Romance philology: understanding history and society through literature

“Romance philology traditionally covers a broad terrain,” says Professor Benjamin Loy. Although this assertion may sound rather sweeping, when the philologist enumerates the research priorities he has set at LMU since his appointment as Professor of Romance Philology in April 2024, and the priorities he intends to set, it actually seems something of an understatement.

“Romance philology is the comparative study of literatures, languages, and cultures, investigating relationships and networks between literatures and cultures of the past and the present,” emphasizes Loy.

The philologist is particularly interested in the relationship between esthetics and politics, often with reference to authoritarian regimes and discourses in Europe and Latin America. He also views literature as a medium that ultimately addresses the phenomena of social, economic, and ecological acceleration in modern times.

The value of comparative literary perspectives

Benjamin Loy’s research undertakings are based on the recognition that all forms of human and social organization take shape through processes of narration. These narrative forms cross the boundaries of nations, languages, and literatures – as Romance languages illustrate particularly well. To give an example: In one of Loy’s main research interests, modern literature from the middle of the 19th century, the literatures of the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America can scarcely be understood without the style-defining influences of French poetry and the realist novel.

The 20th century also saw the emergence of a global literary space, in which texts and esthetics circulate between continents. Publishers, translators, and literary critics played a key role, as Loy has investigated in numerous publications on the global book market.

Loy obtained his doctorate with a dissertation on Roberto Bolaño, “the most important Latin American author of the 21st century,” whose work, among other things, digs deep into the problems of military dictatorships in Latin America – a field that will continue to occupy Loy at LMU.

Esthetics of authoritarianism

Loy is currently working with colleagues from Brazil and the United States on populist and authoritarian positions and esthetics in the literatures of Latin America in the 20th century. It is remarkable, he observes, how ardently authors in the 1920s and ’30s, for example, pursued the goal of “esthetic empowerment” and ultimately sought to found a new national community by means of an “esthetic dictatorship.” Such struggles for political power and authority were not just conducted with weapons, but above all through discourse – through language and the power of images. Loy notes that these same mechanisms can be observed in the current global resurgence of populism.

When the largest fascist movement in Latin America emerged in Brazil, it was a poet and novelist, Plínio Salgado, who undertook a coup d’état, emphasizes Loy. Even after the Second World War, various Latin American leaders were inspired by the esthetics of awe and domination as practiced by the Nazis in German literature, art, and architecture.

Latin America is not just a violent continent

Loy also has an enduring interest in literature and film as forms that help shape people’s ideas of society. For Latin America, these media play a key role in forming global perceptions of the region – we need only think of the narcoculture that features so prominently in depictions of countries like Mexico and Colombia. A special form of popular heroization has developed around this culture in literature, music, and movies, which not only has an esthetic effect, but is also politically problematic.

Professor Loy also views with skepticism the image conveyed by contemporary Latin American literature, which is popular in Europe and much sought after by publishers. He speaks of distorted perceptions, as if violence and dictatorship were the dominant features of those societies. Certainly, it is a “violent continent,” but it is also so much more than that. However, current perceptions by and large do not appreciate this.

Questions concerning different forms of perception are also at the heart of a new research project by the philologist, which investigates categories of time from the perspective of literatures of the Global South. “It’s interesting how authors, in fiction and essays, think about current experiences as reflecting the past of a region that has been strongly shaped by colonialism and colonial exploitation. In our project, it’s less about the economic dimensions of this exploitation than about questions of power, which were associated with certain forms and practices of knowledge in these colonial and postcolonial contexts. Specifically, we’re exploring how Western categories of time were a key instrument of hegemony, how they contributed to new forms of social and economic acceleration in the modern age, and how these categories were contrasted with wholly distinct conceptions of time in the literatures and arts of Latin America and Africa – ideas that sought alternatives to radical fixation on the future.”

New center for contemporary literature

Networking is also important for the philologist, as research does not take place in grand isolation. Loy is deputy spokesperson of the newly established Center for Contemporary Literature Munich, where he plans to discuss topics with other philologists at LMU, such as the status of literature in society.

Loy regularly writes articles for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung about theater and other Romance subjects – “as a springboard for discussion of topics” such as the military putsch in Chile or Counter-Enlightenment thought in France. After all, to a greater extent than the natural sciences, “the humanities need more than ever to inform the general public about our work and why it is relevant.” For a broad subject like Romance philology, as Loy conceives it, the latter certainly applies.