Verbalizarea ca act performativ. Lumea „la feminin” sau „libertatea trăită pe propria piele” în Omul de la fereastră de Alexandru Vlad
Verbalization as a Performative Act. The “Feminine” World or “Freedom Experienced Firsthand” in The Man at the Window by Alexandru Vlad

Summary/Abstract: After reconfiguring the world according to Adam’s vision, I now offer an analysis of Monica’s perspective, without which the map of individualities – shaped at the intersection of past and present, communism and democracy, oppression and freedom – would remain incomplete. Female memory does not preserve the nuances of an idyllic childhood, which, when filtered through a mystifying lens as in Adam’s case, contradicts the monstrosity of the system. Nor does it establish clear boundaries between communism and post-communism, because the past and present have become inextricably linked through a devastating process of entanglement. What we are discussing here is a present of being that no longer recovers the past as a life lesson or a memory of the future but instead relives the nightmare. It is burdened with frustration and resentment, rejecting the possibility of purification. In this insectarium-like world, various human “specimens” are pinned and analyzed with horror and grim detail. The epic dissolves into description, an accounting of individual obsessions and an examination of different mentalities under the magnifying glass. Human degradation is also viewed here as a progressive mechanism that does not cease with the fall of communism. The redefinition of identity becomes a painful exercise in (re)visualizing trauma, leading to suffering, an awareness of existential emptiness, an intuition of individual and collective “sin,” or the acceptance of false happiness as part of the new normal.

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