Who, Why and How are Fighting in the Field of Literature?

Abstract

The article discusses the field of Lithuanian literature produced after the restoration of Independence. The field of literature is considered not as a static structure but as a place of becoming, struggle for meaning and the right of (self) expression. By employing Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of literary field, analysis of a particular event – controversy that has befallen Sigitas Parulskis’ novel Tamsa ir partneriai (2012) – enables us to distinguish the following literary field positions: the idea that an art work is a representation of subjective experience of its creator; the notion of a popular, “industrial” product treated as a means of financial profit; art as a “deeper truth” that performs educational function promoting self-consciousness. Each participant of the field – an academic critic or a writer (the latter often acts also as literary critic) – situates him/herself according to these positions. In all cases a particular position predisposes discursive practices and the notions of oeuvres, functions, assessment and the right to assess. In attempt to answer why particular participants of the field are able or unable to establish or secure certain positions and remain in their boundaries I formulate the issue of cultural biography on the basis of Lotman’s conceptualized literary biography. Particular individuals who wish to participate in the field must have cultural identities – or cultural biographies that are chosen according to already owned perception schemes and assessment totalities (habitus in Bordieu’s sense) rather than freely. The dynamic nature of this process becomes apparent by analyzing cases of cultural biography formation of a writer Parulskis and an academic critic Mindaugas Kvietkauskas (elite intellectual). Keywords : field of literature, habitus, cultural biography, dynamic processes within the culture, world model. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.15823/zz.2014.036