THE MOTHER’S FIGURE IN PETER HANDKE’S NOVEL A "SORROW BEYOND DREAMS" Cover Image

ФИГУРА МАЈКЕ У РОМАНУ „УЖАС ПРАЗНИНЕ“ ПЕТЕРА ХАНДКЕА
THE MOTHER’S FIGURE IN PETER HANDKE’S NOVEL A "SORROW BEYOND DREAMS"

Author(s): Nataša M. Cicvarić
Subject(s): History, Social Sciences, Language and Literature Studies, Psychology, Studies of Literature, Recent History (1900 till today), German Literature, Psychoanalysis, WW II and following years (1940 - 1949)
Published by: Универзитет у Крагујевцу
Keywords: Peter Handke;A Sorrow Beyond Dreams;suicide;trauma;Second World War;psychoanalysis

Summary/Abstract: Peter Handke is a multi-award winning Austrian author, one of the most famous authors in German language; the writer who has a great influence on contemporary world literature. In this work the attention is on the novel A Sorrow Beyond Dreams (1972), that is the mother’s figure as a central charachter in the novel. The aim of this paper is also the analysis of traumatic experience in mother’s life in the novel A Sorrow Beyond Dreams. Thematic concepts were observed and realized through the mother’s figure and some histrorical and socio-political circumstances that led to the mother’s suicide are highlighted. In that context the cyclic structure of the novel is noticed. That structure is framed by birth and death motives. The main coclusions are concered with the cause of the mother’s suicide which was interpreted in two ways: as a resignation or an attempt of resistance. Repression of emotions that is repressively imposed is portraid on mother’s body, so the body is interpreted as the text itself which severs us to understand her trauma. These traumas were connected with the consequences of the Second World War and interpreted in the context of Freud’s psychoanalysis.

  • Issue Year: XXII/2021
  • Issue No: 76
  • Page Range: 181-193
  • Page Count: 13
  • Language: Serbian