Japanese Motifs in Poems of Namzhil Nimbuev: A Transcultural Perspective

• Authors: DONDUKOVA GALINA
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

In this article, I analyze the poems of Buryat author Namzhil Nimbuev from a transcultural perspective, focusing on the influence of Japanese verse on Nimbuevʼs poetry. Although such influence has already been noticed by Buryat literary critics (Dampilova, Hamgushkeeva, Chan), so far there has been no transcultural analysis of Nimbuevʼs poems. What I claim is that the adaptation of Japanese literary motifs by Nimbuev was a mode of expression of his Buryat identity and a possibility to transcend the limitations of dominating Russian literary tradition. In a broader sense, the example of Nimbuev shows that there is a variety of transcultural writers: he himself was a poet who used Russian as a transcultural language, adopted Japanese motifs, although never visited Japan, and whose poetry expressed longing for his Buryat ethnic roots. I argue that Nimbuev is a special case of a transcultural writer who crosses the borders between cultures in order to explore his own ethnic identity. My analysis of Namzhil Nimbuevʼs poetry is preceded by definitions of the key notions, namely transculture and transcultural literature, which are followed by a brief survey of Buryat national literature. Seeking to understand the reasons of Nimbuevʼs identity searching and his predilection for Japanese culture, I present his biography. Finally, I analyze his poems focusing on Japanese elements such as suggestion, irregularity, perishability and ʻdouble moodʼ, in order to prove transcultural character of Nimbuevʼs poetry.

Keywords

EN

Namzhil Nimbuev; transcultural writing; Rusophone literature; Buryat culture; Japanese aesthetics

• Journal: Planeta Literatur. Journal of Global Literary Studies
• Year: 2015
• Issue: 2. Orient and Occident. Distorting mirrors of writing
• Pages: 1-16

Contributors

author

DONDUKOVA GALINA

• University of Warsaw

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