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La littérature française du vingtième siècle entre la mémoire et l’oubli: Proust, Beckett, Perec, et Blanchot; Twentieth Century French Literature between memory and forgetting: Proust, Beckett, Perec, and Blanchot

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

In the course of the twentieth century, the representation of the relationship between time, narrative, and memory in French literature undergoes a change. Proust's <i>A la recherche du temps perdu</i> evidences the power of memory to synthesize separate moments through a work of art and embodies the thesis of Paul Ricoeur on the interdependency of time and narrative. This proustian synthesis becomes almost impossible for Samuel Beckett, George Perec, and Maurice Blanchot, who encounter the disappearance of memory preserved in the narrative space. Not only in the face of the spatialization of memory in the increasing development of mass media, which Walter Benjamin criticizes, but also in the face of the deterioration of space, the translation of a temporalized memory into a coherent story cannot continue. From Proust's immense edifice of memory, to Beckett's invention, to Perec's spatial preservation of vanished time, to Blanchot's désoeuvrement, the works of these authors traverse the wide span between memory and forgetting in literature. This paper integrates these authors who diverge in the direction of memory, on the one hand, and in the direction of forgetting, on the other. This integration forms passageways that make possible the exchange between these two ends. Communication continues in the gap where memory and forgetting are reflections of each other.

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Master of Arts
Level thesis:degree_level
masters
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Foreign Languages, Cultures, and Literatures
Department dc:contributor.department
Foreign Languages, Cultures, and Literatures
Grantor dc:publisher
Virginia Tech
Year dc:date.issued
2010

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Baek, Jiewon
Chair dc:contributor.committeechair
  • Abiragi, Anthony A.
Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember
  • Watson, R. Janell
  • Shryock, Richard L.

Subjects

dc:subject × 10

Rights

dc:rights
Statement dc:rights
  • In Copyright
Language dc:language.iso
fr

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Dc Identifier Other
etd-04232010-155843
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/31850

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
Virginia Tech
Base URL
vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/oai/request
Last updated
2026-07-22
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Baek, Jiewon. La littérature française du vingtième siècle entre la mémoire et l’oubli: Proust, Beckett, Perec, et Blanchot; Twentieth Century French Literature between memory and forgetting: Proust, Beckett, Perec, and Blanchot. masters thesis, Virginia Tech, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/31850