Literature in Georgia. Between Small Literature and World Literature

• Applicant: Dr. Zaal Andronikashvili
• Subject Area: General and Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies
• Term: from 2019 to 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 421741350

In October 2018, Georgia will be the guest of honor at the Frankfurt Book Fair. For the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union, literature from Georgia (written in Georgian as well as in other languages) will be presented at its fullest translated into German. Nevertheless there has been extremely little research on literature in Georgia not only in Germany but outside Georgia in general. The unique position of Georgian as a small language of about five million speakers and Georgia’s uninterrupted literary tradition of 1500 years makes literature in Georgia a preferred case study in order to critically address the common assumptions of the mostly Eurocentric world literary development models. The project aims at diversifying the critical scope and adopts a double perspective: a) until now literature in Georgia has been examined exclusively from the point of view of national literary history. This project fills this gap since this is the first time that the literary development in Georgia will be described not as a national literature, but in the context of the two opposing but complementary terms - small/minour literature and world literature. On the other hand, b) the project takes the micro-perspective from Georgia as an opportunity to discuss a number of theoretical problems affecting wider concepts such as national literature, small/minour literature and world literature using the example of literary development in Georgia.The aim of the project is a monograph on literary development in Georgia in the theoretical framework between small/minor literature and world literature. In contrast to the exhisting histories of Georgian literature, which were written in a linear chronology, the present project will be structured thematicaly. Unlike previous works on comparative literature in Georgia, the project does not seek to compare Georgian literature with other literatures, neither to examine the genesis of individual works but rather to situate individual works or groups of works in a multilingual intertextual context. Each chapter of the monograph will be dedicated to a topic, dealt with from two perspectives: on the one hand, the cardinal points of literary development in Georgia will be examined, especially with regard to the asynchronicity with the Eurocentric models of literary development. On the other hand, the milestones of literary development in Georgia that have so far been missing from national literary historiography will be increasingly addressed.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Cooperation Partner: Professorin Dr. Susanne K. Frank