Lebende Tote: konzeptuelle Allegorien der unwiederholbaren Wiederholung der Lektüre bei Proust und Blanchot

Abstract

Since the beginning of modernity, reading is often enough understood as a communicative process, in which numerical dimensions become crucial, say the possibility that what has been read gives rise to several interpretations, or the possibility that the latter create single convergences or resonances. However, the following study attempts an approach to a different dimension of reading which is concerned with the rhythm of its temporal dimension: reading can be repeated as many times as desired, whereby each repetition remains unique, as it can never be reduced to the repetition of a determined something. Based on the thesis that the autoreflexivity of literature – particularly by means of the figure of allegory – allows for a discovery of details about this dimension of reading (which could also be of interest in other media and discourses), the study applies mainly to a comparative analysis of, in this respect, relevant works of Proust and Blanchot.