The Demystification of the Concept of Homeland in the Hungarian Literature from Vojvodina  Cover Image

The Demystification of the Concept of Homeland in the Hungarian Literature from Vojvodina
The Demystification of the Concept of Homeland in the Hungarian Literature from Vojvodina

Author(s): Erika Bence
Subject(s): Literary Texts
Published by: Scientia Kiadó
Keywords: Hungarian literature from Vojvodina; deheroization; homeland/loss of homeland; border novel; tropes of deficiency; foreignness

Summary/Abstract: The demystification of the cultic meaning of the homeland started already in the disillusionist Romanticism in Hungarian literature. The twentieth century modulates and enriches the thematization of the phenomenon with meanings of loss(es) of homeland within the framework of Hungarian literary representation from Vojvodina. In this context the meaning of homeland has been completed with the codes of the Trianon memory, the nostalgia for the Monarchy, the Balkan consciousness, the quest for the home/homeland, the language swap, the border novel as well as the figures of foreignness. The change and degradation of the concept of homeland is thematized in theory/essay as well as in poetic/narrative discourses, in poems as well as in prose in the Hungarian literature from Vojvodina. The analysis focuses on Károly Jung's (1944) poetry from the end of the twentieth century, above all, on his volumes of poems entitled Barbaricvm (1991) and Hephaestus the Grouch [Mogorva Héphaisztosz] (2002) respectively; the time gap between their publication also marks the historical time of a poetic formation determined by social-historical factors; its formation also embedded in tradition, as well as its tendencies directed at deconstructing traditional contents (myths and cultic meanings) are indicated and created by its trope structure, allusive sign system and transcultural figures.

  • Issue Year: 3/2011
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 45-59
  • Page Count: 15
  • Language: English