In 27th November 2015

Mojster ljubezni

José Leonilson (Brazilija 1957–1993) je v enem svojih najbolj emblematičnih in slavnih del izjavil, da je “silovita ljubezen umetnikov zaklad”. Ta navidez preprosti stavek je resda skrit na hrbtni strani dela, s preprostim peresom je vpisan v kvaziobjekt, narejen iz klobučevine, šivov in kristalnih obeskov. Leonilsonu v Braziliji osemdesetih in zgodnjih devetdesetih let 20. stoletja ni bilo lahko govoriti o ljubezni. Kako naj bi bilo v tradicionalni, heteroseksualni, katoliški deželi lahko govoriti o ljubezni, poželenju, strasti in hrepenenju po ljubezni? Kakšno poetsko držo je dosegel, ko je dopustil, da njegovo ustvarjalnost v kontekstu sodobne umetnosti vodijo čustva? Razumevanje Leonilsonove poetske obravnave ljubezni ni preprosto, kakor tudi ni preprosto doumeti kolizije besed in podobe v njegovih delih ali načina, kako obdeluje tkanine, šive in vezenine, kako ustvarja dela, ki spominjajo na čisto poezijo, podobe, ki so včasih bliže ‘literarni’ umetnosti kot pa ‘vizualni’. Te momente, ki se pojavijo, kadar se poglobljeno ukvarjamo z Leonilsonovimi deli in umetniškimi izjavami, bi zlahka označili kot ‘romantične’. Če je takšna oznaka ustrezna, potem le toliko, kolikor je oznaka ‘feministično’ primerna za dela Louise Bourgeois (Francija/ZDA 1911–2010). Primerjava poetik obeh umetnikov bo pokazala, kako takšne oznake preprečujejo spoznanje, da ljubezen ni nikoli preprosta in da moramo besede, ki jih razbiramo v vizualnem diskurzu teh umetnikov ali jih polagamo vanj, vedno razumeti kot metafore življenja in smrti.

Michael Beck
Love as an Illness

This talk explores how affective love transformed from a so understood disease to the ideal of love in the German literature of the early modern period. Philosophical intellectual history stations will be briefly discussed and related to literary examples: affective love as a disease in the tradition of stoicism (Lipsius and Descartes), courtly dealing with affective love in the time of gallantry and transferring gallant codes on civil love, which finally leads to the idealization of affective love.

It turns out that human love at the beginning of the early modern period (and before that) was perceived as a kind of disease that must be controlled or even fought. In the gallantry, the secular-physical experiences a general appreciation, which leads to a transcoding and idealization of human love.
In selected cases (Gryphius / Lohenstein, Lessing, Schiller), the interaction of social and literary codes will be shown. The aim is to trace the development of love as a disease in the literature of the early modern period. Gryphius’ and Lohenstein’s tragedies are full of good examples of love sick characters, Lessing’s dramas contain plenty of characters who are trying to dominate the love and affections and in Schiller’s work exemplary figures who indulge in love will be analyzed.
This research is based on the communication model of Niklas Luhmann, which understands love as social code, and historic recontextualization of literature in the tradition of Foucault’s discourse analysis.
Basis of the lecture is my in 2014 defended dissertation on love, sexuality and marriage in the dramas of the early modern times (Von Geldheirat und unmoralischen Angeboten. Codes von Liebe, Ehe und Sexualität in den Dramen der Frühen Neuzeit.).
Michael Beck
Ljubezen kot bolezen

Prispevek bo prikazal preobrazbo čustvene ljubezni, pojmovane kot bolezen, v pojem idealne ljubezni, in sicer na primerih iz nemške književnosti zgodnjega novega veka. Na kratko bo orisal posamezne faze filozofsko intelektualne zgodovine in jih povezal s primeri iz književnosti: čustvena ljubezen kot bolezen v tradiciji stoicizma (Lipsius in Descartes), dvorsko obravnavanje čustvene ljubezni v viteški dobi in prenos kodov viteške ljubezni na meščansko, kar končno vodi v idealizacijo čustvene ljubezni.

Izkaže se, da je bila človeška ljubezen v zgodnjem novem veku (in prej) pojmovana kot neke vrste bolezen, ki jo je treba nadzirati in se celo boriti proti njej. V viteški dobi je sekularna telesnost postala splošno sprejemljiva, kar je vodilo v prekodiranje in idealiziranje človeške ljubezni.
Na izbranih primerih (Gryphius / Lohenstein, Lessing, Schiller) bo prikazana interakcija družbenih in literarnih kodov. Cilj je oris razvoja ljubezni kot bolezni v književnosti zgodnjega novega veka. Gryphiusove in Lohensteinove tragedije so polne dobrih primerov za like, ki so bolni od ljubezni, v Lessingovih dramah nastopajo osebe, ki poskušajo obvladovati ljubezen in čustva, v Schillerjevih delih pa bomo analizirali svarilne zglede značajev, ki so se vdali ljubezni.
Raziskava sloni na komunikacijskem modelu Niklasa Luhmanna, ki ljubezen razume kot družbeni kod, in na historični rekontekstualizaciji književnosti v tradiciji Foucaulte analize diskurzov.
Osnova prispevka je moja disertacija na temo ljubezni, spolnosti, zakonske zveze v dramatiki zgodnjega novega veka, ki sem jo zagovarjal leta 2014 (Von Geldheirat und unmoralischen Angeboten. Codes von Liebe, Ehe und Sexualität in den Dramen der Frühen Neuzeit).
Milena Mileva Blažić
The Concept of Love in Slovenian (Children’s) Literature

In her book Tales of Love (1987), Julia Kristeva analyses the topic of love. She labels her text as ‘a philosophy of love’ and defines love as infinite quests for rebirth through the experience of love. According to Kristeva, love is explicitly a hymn to the narcissistic power to which ‘I’ may sacrifice itself. Her rhetorical question is whether we speak of the same thing when we speak about love? Kristeva states that in the rapture of loving the limits of one’s own identity vanish; at the same time the lines between reference and meaning begins to blur in love’s discourse. Love is the intense sign of truth and eternity. The subject discovers the confines of its condition and the powerlessness of language. Kristeva concludes that love is the time and space in which ‘I’ assumes the right to be extraordinary. The characteristics of love are:

1) Expectancy: the subject becomes painfully sensitive to its incompleteness that it was not aware of before. 2) The call: the body responds to the symptoms or emotions. 3) The meeting: the mixture of pleasure, hope and promise represents a perfect future.

The experience of love is: 1) Symbolic (forbidden, distinguishable, thinkable); 2) Imaginary (what the Self imagines in order to sustain and expand itself); 3) Real (an impossible domain, where affects desire everything and no one accounts for the fact that the self is only a part of the whole).

In this talk, the theoretical framework of Julia Kristeva will be applied to three Slovenian authors of children’s book that are on the curriculum of Slovene primary schools (F. Prešeren: Wreath of Sonnets, N. Grafenauer: Mahayana, B. A. Novak: Narcissus and Echo).
Milena Mileva Blažić
Pojmovanje ljubezni v slovenski (mladinski) književnosti

Julija Kristeva v delu Histoires d’amour (1983) obravnava tematiko ljubezni. Osnovna misel v knjigi, ki jo sama imenuje filozofija ljubezni, je neskončno iskanje ponovnih rojstev skozi izkušnjo ljubezni. O ljubezni pravi, da se lahko o njej govori le v prvi osebni ednine. Po njenem mnenju je ljubezen najbolj intenziven znak in najbolj eksplicitna himna narcistične moči, v kateri oseba žrtvuje ljubezen, v resnici pa žrtvuje sebe. Zastavi si retorično vprašanje ali govorimo o isti zadevi, ko govorimo o ljubezni? Pravi, da v zamaknjenosti ljubezni izginejo meje lastne identitete ter da se natančnost in pomen zabrišeta v pogovoru o ljubezni. Zanjo je ljubezen najmočnejši izraz resnice in večnosti. Ko je oseba zaljubljena, postane resnična, močna, subjektivna in etična, ker je pripravljena narediti vse za drugega. Hkrati pa odkrije meje in nemoč jezika. Kristeva definira ljubezen kot čas in prostor v katerem ‘jaz’ dobi pravico do posebnosti. Značilnosti ljubezni so: 1) pričakovanje, zaradi katere oseba postane boleče ranljiva za svojo nepopolnost, ki se je pred ljubeznijo ni zavedala. 2) Klic je klic, na katerega se telo odzove s simptomi oziroma s čustvi. 3) Srečanje, mešanica užitka, obljube in upanja, ki je neke vrste popolna prihodnost. Po Kristevi je izkušnja ljubezni možna na treh ravneh: 1) na simbolni (prepovedano, različno, refleksivno); 2) na imaginarni (kaj si oseba predstavlja v smislu vzdrževanja in razširjanja sebe) in 3) na realni (nemogoča domena, ko čustva želijo vse in ko nihče ne upošteva dejstva, da je ‘jaz’ samo del). Teorija Julije Kristeve bo aplicirana na pojmovanje ljubezni pri slovenskih (mladinskih) avtorjih predlaganih za pouk književnosti v osnovni šoli, npr. pri Francetu Prešerenu (Sonetni venec, 1834), Niku Grafenauerju (Mahajana, 1999) in Borisu A. Novaku (Narcis in Eho, 1991).

Y.C. Cho
Love in Dystopian Narratives – from Richard Matheson to Isaac Marion

Love functions as a new myth in modern literature narratives. The decline in traditional love semantics has enabled various forms of depictions of ‘love’ - and the dystopian narratives always have been an attempt to return to the traditional statements through futuristic means and descriptions. What predestines the literary discourse for reflections on and representations of love in dystopian settings? Is it not the dissatisfaction with society, the gap between individual desires and the rules of society? Furthermore, looking upon the circumstances of how the semantics of love are described in dystopian literature will prove that Max Müller was wrong when he claimed that such ‘myths’ belonged to ‘primitive proto-science’ and also refute Ayn Rands claim that love is solely a response of one man to the virtues of another.

The literary thematizing of love in dystopian narratives shall especially focus on Luhmann’s weakening of social norms, through examples of clashes of individual and collective desires. This talk shall focus on changes and the roles of love in (dystopian) narratives, beginning with Richard Matheson’s I am legend and ending with Isaac Marion’s Warm bodies. It will explore old motifs such as the forbidden love of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet and be a systematic approach to the literary discourse of love today, using Foucault’s ‘pouvoir’-concept to examine the circumstances that produce certain love-descriptions in post-apocalyptic societies.
Y.C. Cho
Ljubezen v distopičnih narativih – od Richarda Mathesona do Isaaca Mariona

Ljubezen v modernih literarnih narativih učinkuje kot nov mit. Propad tradicionalne ljubezenske semantike je omogočil različne oblike opisovanja ‘ljubezni’. Distopični narativi so bili vedno poskus vrnitve k tradicionalnemu izjavljanju s futurističnimi sredstvi. Kaj predestinira literarni diskurz za refleksijo o reprezentaciji ljubezni v distopičnem okolju? Mar ni to nezadovoljstvo z družbo, razkol med individualnimi željami in družbenimi pravili? Nadalje bo pogled na okoliščine opisovanja semantike ljubezni v distopični književnosti dokazal, da je bil Max Müller v zmoti, ko je trdil, da takšni ‘miti’ sodijo v ‘primitivno proto-znanost’, in ovrgel trditev Ayn Rand, da je ljubezen zgolj človekov odziv na vrline drugega.

Tematiziranje ljubezni v distopičnih narativih se bo – s primeri kolizij individualnih in kolektivnih želj – še posebej osredotočilo na Luhmannovo tezo o slabljenju družbenih norm. Prispevek bo obravnaval vlogo ljubezni in njene spremembe v (distopičnih) narativih, in sicer v romanu Jaz sem legenda (I am legend, 1954; prevedla Teja Bivic 2008) Richarda Mathesona in v romanu Warm Bodies (2010) Isaaca Mariona. Prispevek bo orisal stare motive, na primer prepovedano ljubezen v Shakespearovi igri Romeo in Julija, in sistematično obdelal sodobni literarni diskurz o ljubezni s pomočjo Foucaultovega koncepta ‘moči’, ter tako raziskal okoliščine, ki botrujejo določenim opisom ljubezni v post-apokaliptičnih družbah.
Bea Y. Höfgen
Classical Love Concepts: Deconstruction Meets Desire. The Love Discours in Young German Poetry of the 21^st Century

Young German poetry of the 21^st century is aiming for new models and norms in romantic relationships. The poetic love discourse is hidden in gentle nuances in between other topics. While the classical love imagery is either avoided, deconstructed or the subject of satire, recent poetry depicts love through self-centered reflections and the investigation of social relationship frameworks. The contemporary discourse contains a striking ambivalence: whilst classical romantic love concepts are deconstructed in most love poems, they are regarded as a desirable yet unattainable utopia in others.

The source of this development can be traced to the societal changes of the last decades. The shift towards individualization, globalization und eventization causes a need for new concepts in love and partnership, as exemplified by poems about long-distance relationships. Furthermore, the ongoing dismantling of gender stereotypes requires novel social concepts for coexistence. Poetry reflects the deep uncertainty concerning social conceptualization of relationships whilst working on them (cf. Luhmann).

Contemporary love poetry has barely been the subject of thorough analysis. This desideratum is tackled by a first inventory that yields the characterization of central tendencies, thereby opening the door for further investigations about the presented literary and sociological topoi in contemporary love poetry.

Bea Y. Höfgen
Klasični koncepti ljubezni: dekonstrukcija in želja: ljubezenski diskurz v mladi nemški poeziji 21. stoletja

Mlada nemška poezija 21. stoletja poskuša vzpostaviti nove modele in norme ljubezenskih odnosov. Poetični ljubezenski diskurz se skriva v nežnih odtenkih med drugimi temami. Sodobna poezija se klasičnim podobam ljubezni izogiba, jih dekonstruira ali obarva satirično. Ljubezen opisuje v refleksijah, ki se osredotočajo same nase, in raziskavah družbenih okvirjev ljubezenskih odnosov. Sodobni diskurz je močno ambivalenten: večina ljubezenskih pesmi dekonstruira klasične koncepte romantične ljubezni, druge pa jih štejejo za želeno, a nedosegljivo utopijo.

Vzrok takega razvoja lahko zasledimo v družbenih spremembah preteklih desetletij. Individualizacija, globalizacija in ‘eventizacija’ zbujajo potrebo po novih konceptih ljubezni in partnerstva, kakor kažejo primeri pesmi o ljubezenskih razmerjih na daljavo. Poleg tega razkrivanje spolnih stereotipov terja prenovo družbenih konceptov sobivanja. V poeziji, ki se posveča odnosom, se zrcali globoka negotovost glede njihove družbene konceptualizacije. (prim. Luhmann).
Sodobna ljubezenska poezija doslej še ni bila temeljito analizirana. Tega se prispevek loteva s prvo inventarizacijo, ki poskuša označiti osrednje težnje, pri tem pa odpira vrata za nadaljnje raziskave literarnih in družbenih toposov v sodobni ljubezenski liriki.
Isabel Kranz
The Language of Flowers: Sex and Love in the Plant Kingdom

At the beginning of the age Michel Foucault termed ‘classical’, a flower-based ideographic sign system arose in France - the so-called langage des fleurs. It rests on the idea that certain flowers can be combined to encode secret messages. These floral messages represent an exotistic and, at the same time, erotic phantasm; the non-verbal and non-written code was said to stem from the East, being intimately related to the rigid social and gender orders purportedly in place there. Parallel to the growing prominence of the language of flowers, the rise of botany as a science also gave a pivotal role to the sexual organs of plant, the blooms. Starting with Linnaeus’s taxonomy, floral signs serve as key indicators for the classes and species of plants, structuring the classification and hence the linguistic order of the plant kingdom.

These two new floral arrangements are interrelated: By assigning flowers the role of ordering the plant kingdom, thus making them the key indicators for systematic and structured knowledge, an esoteric undercurrent emerges which assumes that flowers convey a surplus of meaning that cannot be contained. In particular, they become signs of affection, transmitting secret messages of intense emotions. Flowers therefore encode both a scientific and an esoteric knowledge that can be deciphered.
In my talk, I will examine these two versions of flower languages. By correlating one of the founding scenes of modern botany with a popular tradition deeply imbued with orientalist notions and bourgeois ideas of love that exists well into the 19^th century, I will show how these floral languages share similar attitudes towards language and order but also to the relation between love and sex that can be exposed by reading them alongside one another.
Isabel Kranz
Jezik cvetlic: spolnost in ljubezen v kraljestvu rastlin

Na začetku dobe, ki jo je Michel Foucault označil kot ‘klasično’, se je v Franciji razvil ideografski znakovni sistem, ki je temeljil na cvetlicah – tako imenovani langage des fleurs. Opiral se je na idejo, da lahko določene cvetlice kombiniramo tako, da kodiramo skrivna sporočila. Ta cvetlična sporočila izražajo eksotično in včasih tudi erotično fantazmo. Neverbalni in nenapisani kod naj bi izviral z Vzhoda in se tesno navezoval na strog družbeni in spolni red, ki domnevno vlada tam. Vzporedno z rastočim pomenom language of flowers je razvoj botanike kot znanosti poudaril ključno vlogo rastlinskih spolnih organov: cvetov. S taksonomijo Carla Linnéja so začeli cvetlične znake uporabljati kot ključne indikatorje za določitev rodu in vrste rastlin, strukturirali so klasifikacijo in s tem lingvistični red kraljestva rastlin.

Ta dva nova cvetlična aranžmaja sta povezana: ko je cvetju dodeljena vloga urejanja kraljestva rastlin in je povzdignjeno v indikatorje sistematičnega in strukturiranega znanja, se pojavi ezoterični podton, ki predpostavlja, da cvetje prinaša presežek pomena, ki ga ni mogoče zamejiti. Cvetlice postanejo predvsem znaki naklonjenosti, prenašajo skrivna sporočila o intenzivnih čustvih, zato kodirajo tako znanstveno kakor tudi ezoterično védenje, ki ga je mogoče dešifrirati.
V prispevku bom raziskala ti dve verziji cvetličnega jezika. Enega od ustanovnih prizorov moderne botanike bom povezala z razširjeno tradicijo, globoko prežeto z orientalističnimi pojmi in meščanskimi idejami o ljubezni, ki so se ohranile daleč v 19. stoletje. Tako bom pokazala, kako sta si ta dva cvetlična jezika podobna v odnosu do jezika in reda, pa tudi v odnosu do razmerja med ljubeznijo in spolnostjo, ki ga s takšnim vzporejanjem mogoče izrazito izpostaviti.
Stefan Lindinger – Maria Sgouridou
Looking for Love in Werther, Iacopo Ortis, and Leandros

While Goethe’s and Foscolo’s epistolary novels are widely known and can certainly be considered part of the European canon, Panagiotis Soutsos’ Leandros, published in 1834, is only familiar to relatively few. However, it is both an important testimony for the reception of the two former works as well as a seminal - at least when it comes to Soutsos’ intentions - work for the establishment of a new Greek national literature in the aftermath of the foundation of the new national state.

Taking into account intrinsic (mainly the similarities and differences in the three love relationships in the novels) and extrinsic (such as the biography of the authors, socio-historical and philosophical contexts etc.) factors, we intend to investigate the different notions of love in the respective works, taking into account to what degree Leandros has been influenced by Werther as well as by Iacopo Ortis.
In Werther, we are essentially confronted with the principal character’s narcissistic infatuation with Lotte, embedded in a feeling of ever increasing isolation and an utter discontent with contemporary society, ultimately resulting in Werther’s suicide.
Iacopo Ortis’ love for Teresa, on the other hand, is inseparably linked to his love for ‘la patria’, the unified Italy. The loss of both ‘loves’ turns into a question of honor. Unwilling to make any compromises, Iacopo kills himself.
With regard to love, Leandros is probably more oriented towards the model of Werther. His love for Koralia is imbued by pessimism and ‘romantic’ exaggeration, bordering at the pathological. Here, too, the outcome is fatal. The, in a way, ‘epigonal’ character of the work is reflected by the fact that we are not confronted with ‘love at first sight’, as in the previous works, but with an old, rekindled love affair.
Stefan Lindinger – Maria Sgouridou
Iskanje ljubezni v romanih Werther, Iacopo Ortis in Leandros

Pisemska romana J. W. Goetheja in Uga Foscola sta zelo znana in gotovo ju lahko uvrstimo v evropski literarni kanon. Roman Leandros Panagiotisa Soutsosa, ki je izšel leta 1834, pa je ostal razmeroma neznan, a je kljub temu pomembno pričevanje o recepciji obeh starejših del in obenem ključnega pomena – vsaj Soutsosov namen je bil tak – za osnovanje nove grške nacionalne literature po ustanovitvi nove nacionalne države.

V prispevku bova raziskala različna pojmovanja ljubezni v teh delih z ozirom na vprašanje, kako močno sta Werther in Iacopo Ortis vplivala na Leandrosa, pri tem pa bova upoštevala tako notranje dejavnike (podobnosti in razlike med tremi ljubezenskimi razmerji v romanih) kakor tudi zunanje (življenjepise avtorjev, družbeno-zgodovinski in filozofski kontekst itd.)
V Wertherju se bralec sooča predvsem z junakovo narcistično zaljubljenostjo v Lotte, vpeto v občutek čedalje večje osamljenosti in popolnega nezadovoljstva s takratno družbo, kar naposled pripelje do samomora naslovnega junaka.
Ljubezen Iacopa Ortisa do Terese je neločljivo povezana z njegovo ljubeznijo do združene Italije (la patria). Izguba obeh ljubezni se sprevrže v vprašanje časti. Iacopo, zavračajoč sleherni kompromis, se ubije.
Leandros se, kar se tiče ljubezni, zgleduje bolj po modelu Wertherja. Njegova ljubezen do Koralie je prežeta s pesimizmom in ‘romantičnim’ pretiravanjem ter meji na patologijo. Tudi ta roman ima smrtni izid. V določenem smislu ‘epigonski’ značaj dela se odraža v dejstvu, da v njem ne gre za ‘ljubezen na prvi pogled’ kot v obeh zgodnejših delih, temveč za staro, oživljeno ljubezensko razmerje.

Marcus Maida
Love Is All: An Ethnography of Love in the Lyrics of Pop Music

It is not too difficult to find pop-lyrics concerning the topic ‘Love’. The expressions, forms and socio-psychological relations of love within the lyrics of pop music seem to be almost ontological – its wide history suggests that. However, logically, here the contextual analysis applies: love here means something different than love there - in another context, the other love is different. So in the end love is a universal congress of utopia, idealism, universalism disappointment, deconstruction, negotiation, labeling, advertising, and business exchange. Besides, it’s a quasi-individual appropriation, which the recipient undertakes from the total ensemble of pop music, and here especially its lyrics. Theoretically, an ethnography of love is accompanied by, for example, Georges Bataille’s Tears of Eros, Roland Barthes' Fragments of a Language of Love, Niklas Luhmann’s Love as Passion as well as Judith Butler’s Hate Speech or Alexander Kluge’s The Power of Feelings.

I want to focus on love expressed within the rich culture of popular music lyrics.
Marcus Maida
Love Is All