A Distant Reading of Two ‘Distant Writings’ by Istrati and Cartarescu: Penchant for a Chronotopic Construct in Mediterranean and The Levant.

Abstract

As distinct from a ‘close reading’ that has long become a core value in literary studies, ‘distant reading’ has been proposed by Franco Moretti (2000) to overcome the obstacles faced by comparative literature, and to counterweigh the disadvantages of distant reading. Relying on my past work in Mediterranean and Black Sea Studies, I attempt an interpretive ‘distant reading’ of the two fiction works that were written from a meaningful distance, that is, approaching the Mediterranean and/or the Levant from the Black Sea point of view. In keeping with his literary style, Cartarescu himself referred to Istrati in his fiction. (The Levant 102, 136) This intertextuality invites a reconsideration of how he echoed his predecessor, just as the Levant in the title did the Mediterranean. I argue that the representation of the pre-World War I Mediterranean in Istrati’s Mediterranean (Sunrise) (1934) and (Sunset) (1935), posthumously available in a single volume (2018) is ‘impression-istic’ and informed by modern social and poetic realism. It differs from Cartarescu’s postmodern reworking of this geography as a film-set with a distinct background, by recourse to the repertoire of conventions and clichés constitutive of the Levant literature. I relate this basic difference to the writers’ space/time specifications, as well as the literary space, or alternatively literary geography, within which they positioned themselves. The present study is devoted to the evaluation of the intertextual connection between the two books and its overall representational consequences.

Keywords

• distant reading
• space
• time
• mediterranean levant
• mircea cartarescu
• panait istrati