Description
Book SynopsisWith the Treaty of Versailles, the Western nation-state powers introduced into the East Central European region the principle of national self-determination. This principle was buttressed by frustrated native elites who regarded the establishment of their respective nation-states as a welcome opportunity for their own affirmation. They desired sovereignty but were prevented from accomplishing it by their multiple dispossession. National elites started to blame each other for this humiliating condition. The successor states were dispossessed of power, territories, and glory. The new nation-states were frustrated by their devastating condition. The dispersed Jews were left without the imperial protection. This embarrassing state gave rise to collective (historical) and individual (fictional) narratives of dispossession. This volume investigates their intended and unintended interaction. Contributors are: Davor Beganović, Vladimir Biti, Zrinka Božić-Blanuša, Marko Juvan, Bernarda Katušić, Nataša Kovačević, Petr Kučera, Aleksandar Mijatović, Guido Snel, and Stijn Vervaet.
Table of ContentsNotes on Contributors Introduction Tua res agitur, tua fabula narratur: In Search of Lost Sovereignty Vladimir Biti Part 1: The Janus-Face of Dispossession Ruling (Out) the Province and Its Consequences: Sovereignty, Dispossession, and Sacrificial Violence Vladimir Biti The Time of Dispossession: The Conflict, Composition and Geophilosophy of Revolution in East Central Europe Aleksandar Mijatović Manifesting Dispossession: Politics of the Avant-garde Zrinka Božić-Blanuša Part 2: The Politics of Post-Imperial Hi/Storytelling Claiming the West for the East: Classical Antiquity as an Alternative Source of Turkish Post-Ottoman Identity? Petr Kučera Andrić and the Bridge: Dispossessed Writers and the Novel as a Site of Enduring Homelessness Guido Snel Anika and the “Big Other” Bernarda Katušić Melancholic Dispossession in The Diary about Čarnojević Davor Beganović Part 3: The Post-Post-Imperial Retake Failures of Community: Andrić in Andrićgrad Nataša Kovačević Literature and the Politics of Denial: Slovenian Novels on ‘The Erasure’ Marko Juvan Cosmopolitan Counter-Narratives of Dispossession: Migration, Memory, and Metanarration in the Work of Aleksandar Hemon Stijn Vervaet Index
