Event Details

Current, largely eurocentric methods of studying world literature do not sufficiently acknowledge non-Western literatures as part of the world. I want to suggest three fruitful ways to construct a world literature that not only more accurately reflects the composition of the world but also views the world in a more egalitarian way than current perspectives. One of these is to treat world literature from an indocentric, sinocentric, nipponcentric or other non-Western point of view. Another is to treat junctures of aesthetic circulation during which East learns from West and West learns from East. A third is to articulate originary poetic systems of West and East--systems that evolved before the modern period--in a comparative context.