Auswahl der wissenschaftlichen Literatur zum Thema „Refugees – Romania – Fiction“

I would like to begin by juxtaposing two very different pictures of global travel taken from recent articles in the popular media and considering their implications both for contemporary postcolonial theory and for our readings of “third world” fictional texts. In one article from the summer of 1997 (Newton 6-7), the Los Angeles New Times displayed on its cover a slender man in his thirties staring hopelessly out from behind a barred window. The caption read: “No Way Out: Romanian Gavrila Moldovan Risked His Life to Come to America. The INS Promptly Locked Him Up on Terminal Island. Three and a Half Years Later, He’s Still in Jail.” The accompanying story described Moldovan’s desperate flight out of Romania after being declared a “noncitizen” for writing an anti-government news article, which rendered him vulnerable to immediate arrest, and after his parents died in a suspicious car “accident.” Having slipped aboard a container ship bound for the United States together with some fellow countrymen (three of whom died en route), he was discovered and unceremoniously dumped ashore in Panama, only to stow away shortly thereafter on another container ship headed for the Port of Los Angeles. After finally reaching his destination, a “euphoric” Moldovan explained to the US authorities awaiting him at the port: “I come here to be in freedom.... ’” His “welcome” consisted of being arrested and locked up in the INS Processing Center on Terminal Island, in which, though never charged with any crime, he remained for several years before being transferred to Kern County Jail in Bakersfield, where he is currently languishing amongst a population of men awaiting trial for serious crimes (6-7)—one of thousands of refugees and immigrants who have been, and continue to be, incarcerated in prisons that have contracts with the INS, for lack of proper documents, for minor infringements of the law, or because they are denied political asylum despite compelling evidence of their vulnerability to government reprisal at home.

Fawaz Husên, fîksîyonalîteya romana xwe ya Barê Şêvê di lehengsazîya çar lehengên kurd ên penaber da ku her yek bi awayekî sembolîk ji parçeyekî Kurdistanê derketî û li ser sedem û encamên neyînî yên penaberîya wan her çar lehengan saz kirîye. Herwiha bingeha romana xwe jî bi awayekî giştî li gorî rêbaza realîzma efsûnî saz kirîye ku wekî tê zanîn di rêbaza realîzma efsûnî da qewimînên rastî yên heyatê û yên efsûnî hin caran ligel hev û hin caran jî wekî dijberîyeke dualî bi rê ve diçin. Em ê di vê xebata xwe da li gorî rêbaza realîzma efsûnî bi awayekî giştî sedem û encamên neyînî yên penaberîyê di lehengsazîya wan her çar lehengên kurd ên penaber da tehlîl bikin. Li gorî van tehlîlan di vê gotara xwe da em ê encamên neyînî yên penaberîyê di kesayetî û derûnîya her çar lehengên kurd ên penaber da destnîşan bikin.

The novel Train to Trieste by Domnica Rădulescu features the role played by transnational channels of communication in maintaining connections across physical and temporal borders between Romania and America. The discussion will focus on the particular networks employed by the protagonist Mona Manoliu (letters, phone calls, radio/TV transmissions) in order to transcend the alienating effects of exile in America. The argument combines a cultural studies approach with a close reading of the text, seeking to establish the manner in which contemporary fiction of migration presents the impact of linear transnationalism upon Romanian political refugees and their families.

In this chapter, the author proposes a keen look at Domnica Rădulescu's novel Black Sea Twilight, representative for women literary prose of the Romanian diaspora after the Cold War (post-1989). The chapter highlights a strong voice discussing Western Europe and Romania the encounter of the two spaces (East and West), from the standpoint of a Romanian woman and a refugee writer. Furthermore, the analysis highlights the concept of cultural and spatial creolization and brings to the forefront the concept of circular creolization in order to compare, contrast East and West and, hopefully, add new perspectives to previous ways of analyzing diasporic writings. Specifically, the analysis zooms in on text close reading of Domnica Rădulescu's above-mentioned novel. The approach demonstrates interesting insights into emigrant fiction framed by concepts such as creolization, circular creolization and showcases a type of analysis not readily available with the traditional analytical toolbox of exile/diaspora studies.