A spatial reading of Ilse Aichinger's novel "Die größere Hoffnung"

Auteurs

• Gail Wiltshire

Paramètres

• 147 pages
• 6 heures de lecture

• Fiction

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The contribution of literary scholarship to understanding spatiality and meaning in Ilse Aichinger’s writings, particularly in Die größere Hoffnung, is long overdue. Peter Härtling noted in 1980 that Aichinger’s novel has “long, all too long waited for us.” Gail Wiltshire’s text explores various aspects of meaning, symbolism, and spatial discourse, organized into categories such as space and time, heterotopia, memory, and (auto-)biographical space. She incorporates theories from contemporary cultural theorists, referencing M. M. Bakhtin’s concept of “chronotopicity” from The Dialogic Imagination, and Michel Foucault’s ideas on heterotopic otherness and biopolitics. Aleida Assmann’s theory of memory from Cultural Memory and Western Civilisation is used to examine the relationship between space and memory in Aichinger’s work. Foucault’s discourse “What Is an Author?” aids in analyzing (auto-)biographical space. The integration of theories from Bakhtin, Foucault, and Assmann offers new insights, while also engaging with Marc Augé’s perspectives on non-places and Gaston Bachelard’s The Poetics of Space. In addition to a detailed reading of Aichinger’s novel, the volume features interviews with individuals close to her, including Helga Michie née Aichinger, Ruth and Hugh Rix, Dr. Christine Ivanovic, and Reto Ziegler.

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• Année de publication: 2015