World War II in Contemporary German and Dutch Fiction: The Generation of Meta-Memory

World War II in Contemporary German and Dutch Fiction: The Generation of Meta-Memory explores how literary writers from Germany,Flemish,and the Netherlands have negotiated the meaning and form of World War II memory over the last decades,asserting a self-conscious and often irreverent approach toward established mnemonic routines,practices,and rules.

Format: Hardback
Length: 238 pages
Publication date: 05 March 2021
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

World War II in Contemporary German and Dutch Fiction: The Generation of Meta-Memory delves into a comparative analysis of the construction of World War II memory in contemporary German, Flemish, and Dutch literature. Specifically, it explores the profound impact of the significant temporal distance from the historical events on how literary writers from these three literatures have negotiated its meaning and form over the past decades. To achieve this, the book presents comprehensive examinations of nine novels that exhibit a pronounced reflexivity on the conditions of contemporary remembering. Rather than seeking historical truth or grappling with historical trauma, these novels reflect on the transmission, narrative structures, formation processes, and functions of World War II memory in the present day, while asserting a self-conscious and often irreverent approach toward established mnemonic routines, practices, and rules.

As the analyses reveal, this approach is seamlessly articulated through the novels' poetics, characterized by a vast formal diversity and a playful approach that highlights mnemonic agency, posttraumatic positioning, and the ascendancy of the literary over the historiographical. Drawing from these findings, the book proposes the emergence of a new paradigm within the postwar cultural assessment of World War II: the generation of meta-memory.

Weight: 496g
Dimension: 157 x 235 x 22 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780367473730