Comparative Literature

1. Dr.B.Kanagalakshmi,
Assistant Professor of English,
V.V.Vanniaperumal College for Women,
Virudhunagar.

2.  Attacked by American Comparatists for their
devotion to ‘source-hunting’
 Baldensperger, Van Tieghem, Jean Marie
Carre
 CL is part of literary history
 Influence is central to CL
 It is the expression of direct casual
relationship

3.  Charge the French that they have failed to
make a qualitative distinction between
‘Reception’ and ‘Influence’
 The native writer would have made a liberal
use of phrases, quotations and ideas from
foreign writer without being inwardly
affected by the model. The impact may be
superficial, which they call as reception.

4.  Literary works are products of artistic
imagination, they cannot be subjected to
factual investigation.
 More internal than external
 Baskell Block, Claudio Guillen, J.T.Shaw,
Anna Balakian, S.S.Prawer and Ulrich
Weisstein

5.  His book Comparative Literature and Literary
Theory – two chapters - ‘Influence and
Imitation’ and ‘Reception and Survival’
 His observations (1) the study of influences
within a national literature or between two
national literatures is not a qualitative one;
it is a methodological one.
 (2) the function of “intermediaries” or
“transmitters” (translators, reviewers,
books, journals, etc.,) which are supposed to
link the ‘emitter’ and ‘receiver’ , will be
partially ignored.

6.  For example, Mikhail Lermontov, the Russian
poet borrowed from Pushkin ( Russian) the
model of Byronic verse tale, but at the same
time went to Byron to derive certain
characteristics rejected by Pushkin.
 Benjamin Franklin ( American) in Poor
Richard’s Almanac has been partially
influenced by La Rochefoucald, the French
writer, without knowing about his total
work. It is even hard to say whether he was
influenced directly by him.

7.  So, Weisstein warns the comparatists that he
should not make a qualitative distinction
between the giver and the receiver, since
there exists only creative transmutations and
not literal imitations.
 Influence is unconscious imitation and
imitation is directed influence.
 He supports the views of J.T.Shaw and
Aldridge that influence does not reveal itself
in a single pattern ormanner; Influence
cannot be quantitatively measured either.

8.  The steps that lead to the study of original
work of art are translation, adaptation,
imitation and influence.
 Weisstein says, the term “originality applies
to creative innovations in form of content as
well as reinterpretations and combinations of
ingredients borrowed from diverse models”.
 In imitation, the author to some degree
surrenders his creative personality to another
author or a particular work; he need not be
sincere as a translator

9.  Adaptation range from the reworkings of a model
to the commercial attempts to make the work
available to the foreign audience.
 Sometimes, it results in ‘creative treason’, due
to the native author’s imperfect understanding,
or even misunderstanding and distortion of the
foreign writer.
 ‘Creative treason’ is common in the history of
the relationship between a foreign and native
literature with reference to reception, influence
and translations.

10.  Another kind of imitation is “stylization”, which
aims at the style of a single writer, a whole
movement, or even an entire period.
 J.T.Shaw cites the example of Pushkin’s epitaph
for Byron and his use of old Russian style in some
portions of Eugene Onegin
 “Burlesque” is a comic distortion of a particular
style, it is comic imitation
 “Pastiche” is not humorous, but the traits
related to subject matter, extracted from
different works are loosely mixed.

11.  “Parody” is poking fun at specific literary
models.
 Sometimes, parody excels the original and
becomes an original product itself.

12.  Scholars like Anna Balakian point to what is
called “negative influences”.
 It is the emergence of new trends and beliefs
within national literature, inspired by foreign
models, as a protest against the existing theories
and practices.
 Parody and travesty, as creative genres, pave the
way for “negative influences”, which is possible
when native authors imitate one another.

13.  Such impact, whether through a foreign or a
local model, is more in the form of imitation
than influence.
 Anna Balakian records that in the name of
individualism, the younger writers “reject in the
work of their elders what they consider to be the
conventions of the past”.
 The variant of “negative influence” is “Counter-
design” ( Gegenentwurf ), a term popularized by
Brecht.

14.  In this, says Weisstein, “a literary model is
changed into its poor opposite as it were,
through a reversal of the polemic thrust”.
 Ex. Wesker’s The Merchant , which is a remaking
of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice
 Weisstein says that further lines of demarcation
are imperative, since the French theoreticians of
CL seems to be reluctant to distinguish between
“influence” and “impact”.

15.  Van Tieghem writes that “the study of writer’s
influence on a foreign writer or country is closely
linked to the study of his appreciation or his
fortune” that they are both inseparable.
 Guyard regards, “influence” as one of the
phenomena to be treated under the heading,
“The Fortunes of Authors”
 Though he states that one must differentiate
between diffusion, imitation, fortune and influence
,he does not establish the difference.

16.  Carre accepts that the influence studies are “often
deceptive” and prefers to conduct a straight-forward
reception studies.
 Anna Balakian asserts that the contamination of influence
and reception studies should be avoided, since the date
accounted for in each case is entirely different.
 Reception studies are likely to shed new light on the
artistry of the emitter, depending on his fame and
reputation.
 The primary interest in ‘influence studies’, is in tracing
out the reactivity, in which the quantitative criteria are
replaced by the qualitative ones; but the dialectic of
originality and imitation is at the base of such studies.