Novels as big data: A genre-centric approach to the Romanian novel (1900-1940)
Novels as big data: A genre-centric approach to the Romanian novel (1900-1940)
My paper aims to present the premises, objectives and both methodological and theoretical framework of my doctoral research. The main ambition of my thesis is to investigate the evolutionary process of the Romanian novel published between 1900 and 1940 from a transnational, quantitative approach. My paper shall focus on the circulation of literary ideas and narrative formulas in the Romanian literary space, as well as on the literary and cultural import and the contribution of western literature to the modernization process of the autochthonous novel. By means of computational analysis, macroanalysis (Jockers), and quantitative research models (Moretti) the aim of my research is to generate a series of data, visual representations, and statistics in order to provide a factual accurate image of the evolution of the Romanian novel, exposing, at the same time, the fair amount of thematic and formal elements that have been imported by the Romanian writers in their works. The quantitative analysis will engage the following aspects: genre, theme, narrative formula, style, lexical elements and geographical distribution, while the primary sources will be constituted by both data bases such as chronological dictionaries and indexes, and novels.
Keywords: quantitative studies, macroanalysis, computational analysis, transnational studies, the Romanian novel
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