Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Jonathan Safran Foer'

Not long after the release of his first novel, Everything is Illuminated, critics and authors alike began showering Jonathan Safran Foer with both praise and disparagement for his postmodern style. Yet, this large body of criticism ignores the theoretical work taking place within Foer's fiction. This thesis attempts to fill this gap by highlighting specific aspects of Foer's theoretical work as it relates to the creation of meaning in a text and to explore what this work might imply for the broader literary community. Much of Foer's work toys with the capacity of language to express meaning, indulging in the playfulness of language throughout his work to highlight the place where at written language blurs the line between word and flesh, or language and experience. In this playfulness, Foer seems to assert that meaning is created in the space between language and experience through the act of metaphor. This theory of metaphor places the individual, the author, and the critic all in a creative position and the narrative content of Foer's works examines how this creative power is used by individuals to create a world of meaning out of experiences that seem to have none. In this way, Foer argues that the creative act of metaphor is a redemptive act—an act of saving one's self from the void. Such a conclusion can be applied to all who use the word to create, particularly authors and critics, wherein the creative act as well as the interpretive act become acts of redemption.

Orientador : Prof. Dr. Caetano Waldrigues Galindo
Tese (doutorado) - Universidade Federal do Paraná, Setor de Ciências Humanas, Programa de Pós-Graduação em Letras. Defesa: Curitiba, 05/12/2017
Inclui referências : f.199-207
Resumo: Everything is Illuminated, romance de 2003 de Jonathan Safran Foer, nasce do desejo de construção de uma "verdade experimental" a partir da distância - temporal e geográfica - dos acontecimentos da Segunda Guerra, que se expressa por meio da reconstrução da memória na literatura a partir de fragmentos do passado. Esta tese pretende confirmar a hipótese de que o romance transcende o status de narrativa sobre a Shoá para atingir uma esfera autorreflexiva, pois parte do evento para expandir-se aos efeitos que produz no presente. Revela a reação de Jonathan, um representante da terceira geração de sobreviventes, à perpetuação da memória da Guerra como parte de uma tradição maior, a de registro e manutenção da memória coletiva, novamente lembrando o duplo papel da linguagem, o de alterar a vida e se deixar alterar por ela. Nesse contexto, a escrita prova-se parte de uma ideia de pertencimento, e inscreve-se na vida de Jonathan como o ato que cimenta a conexão, já que a tradição judaica está presente, mas a serviço da cultura das novas gerações, que se negam a esquecer a interrupção da Guerra em suas histórias familiares, mas que não podem nem desejam repeti-la ipsis litteris. Não há mais o mundo judeu que existia antes da Shoá, por isso é imperativo encontrar novas formas para narrar esse passado sob o prisma daqueles que não viveram o evento, mas que herdam sua memória e, por extensão, seus traumas e que vivem, portanto, o passado de Guerra indiretamente. Essa geração, porém, não pretende reconstruir o passado ou representar uma pretensa verdade sobre a Shoá na literatura; quer manter o valor intrínseco da sobrevivência e, principalmente, o da resistência. Resistência da memória e da história sobre a passagem do tempo, do apagamento e do distanciamento. Desta forma, este trabalho propõe uma investigação das ferramentas literárias de que Everything is Illuminated lança mão para colmatar a lacuna temporal e geográfica entre o sujeito que escreve e o objeto de sua escrita. Palavras-chave: memória, Shoá, Literatura do Holocausto, Jonathan Safran Foer.
Abstract: Everything is Illuminated, a 2003 novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, expresses the desire to build an "experiential truth'" from the temporal and geographical distance of the events of World War II, which is expressed through the reconstruction of memory in literature from fragments of the past. This work intends to confirm the hypothesis that the novel transcends narrative status on the Shoah to attain a self-reflexive sphere, since it departs from the event to expand to the effects it produces in the present. It reveals the reaction of Jonathan, a representative of the third generation of survivors, to the perpetuation remembering the War as part of a larger tradition of recording and maintaining collective memory. This process recalls the dual role of language, that is, modifies life and allows it to modify itself. In this context, writing proves to be part of an idea of belonging, and is inscribed in Jonathan's life as the act that cemented the connection. According to this premise, the Jewish tradition is present, but at the service of the culture of the new generations, who refuse to forget the interruption of the War in their family histories - that, on their turn, cannot and do not wish to repeat it ipsis litteris. There is no longer the Jewish world that existed before the Shoah, so it is imperative to find new ways to narrate the past under the prism of those who did not live the event, but have inherited their memory and, by extension, their traumas and who live, therefore, the past of War indirectly. This generation, however, does not intend to reconstruct the past or represent a pretended truth about the Shoah in literature; they want to maintain the intrinsic value of survival, and especially that of resistance. Resistance of memory and history over the passage of time, obliteration and detachment. Therefore, this work proposes an investigation of the literary tools by which Everything is Illuminated aims to bridge the temporal and geographical gap between the subject who writes and the object of his/her writing. Key-words: memory, Shoah, Holocaust Literature, Jonathan Safran Foer.

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This thesis studies the works of Brazilian author Valêncio Xavier and North American author Jonathan Safran Foer, both of which, through narratives composed by newspaper articles, drawings, photographs, maps, flip books and by a peculiar textual disposition, transcend the traditional notion of romance mostly by incorporating other artistic manifestations, which allows them to be denominated as hybrid and interartistic narratives. Discussing these authors’ works consists on using alternative and current theories in order to analyze the intersection between word and image. Such contemporary and profane narratives, if they are considered through the concepts of Giorgio Agambem, subvert and illuminate the book as object and support, restoring the playful aspect of reading and the pleasure of the unexpected in each page. Hence, the aforementioned texts are analyzed as representatives of a narrative that is contemporary because it profanes themes and supports and, consequently, analyzed through questions related to visual narratives and interartistic poetics, to fictional games and intertextual collage and still, and through the reflection on the themes shared by them: the re-elaboration of memory as well as the joys and sorrows of childhood and old age. The narratives Minha mãe morrendo e o menino mentido, Meu sétimo dia: uma novella rébus, “Rremembranças de menina de rua morta nua”, “Maciste no inferno” and “Mistério mágico”, written by Valêncio Xavier and the novels Everything is illuminated and Extremely loud & incredibly close, the unclassifiable Tree of Codes and the short story “If the Aging Magician Should Begin to Believe”, by Jonathan Safran Foer are discussed in order to highlight their similarities in terms of formal composition strategies. Just as much as Valêncio Xavier and Jonathan Safran Foer profane themes and supports, the present thesis also aims to subvert the subjectile it deals with in a certain way, playing and interacting with the works and authors, since, as Roland Barthes once said, there’s no other way of dealing with authors and their works other than writing with them.
Esta tese estuda as obras do autor brasileiro Valêncio Xavier e do autor estadunidense Jonathan Safran Foer, que, a partir de narrativas compostas por artigos de jornal, desenhos, fotografias, mapas, flip books e por uma disposição textual peculiar ultrapassam a concepção tradicional do que se entende como romance ao incorporarem, sobretudo, outras manifestações artísticas, o que permite que sejam denominadas como narrativas híbridas e interartísticas. Discutir as obras de Valêncio Xavier e as de Jonathan Safran Foer consiste na utilização de teorias tradicionais e contemporâneas para a análise da intersecção entre palavra e imagem. Tais narrativas contemporâneas e profanadoras, se pensadas a partir de conceitos de Giorgio Agamben, subvertem e iluminam o livro enquanto objeto e suporte, restituindo o aspecto lúdico à leitura e o prazer do inesperado a cada página. Desse modo, os textos desses escritores são analisados aqui como representantes de uma literatura que é contemporânea por ser profanadora de temas e de suportes e, consequentemente, analisadas a partir de questões relacionadas às narrativas visuais e às poéticas interartísticas, aos jogos ficcionais e da colagem intertextual e, ainda, a partir da reflexão sobre os temas que compartilham: a reelaboração da memória, as alegrias e tristezas infantis e senis. As narrativas Minha mãe morrendo e o menino mentido, Meu sétimo dia: uma novella rébus, “Rremembranças de menina de rua morta nua”, “Maciste no inferno” e “Mistério mágico”, de Valêncio Xavier, e os romances Everything is illuminated e Extremely loud & incredibly close, o inclassificável Tree of Codes e o conto “If the Aging Magician Should Begin to Believe”, de Jonathan Safran Foer, são discutidos a fim de se evidenciar as suas semelhanças nas estratégias formais de composição. Assim como Valêncio Xavier e Jonathan Safran Foer profanam temas e suportes, esta tese também objetiva subverter em certa medida o subjétil com que lida, jogando e dialogando com as obras e os autores estudados, pois, como afirma Roland Barthes, não há como se tratar de obras e de autores sem escrever com eles.

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This thesis studies the works of Brazilian author Val?ncio Xavier and North American author Jonathan Safran Foer, both of which, through narratives composed by newspaper articles, drawings, photographs, maps, flip books and by a peculiar textual disposition, transcend the traditional notion of romance mostly by incorporating other artistic manifestations, which allows them to be denominated as hybrid and interartistic narratives. Discussing these authors? works consists on using alternative and current theories in order to analyze the intersection between word and image. Such contemporary and profane narratives, if they are considered through the concepts of Giorgio Agambem, subvert and illuminate the book as object and support, restoring the playful aspect of reading and the pleasure of the unexpected in each page. Hence, the aforementioned texts are analyzed as representatives of a narrative that is contemporary because it profanes themes and supports and, consequently, analyzed through questions related to visual narratives and interartistic poetics, to fictional games and intertextual collage and still, and through the reflection on the themes shared by them: the re-elaboration of memory as well as the joys and sorrows of childhood and old age. The narratives Minha m?e morrendo e o menino mentido, Meu s?timo dia: uma novella r?bus, ?Rremembran?as de menina de rua morta nua?, ?Maciste no inferno? and ?Mist?rio m?gico?, written by Val?ncio Xavier and the novels Everything is illuminated and Extremely loud & incredibly close, the unclassifiable Tree of Codes and the short story ?If the Aging Magician Should Begin to Believe?, by Jonathan Safran Foer are discussed in order to highlight their similarities in terms of formal composition strategies. Just as much as Val?ncio Xavier and Jonathan Safran Foer profane themes and supports, the present thesis also aims to subvert the subjectile it deals with in a certain way, playing and interacting with the works and authors, since, as Roland Barthes once said, there?s no other way of dealing with authors and their works other than writing with them.
Esta tese estuda as obras do autor brasileiro Val?ncio Xavier e do autor estadunidense Jonathan Safran Foer, que, a partir de narrativas compostas por artigos de jornal, desenhos, fotografias, mapas, flip books e por uma disposi??o textual peculiar ultrapassam a concep??o tradicional do que se entende como romance ao incorporarem, sobretudo, outras manifesta??es art?sticas, o que permite que sejam denominadas como narrativas h?bridas e interart?sticas. Discutir as obras de Val?ncio Xavier e as de Jonathan Safran Foer consiste na utiliza??o de teorias tradicionais e contempor?neas para a an?lise da intersec??o entre palavra e imagem. Tais narrativas contempor?neas e profanadoras, se pensadas a partir de conceitos de Giorgio Agamben, subvertem e iluminam o livro enquanto objeto e suporte, restituindo o aspecto l?dico ? leitura e o prazer do inesperado a cada p?gina. Desse modo, os textos desses escritores s?o analisados aqui como representantes de uma literatura que ? contempor?nea por ser profanadora de temas e de suportes e, consequentemente, analisadas a partir de quest?es relacionadas ?s narrativas visuais e ?s po?ticas interart?sticas, aos jogos ficcionais e da colagem intertextual e, ainda, a partir da reflex?o sobre os temas que compartilham: a reelabora??o da mem?ria, as alegrias e tristezas infantis e senis. As narrativas Minha m?e morrendo e o menino mentido, Meu s?timo dia: uma novella r?bus, ?Rremembran?as de menina de rua morta nua?, ?Maciste no inferno? e ?Mist?rio m?gico?, de Val?ncio Xavier, e os romances Everything is illuminated e Extremely loud & incredibly close, o inclassific?vel Tree of Codes e o conto ?If the Aging Magician Should Begin to Believe?, de Jonathan Safran Foer, s?o discutidos a fim de se evidenciar as suas semelhan?as nas estrat?gias formais de composi??o. Assim como Val?ncio Xavier e Jonathan Safran Foer profanam temas e suportes, esta tese tamb?m objetiva subverter em certa medida o subj?til com que lida, jogando e dialogando com as obras e os autores estudados, pois, como afirma Roland Barthes, n?o h? como se tratar de obras e de autores sem escrever com eles.

Cette étude propose d’explorer les œuvres de Jonathan Safran Foer, Daniel Mendelsohn, et Art Spiegelman, à travers la notion de trace, principe fondateur de l’esthétique et de l’éthique des écritures de l’après-Shoah. L’expérience lacunaire de ces « générations d’après » implique la présence d’une « postmémoire », dont le caractère « différé » sollicite le travail de l’imagination et informe la démarche créatrice de ces artistes et écrivains de l’après, qui reconstruisent le passé de leurs familles. Ces récits de la hantise sont marqués par une « mémoire trouée », et découlent souvent d’une rupture de la filiation, donc d’une défaillance de la transmission. Engagés dans une quête de savoir, narrateurs et protagonistes interrogent l’événement à partir de traces matérielles, ainsi qu’au travers de retours, réels et imaginaires, sur les lieux de l’origine. Ces récits sont composés de matériaux hétérogènes qui créent des ruptures visuelles, et sont informés par divers dérèglements temporels : désordres, disruptions chronologiques, latence et répétition – tous symptomatiques de l’après-coup du trauma. Ces textes postmémoriels posent enfin la question de l’éthique de la représentation. Performativité de la langue, fictionnalisation de l’Histoire, et enjeux de la transmission sont au cœur de ces œuvres en devenir, et interrogent l’éthique de la responsabilité de leurs auteurs, entre passation et travail de deuil
This study explores the works of Jonathan Safran Foer, Daniel Mendelsohn, and Art Spiegelman through the notion of trace, the founding principle of the aesthetics and ethics of post-Holocaust writing. The incomplete knowledge of these “post-Holocaust generations” implies the presence of a “postmemory”, the “deferred” nature of which requires the imagination to be put to work and informs the creative approach of these post-Holocaust artists and writers, reconstructing their family’s past. These haunting narratives are marked by a “memory shot through with holes” and are often the result of a break in the bond of filiation, and therefore a hiatus of transmission. Having embarked on a quest for knowledge, narrators and protagonists examine the event through material traces, as well as real or imaginary returns to their places of origin. These narratives are made up of heterogeneous elements which create visual ruptures and are informed by various temporal disruptions: disorders, chronological breaks, latency and repetition – all symptomatic of the deferred action of trauma. Finally, these postmemorial texts raise the issue of the ethics of representation. The performativity of language, the fictionalization of History, and the issue of transmission are at the heart of these works in the making, and ethically question their authors’ responsibility, between transfer and the work of mourning

Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close stands out from the nationalistic-toned American “9/11 novels”. It depicts the story of a young boy and his grandparents who are left with the aftermath of losing a loved one in the attack on the twin towers. However, the complexity of the three main characters and the depth of their individual and common traumas make the novel go beyond the usual nationalistic 9/11 narrative and focus on the personal and, consequently, the national trauma.  This essay analyses the possibility of coping with and recovering from trauma through communication. Dominick LaCapra’s trauma theory notions of “working through” and “acting out”, as well as other traumatic memory research highlight the necessity of utterance in order to overcome trauma and to attempt an existence beyond it. In the instance of the three traumatized characters of the novel, the confessional language is entangled, broken and sometimes muted. This makes the recovery difficult in the case of the grandparents, almost impossible for the character of Grandpa. When it comes to the young boy, Oskar Schell, a more successful communication seems to open up the possibility of mental healing. These personal traumas are a reflection of a broader American trauma where an obsessive “rememoration” of the September 11 events and one-sided, revenge loaded public discourse do not seem to facilitate the national healing process. On all these levels, personal and community, the need and the difficult attempt to communicate the trauma of 9/11 does not necessarily grant recovery from it, but it facilitates a desired “working though” process.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Missouri-Columbia, 2007.
The entire dissertation/thesis text is included in the research.pdf file; the official abstract appears in the short.pdf file (which also appears in the research.pdf); a non-technical general description, or public abstract, appears in the public.pdf file. Title from title screen of research.pdf file (viewed on October 23, 2007) Includes bibliographical references.

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Este trabalho investiga as estratégias narrativas utilizadas por Jonathan Safran Foer no romance Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2005), a fim de verificar como o autor avalia o episódio dos ataques terroristas de 11 de setembro. A tragédia representa o início de um novo período da História dos Estados Unidos e tem sido tema de publicações em diversas áreas. Este estudo examina, por meio da jornada empreendida pelo menino Oskar, de apenas nove anos, cujo pai foi vítima dos atentados, a forma como os acontecimentos do passado são transformados em fatos históricos relevantes, os sistemas que permitem a abordagem da História por meio de várias perspectivas, e a presença do trauma como elemento de ligação entre História e Literatura. Focalizando primordialmente o narrador, o pequeno Oskar, a análise perseguirá sua jornada em Nova York à procura de respostas para a morte de seu pai naquele dia catastrófico, tratado por Oskar como the worst day. Serão também analisados os usos de imagens, espaços em branco, as escritas com sobreposição e o diálogo com a tecnologia e mensagens codificadas, como SMS, que estão presentes no romance. A fundamentação teórica desta discussão será baseada em textos de McHale (1992), Lyotard (1990), Jameson (2007), Santiago (2002), Connor (2000), White (1994), Le Goff (2003), e Hutcheon (1991)
This thesis investigates the narrative strategies used by Jonathan Safran Foer in Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2005) in order to verify how the author evaluates the episode of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. The tragedy is the beginning of a new period in the history of the United States and has been the subject of publications in several fields. This study examines, through the journey taken by the nine-year-old boy Oskar, whose father was a victim of the 9/11 attacks, how the events of the past are transformed into relevant historical facts, systems that allow the treatment of History through multiple perspectives, and the presence of trauma as a conection between History and Literature. Primarily focusing on the narrator, little Oskar, the analysis will pursue his journey in New York looking for answers to the death of his father on that catastrophic day, treated by Oskar as “the worst day”. The use of images, blanks, written with overlapping and dialogue with technology and coded messages such as SMS, which are present in the novel, will also be analyzed. The theoretical basis of this discussion includes texts by McHale (1992), Lyotard (1990), Jameson (2007), Santiago (2002), Connor (2000), White (1994), Le Goff (2003) and Hutcheon (1991)

La pregunta sobre com s’ha de representar l’Holocaust és i ha estat una qüestió problemàtica i essencial en els Estudis de l’Holocaust. Certs acadèmics i intel•lectuals han negat la possibilitat de representació de l’horror del genocidi dels jueus europeus, i en especial, s’ha negat l’ús de la ficció literària i cinematogràfica. Aquesta tesi analitza les tres etapes de recepció de l’Holocaust i els seus discursos acadèmics predominants. L’inicial silenci i la invisibilitat social del genocidi, en la que es formula el dictum adornià sobre la irrepresentabilitat del genocidi dels jueus europeus. Més endavant, l’Holocaust es fa socialment visible, i l’aparició d’obres de ficció controvertides obliguen a plantejar-se certs “límits de representació”. I contemporàniament, quan la ficció sobre l’Holocaust s’ha popularitzat i globalitzat, arribant a formar part de l’entreteniment i del consum mediàtic. En aquest context, en el que les representacions de ficció del genocidi dels jueus europeus ja formen part de la nostra cultura, l’estudi de cas es centra en l’anàlisi narratològica del llibre Everything is Illuminated (2002) de Jonathan Safran Foer, amb l’objectiu de presentar una opció de ficció de l’Holocaust.
La pregunta sobre cómo se debe representar el Holocausto es y ha sido una cuestión problemática y esencial en los Estudios del Holocausto. Ciertos académicos e intelectuales han negado la posibilidad de representación del horror del genocidio de los judíos europeos, y en especial, se ha negado el uso de la ficción literaria y cinematográfica. Esta tesis analiza las tres etapas de recepción del Holocausto y sus discursos académicos predominantes. El inicial silencio e invisibilidad social del genocidio, en el que se formula el dictum adorniano sobre la irrepresentabilidad del genocidio de los judíos europeos. Más adelante, el Holocausto se hace socialmente visible, y la aparición de obras de ficción controvertidas obligan a plantearse ciertos “límites de representación”. Y contemporáneamente, cuando la ficción sobre Holocausto se ha popularizado y globalizado, llegando a formar parte del entretenimiento y del consumo mediático. En este contexto, en el que las representaciones de ficción del genocidio de los judíos europeos ya forman parte de nuestra cultura, el caso de estudio se centra en el análisis narratológico del libro Everything is Illuminated (2002) de Jonathan Safran Foer, con el objetivo de presentar una opción de ficción del Holocausto.
The question of how the Holocaust should be represented is and has been a problematic and essential question in Holocaust Studies. Certain academics and intellectuals have denied the possibility of representation, and very specially, have denied the use of literary and cinematographic fiction. This thesis analyses the three stages of reception of the Holocaust and their predominant academic discourses. The initial silence and social invisibility of the genocide, in which the Adornian dictum is formulated on the unrepresentability of the genocide of European Jews. Later, the Holocaust is made socially visible, and the emergence of controversial works of fiction force us to consider the option of certain “limits of representation”. And, recently, in which fiction about the Holocaust has become popularized and globalized, and become part of the entertainment and consumer mass media. In this context, in which fictional representations of the genocide of European Jews are now part of our culture, this case study focuses on the narratological analysis of the book, Everything is Illuminated (2002), by Jonathan Safran Foer, in order to present a fictional choice of the Holocaust.

Al Qaeda killings, posttraumatic stress, and the Gothic together triangulate a sizable space in recent American fiction that is still largely uncharted by critics. This thesis maps that shared territory in four novels written between 2005 and 2007 by writers who were born in America, and whose protagonists are the survivors in New York City after the World Trade Center falls. Published in the city of their tragedy and reviewed in its media, the novels surveyed here include Don DeLillo’s _Falling Man_ (2007), Jonathan Safran Foer’s _Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close_ (2005), Lynne Sharon Schwartz’s _The Writing on the Wall_ (2005), and Jess Walter’s _The Zero_ (2006). The thesis issues a challenge to the large number of negative and dismissive reviews of the novels under consideration, making a case that under different criteria, shaped by trauma theory and psychoanalysis, the novels succeed after all in making readers feel what it was to be alive in September 2001, enduring the posttraumatic stress for months and years later. The thesis asserts that 9/11 fiction is too commonly presented in popular journals and scholarly studies as an undifferentiated mass. In the same critical piece a journalist or an academic may evaluate narratives in which unfold a terrorist's point of view, a surviving or a dying New York City victim's perspective, and an outsider's reaction set thousands of miles away from Ground Zero. What this thesis argues for is a separation in study of the fictive strands that meditate on the burning towers, treating the New York City survivor story as a discrete body. Despite their being set in one of the most known cities of the Western world, and the terrorist attack that they depict being the most- watched catastrophe ever experienced in real-time before, these fictions have not yet been critically ordered. Charting the salient reappearing conflicts, unsettling descriptions, protagonist decay, and potent techniques for registering horror that resurface in this New York City 9/11 fiction, this thesis proposes and demonstrates how the peculiar and affecting Gothic tensions in the works can be further understood by trauma theory, a term coined by Cathy Caruth in Unclaimed Experience (1996: 72). Though the thesis concentrates on developments in trauma theory from the mid 1990s to 2015, it also addresses its theoretical antecedents: from the earliest voices in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that linked mental illness to a trauma (Charcot, Janet, Breuer, Freud), to researchers from mid-twentieth century (Adler, Lindemann) who studied how catastrophe affects civilian minds not previously trained to either fight war or withstand cataclysm. Always keeping at the fore the ancient Greek double-meaning of trauma as both unhealing “wound” and “defeat,” the thesis surveys tenets of the trauma theorists from the very first of those who studied the effects on civilian survivors of disaster (of what is still the largest nightclub fire in U.S. history, which replaced front page coverage of World War II for a few days: the Cocoanut Grove blaze in Boston, 1942) up to those theorists writing in 2015. The concepts evolving behind trauma theory, this thesis demonstrates, provide a useful mechanism to discuss the surprising yearnings hiding behind the appearance of doppelgängers, possession ghosts, terrorists as monsters, empty coffins, and visitants that appear to feed on characters’ sorrow, guilt, and loneliness within the novels under discussion. This thesis reappraises the dominant idea in trauma studies of the mid-1990s, namely that trauma victims often cannot fully remember and articulate their physical and psychic wounds. The argument here is that, true to the theories of the Caruthian school, the victims in these novels may not remember and express their trauma completely and in a linear fashion. However, the victims figured in these novels do relate the horrors of their memory to a degree by letting their narration erupt with the unexpectedly Gothic images, tropes, visions, language, and typical contradictions, aporias, lacunae, and paradoxes. The Gothic, one might say, becomes the language in which trauma speaks and articulates itself, albeit not always in the most cogent of signs. One might easily dismiss these fleeting Gothic presences that characters conjure in the fictions under consideration as anomalous apparitions signalling nothing. However, this thesis interrogates these ghostly traces of Gothicism to find what secrets they hold. Working from the insights of psychoanalysis and its post-Freudian re-inventers and challengers, it aims to puzzle out the dimensions of characters’ mourning in its “traumagothic” reading of the texts. Characters’ use of the Gothic becomes their way of remembering, a coded language to the curious. This thesis holds that unexpressed grief and guilt are the large constant in this grouping of novels. Characters’ grief articulation and guilt release, or the desire for symbolic amnesia, take paths that the figures often were suspicious of before 9/11: a return to organized religion, a belief in spirits, a call for vengeance, psychotherapy, substance abuse, splitting with a partner, rampant sex with nearby strangers, torture of suspects, and killing. All the earnest attempts through the above means by the characters to express grief, vent rage, and alleviate survivor guilt do so without noticeable success. True closure towards their trauma is largely a myth. No reliable evidence surfaces from the close reading of the texts that those affected by trauma ever fully recover. However, as this thesis demonstrates, other forms of recompense come from these searches for elusive peace and the nostalgic longing for the America that has been lost to them.

Orientador: Giséle Manganelli Fernandes
Banca: Manuel Fernando Medina
Banca: Norma Wimmer
Resumo: Este trabalho investiga as estratégias narrativas utilizadas por Jonathan Safran Foer no romance Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2005), a fim de verificar como o autor avalia o episódio dos ataques terroristas de 11 de setembro. A tragédia representa o início de um novo período da História dos Estados Unidos e tem sido tema de publicações em diversas áreas. Este estudo examina, por meio da jornada empreendida pelo menino Oskar, de apenas nove anos, cujo pai foi vítima dos atentados, a forma como os acontecimentos do passado são transformados em fatos históricos relevantes, os sistemas que permitem a abordagem da História por meio de várias perspectivas, e a presença do trauma como elemento de ligação entre História e Literatura. Focalizando primordialmente o narrador, o pequeno Oskar, a análise perseguirá sua jornada em Nova York à procura de respostas para a morte de seu pai naquele dia catastrófico, tratado por Oskar como the worst day. Serão também analisados os usos de imagens, espaços em branco, as escritas com sobreposição e o diálogo com a tecnologia e mensagens codificadas, como SMS, que estão presentes no romance. A fundamentação teórica desta discussão será baseada em textos de McHale (1992), Lyotard (1990), Jameson (2007), Santiago (2002), Connor (2000), White (1994), Le Goff (2003), e Hutcheon (1991)
Abstract: This thesis investigates the narrative strategies used by Jonathan Safran Foer in Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2005) in order to verify how the author evaluates the episode of the terrorist attacks of 9/11. The tragedy is the beginning of a new period in the history of the United States and has been the subject of publications in several fields. This study examines, through the journey taken by the nine-year-old boy Oskar, whose father was a victim of the 9/11 attacks, how the events of the past are transformed into relevant historical facts, systems that allow the treatment of History through multiple perspectives, and the presence of trauma as a conection between History and Literature. Primarily focusing on the narrator, little Oskar, the analysis will pursue his journey in New York looking for answers to the death of his father on that catastrophic day, treated by Oskar as "the worst day". The use of images, blanks, written with overlapping and dialogue with technology and coded messages such as SMS, which are present in the novel, will also be analyzed. The theoretical basis of this discussion includes texts by McHale (1992), Lyotard (1990), Jameson (2007), Santiago (2002), Connor (2000), White (1994), Le Goff (2003) and Hutcheon (1991)
Mestre

What is the relationship between writing in the present and the traumatic historical events that form the subject of that writing? What narrative strategies do authors employ in order to negotiate the ethical and epistemological problems raised by this gap in time and experience? “Trauma theory” is undermined by clinical controversies and contradictory claims for “literal truth” and “incomprehensibility”. Similarly, the Holocaust has been considered inherently unrepresentable unless by those who witnessed it, leading to a false opposition between genres of “testimony” and “fiction”. A way out of these dead ends is to consider the role of the first-person narrator in contemporary Holocaust narratives. While use of this device risks an inappropriate level of identification with those whose experience is both extreme and unknowable, I argue that this problem may be resolved to an extent through “transgenerational empathy”, an approach to the past that is self-reflexive, incorporates ideas of time, memory and generations, and moves both towards and away from the victims of the past in a simultaneous gesture of proximity and distance. For this theory I draw on Dominick LaCapra’s definitions of empathy and “empathic unsettlement”, and on Hans-Georg Gadamer’s concept of the “fusion of horizons” between past and present. Transgenerational empathy involves giving equal weight to “memory” and “history”. An over-emphasis on memory leads to narratives that are merely identificatory, such as Anne Michaels’ Fugitive Pieces and Binjamin Wilkomirski’s Fragments. In contrast, W. G. Sebald’s use of a narrative persona in The Emigrants and Austerlitz enables transgenerational empathy in narrative by simultaneously imposing layers of distance while establishing close personal connection. Similarly, Jonathan Safran Foer’s third-generation aesthetic of “post-postmemory” in Everything is Illuminated uses a “dual persona” device to foreground empathically the abyss at the heart of any attempt to recapture the past. My analysis of these authors draws on the writings of Gillian Rose, Paul Ricoeur, Marianne Hirsch and Jacques Derrida. However, the concept of “transgenerational empathy” would benefit from further research, both in terms of its “temporal dimension” and the use of narrative personae by other contemporary authors such as Philip Roth.

The aim of this thesis is to contribute to the development of initial criticism on the early literary response to the September 11^th attacks and the trauma they engendered. The first part of the thesis explores the specificity of the 9/11 event through the lens of trauma theory and other especially pertinent theories. Chapter I looks at the unique sequence of events on 11 September 2001. Basing its argument on Chapter I’s investigation of a possible overlap between reality and fiction during the hundred and two minutes of the attacks on the World Trade Center, Chapter II further focuses on the way the event erupted into the phenomenological world and traumatically disrupted subjectivities to ponder on an oft-eluded definition of 9/ll as a sublime event. Chapter III examines the figure of the ‘jumpers’, these men and women who were forced outside the World Trade Center by the unbearable inside conditions and who offered a glimpse of the invisible horror taking place within the towers. The second part studies the early novelistic response to 9/11 through three novels: Window on the World by Frédéric Beigbeder (2003), Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer (2005), and Falling Man by Don DeLillo (2007). These novels constitute but also depict an instant response to the event. Each chapter of the second part of the thesis focuses on a different aspect of the 9/11 trauma. Chapter IV examines the immediate response of Beigbeder to the attacks on the World Trade Center in Window on the World. Chapter V investigates the characteristics of 9/11 mourning by looking at the mourning process of Foer’s 9-year old protagonist in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Chapter VI analyses the figures of the 9/11 survivor in DeLillo’s Falling Man.

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Coordena??o de Aperfei?oamento de Pessoal de N?vel Superior - CAPES
Some historians agree that the terrorist attacks of September 11 marked the beginning of the 21st century. If the twentieth century was marked by two world wars, the 21st century was no better than its predecessor in terms of horror and violence. Consequently, art couldn?t fail to be contaminated by all of this. Thus the postmodern literature emerges, which resumes past tragedies in order to shed a new light on the catastrophes of the present. One of the most representative works of this new literary movement in the 21st century is Extremely loud and incredibly close, Jonathan Safran Foer? second novel, published for the first time in 2005. In order to clarify the relationship between Literature, History and traumatic events, this work aims to examine the way in which the North American author represents these facts and their subjective consequences in the novel Extremely loud and incredibly close, based on concepts of psychology, history and literary theory.
Alguns historiadores apontam que os atentados terroristas de 11 de setembro marcaram o in?cio do s?culo XXI. Se o s?culo XX foi marcado por duas guerras mundiais, o s?culo XXI n?o deixa nada a desejar em termos de horror e viol?ncia quando comparado a seu antecessor. Consequentemente, a arte n?o poderia deixar de ser contaminada por tudo isso. Assim, surge a literatura p?s-moderna, que retoma trag?dias passadas a fim de lan?ar uma nova luz nas cat?strofes do presente. Uma das obras representativas desse novo movimento liter?rio no s?culo XXI ? Extremely loud and incredibly close ? em portugu?s, Extremamente alto e incrivelmente perto ?, segundo romance do escritor Jonathan Safran Foer, publicado pela primeira vez em 2005. Com o objetivo de elucidar a rela??o entre a Literatura, a Hist?ria e os eventos traum?ticos, este trabalho busca examinar a maneira como o autor norte-americano realiza a representa??o desses acontecimentos e suas consequ?ncias subjetivas no romance Extremamente alto e incrivelmente perto, tendo como base conceitos da psicologia, da hist?ria e da teoria da literatura.

The topic of this dissertation is the aspects of trauma and reaction to the traumatic experience that can be found in 9/11 literature. The research engages in a comparative analysis of five books that can be categorised as 9/11 literature, which means that the events of 9/11 are central in the novels and are a recurrent theme. The books have been written by authors of different nationalities: "Extremely Loud & Incredibily Close" by J. S. Foer, "Falling Man" by D. DeLillo, "Windows on the World" by F. Beigbeder, "Saturday" by I. McEwan and "The Reluctant Fundamentalist" by M. Hamid. The characters have either experienced the attacks personally or their lives have been largely influenced by the event. In either case, the protagonist has been traumatised by the tragedy. Therefore, in this study two different fields are fused together – the field of comparative literature and that of trauma studies.

Cette thèse a pour objet d’examiner comment des auteurs juifs américains contemporains renouvellent l’écriture de la Shoah au XXIe siècle en plaçant le lecteur au cœur de l’entreprise de transmission qui leur tient à cœur. Ces textes post-modernes – hybrides et foisonnants – reflètent le traumatisme qui a été transmis aux auteurs, tous issus de familles partiellement décimées pendant la Shoah, qui appartiennent à la troisième génération, dite « génération passerelle » car ils sont les derniers à avoir rencontré des survivants de la Shoah. Récits de post-mémoire, ils traitent davantage de l’après-coup de la Shoah et de la difficulté à mettre en mots une histoire lacunaire que des événements eux-mêmes. Ils requièrent ainsi une participation imaginative de la part du lecteur et entendent à la fois l’édifier et susciter chez lui une émotion authentique basée sur l’empathie qui représente la seule vérité qui reste de la Shoah après la disparition des derniers survivants et témoins
This thesis aims at studying the role explicitly assigned to the reader by contemporary authors of recent American writings dealing with the Holocaust’s aftereffects. These post-memory narratives which all bear physically the family trauma inherited by the authors require an active participation from the reader who is placed in a similar position as the one the authors once found themselves in, forced to use his imagination, question the unknown and embark on a quest for facts that may lead him to unexpected questionings. The “bridging generation” is the last direct link that exists between Holocaust survivors and contemporary readers and third-generation writers are aware of their responsibility as memory passers

Thesis (MA VA (Visual Arts))--University of Stellenbosch, 2010.
ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The primary function of paintings and novels in Western culture has historically been considered the depiction or description of reality. Over the course of the last century, however, the inherent reflexivity of both art and literature has become progressively more insistent and programmatic, in such a way as challenges the relationship between form and the world. A re-thinking of the role of representation is thus central to both modernism and postmodernism. This thesis is an investigation into the relationship between modern and postmodern reflexivity. Through the close examination of four artists who serve as case studies, I argue that literary and artistic modernism‟s emphasis on form and subjectivity, as well as the tendency of postmodern art and writing to flaunt its own status as rhetoric/fiction, are different facets of a continuous response to a rapidly changing world. Using the insights of post-structuralist theory, I suggest that whereas modernism‟s reflexive drive is directed towards truth and self-knowledge, postmodern reflexivity is centrally concerned with the elusive, continually shifting nature of meaning. What emerges in the light of the practice of individual artist and authors, however, is that the modern and postmodern reflexive modes are not necessarily mutually exclusive, but can co-exist, producing a vital and necessary tension.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Beskrywing en uitbeelding van die werklikheid word geskiedkundig as die kernfunksies van skilderye en die roman in die Westerse kultuur beskou. Gedurende die laaste eeu het die inherente refleksiwiteit van beide kuns en letterkunde toenemend meer programmaties en sistematies geword. Dit het geskied op „n wyse wat die verhouding tussen vorm en die wêreld uitdaag. „n Herbesinning van die rol van uitbeelding of representasie is gevolglik van sentrale belang vir beide modernisme en postmodernisme. Hierdie tesis is „n ondersoek na die verwantskap tussen moderne en postmoderne refleksiwiteit. Deur „n noukerige ondersoek van vier kunstenaars se werk, stel ek voor dat die letterkundige en artistieke klem van modernisme op vorm en subjektiwiteit, sowel as die gebruiklike kenmerk van retoriek/fiksie, verskillende aspekte is van „n voortdurende weerkaatsing op „n vinnig veranderende wêreld is. Deur die teoretiese perspektiewe van post-stukturalisme toe te pas, stel ek voor dat modernistiese refleksiwiteit neig na die waarheid en selfkennis, terwyl postmoderne refleksiwiteit fokus op die onbepaalde en veranderlike aard van betekenis. Nietemin, uit my kritiese beskouing van die kreatiewe praktyk van afsonderlike kunstenaars en skrywers blyk dit dat die modernistiese en postmodernistiese refleksiewe benaderinge nie noodwendig mekaar uitsluit nie, maar saam kan bestaan en „n dinamiese en noodsaaklike spanning skep.

This paper delves into the realms of tragedy, memory and representation. Drawing upon the phenomenon of the Phantom Limb and extending it towards a theory of Phantom Bodies, various artworks - literary, theatrical and visual - are examined. After the conflagration of the terrorist attack, how are these absences grieved over and remembered through artistic representation? The essay examines this question by positioning itself amongst the scarred landscapes of post-September 11 New York and suicide bombings in Israel (2000-2006). Furthermore, it investigates whether humanity can be restored in the aftermath of an event in which certain individuals have sought to eradicate it. The fragmentation of the affected body in these scenarios is understood as further complicating processes of grief and remembrance. Artists who reject political polemic and engage with the dimensions of human loss are seen to have discovered means of referring to the absence caused by the act of terrorism. Three such recurring representations present themselves: ash and remnants, presence/absence and memory building. Phantom Bodies are perceived as simultaneously functioning as a reminder of the event itself, insisting upon the response of bearing witness, and as a symbol of the overwhelming power of humanity. Challenges arise when individuals or sections of the affected society deem these artworks to be inappropriate or explicit. Works considered include: Neil LaBute's play The Mercy Seat, Sigalit Landau's art installation The Country, Jonathan Safran Foer's Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close, Spike Lee's 25th Hour, Daniel Libeskind's architectural plans for the World Trade Center site, Eric Fischl's sculpture 'Tumbling Woman', Honor Molloy's autodelete://beginning dump of physical memory and A.B.Yehoshua's A Woman in Jerusalem. The accompanying play, Tales of Ash: A diptych for the theatre, is set in Melbourne, New York and Tel Aviv and deals with life in the face of and after terror. It veers between naturalism, poetic monologue and the epic. Tales of Ash contains two plays. The first centres on Mia, a young sculptor living in New York, who loses both her lover and her creativity on September 11. Upon returning to her home in Melbourne, she finds familial bonds still entwined with guilt and family trauma. The second play revolves around Ilana and Benny, two people living in Tel Aviv, who find themselves suddenly thrust together after a devastating bombing. As they attempt to resume rhythms of life, in the face of all the inherent ferocity of a modern existence in Israel, the struggle between The Ash Woman and The Ash Takers escalates.

Prenant appui sur l'intérêt contemporain pour les rencontres texte/image et la prolifération récente des oeuvres bi-médiales, cette thèse se propose d'étudier les structures et les qualités du photo-roman, en vue de soutenir que cette forme nouvelle offre un espace privilégié à l'interrogation — et potentiellement à la représentation ¬des événements traumatiques collectifs. L'exploration d'une série de travaux photo-littéraires produits entre la fin du 20ème siècle et le début du 21ème et caractérisés par une thématique historiographique ainsi que la concomitance avec une catastrophe historique suggère que la combinaison de la fiction et de la photographie au sein d'un même dispositif photo-narratif est susceptible de fournir une alternative à la problématique bien connue de l'irreprésentabilité du trauma. Nous considérons que la photo-littérature emploie les rapports souvent notés entre la photographie et l'histoire, la biographie, le temps et la mort dans le cadre familier du roman, tout en faisant appel au lecteur comme un acteur indispensable du processus d'élaboration du sens textuel. Les mécanismes complexes du composé photo-textuel permettent de mettre en lumière le fait que les histoires de vie personnelles sont pertinentes à l'expérience collective, ainsi que les parallèles entre des événements historiques traumatiques divers. Ainsi, la photo-littérature permet un passage de l'histoire à un genre de mémoire qui est essentiellement connectif ; par là même, cette forme nouvelle va à l'encontre d'une incapacité présumée à énoncer la mémoire traumatique, en suivant une approche fondée sur l'attention et l'investissement affectif
Drawing on the increased interest in word-image interactions and the recent proliferation of bimedial works of literature, this study proposes an investigation of the structures and qualities of the photo-nove', with the contention that this emergent new form constitutes a privileged space where instances of collective trauma may be addressed, potentially even represented. The exploration of a series of works of photo-literature of the Tate 20th and early 215t century that are affiliated to historiography and unfold in the midst or aftermath of a great historic calamity suggests that the combination of fiction and photography within a single, photo-textual narrative may counter the problematic of unrepresentability raised by Trauma Studies. Photo-literature, as this study purports, employs photography's well-lçnown relations to history, biography, time and'cleath within the familiar schema of the nove', while invoking? the respondent reader as an essential component of the meaning¬making process. These elaborate workings of the photo-textual compound result in the highlighting of the individual life story's pertinence to the collective experience and the establishment of parallels between diverse historical instances of trauma. Thus, photo-literature enables the passage from history to an essentially connective type of memory and, subsequently, responds to a professed inability to enunciate the traumatic experience, by offering an approach that is reliant on affective investment and attention

Located on the interstice between Media Studies and Literary Theory, my dissertation explores the emerging genre of photo-fiction -- literary works that incorporate photographic images into the manuscripts -- and its impact on the commemoration of traumatic historical events. I argue that the way we represent and remember historical traumas is dependent on the media in which images emanating from these events are produced and circulated; put differently, the context of these images shapes our engagement with them. By examining literary works that incorporate photographs into their printed text, I explore textual and visual representations of historical trauma (such as the two World Wars, the Balkan wars of the Nineties, and 9/11). The authors whose works I analyze (Jonathan Safran Foer, Aleksandar Hemon, W.G. Sebald) grant photography a new status: the inserted images transcend traditional “authentification strategies” and draw attention to the convergence of realism and indexicality featured by these photographs. These authors’ employment of photographs from various media (television, internet, printed press, encyclopedias and archives) questions not only the technical qualities of each medium but the veracity and accuracy of evidence. Photography’s capacity to secure and store information is put radically into question, not only because the new contexts of these images, but because of the manipulations and reconfigurations the movement between media has brought about. Drawing on Walter Benjamin’s concept of the literary montage, I suggest that literature provides an apt arena to examine the reception to images. By literary montage I mean the opening up of a new dimension in which visual and verbal elements are juxtaposed, and the disjunctions and gaps between them encourage readers to become active participants in the creation of narrative. Photo-fiction’s interplay between images and texts therefore not only sheds light on the mechanics of representation, but demand from its audience to reflect on the way we interpret and respond to historical traumas in a society saturated with images.