Literary Genres in the 19th Century Macedonian Literature and the Dislocation of the Predominant (Authorial) Voice

Abstract

The specifics of the 19th century Macedonian literature to great extent goes beyond the strict genre issue, and opens up questions about the factual position of the variety of genres, that experience expansion and impossibility of genre systematization. On the other hand, treating the levels of heteroglossia (according to Mikhail M. Bakhtin), we have the opportunity to reveal how is it possible for one explicitly linear style (such as the medieval literary canon) to be outgrown by its offspring – pictorial style (in the Macedonian literature of the 19th century we can detect the beginning of the co-existence between the authorial and the narrative voice). We dedicate our inquiry to depicting the characteristic elements of that process concerning two specific examples – the autobiographical discourse in “Avtobiografijata” (Autobiography) by Grigor Prlichev, and the short story “Proshedba” (A Stroll) by Rajko Zhinzifov. At the same time, the variety of literary genres in that period provides us with a wide range of comparison overall. The fact that Prlichev’s autobiography is more than that – it comprises of several novel elements (spatio-temporal confrontations, merely assigned genre specification, divided subjectivity, different/confronting value stances, etc.) only confirms the validity of vast genre delineation. As to the Zhinzifov’s narrative, the absence of a wider plot structure (the fact that “nothing” actually happened) determines this short novel as very similar to the travel writings of that period (usually defined through their ethnographic, playful mode of historicity, and the distinctive range of fiction). The endeavor to acquire narratological and phenomenological inspection should enrich the specific analysis of heteroglossia.