Lyn Hejinian’s Writing. Poetic Language as Language of Inquiry
- Issue:
- УДК / UDK: 821.111(73).0
- DOI:
- EDN:
- Abstract:
The article is devoted to the poetics of contemporary American writer Lyn Hejinian (1941–2024), considered one of the most consistent successors of Gertrude Stein's experimentalism in Anglophone literary writing. The study encompasses all stages of Hejinian’s poetic creativity: from early experiences of “language writing” in the 1960–70s, autobiographical texts and collective works of the 1980–90s, to theoretical and poetic quests in the first decades of the 21st century. The writer's main interest is the persistence and impermanence of memory and the subject, as well as the role of writing in their preservation and transformation. Descriptions of the writing process as a driving force of memory and experience come to the fore here. Syntax acts as the materialization of temporality in writing. Texts in a variety of formats explore natural and cultural worlds brought to life by language. Many of Hejinian's texts, both theoretical and artistic, explore the problem of language as a social space, as a philosophical search and as political pragmatics, as well as the problem of the relationship of time to language and language to time. The book The Language of Inquiry has become a kind of manifesto for poetic language, which is the “language of inquiry.” A special place in the book is occupied by essays about Gertrude Stein, which actualize the writing practices of the great American modernist in the contemporary context of language-oriented poetics. In her work of the recent years, Hejinian increasingly turns to social themes, never ceasing to experiment with the boundaries of the poetic. She puts forward a theory of so-called “allegorical activism,” which is understood as “artistic and political practice in the service of activating creative potential in everyday life.”
- Keywords: language writing, L. Hejinian, G. Stein, poetic language, subjectivity.
- For citation:
Feshchenko, Vladimir. “Lyn Hejinian’s Writing. Poetic Language as Language of Inquiry.” Literature of the Americas, no. 16 (2024): 347–389. https://doi.org/10.22455/2541-7894-2024-16-347-389
- References:
Bernstein 2012 — Bernstein, Charles. “The Expanded Field of L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E.” In Routledge Companion to Experimental Literature, edited by Joe Bray et al. et al., 281–297. Oxford: Routledge, 2012.
Davidson et al — Davidson, Michael, Lyn Hejinjan, Ron Silliman, and Watten Barrett. “Iz knigi Leningrad” [“From Leningrad”]. Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie, no. 113 (2021): 218–230. (In Russ.)
Dragomoshchenko 2012 — Dragomoshchenko, Arkady. “Slepok dvizheniia” [“Mask of motion”]. Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie no. 113 (2012): 250–252. (In Russ.)
Edmond 2002 — Edmond, Jacob. “‘A Meaning Alliance’: Arkady Dragomoshchenko and Lyn Hejinian's Poetics of Translation.” The Slavic and East European Journal 46, no. 3 (Autumn, 2002): 551–564.
Edmond 2006 — Edmond, Jacob. “Lyn Hejinian and Russian Estrangement.” Poetics Today 27, no. 1 (2006): 97–124.
Feshchenko 2022 a — Feshchenko, Vladimir. “Lingvocentrichnaia poeziia v SShA i v Rossii: traektorii vzaimodeistviia” [Language-centered poetry in the USA and in Russia]. Literature of the Americas no. 12 (2022): 66–89. (In Russ.)
Feshchenko 2022 b — Feshchenko, Vladimir. “Ia=Z=Y=K kak takovoi: Piat'desiat let "iazykovogo pis'ma" v SShA” (“L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E as such: Fifty Years of “Language Writing” in the USA”]. In Ot “Chernoi gory” do “Iazykovogo pis'ma”: Antologiia noveishei poezii SShA [From the Black Mountain to Language poetry: An Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry], edited by Jan Probshtein,
Vladimir Feshchenko, 356–374. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie Publ., 2022. (In Russ.)
Feshchenko 2022 c — Feshchenko, Vladimir. “Continuous reframing: G. Lakoff, kognitivnaia lingvistika i ‘iazykovaia poezia’” [“Continuous reframing: G. Lakoff, cognitive linguistics and ‘language poetry’”]. Kritika i semiotica, no. 2 (2022): 9–17. (In Russ.)
Feshchenko 2023 — Feshchenko, Vladimir. Russian and American Poetry of Experiment: The Linguistic Avant-Garde. Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2023.
Freitag 2006 — Freitag, Kornelia. Cultural Criticism in Women's Experimental Writing. The Poetry of Rosemary Waldrop, Lyn Hejinian and Susan Howe. Heidelberg: Winter, 2006.
Hartley 1989 — Hartley, George. Textual Politicsand the Language Poets. Bloomington: Indiana Univ Press, 1989.
Hejinian 1986 — Hejinian, Lyn. “The Person.” Boundary 2 XIV, no. 1, 2. (Fall 1985/Winter 1986): 75–79.
Hejinian 2000 — Hejinian, Lyn. The Language of Inquiry. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2000.
Hejinian 2002 — Hejinian, Lyn. “Afterword.” In Shklovsky, Viktor. Third Factory, 99–105. Chicago: Dalkey Archive Press, 2002.
Hejinian 2011 — Hejinian, Lyn. “Otritsanie zakrytosti” [“The Rejection of Closure”]. Filosofskii zhurnal, no. 1 (2011): 78–85. (In Russ.)
Hejinian 2012 — Hejinian, Lyn. “Varvarstvo” [“Barbasirm”]. Novoe lityeraturnoe obozreniie, no. 113 (2012): 253–263. (In Russ.)
Hejinian 2013 — Hejinian, Lyn. “Materialy” [“Materials”]. Translit, no. 13 (2013): 60–65. (In Russ.)
Hejinian 2022a — Hejinian, Lyn. “Drugie sviazi” [“Other connections”], 2022. Flagi. https://flagi.media/piece/516. (In Russ.)
Hejinian 2022b — Hejinian, Lyn. “Esli napisannoe pishet” [“If Written is Writing”]. In Ot “Chernoi gory” do “Iazykovogo pis'ma”: Antologiia noveishei poezii SShA [From the Black Mountain to Language Poetry: An Anthology of Contemporary American Poetry], edited by Jan Probshtein, Vladimir Feshchenko, 463–464. Moscow: Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie Publ., 2022. (In Russ.)
Hejinian 2022c — Hejinian, Lyn. “Otvety na voprosy ‘Flagov’” [“Replies to Flagi’s Questions”], 2022. Flagi. https://flagi.media/piece/531?fbclid=IwAR0kV9QKz7y3nfQY_1M-ErbUqq_xWiaqeAFgJRrA3rRoP_rmPyaPex3E0Jc. (In Russ.)
Hejinian 2023 — Hejinian, Lyn. Slepki dvheniшa = Masks of Motion: izbrannoe iz raznyh knig [Masks of Motion: Selected Writings]. Moscow: Polifem Publ., 2023. (In Russ.)
Hejinian and Watten 2013 — A Guide to Poetics Journal. Writing in the Expanded Field, 1982–1998. Edited by Lyn Hejinian, Barrett Watten. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 2013.
Hoffman 1986 — Critical Essays on Gertrude Stein. Edited by Michael J. Hoffman. Boston, MA: G K Hall, 1986.
Janecek 2004 — Janecek, Gerald. “Lyn Hejinian perevodit Arkadiia Dragomoshhenko” [Lyn Hejinian translates Arkadii Dragomoshchenko]. In Poetika iskanii, ili poisk poetiki [Poetics of search, or the search for poetics], 293–301. Moscow: Institut russkogo iazyka im. V.V. Vinogradova RAS Publ., 2004. (In Russ.)
Kostelanetz 1990 — Gertrude Stein Advanced: An Anthology of Criticism. Edited by Richard Kostelanetz. Jefferson, MS: McFarland Publishing, 1990.
Mehne 2003 — Mehne, Phillip. “‘Making It Strange’: Bewusstsein, Erfahrung und Sprache bei Gertrude Stein und Lyn Hejinian.” Amerikastudien/American Studies 48, no. 4 (2003): 537–561.
Mix 2007 — Mix, Deborah M. A Vocabulary of Thinking: Gertrude Stein and Contemporary North American Women's Innovative Writing. Iowa: University of Iowa Press, 2007.
Molnar 1989 — Molnar, Michael. “The Vagaries of Description: The Poetry of Arkadii Dragomoshchenko.” Essays in Poetics 14, no. 1 (1989): 76–98.
Morzhenkova 2012 — Morzhenkova, Natalia V. Avangardistskii ieksperiment Gertrudy Stain: v poiskah zhanra [ Avant-Gardist Experiment of Gertrude Stein: in Search of a Genre]. Moscow: Lenand Publ., 2012. (In Russ.)
Perloff 1986 — Perloff, Marjorie. The Futurist Moment. Avant-Garde, Avant Guerre, and the Language of Rupture. Chicago; London: The University of Chicago Press, 1986.
Quartermain 1992 — Quartermain, Peter. Disjunctive Poetics. From Gertrude Stein and Louis Zukofsky to Susan Howe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992. (Cambridge Studies in American Literature and Culture.)
Sandler 2005 — Sandler, Stephanie. “Arkadii Dragomoshchenko, Lyn Hejinian, and the Persistence of Romanticism.” Contemporary Literature 46, no. 1 (Spring 2005): 18–45.
Sherry 2022 — Sherry, James. Selfie: Poetry, Social Change & Ecological Connection. Singapore: Palgrave Macmillan, 2022.
Siltanen 2016 — Siltanen, Elina. Experimentalism as Reciprocal Communication in Contemporary American Poetry: John Ashbery, Lyn Hejinian, Ron Silliman. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 2016.
Watten 2021 — Watten, Barrett. “Prakticheskaia utopiia iazykovogo pis'ma: ot knigi ‘Leningrad’ do dvizheniia Occupy” [“Langage Writing's Concrete Utopia: From Leningrad to Occupy”]. Novoe literaturnoe obozrenie. no. 174 (2021): 200–217. (In Russ.)
Watten 2002 — Watten, Barrett. “The Turn to Language and the 1960s.” Critical Inquiry, no. 29 (2002): 139–183.
Watten 2023 — Watten, Barrett. “Scaffolding Repetition: Gertrude Stein, Language Writing, Electronic Dance Music.” eLyra 22, no. 12 (2023): 29–55.
Williams 2018 — Williams, William C. “Trudy Gertrudy Stein” [“The Work of Gertrude Stein”]. In Transatlanticheskii avangard. Anglo-amerikanskie literaturnye dvizheniia (1910-1940). Programmnye dokumenty i teksty [Transatlantic Avant Garde. Anglo-American Literary Movements, 1910–1940. Program Documents and Texts], 232–239. St. Petersburg: Izdatel'stvo Evropeiskogo universiteta v Sankt-Peterburge Publ., 2018. (In Russ.)