Reconsidering (Post-)Yugoslav Time: Towards the Temporal Turn in the Critical Study of (Post)-Yugoslav Literatures(65 Studies in Slavic Literature and Poetics)

In this collection of essays, authors propose a temporal shift in (post-)Yugoslav studies. By taking into account select examples from literature, art, and culture, the volume questions a possibility of explaining the temporal structure underlying the theoretical and analytical concepts employed in understanding (post-)Yugoslav literature(s) and culture(s). Analyses undertaken in the essays showcase that the (post-)Yugoslav literary, artistic, and cultural practices do not only attempt to portray the demise of the state and the succeeding war between its former republics. Instead, the authors underscore that the critical (post-)Yugoslav studies task is to evince and critically reflect on and engage with the processes before and after the dissolution to capture the collapse itself.

Table of Contents:
Acknowledgements Notes on Contributors Introduction  Aleksandar Mijatović and Brian Willems Part 1: The Concept of (Post)-Yugoslav Time Section 1: Time Unbound: De-synchronized Temporalities of Modernity, the (Neo)-Avant-Garde, Post-modernity, and the Concept of (Post)-Yugoslav Literature 1 Past Fragments, Future Change: Dubravka Ugrešić, Vladan Desnica, Sanja Iveković, and Dalibor Martinis  Brian Willems 2 “The Historical Moment before Our Eyes”: On Producing Post-Yugoslav Literature  Tijana Matijević 3 Whose (Neo-)Avant-Garde? The Poetry of Josip Sever, Yugoslav Modernity, and the Problem of Mononational Literary History  Lujo Parežanin Section 2: From the Time That Belongs to No-One to Temporalities of Non-belonging 4 The End of the World as We Know It? Anti-utopia in Post-Yugoslav Literature  Boris Postnikov 5 Post-Yugoslav Dystopian Dilemmas and Writing the History of the Future: Alternative Version or Parodic Subversion?  Miranda Levanat-Peričić 6 Kant Has Some Relevance Here: On a Fictional Theory of Quentin Meillassoux and the Theoretical Fiction of Luka Bekavac  Ante Jerić 7 The Narrative Out of Time: The Nonhuman World of Luka Bekavac’s Fiction  Matija Jelača and Anera Ryznar Part 2: Application(s) of/to (Post)-Yugoslav Time Section 1: Unhinging Memory and Space: Remembering (Post)-Yugoslav Time 8 Re-reading/Writing Yugoslav Pasts and Presents in Post-Yugoslav Literature: Between (Yugo-)Nostalgia and “Lateral Networks”  Mirko Milivojević 9 Spaces of Memory in Dragan Velikić’s Novel Investigator  Danijela Marot Kiš 10 In Search of Home Time  Kujtim Rrahmani Section 2: De-composing Broken Bonds: The Culture of Non-relational Relation 11 Cultural Values and the Circularity of ‘Transition’ in Croatia: Post-war Literature and Film  Saša Stanić and Marina Biti 12 Writing against the Code and Fitting in with the Code: Reading Dubravka Ugrešić in the Context of the International Literary Field  Iva Kosmos 13 Narrations of Lost and Found: The Twists and Turns of the Friendship Discourse in the (Post)Yugoslav Environment  Zala Pavšič Index

About the Author :
Aleksandar Mijatović, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Literary Theory and History at the Department of Croatian Language and Literature, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Rijeka. He has recently authored the book Temporalities of Post-Yugoslav Literature: The Politics of Time (2020). Brian Willems, Ph.D., European Graduate School, is Associate Professor of Literature and Film at the University of Split. His most recent books are Zug efekt (2021) and Speculative Realism and Science Fiction (2017).