Discovering the Self in Negative Space: Revisiting the Past under Communism in Luljeta Lleshanaku’s Poem <i>Negative Space</i>

ABSTRACT This article focuses on the poetry of Luljeta Lleshanaku, a principal figure in Albanian poetry during the post-Communist period, and Albania’s most widely translated poet. Through a close reading of her poem, “Negative Space,” a cornerstone in her poetic oeuvre dealing with Albania’s past under Communism, the concept of negative space is considered in biographical and cultural contexts. A portal into the past of this politically persecuted individual, the concept lends meaning to the self as an exile in one’s own country. In her poem, Lleshanaku offers a way to comprehend the influence of the past on our understanding of the present and reflects on the essential need of the individual to act as an ethical being, preserving the sense of self and the ethical life through memory.