On Being “Retroactive and Retrospective”: Translingual Self-writing as Heterotopia in Joseph Brodsky’s Autobiographical Essays
Year: 2016
Type: article
Abstract: alina SuFaru « . . .momentanément éclipsé, mon passé ne projetait plus devant moi cette ombre de lui-même que nous appelons notre avenir.» Marcel Proust, À la recherche du temps perdu.When asked "Who received the Nobel Prize for literature this year [1987]-an American poet of Russian origin, or a Russian poet living in America?",Joseph Brodsky (known in Russia by his given name, Iosif Brodskii) simply answered: "[A] Russian poet, an English essayist, and of course, an American citizen" (Husarska 11).If in Russia Brodsky is primarily known for his poetry (which eventually caused his forced expulsion from the Soviet Union), in the United States it is his essays that raised his literary status.Despite his proclaimed preference for poetry, 1 Brodsky began writing prose immediately after being forced into exile in 1972.According to Valentina Polukhina, Brodsky's first attempts at the essay genre had been in Russian, but he switched to English shortly after as the preferred language for his expression in prose.His first published essay, which was also his first autobiographical piece, "Less Than One" (1976), was written directly in English.Although he continued to write his poetry in his mother tongue, Russian, and later translated it into English, he chose English as the first language for his texts in prose, and especially for his autobiographical essays. 2 1.In the essay "A Poet and Prose" (1979, translated from Russian by Barry Rubin and included in the collection Less Than One), Brodsky describes the relation between prose and poetry as follows: "The concept of equality is extrinsic to the nature of art, and the thinking of any man of letters is hierarchical.Within this hierarchy poetry occupies a higher position than prose, and the poet, in principle, is higher than the prose writer."(176) 2. Among which "Less than One" (1976), "A Guide to the Renamed City" (1979), "In a Room and a Half" (1985), "Spoils of War" (1983), "The Condition We Call Exile" (1988), and Watermark: An Essay about Venice (1992).
Author: Alina Sufaru
Language: English
Subfield: Literature and Literary Theory
Field: Arts and Humanities
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W7140590863