Thesis (M.A.) - Carleton University, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available in electronic format on the Internet.

Zugl: Mainz, Univ., Diss.

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 47-49).

Thesis (M.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 2001. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 47-49). Also available in print.

Entre autobiographie et fiction, le terme « autofiction », inventé par Serge Doubrovsky, est un « genre » qui s'est surtout épanoui à la fin du XIXe siècle avec « la transposition en fiction des fragments d'une expérience » (Hubier), devenue de plus en plus populaire au fil du temps. La recherche entreprise dans cette thèse porte sur la forme contemporaine de ce mélange entre autobiographie et fiction que l'on trouve chez Paul Auster. Notre corpus principal est composé de ses romans dits de la « maturité », publiés entre 1991 et 2008 : Leviathan, The Book of Illusions, Oracle Night, The Brooklyn Follies, Travels in the Scriptorium et Man in the Dark. Nous nous poserons ainsi la question de l'évolution de l'autofiction mais également de la métafiction chez cet auteur. Divisé en trois parties, notre travail porte dans un premier temps sur les repères spatiotemporels dans les romans de Paul Auster avant de se concentrer sur les éléments métafictionnels présents dans les romans de notre corpus. Dans notre première partie, nous distinguerons deux espaces : l'espace intérieur et l'espace extérieur. Nous verrons comment ces deux espaces cohabitent. Dans une deuxième partie, nous nous intéresserons aux repères temporels, qu'ils soient d'ordre mémoriel ou en rapport direct avec la structure du récit. Nous examinerons le rôle que jouent certains repères empruntés à l'Histoire contemporaine dans l'histoire personnelle des personnages, en observant qu'ils occupent une place toujours plus importante au fur et à mesure que l'oeuvre austérienne progresse, en particulier à partir des attentats du onze septembre. Enfin, nous étudierons la mise en scène de l'écriture chez Paul Auster et la façon dont elle alimente l'autofiction en mettant l'accent sur l'identité d'écrivain de notre auteur. Nous nous intéresserons à son emploi du langage, à l'évolution des supports d'écriture chez ses personnages, à la description de la méthodologie du travail de l'écrivain mais également à l'intratextualité qui met en avant le lien entre tous ses romans. / Between autobiography and fiction, the term “autofiction”, invented by Serge Doubrovsky, is a “genre” which started to flourish at the end of the 19th century and has become more and more popular ever since. Our research focuses on the contemporary form of this mixture of autobiography and fiction which can be found throughout Paul Auster's works. Our main corpus is based on the author's later works, published between 1991 and 2008 : Leviathan, The Book of Illusions, Oracle Night, The Brooklyn Follies, Travels in the Scriptorium and Man in the Dark. Our aim is to study the evolution of autofiction but also metafiction in Auster's works. Divided into three parts, our research focuses first on the representation of space and time before concentrating on the metafictional side of Auster's novels. In our first part, we distinguish between two distinct spaces : the inside world and the outside world. We analyse the way in which these two spaces co-Exist side by side in the novels. In our second part, we study time by analysing the themes of memory, narrative structure but also history which inserts itself into the personal stories of the characters. We will see how these historical dates become more and more contemporary throughout the novels, especially since 9/11. In our third and last part, we focus on the way in which the author presents his identity as a writer by studying the way in which he presents language, writing format, the description of his writing methodology but also intratextuality which shows the way in which all his novels are linked together.

This essay offers an analysis of Paul Auster's novel Invisible. The main focus of the essay is on the incestuous love affair between Adam Walker and his sister Gwyn. It is argued that the novel via this incestuous affair is addressing the issue of the unrepresentable, what Lacan termed the “real” that lies beyond the symbolic order. It is shown that the concept of the unrepresentable has been a central theme in Auster's work throughout his career. The main theoretical foundation of the essay is Julia Kristeva's theories regarding the “abject.” A summary of Kristeva's theories is therefore offered, as well as a summary of research into the incest taboo.

This doctoral thesis examines literary representations of the Holocaust by Saul Bellow, Thomas Pynchon and Paul Auster, and maps the relation between memory and narrative elicited from literature onto American museums, memorials and monuments. This research argues that the ramifications of the trauma originally felt by Holocaust witnesses resonate in the American collective memory, and its literary and architectural forms, that seeks to remember on behalf of those witnesses. The consequent traumatic disruption of literary and architectural narratives can be identified, using various appropriated psychoanalytical concepts, and Holocaust memory traced as it eludes, and irrupts in, the cultural forms that try to remember it. Establishing the dynamics of collective memory allows the cultural significance of Holocaust remembrance to be investigated, especially in relation to the memories and ethnic identities of survivors that are subsumed by an Americanised version of the past. By way of a conclusion, although this thesis points to the problematisation of historical representation, it also challenges notions of the Holocaust's unrepresentability common to much postmodern thought. It searches for a methodology of memorialisation or at least identifies where blocks to mourning could be removed from the American cultural landscape.

This project examines some of the most notable fiction of contemporary American writer Paul Auster through the postmodern lens of Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s rhizome. Auster’s novels often feature characters that are also writers, characters that resurface in subsequent novels, and characters that bear a resemblance to Paul Auster himself. This thesis uses the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari to better understand the significance of these puzzling characters. Ultimately, the model of the rhizome reveals a particular connectivity between Auster’s works underpinned by multiplicities, refrains, and a dislocation of origins.

Heidelberg, Univ., Diss., 1999.

This thesis deals with six texts by two of the best-known contemporary American novelists, namely Paul Auster and Thomas Pynchon. The thesis analyzes three most recent novels by each writer: Invisible, Sunset Park and 4 3 2 1 by Paul Auster and Against the Day, Inherent Vice and Bleeding Edge by Thomas Pynchon. All six novels explore various modes of authenticity - a notion which in each author's work adopts specific mechanisms of establishing ways of existing within the world that are directed towards a critique of the forms of society that try to limit individuals, confine them to prescribed objective categories. Chapters I to IV establish one by one the primary approaches to understanding how authenticity works within individual novels. First two chapters explore Paul Auster's works, and emphasize their portrayal of change as an organizing leitmotif. Chapters III and IV deal with selected works by Thomas Pynchon and analyze their use of entropy and information overload within individual narratives. The final chapter then combines all these notions and provides a comparative analysis and a critical interpretation of all six works against a theoretical and critical framework. The thesis explores the differences between Auster's and Pynchon's approach to authenticity, notions of the subjective or the...