NEMLA Panel: Narratives of Literary Recovery
Cary Nelson’s stance on archival work in his 1989 book Repression and Recovery applies to the intimate, frustrating, and rewarding practice of archival research’s potential to offer literary scholars the chance to rehabilitate both author and text. He states, “For texts previously ignored or belittled, our greatest appreciative act may be to give them fresh opportunities for an influential life. That discourse can include new constructions of the cultural work those texts may have done in their own time” (14). When archival research uncovers voices that showcase underrepresented voices, the outcome is tremendous in how it results in new ways of reading the past in contemporary culture. But what about historically problematic constructions?