always be self-containing, unified, coherent in itself. We may call them, therefore, metaphysics, and if my argument requires the identification of any philosophy with metaphysics, I am more willing to accept this consequence than to give up the thesis of unity and coherence.
7 Many of the philosophies appropriated in this way were indeed theories of language, signs, even reading. Deconstruction, to mention the most obvious, is undoubtedly a theory (or in any case also a theory) of signification and signs, and as such it constitutes an important challenge to all other theories of meaning that are explicitly or implicitly based on hermeneutics. Yet even in this case there is a considerable gap between a complex theory of how meaning emerges and the actual analyses of texts, and this gap has only rarely been successfully bridged by anything other than political and ideological considerations.
8 “We shall make no attempt at system, nor lay any claim to ‘historical principles.’ On the contrary, we shall confine ourselves to observation, taking transverse sections of history in as many directions as possible. Above all, we have nothing to do with the philosophy of history” (Burckhardt 32).
9 “In this science it would seem as if Thought must be subordinate to what is given, to the realities of fact; that this is its basis and guide: while Philosophy dwells in the region of self-produced ideas, without reference to actuality … But as it is the business of history simply to adopt into its records what is and has been – actual occurrences and transactions; and since it remains true to its character in proportion as it strictly adheres to its data, we seem to have in Philosophy, a process diametrically opposed to that of the historiographer. This contradiction, and the charge consequently brought against speculation, shall be explained and confuted” (Hegel 22).
THE PAST AS A FORBIDDEN FRUIT: NOSTALGIA’S ETHICAL AND UNIVERSAL POTENTIAL IN TRANVÍA A LA MALVARROSA BY MANUEL VICENT
Fiona Schouten, Radboud University Nijmegen
NOSTALGIA AS A UNIVERSAL PHENOMENON
In What is World Literature? David Damrosch answers his own question by proposing a threefold definition of the phenomenon. Damrosch argues that world literature is “an elliptical refraction of national literatures”; that it “gains in translation”; and that it is “not a set canon of texts but a mode of reading” (Damrosch 281). World literature, in other words, rises beyond its national and local origins. In doing so, it may change in meaning as it changes contexts, but this is an enrichment rather than a loss. At the same time, moreover, it starts “resonating” with other, similar works, so that “we encounter the work not as the heart of its source culture but in the field of force generated among works that may come from very different cultures and eras” (300).
It is doubtful whether Tranvía a la Malvarrosa by Spanish author Manuel Vicent would qualify as world literature in Damrosch’ eyes. It is not its rootedness in national Spanish and local Valencian culture that might disqualify the novel; rather, it is the very fact that it has not been translated (from the original Spanish) into any other language. Of course, there is still a large potential (and actual) audience in other Spanish-speaking countries and communities; but to the English-speaking world, among others, the novel does not exist. Therefore, it has not managed to rise above its national embeddedness or to bring about its own “elliptical refraction”. The problem we are faced with here is that, although Tranvía a la Malvarrosa might “gain” in translation, we cannot be sure, since it has not yet been translated. This in itself, however, suggests that the work is not all that suitable for translation, and that it is likely to remain fixed in its strictly national setting.
Damrosch asserts, on the one hand, that only works that are read and appreciated in other contexts than the original can be called world literature. On the other hand, he argues that any given work can in principle inscribe itself into world literature; what it needs is a certain quality that makes it rise above its regionality, that opens it up to trans- and international, out-of-context readings. Damrosch points out, for example, that Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake is “so intricate and irreproducible that it becomes a sort of curiosity in translation”, whereas Dubliners by the same author is much more “viable” as world literature (Damrosch 289). By this definition, even an untranslated novel such as Tranvía a la Malvarrosa may have world literature potential, which would be activated as soon as it was actually translated.
Locally grounded though Vicent’s novel may be, I want to argue here that it contains at least one element that makes it potentially eligible for the title of world literature: namely, nostalgia. Tranvía a la Malvarrosa is, in fact, a thoroughly nostalgic work employing a number of strategies to evoke an emotional image of the recent Spanish past. In particular, it activates all five senses to imbue the reader with a sense of the past: street noises, Mediterranean colours, local bands and the aroma of paella set the scene. Indeed, even Valencia’s red-light district is described poetically, with a focus on the senses: it smells like “flor de alcantarilla” and has the flavour of “flujo de cebolla que llegaba junto con el viento sur” (Vicent 76, 77). A particularly clear example of the importance of sensory images in the novel is provided by the following description of a local Valencian fair:
La feria de diciembre en la Alameda. Sonaba la melodía Corazón de Violín dentro del aroma de almendra garrapiñada y el estruendo de las sirenas y los cochecitos de choque se unían a la canción ay Lilí, ay Lilí, ay Lo… y un vientecillo húmedo discurría por el cauce seco del Turia, levantaba los papeles, se llevaba la música junto con los gritos de los feriantes. (101)
(The December fair in the Alameda. The melody of Corazón de Violín sounded within the aroma of sugar-coated almonds and the noise of the sirens and the bumper cars joined the song ay Lilí, ay Lilí, ay Lo… and a humid breeze blew over the dry river bed of the Turia, lifted the papers, took with it the music together with the shouts of the fair-goers.)
The nostalgia evoked by sensory elements in the novel is perhaps best summarised by the narrator himself: “Todos los placeres pertenecían a los sentidos y parecían eternos” (All pleasures belonged to the senses and seemed eternal) (183). The idealised past is gone, and what seemed to last forever at the time is now nothing more than a – sensory – memory.
This foregrounding of nostalgia is not unique to Spain. What we are dealing with here, instead, is a universal, postmodern condition. Scholars agree that nostalgia is omnipresent in contemporary (postmodern) culture, especially since the 1990s. As Linda Hutcheon puts it, “a lot of contemporary culture [is] indeed nostalgic” (190). Gilles Lipovetsky notes, in discussing our current, “hypermodern” culture, that “we now have the emotional-memorial value associated with feelings of nostalgia. This is a phenomenon that is indissociably postmodern and hypermodern” (60). Nostalgia might even be understood as a consequence of globalisation: the fast pace and large scale of contemporary society create a longing for a slower and more compact past. Nostalgia’s importance in contemporary culture becomes clear in works such as On Longing by Susan Stewart, who deals with such cultural phenomena as souvenirs and collections; and it is apparent in more recent studies such as those of John Su and Pam Cook, who analyse nostalgic novels and films respectively.
Nostalgia, then, is a universal phenomenon these days. Moreover, as David Lowenthal points out, it is a sentiment felt by humans throughout the ages: “Nostalgic evocations long antedate our time”, says Lowenthal, and refers to writers as far apart in time as Wordsworth, Petrarch and Virgil (8). In this sense, nostalgia can be seen as a fundamentally human, and thus universally shared, emotion. The feeling of nostalgia has always been a part of the human condition; what is clear, however, is that its importance has intensified over the centuries to become one of postmodernity’s obssesions: “nostalgia … is now a drug that hooks us all” (12). In studying the workings of nostalgia in a specific work of literature, then, we are examining a phenomenon that is locally anchored, yet crosses borders. But does the presence of nostalgia in Tranvía a la Malvarrosa really lift it above its local embeddedness? Does it make of the novel, if not an actual work of world literature, at least a work that is eligible for the title?
Perhaps not. The longed-for