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Erinnerung als Konstruktion: August Strindbergs „Ett halvt ark papper“

Published/Copyright: December 6, 2010
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European Journal of Scandinavian Studies
From the journal Volume 38 Issue 1

Research on Strindberg's short story “Ett halvt ark papper” has ascribed a therapeutic effect to the protagonist's memorialization of the past two years of his life. In this view, the story ends happily, as the narrator tells us. In contrast, the aim of this article is to show the narrator's unreliability. He not only fits together the puzzle pieces of the protagonist's life story into a coherent narration, but he also wants to meet the demands of the genre “Fairytale”, which is the title of the book containing “Ett halvt ark papper”. A coherent narration, however, can only be obtained by neglecting the uncertainties of the protagonist's life. Nobody knows what exactly happened to him. What seems to be his memories is in fact the constructed memorialization of the narrator. Additionally, there are strong textual signs indicating an ironic attitude of the narrator towards H.C. Andersen's fairytales and his “fairytale sound”. Does this mean that it is the narrator's goal to make a fairytale out of the protagonist's tragic fate?

Online erschienen: 2010-12-06
Erschienen im Druck: 2010-November

©Walter de Gruyter 2010

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