The imperialism of the imagination: the case of Transylvania

Marius Crisan (University of Turin, Italy) [BIO]

Email: marius_crisan@yahoo.com

 

ABSTRACT:

In general, the association of Transylvania with English literature has a spontaneous effect and the first name one thinks about is Dracula. Stoker’s novel, Dracula, is indeed one of the most famous literary representations of this territory – if not the most famous –, but it reflects only in some fragments what had been written before it in British literature. The image of Transylvania in Stoker’s novel is only a side of the coin and it stands for the sensational element as a defining feature of the Transylvanian space. The other side of the coin is reflected in less fanciful texts, which try to present in a more realistic way this land. Broadly speaking, I think that two directions may be outlined in the shaping of the Transylvanian space: on the one hand the representation of Transylvania as something different, sometimes opposed to the British space (and difference is a starting point for sensationalism), and on the other hand the (re)presentation of Transylvania as a space of rediscovering the Self through the dialogue with the Other. In shaping Transylvania, the geographical position places an important role too. Firstly, its place in Europe, at the border between West and East is very significant. In “The Image of Transylvania in English Literature” and in România şi imaginile ei în literature de călătorie britanică, Carmen Andras shows the impact of this frontier space. There are many literary texts which present Transylvania as a space of Otherness. But in the literature of the 20th and 21st centuries and sometimes in the previous texts too, Transylvania and the whole Romania are also described as charming and fascinating places. The difference does not have negative connotations, but the encounter with the Other is a way to discover the self and the world. Such an attitude is reflected in the works of some authors such as Henry Baerlein (And Then to Transylvania, 1931), Walter Starkie (Raggle – Taggle, 1933), Sacheverell Sitwell (Roumanian Journey, 1938), Patrich Leigh Fermor (Between the Woods and the Water, 1986), Dervla Murphey (Transylvania and Beyond, 1992), Alan Ogden (Romania Revisited, 2000; Winds of Sorrow, 2004), Caroline Juler (Searching for Sarmizegetusa, 2003), Allan Brownjohn (Long Shadows, 1997) or Paul Bailey (Kitty & Virgil, 1998).