CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 Purdue University Press ©Purdue University
Volume 15 (2013) Issue 6 Article 7
Fiction, Film, Painting, and Comparative Literature
Ramona L. Ceciu Jadavpur University
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CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Language Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monograph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact:
Recommended Citation Ceciu, Ramona L. "Fiction, Film, Painting, and Comparative Literature." CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 15.6 (2013):
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ISSN 1481 4374 < http://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb > Purdue University Press ©Purdue University
CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture , the peer reviewed, full text, and open access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." In addition to the publication of articles, the journal publishes review articles of scholarly books and publishes research material in its Library Series. Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Langua ge Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monog raph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: < [email protected] >
Volume 15 Issue 6 (December 2013) Article 7 Ramona L. Ceciu, "Fiction, Film, Painting, and Comparative Literature"
Contents of CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 15.6 (2013) Special Issue New Work about World Literatures Ed. Graciela Boruszko and Steven Tötösy de Zepetnek
Abstract : In her article "Fiction, Film, Painting, and Comparative Literature" Ramona L. Ceciu proposes a view of comparative literature as a "language in a process of ascertaining its proper grammar." She argues that like any language in order to survive, comparative literature must allow for a constant rejuvenation of its vocabulary and methods it must keep an "open" structure that would accommodate fresh extra methodological approaches through a procedure of re invention and expansion. Ceciu posits that in this process the comparatist's "objective creativity" plays a crucial role and draws on Steven Tötösy de Zepetnek's concept of a "new comparative literature" and applies the concept to literature, painting, and film in India.
Ramona L. Ceciu, "Fiction, Film, Painting, and Comparative Literature" page 2 of12 CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 15.6 (2013):
Fiction, Film, Painting, and Comparative Literature
In many ways comparative literature is similar to a "language" created from other "languages" which functions as a sort of "methodological Esperanto." Steven Tötösy de Zepetnek posited that comparative literature as discipline is a "method in the study of literature" because it requires "knowledge of more than one national language and literature, "the application of other disciplines to the study of literature, and because it has "an ideology of inclusion of the Other, be that a marginal literature … a genre, other text types"(Comparative Literature 13). Comparison stands out as a sine qua non for any critical analysis, while comparative literature needs to expand its methodological purview so that it incorporates new methods of research pertaining to other disciplines. Since its beginnings as a discipline, comparative literature has been contested, always in some crisis or another either in terms of identity or in terms of methodology, scope, focus, language issues, and so on. Its birth was proclaimed in the nineteenth century, its death was proclaimed in recent times, its path has been wrought many times in various directions with countless obstacles and, yet, comparative literature has survived proving its endurance. From Adrian Marino's nouveau paradigme , Claudio Guillén's crisis de las humanidades and his position on the comparativist's sensitivity to tensions between the local and the universal or the complaint against the "politicization of the humanities" to Emily Apter's proposition of a discipline that is "open to historical change and Third World cultures," etc., all the ups and downs of literary (comparative) studies are amply evident. In the same context, César Domínguez for instance speaks about the global phenomena of "emergence" in humanities and posits that "literary emergence" is a "comparative problem" whose study requires an interdisciplinary focus: "the multi dimensionality of literary work, emergent included, requires the application of theoretical and methodological frameworks employed in other disciplines in order to gain a balanced perspective … which Darío Villanueva has defended as 'critical pluralism'" (