In this Book
- Underworlds of Memory: W. G. Sebald's Epic Journeys through the Past
- Book
- 2017
- Published by: Northwestern University Press
summary
Underworlds of Memory argues persuasively that the literary works of the expatriate German author W. G. Sebald can best be understood through the lens of the classical genre of epic.
Scholars often read Sebald’s work as a project of cultural memory that aims to reevaluate Europe's past in the wake of the traumatic and complex events of the twentieth century. Sebald’s characters seek out the traces of Europe’s destructive history in strange places. They linger in disused train stations, pause before works of art, and return to childhood homes that turn out to be more foreign than any place they have visited. Underworlds of Memory demonstrates that these strange encounters with the past are based on central tropes of classical epic: the journey to the underworld, the encounter with a work of art, and the return to the homeland.
Sebald thus follows in the footsteps of German Jewish authors, including Peter Weiss, Siegfried Kracauer, and Jean Améry, who use these same epic tropes to reconsider the cultural memory of the Holocaust. Underworlds of Memory reads Sebald's works together with the works of these German Jewish authors and the classical epics of Homer and Virgil in order to describe and trace the origins of the unique intervention into cultural memory they embody.
Scholars often read Sebald’s work as a project of cultural memory that aims to reevaluate Europe's past in the wake of the traumatic and complex events of the twentieth century. Sebald’s characters seek out the traces of Europe’s destructive history in strange places. They linger in disused train stations, pause before works of art, and return to childhood homes that turn out to be more foreign than any place they have visited. Underworlds of Memory demonstrates that these strange encounters with the past are based on central tropes of classical epic: the journey to the underworld, the encounter with a work of art, and the return to the homeland.
Sebald thus follows in the footsteps of German Jewish authors, including Peter Weiss, Siegfried Kracauer, and Jean Améry, who use these same epic tropes to reconsider the cultural memory of the Holocaust. Underworlds of Memory reads Sebald's works together with the works of these German Jewish authors and the classical epics of Homer and Virgil in order to describe and trace the origins of the unique intervention into cultural memory they embody.
Table of Contents
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- Acknowledgments
- pp. vii-viii
- List of Abbreviations
- pp. ix-x
- Part One. Katabasis: Space and Memory
- Part Two. Ekphrasis: History and Representation
- Chapter 4. “A Synoptic and Artificial View”
- pp. 103-134
- Part Three. Nostos: Exile and Closure
- Chapter 5. Exile as a Disturbance of Memory
- pp. 137-160
- Chapter 6. Sebald’s Epics without Homecoming
- pp. 161-184
- Conclusion: Epic Today
- pp. 185-192
- Bibliography
- pp. 241-252
Additional Information
ISBN
9780810134829
Related ISBN(s)
9780810134805, 9780810134812
MARC Record
OCLC
981547539
Pages
267
Launched on MUSE
2017-04-14
Language
English
Open Access
No
Copyright
2017