Die Unmöglichkeit der Erinnerung: Arno Geigers Es geht uns gut als Persiflage des Generationenromans der Gegenwartsliteratur

Arno Geiger’s novel Es geht uns gut (2005) treats the genre of the „Familienroman“ in an idiosyncratic way: the text appears to play with and subvert the conventions of the generational novel and readers’ expectations. The protagonist’s atypical refusal to uncover his family’s past can be read as a symptom of his precarious postmodern subjectivity and as a consequence of his „postheroic generationality.“ This paper will also show that Geiger’s novel presents family history through the lens of specific literary tropes—that the text could be read as a meta-commentary on its own genre, that of the contemporary generational novel.