Chronotopes in the reminiscence narrative of a Karelian child evacuee

Authors

• Ulla Savolainen Helsingin yliopisto

Abstract

The article discusses chronotopes in evacuation journey narrative written by a Karelian child evacuee. Mikhail Bakhtin defines chronotope as interaction of temporal and spatial relationships expressed in literature. My purpose is to analyze chronotopes in the evacuation narrative in relation with Bakhtin’s examples, and more generally to chart the problems and the advantages of chronotope in research of reminiscence narratives. Chronotopes expose meanings of the narration engaged in its formal structure which are not explicitly expressed in the content. In evacuation journey narrative in question, these meanings are emotions and attitudes. Hence, the narrative is not only as account of evacuation and migration, but also a representation of growing up. Via chronotopes, this representation is concurrently deeply personal and contemporary and relates to communal and historical context. Despite its profits, Bakhtin’s open definition makes the application of chronotope to reminiscence narratives challenging. The problems of application involve, broadly speaking, questions of interpretation and recognition.