Some aspects of the poetic multilingualism of contemporary Estonian poetry

Abstract

ABSTRACT The self-image and study of Estonian literature are characterized by postmonolingual tensions: while there are increasingly more multilingual approaches, the traditional perspective is to focus exclusively on Estonian-language literature. The latter does not encompass the reality of the literary field because it leaves out authors who write in multiple languages, as well as other manifest and latent expressions of multilingual poetics. In contemporary Estonian poetry, words, phrases, and other linguistic nuances from different languages frequently intertwine with Estonian. By analyzing seven of such multilingual poems from the perspective of literary multilingualism studies, this article will highlight and compare three poetic techniques of code-switching present in contemporary Estonian poetry, pointing out the similarities and differences between such poetic structures and mechanisms of meaning-making.