From the Archive to the Field : New Research on Albanian Epic Songs

This essay aims primarily to point out some new directions in research on Albanian epic song. Starting from archival materials and the issues they raise for further investigation in the field, it will focus in particular on certain structural elements of the songs related to their performance. The Albanian-language archival materials of the Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature (henceforth MPCOL), collected in the 1930s by Milman Parry and Albert Lord, provide significant insight into the tradition. The first section offers an overview of the major collections and scholarly research on Albanian epics through the twentieth century, a rich body of work that includes local fieldwork-based studies as well as important foreign contributions, and that documents the geographical scope and contents of the Albanian epic tradition, which constitutes an important part of the oral heritage still alive in Europe today. The second section focuses more narrowly on the materials collected by Milman Parry and Albert Lord in the 1930s, exploring the ways in which those songs as well as the singers’ biographies—which have often been neglected in discussion of the MPCOL—still hold valuable insights for the study of oral poetry more broadly. In particular, this essay explores the implications of the collection process itself, as embedded in recordings and texts from the MPCOL. Finally, the third section summarizes some recent research conducted by the authors focusing on the singer Isa Elezi-Lekëgjekaj, one of the most important living practitioners of this epic tradition. His performances highlight some of the demands placed on the body and the resulting bodily techniques that emerge as part of this performative tradition.