Table Of ContentCultures and Literatures
in Dialogue
This book addresses the narrative construction of Russian cultural
memory in the work of Julian Barnes. It investigates how Barnes’s texts
tend to display a memory process as a transcultural mode of the creation
of English and Russian national identities. Examining a need to revisit
Russian canonical works, the detailed discursive analysis of the selected
English texts exposes an intertextual remembering by duplication, thus
contributing to the prevention of forgetting through the recuperation of
still misrecollected cultural meanings. By creatively incorporating Russian
intertextual elements into his work as a novelist, the author seems to insist
on sweeping across and beyond national boundaries, revealing how frail
the invention of tradition is when leading to the illusion of a solid collec-
tive memory and its political legitimation. The book considers not only a
constructive dialogue between Barnes’s fiction and Russian classical liter-
ature, but also this writer’s interpretative, mostly imaginative, integration
of Russian literature and culture into his work as a novelist. Exploring the
double meaning of a literary metaphor as a mnemonic image of memory
and a product of imagination, it offers a comprehensive analysis of Barnes’s
texts which play with intertextuality as an efficient tool of displacement
of official memory, providing a deeper understanding of historical and
cultural processes related to the constantly moving architecture of trans-
cultural memory.
Elena Bollinger holds a PhD in English and American Studies from the
Faculty of Arts and Humanities at the University of Lisbon. She is cur-
rently a researcher at the University of Lisbon Centre for English Studies
and a member of the interdisciplinary project entitled ‘Shared Memories:
Literatures and Cultures in English and Portuguese’. Close to both the
Centre for Slavic Languages and Cultures and the Centre for Comparative
Studies, she has been working on intercultural research involving mem-
ory, history and (trans)national identity within the scope of literary
representations. She is also a member of Memory Studies Association.
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Cultures and Literatures in Dialogue
The Narrative Construction of Russian Cultural Memory
Elena Bollinger
For more information about this series, please visit: https://www.
routledge.com/Routledge-Studies-in-Nineteenth-Century-Literature/
book-series/RSNCL
Cultures and Literatures
in Dialogue
The Narrative Construction of Russian
Cultural Memory
Elena Bollinger
First published 2023
by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
and by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2023 Elena Bollinger
The right of Elena Bollinger to be identified as author of this
work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of
the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted
or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks
or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and
explanation without intent to infringe.
ISBN: 978-1-032-37974-6 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-37975-3 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-34287-8 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003342878
Typeset in Bembo
by codeMantra
“To Nono, Didi and Kiko”
Contents
Acknowledgements ix
Introduction: rethinking literature through memory 1
1 Cultural dimension of literary memory 33
2 Narrative and memory in Julian Barnes 68
3 Patterning transcultural readings of memory 116
Conclusion: narrative irresolvability of memory 203
Index 209
Acknowledgements
I would like to express the deepest sense of gratitude to Professor Luísa
Maria Flora, whose consistent support, dedication, motivating encour-
agement and patience have been invaluable throughout this project. Her
insightful comments and keen attentiveness to the intricacies of intercul-
tural dialogues have made the working on this book a truly gratifying
experience.
I extend my gratitude to Professor Margaret Tejerizo and to Professor
Gueorgui Hristovsky for giving me advice and valuable suggestions relat-
ing to Russian literature. Their kind help at different stages of my research
has been supportive and comprehensive of the complexities which dwell
beneath the surface of Russian texts.
I am especially grateful to Professor Catherine Bernard, for thought-
provoking conversations, constructive criticism and encouragement to
proceed with my research.
I am especially indebted to the University of Lisbon School of Arts
and Humanities, the Department for English and American Studies, the
Centre for Comparative Studies and the Centre for Slavic Languages and
Cultures for their institutional, academic and personal support. Special
words of gratitude are due to Professor Teresa Malafaia and to Professor
Adelaide Serras, who have read and commented constructively on several
articles, to Professor Helena Buescu whose questions on different theoret-
ical aspects of my Russian readings have been very helpful, to Professor
Fernanda Mota Alves and to Professor Susana Araújo for inspiring my
interest in Cultural Memory Studies.
I offer my thanks to the University of Innsbruck, as well as the London
Centre for Interdisciplinary Research and the Memory Studies Association,
all of which have been very supportive during the writing of this book.
I would also like to thank my colleagues Alexandra Cheira, Maria José
Pires and Ana Carina Prokopyshin who have made available their support
in a number of ways and contributed to many decisions that helped shape
this research.
I am grateful for permission to quote copyright material: British Council
for excerpt from the Author’s statement; BOMB Magazine for excerpts
from the Interview Julian Barnes by Patrick McGrath; Horizon Research
