ABSTRACT
In this chapter I will discuss the trajectories of Eastern European Oriental-
isms in selected essays by Joseph Brodsky (from Less than One (1986a) and On Grief and Reason (1995)) and Czesław Miłosz (from Native Realm: a
search for self-definition (1968), Visions from San Francisco Bay (1982), and
To Begin Where I Am (2001)). Specifically, I highlight the problematic of
treating the essayistic writing by Miłosz and Brodsky, which has largely helped
them achieve and maintain public visibility in exile, as mimetic, objective
representations of the lands behind the Iron Curtain. Critical scholarship
has largely focused on these authors’ poetic output – where the ‘‘real,’’
unrestrained artistic innovation worthy of literary critical attention allegedly surfaces – somewhat neglecting, in turn, the vast and diverse body of their
essays, lectures, and open letters, which have nevertheless served as an
important context for interpreting (and prompting interest in) their poetry.1
