Résumés
Abstract
The manuscript as narrator in Icelandic children’s novel Bál tímans (2022) belongs to a literary tradition of sentient object narrators who document the domestic spaces in which they circulate. Bál tímans shifts the reader’s focus to normally invisible manuscript owners and users, including women and children, bringing attention to disparities in access created through archive-building activities. In domestic settings, Möðruvallabók is accessible to a broad segment of the Icelandic population through practices of social reading, women’s book ownership, and home education. In the archive, human-manuscript interactions are restricted to a narrow and initially male-only elite. While tensions between preservation and access are resolved when the codex is exhibited in a museum space where it can share its stories with a wider audience, Bál tímans examines what can be lost by bringing cultural objects into archival spaces.
Keywords:
- Nordic children’s literature,
- object biography,
- manuscript culture,
- Möðruvallabók,
- materiality
Résumé
Le manuscript narrant le roman islandais pour enfants Bál tímans par Arndís Þórarinsdóttir appartient à une tradition littéraire où le narrateur est un objet conscient et sensible qui documente les espaces domestiques dans lesquels il circule. En tant que biographie fictive de ce codex historique, Bál tímans porte l’attention du lecteur sur les propriétaires et usagers du manuscript normalement invisibles, tels que les femmes et les enfants. Le roman attire notre attention sur les disparités d’accessibilité résultant de l’établissement d’archives. Avant d’être envoyé au Danemark à la fin du dix-septième siècle, Möðruvallabók (AM 132 fol.) est accessible à une large portion d’Islandais grâce aux pratiques de lectures sociales, des femmes propriétaires de livres et de l’enseignement à domicile. Dans les archives, en revanche, ses interactions avec des humains sont réduites à une élite restreinte et, dans un premier temps, uniquement male. Même si les tensions entre préservation et accessibilité sont résolues dans le roman lorsque le codex est exposé dans un musée, où il peut à nouveau partager ses histoires avec un large public, Bál tímans porte un oeil critique sur ce qui peut être perdu lorsque des objets culturels sont apportés dans des archives.
Parties annexes
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