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Urbanity and Literature – Cities as Transareal Spaces of Movement in Assia Djebar, Emine Sevgi Özdamar and Cécile Wajsbrot

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  31 May 2011

Ottmar Ette (translated by MARK MINNES)
Ottmar Ette (translated by MARK MINNES)*
Affiliation:
Am Neuen Palais 10, D-14469 Potsdam, Germany. E-mail: [email protected]
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Abstract

Transarea studies focus upon spaces as created by the movements that criss-cross them. From this point of view, from its very beginnings, literature is closely interrelated with a vectorial (and much less with a purely spatial) conception of history – and with urbanity, which plays a decisive role in Gilgamesh's travels through a (narrative) cosmos centered upon the city of Uruk. This article explores the city as a transareal space of movement in three examples of literature, with no fixed abode, around the turn of the millennium, i.e. Assia Djebar's Les Nuits de Strasbourg, Emine Sevgi Oezdamar's Istanbul-Berlin Trilogy, and Cécile Wajsbrot's L’île aux musées. These three writers project, in a very specific way, cities in motion as anagrammatic and fractal structures.

Type
Risks, Environment and Sustainable Development – Papers from the 2009 Academia Europaea Meeting in Naples
Information
European Review , Volume 19 , Issue 3 , 31 May 2011 , pp. 367 - 383
Copyright
Copyright © Academia Europaea 2011

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References

Notes and References

1.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud). See my extensive analysis in, O. Ette (forthcoming) ‘Experimente des ZusammenLebensWissens in den Literaturen ohne festen Wohnsitz: Assia Djebar und die Straßburger Nächte’.Google Scholar
2. See in this context the very interesting essay by Asholt, W. (2005) Les villes transfrontalières d'Assia Djebar. In: M. Calle-Gruber (ed.) Assia Djebar, Nomade entre les murs… Pour une poétique transfrontalière (Paris: Maisonneuve & Larose), pp. 147–160.Google Scholar
3. See in this context Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 399sq.Google Scholar
4.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 11.Google Scholar
5.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 14.Google Scholar
6.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 17.Google Scholar
7.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud).Google Scholar
8.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 18.Google Scholar
9.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 35.Google Scholar
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12.Djebar, A. (1997) Les Nuits de Strasbourg. Roman (Arles: Actes Sud), p. 50.Google Scholar
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16. For more information on the concept of the nomadic in the work of Assia Djebar, see Calle-Gruber, M. (2005) Assia Djebar, Nomade entre les murs… Pour une poétique transfrontalière (Paris: Maisonneuve & Larose).Google Scholar
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25. The first-person narrator from Emine Sevgi Özdamar's novel Seltsame Sterne starren zur Erde uses almost the exact same words to reflect upon language. See Özdamar, E. S. (2003) Seltsame Sterne starren zur Erde. Wedding – Pankow 1976/77 (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch), p. 23.Google Scholar
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30.Özdamar, E. S. (1998) Die Brücke vom Goldenen Horn (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch), p. 63.Google Scholar
31.Özdamar, E. S. (1998) Die Brücke vom Goldenen Horn (Cologne: Kiepenheuer & Witsch).Google Scholar
32. See in this context Ette, O. (2005) Von Inseln, Grenzen und Vektoren. In: M. Braig, O. Ette, D. Ingenschay and G. Maihold (eds) Grenzen der Macht, Macht der Grenzen (Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert), pp. 135–180.Google Scholar
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34.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Editions Denoël), p. 10; For an in-depth analysis of the novel, see my article, O. Ette (forthcoming) Cécile Wajsbrot, ‘L'Ile aux musées’ oder die verborgenen Choreographien der Anwesenheit.Google Scholar
35.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Editions Denoël), p. 11.Google Scholar
36. See Wajsbrot, C. (2005) Mémorial (Paris: Zulma).Google Scholar
37. See Wajsbrot, C. (2002) Caspar-Friedrich-Strasse (Paris: Zulma).Google Scholar
38.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Aditions Denoël), p. 12.Google Scholar
39.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Editions Denoël), p. 38.Google Scholar
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41.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Editions Denoël), p. 83.Google Scholar
42.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Editions Denoël), p. 106.Google Scholar
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44. See in this context Ette, O. (forthcoming) ‘Caspar-David-Friedrich-Straße’: Cécile Wajsbrot oder die Ästhetik der Abwesenheit; see also the eighth chapter of O. Ette (2005) ZwischenWeltenSchreiben. Literaturen ohne festen Wohnsitz (Berlin: Kulturverlag Kadmos), pp. 239–263 and pp. 54–59.Google Scholar
45.Wajsbrot, C. (2008) L'Ile aux musées. Roman (Paris: Aditions Denoël), p. 85.Google Scholar