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The SNSF-project Novelizations. Scandinavian Prose Literature in the Late Premodern Period investigates the rich and diverse prose tradition in the Nordic countries in the long eighteenth century. With a departure point in historical-narratological, mediological and genre-theoretical approaches, we are interested in how printed as well as handwritten texts deploy material and narrative potentials for the formation of new narrative traditions. Rather than aiming at predating the or telling a new history of the novel with an anchor point at a specific point in time, we intend to unveil the continuous and dynamic preoccupation with and self-reflective articulation of prose literature in this period in a complex field of different media, narrative, and genre constellations. With recourse to Mikhail Bakhtin, we address these continuous re-formations of prose literature as novelizations.
Building up on two previous project workshops, this conference will put genre-theoretical considerations in focus and address the formation of prose literature in late premodern Scandinavia as dynamic engagement with the domestic and international literary tradition.