Jacques Austerlitz, the eponymous character of W.G. Sebald’s Austerlitz, displays many of the characteristic signs of a traumatized subject: he is sensitive to the suffering and captivity of others, he continually experiences uncanny feelings in his surroundings, his perception of time is fractured, and he finds himself following inexplicable inner compulsions. All these aspects of trauma are reflected in his perception of the architectural structures and landscapes that he studies. In fact, as Austerlitz recounts his life, it becomes apparent that his obsession with the structures of architecture and their significance is ultimately an obsession with repressed memory. While Austerlitz’s initial perception of architectural sites is inextricably …show more content…
Initially, Austerlitz claims, it had “never occurred to [him] to wonder about [his] true origins” (125), despite the fact that as a young student he had discovered his birth name was Jacques Austerlitz and not Dafydd Elias. The recovery of lost memory becomes an obsession replacing the perpetual accumulation of architectural knowledge, which, he explains, “served as a substitute for compensatory memory” (140). The layers of history which he uncovers at each architectural site, and the eventual ruination of the buildings he studies, speak of his connection with disaster and trauma that point towards the history of the Holocaust, a history which he refuses to acknowledge, but which is undeniably his. Austerlitz, before learning of his history and journey on the kindertransport, studies a certain time period and avoids all knowledge of both the history and landscape of Germany, seeking to repress his suspicions about his history. However, he can no longer continue to deny the truth of his past, “I realized…how little practice I had in using my memory, and...always have tried to recollect as little as possible, avoiding everything, which related in any way to my unknown past…I was always refining my defensive reactions, creating a...quarantine or immune system which…protected me from anything that could be connected in any way, however distant, with my own early history.” (139-140) Although Austerlitz has avoided all knowledge of the history of the twentieth century, and that of Germany in particular, the buildings that he studies point towards both their own ruination and the destruction of the society that built them. Therefore, in his encounters with these buildings, Austerlitz is faced with their narratives of the historical devastation he seeks to avoid.
Mark Baker’s ‘The Fiftieth Gate’ creates a struggle between memory and history as each represents the Holocaust but through different means of representation. The language of memory is partial, subjective, and emotional and experiences confusion and doubts. Baker provides the historical facts of the Aktions and slave-labour camps in historian terms, that of numbers of deaths, survivors and prisoners, and is criticised by his parents. “Fecks, fecks” Joe says dismissively and Genia describes his work as “shopping lists”. This demonstrates how Baker believed his parents’ pasts were represented through history, and Joe and Genia felt their experiences were represen...
The tragedies of the holocaust forever altered history. One of the most detailed accounts of the horrific events from the Nazi regime comes from Elie Wiesel’s Night. He describes his traumatic experiences in German concentration camps, mainly Buchenwald, and engages his readers from a victim’s point of view. He bravely shares the grotesque visions that are permanently ingrained in his mind. His autobiography gives readers vivid, unforgettable, and shocking images of the past. It is beneficial that Wiesel published this, if he had not the world might not have known the extent of the Nazis reign. He exposes the cruelty of man, and the misuse of power. Through a lifetime of tragedy, Elie Wiesel struggled internally to resurrect his religious beliefs as well as his hatred for the human race. He shares these emotions to the world through Night.
Elizer’s personal account of the holocaust does not merely highlight the facts of the holocaust: millions suffered and the event was politically and religiously motivated, but provides an in depth investigation to what a person endured mentally, physically, and emotionally. Beginning as a teenager, Elizer thought highly of God and of his own beliefs, however, that quickly diminished when he was put into a system of sorting and killing people. During the holocaust, Elizer was not the only person to change; almost everyone suffered and changed differently. The stressful and harsh times affected Elizer just as they affected the person working next to him in the factory. Elizer quickly began to question everything “I pinched myself: Was I still alive? Was I awake? How was it possible that men, women, and children were being burned and that the world kept silent?” (Wiesel 32). Although Elizer forms this mentality, he also finds the will to survive, to protect his father, and to not turn into the people that were aro...
Since the publication of, Night by Eliezer Wiesel, the holocaust has been deemed one of the darkest times in humanity, from the eradication of Jewish people to killing of innocents. Wiesel was one of the Jewish people to be in the holocaust and from his experience he gave us a memoir that manages to capture the dark side of human nature in the holocaust. He demonstrates the dark side of human nature through the cruelty the guards treat the Jews and how the Jews became cold hearted to each other. Wiesel uses foreshadowing and imagery, and metaphors to describe these events.
In Night, Elie Wiesel descriptively portrays the Holocaust and the experiences he has in each part of his survival. From the ghettos to the Death March and liberation, Elie Wiesel shares his story of sadness and suffering. Specifically Wiesel speaks about his short experience in the Sighet ghetto, a historically accurate recount illustrating the poor living conditions, the Judenrat and Jewish life in the ghetto as well as the design and purpose of the two Sighet ghettos. Wiesel’s description of the Sighet ghettos demonstrates the similar characteristics between the Sighet ghetto and other ghettos in Germany and in German-annexed territories.
Under the orders of her husband, the narrator is moved to a house far from society in the country, where she is locked into an upstairs room. This environment serves not as an inspiration for mental health, but as an element of repression. The locked door and barred windows serve to physically restrain her: “the windows are barred for little children, and there are rings and things in the walls.” The narrator is affected not only by the physical restraints but also by being exposed to the room’s yellow wallpaper which is dreadful and fosters only negative creativity. “It is dull enough to confuse the eye in following, pronounced enough to constantly irritate and provoke study, and when you follow the lame uncertain curves for a little distance they suddenly commit suicide – plunge off at outrageous angles, destroy themselves in unheard of contradictions.”
Authors sometimes refer to their past experiences to help cope with the exposure to these traumatic events. In his novel Night, Elie Wiesel recalls the devastating and horrendous events of the Holocaust, one of the world’s highest points for man’s inhumanity towards man, brutality, and cruel treatment, specifically towards the Jewish Religion. His account takes place from 1944-1945 in Germany while beginning at the height of the Holocaust and ending with the last years of World War II. The reader will discover through this novel that cruelty is exemplified all throughout Wiesel's, along with the other nine million Jews’, experiences in the inhumane concentration camps that are sometimes referred to as “death factories.”
“As a writer of fiction Böll was interpreting history, creating patterns of meaning, ordering his material to enable his reader to make sense of it.” The experiences of Böll and his values that arose from these events have been influential on the content and themes of Böll’s novel, The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum. Böll experienced both the first and second world wars and the effects that these wars had on German society. Events such as the economic collapse in Germany post WWII, the construction of the Berlin Wall, the rise of student based urban terrorism in West Germany in the 1970’s and the increasing state controls to contain such alleged threats can be seen to influence the issues explored in The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum. The novel is a comment on the press and the law, the labyrinth of social truth, the collision of fact and fiction and the power of language. Böll himself experienced the press first hand and this along with the experiences of Professor Bruckner, form the basis of his criticism directed at the powerful and hegemonic structures in society, in particular in relation to the police and the press and their corrupt relationship in the novella. Many of Heinrich Böll s views and attitudes, resulting form his context, are clearly visible in the novella through the portrayal of certain characters in positive or negative lights. The historical, social, economic and political context of Böll and West Germany at this time (1900’s) had a considerable effect on the issues Böll delves into in The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum and greatly affected my understanding of the novel.
Using the quote by Habermas as a starting point, select up to two buildings designed in the twentieth century and examine what ‘sudden, shocking encounters’ they have encountered, or created. Analyse the building’s meanings as a demonstration of an avant-garde, or potentially arriere-garde, position.
Many themes exist in Night, Elie Wiesel’s nightmarish story of his Holocaust experience. From normal life in a small town to physical abuse in concentration camps, Night chronicles the journey of Wiesel’s teenage years. Neither Wiesel nor any of the Jews in Sighet could have imagined the horrors that would befall them as their lives changed under the Nazi regime. The Jews all lived peaceful, civilized lives before the German occupation. Eliezer Wiesel was concerned with mysticism and his father was “more involved with the welfare of others than with that of his own kin” (4).
At first glance, Night, by Eliezer Wiesel does not seem to be an example of deep or emotionally complex literature. It is a tiny book, one hundred pages at the most with a lot of dialogue and short choppy sentences. But in this memoir, Wiesel strings along the events that took him through the Holocaust until they form one of the most riveting, shocking, and grimly realistic tales ever told of history’s most famous horror story. In Night, Wiesel reveals the intense impact that concentration camps had on his life, not through grisly details but in correlation with his lost faith in God and the human conscience.
The brutality the Germans displayed in the 1930s through the 1940s was utterly horrifying. In the novel Night by Elie Wiesel, the author’s harrowing experience is shared. The Holocaust is worldly known as being one of the largest genocides in history, but not many truly understand what it was like to live through and witness. A lot of people had their life taken away whether figuratively or literally and many discovered so much loss that they became unphased by it after a while. Many who encountered the cruelty and merciless of the Germans have passed but a few remain that live to tell their story to the world and try to explain the feelings that coursed through them during the genocide and even now. Wiesel, who lived in Auschwitz for
Philippe Petit changed numerous peoples’ thoughts about the Twin Towers when he performed his high wire walk between them in 1974. Before Philippe Petit walked the high wire between the Twin Towers in 1974, people weren’t certain how they felt about the construction of the World Trade Center. After Philippe performed, people began to warm up to the idea of the towers. Philippe Petit walked the high wire between the Twin Towers on August 7, 1974. This event prompted Andrew McMahon to write the song “Platform Fire” about this event for his band, Jack’s Mannequin. This song was not a hit for the band; however, fans of Jack’s Mannequin seem to have a special place in their heart for it.
The poem “The action in the ghetto of Rohatyn, March 1942” by Alexander Kimel is an amazing literary work which makes the reader understand the time period of the Holocaust providing vivid details. Kimel lived in an “unclean” area called the ghetto, where people were kept away from German civilians. The poet describes and questions himself using repetition and rhetorical questions. He uses literary devices such as repetition, comparisons, similes and metaphors to illustrate the traumatizing atmosphere he was living in March 1942.
For instance, highly populous and famous cities such as Oslo, New York, Alexandria, and San Francisco hold some of the important architecture projects that have shaped individuals’ lives. Reporter David Owen, in his New Yorker article “Psychology of Space”, argues how the architecture firm Snøhetta utilizes their magic through their projects to build people’s moods, shape their relationships with cities, buildings and other individuals, and create illusions with exhilarating effects. The author’s argument is rhetorically compelling because his arrangement of ideas, selection of words, and supporting evidence maintain his public engaged in the magic of architecture and persuade anyone reading his article that architecture plays a critical role in their lives in numerous