Comparative Literature as Collage

Abstract

In “Comparative Literature as Collage: A Zine,” I propose that studying comparative literature is somewhat akin to making a collage: both strive to uncover new meanings by putting different elements in an alien environment. The zine draws from Roland Barthes’s concept of “punctum”—the insignificant yet poignant detail that captures the viewer—and Max Ernst’s description of collage as “the coupling of two realities, irreconcilable in appearance, upon a plane which apparently does not suit them.” Stemming from the two, I argue that to be a comparatist is to approach literary studies from this moment of revelation that is meant to have a personal, subjective meaning, and then replanting it in a different context.