Next Thursday, November 30, 2023, we are organising the next seminar of our GlobaLS seminar series: «Spanish and Belgian Modernisms: The Role of Literary Magazines and Modernist Networks in the Transnational Circulation of Texts (1890–1939)» by Christina Bezari (Université Libre de Bruxelles, ULB).
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30 November 2023, from 12 pm to 14 pm (CET)
Venue: 22@, IN3-UOC, Barcelona
Seminar Abstract
This seminar proposes a comparative study of Spanish and Belgian modernisms and sheds light on literary magazines and transnational networks that shaped early twentieth-century literary culture. The first objective of this seminar is to examine a number of Belgian and Spanish magazines that described modernism as a cross-cultural movement with far-reaching influences. Starting with the literary magazines Lumière (1919–1923) and Ça Ira (1920–1923), this paper focuses on the circulation of Spanish literature in Belgium during the interwar period and sets out to recover translations that have often gone unnoticed, and which prove the active participation of Spanish writers and poets in the Belgian literary scene. In the same vein, the magazines Cosmopolis (1919–1922) and La Gaceta Literaria (1927–1932) will be considered as the Spanish counterparts to the Belgian monthlies Lumière and Ça Ira. By exploring these magazines, this paper aims to shed light on the circulation of Belgian literature in Spain and the emergence of a modernist aesthetic in the work of Belgian writers and poets such as Odilon-Jean Périer and Irène Hamoir. The second objective of this seminar is to examine the role of two Brussels-based literary circles, La Lanterne Sourde (1921–1931) and the Amitiés hispano-belgo-américaines (1932–1936), which encouraged international collaboration and contributed to the circulation of modernist works. By examining the contribution of these circles to the literary culture of the time, this paper aims to challenge the center vs. periphery dichotomy and initiate a shift in our thinking regarding the impact of Spanish and Belgian agents on the European stage.
On Christina Bezari
Christina Bezari is a senior post-doctoral fellow at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB). Her research is located at the intersection of Spanish and comparative literature, translation studies and women’s history. She is the author of Transnational Modernity in Southern Europe: Women’s Periodicals and Salon Culture (Routledge, 2022) and the co-editor of “Las Vanguardistas: Women and the Avant-Garde in Ibero-America” (2023). Her current project at the ULB proposes a comparative study of Spanish and Belgian modernisms and examines the transnational networks that shaped early twentieth-century literary culture.
