Metapoetizität und Textgenese - Ebenen diachronischen Bedeutungswandels bei Joan Maragall: "El comte Arnau" (1900-1911)

Abstract

The first part of Joan Maragall’s poetical triptych El comte Arnau (1900) has achieved its status of literary myth due to its polysemy, which added a new quality to Catalan poetry at the last turn of the century. In the continuation of the poem (1906), a metapoetical dimension is introduced into Maragall’s version of the traditional story of the Count Arnau. Most importantly, it exhibits the fact that the meaning of poetical texts is subject to historical variability. This is exemplified by a ‘poem within a poem’, the Cançó del comte l’Arnau. The end of the Escòlium, together with the last part of the triptych (1911), brings about a performative effect, thus making it evident for the reader how the meaning of the poem depends on the real time of its genesis. In this way, the diachronic change of signification becomes visible in El comte Arnau on three levels: biographical, metapoetical and performative.

Keywords: Catalan literature, poetry, Catalan Modernism, Joan Maragall, Comte Arnau, metapoeticity, self-reference, biographism, performativity.