Oldal 86 [86]
OCR
NIKOLA TUTEK There are three typically Munrovian switches in the story that are important for this analysis: 1. Lottar becomes a sworn virgin, basically taking on all the social functions of a male (gender switch), 2. the story of Lottar is a story within a story, it is retold by Charlotte (switch in narration), and, 3. the story strongly suggests that Lottar and the Franciscan priest are actually Charlotte and Gjurdhi (a typical Munrovian switch in the plot and also another semantic binary opposition between Charlotte and Gjurdhi in Albania and Canada). It is important to understand that this is a story of constant change and re-definition of characters and situations (like so many other stories by Munro). And because the story of Lottar was retold by an older woman in a hospital, making her a fairly unreliable narrator (who claims that her story was a fictional idea for a movie), a certain distance from reality is achieved. In that sense, Charlotte’s visions and depictions of Albania cannot and should not be seen as (only) factual and credible. “The Albanian Virgin” is especially interesting from the point of view of cultural appropriation or cultural re-interpretation. This is so for at least these four main reasons: 1. It is one of the rare stories by Alice Munro which is partially not set in Canada, 2. It features a wide range of depictions of a foreign land and people, from geography to cultural rituals, 3. The plot is based on one specific cultural ritual of gender-swapping, which is also in the title of the story, and, 4. It features two main characters who are exposed to both processes of cultural appropriation and cultural assimilation. I will proceed by establishing a set of focal points of discussion important for the analysis and provide examples from the text for each point. The focal points of discussion in this analysis will be 1. Appropriation and reinterpretation of traditions (customs, clothes, women), names (personal names and toponyms), and factual cultural data (language, economy, geography, religion), 2. Descriptions of assimilation, and 3. Binary oppositions used in depictions of a culture. I will provide sources of knowledge possibly used by Alice Munro for her literary descriptions explained by these three points. Appropriation and re-interpretation of traditions, names, and factual cultural data As featured in the title “The Albanian Virgin’, the pivotal idea for understanding the story is that of the sworn virgin. But let us first see how Alice Munro came into contact with this ethnographic knowledge. During the 20° century, Balkan exoticism was often the theme of numerous scholarly and popular publications in the West. It is worth mentioning the work of Edith Durham, a British traveler and author of many works on the Balkans, and especially Albania. In 1910, Durham took a trip “down the coast of Dalmatia, traveling from Trieste to Kotor and then overland to Cetinje, the capital of + SA +
