Litteratur i transit : Svensk presentation och reception av transkulturell litteratur kring millennieskiftet

Sammanfattning: This study deals with the reception of world literature novels and authorships between 1997 and 2003. The study analyses the Swedish book publishers' presentations and the newspaper reviews of fifteen authors and novels from geographical areas that are seen to be peripheral to Swedish culture. Using Gerard Genette's concept of paratext and various evaluation categories, the study explores how presentation and reception situate so-called peripheral authorships. With a discourse analytical approach, the study identifies the themes and tropes used to situate these authorships and what kind of norms govern the peripheral literature. Taking a step from the focus on the worldling processes of world literature which usually occupies postcolonial oriented studies, this thesis rather highlights the valuing processes of world literature. The analysis consists of four parts. The first part demonstrates how the novels are introduced with almost exoticising statements. Thus, paradoxically, inclusion also means exclusion, as the authorships are presented as a cultural other. The second part highlights two different legitimisation strategies, either by attributing the authorship to a Eurocentric or Anglo-Saxon context or solely to the author's own literary continent. The third part focuses on how publishers and reviewers determine literary value through the knowledge that novels and authorships convey about other cultures and societies. The authorship can be attributed to social and emotional values in these first three parts. The statements rely on the particularities of authorship as truth-tellers for their own culture. The fourth part, focuses on statements that do not revolve around the author's geographical starting point, but instead on the author as standing between or across cultures. In these cases, values of authenticity, originality, style and form are attributed.