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Time and Trauma in Ricardo Piglia's The Absent City

Time and Trauma in Ricardo Piglia's The Absent City h e Nry Jame S mo rello Time and Trauma in Ricardo Piglia’s e A Th bsent City In Ricardo Piglia’s novel La ciudad au ( see A Th ntebsent City ), Macedonio Fer- nández attempts to save some semblance of his terminally ill wife, Elena, by placing her memories in a machine. The machine eventually begins to tell others’ stories, stories that challenge the state’s oci ffi al history. At the same time, they are the in- trusive thoughts of a traumatized community, of a city that has no stories to tell about the dictatorship that took place between 176 a 9 nd 13,98 at least not publi- cally. That city is a futuristic Buenos Aires that continues to sue ff r from a traumatic past in which memories have been both corrupted and rewritten by a repressive state apparatus that attempts to control the collective narrative. However, the un- told stories of that collective narrative find their start in this desperate act by Mace- donio, who refuses to let go of the past. Macedonio, though, is not so much a char- acter as a specter that haunts the novel, refusing to mourn the loss of his wife. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png The Comparatist University of North Carolina Press

Time and Trauma in Ricardo Piglia's The Absent City

The Comparatist , Volume 37 – May 12, 2013

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Publisher
University of North Carolina Press
Copyright
Copyright © Southern Comparative Literature Association.
ISSN
1559-0887

Abstract

h e Nry Jame S mo rello Time and Trauma in Ricardo Piglia’s e A Th bsent City In Ricardo Piglia’s novel La ciudad au ( see A Th ntebsent City ), Macedonio Fer- nández attempts to save some semblance of his terminally ill wife, Elena, by placing her memories in a machine. The machine eventually begins to tell others’ stories, stories that challenge the state’s oci ffi al history. At the same time, they are the in- trusive thoughts of a traumatized community, of a city that has no stories to tell about the dictatorship that took place between 176 a 9 nd 13,98 at least not publi- cally. That city is a futuristic Buenos Aires that continues to sue ff r from a traumatic past in which memories have been both corrupted and rewritten by a repressive state apparatus that attempts to control the collective narrative. However, the un- told stories of that collective narrative find their start in this desperate act by Mace- donio, who refuses to let go of the past. Macedonio, though, is not so much a char- acter as a specter that haunts the novel, refusing to mourn the loss of his wife.

Journal

The ComparatistUniversity of North Carolina Press

Published: May 12, 2013

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