To Hear the Unheard-Or Reimagining Representation with Primo Levi and Hélène Cixous
With a common Jewish heritage and a personal relation to the Holocaust, both Primo Levi and Hélène Cixous have a desire, even a craving, to write. They aim to hear the unheard and to re-present the 'unheard' in different but distinct ways. Levi uses animal symbols and Cixous not only uses...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Oxford University Press
[2017]
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| In: |
Literature and theology
Year: 2017, Volume: 31, Issue: 4, Pages: 437-454 |
| RelBib Classification: | BH Judaism NCG Environmental ethics; Creation ethics VA Philosophy |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (Resolving-System) Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | With a common Jewish heritage and a personal relation to the Holocaust, both Primo Levi and Hélène Cixous have a desire, even a craving, to write. They aim to hear the unheard and to re-present the 'unheard' in different but distinct ways. Levi uses animal symbols and Cixous not only uses her 'magical animots' but creatively elaborates on human and animal differences through what could be called her 'animal thinking'. I argue that Levi's animal symbols and Cixous' animal thinking can prompt a constructive reimagining of how we re-present self and other beyond the confines of the 'human'. In this article I explore Levi's and Cixous' way of interacting with animals and animality in their writings, and relate it to Walter Benjamin's thinking on human language. Following my discussion of Levi and Cixous, Benjamin's writing on language is instructive in considering the possibilities and limits to hear the (what seems to be) unheard and its importance to the potentiality of creating conditions for a greater inclusivity in our daily lives. |
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| ISSN: | 1477-4623 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Literature and theology
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1093/litthe/frx031 |