual reflexivity. While the first two are related to typical romantic affectivity (D. Demeter, F. Prešeren) and/or rhetoric identification with oral folk rhapsodists’ tradition (P. P. Njegoš), the third one is marked with so-called “integration story” (I. Mažuranić), or mise en abyme, i.e. “the mirror in the text” effect as a medium of artistic auto-perspectivization and possible creative invention which leads to indications of the early pro-modern poetic procedures.

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