Helena Duffy - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Helena Duffy

The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action... more The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) of the European Union’s research and innovation program Horizon 2020, under grant agreement number 654786. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis [Dapim: Studies on the Holocaust] available on https://doi.org/10.1080/23256249.2018.1432254.

The article examines Yannick Haenel’s novel Jan Karski (2010) as an act of metawitnessing, a term coined by Derrida in relation to Celan’s poetry and applicable to the philosopher’s own readings of the Judeo–Romanian poet’s work. Contrary to secondary witnessing, metawitnessing is the act of testifying on behalf of a witness, which is underpinned by a self-reflective meditation upon the mutually contradictory necessity and impossibility of bearing witness. Consequently, the article discusses Haenel’s both awareness of his project’s morally risky nature and ambition to offer a broader reflection upon the figure of the witness. Guided by the novel’s epigraph—“Who bears witness for the witness?”—, which paraphrases the closing stanza of Celan’s poem “Aschenglorie,” the analysis moves on to Haenel’s handling of the aporia voiced by the poem and materialized as the urge to testify to what is often felt to be unrepresentable for the absence of the absolute witnesses. Finally, drawing on Dan Stone’s considerations upon the tension between Holocaust testimony and historiography, the article posists Jan Karski as an apology of testimony, even if testimony should be—oxymoronically—a work of imagination. For, unlike history proper, eyewitness accounts can voice trauma, and can therefore testify to a differend, as Lyotard terms a situation in which victims have no means of expressing the injustice they have suffered. According to Lyotard, it is the postmodern writer’s duty to seek new artistic means to articulate the victims’ wrongs, without, however, trying to resolve the differend or substitute for those s/he is representing. The article concludes with an attempt to assess whether Haenel’s novel has done further violence to the memory of Karski and the cause he championed, or, conversely, thanks to its unconventional form, is an ethically sound testimony to the wrongs inflicted upon the Jews and their advocate.

The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action... more The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) of the European Union’s research and innovation program Horizon 2020, under grant agreement number 654786. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis [Holocaust Studies] available on https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2018.1468669

This article examines Philippe Claudel’s 2007 novel Brodeck (French title: Le Rapport de Brodeck) that allegorizes the Holocaust by parodying tropes and narrative structures characteristic to fairy tales and fables. While analyzing the author’s simultaneous inscription and subversion of the two ancient genres, I speculate about the possible reasons for his narrative choices and consider the meanings generated by his indirect representation of the Nazi genocide. Considering the widespread view of the Holocaust as sacred and unique, the article problematizes the novel’s universalization of the Jewish tragedy, which Claudel achieves by drawing on genres shunning historical and geographical specificity, and aiming to convey timeless and universal truths.
Keywords: Holocaust; Philippe Claudel; fable; fairy tale; parody; animal rights

The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action... more The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) of the European Union’s research and innovation program Horizon 2020, under grant agreement number 654786. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis [Dapim: Studies on the Holocaust] available on https://doi.org/10.1080/23256249.2018.1432254.

The article examines Yannick Haenel’s novel Jan Karski (2010) as an act of metawitnessing, a term coined by Derrida in relation to Celan’s poetry and applicable to the philosopher’s own readings of the Judeo–Romanian poet’s work. Contrary to secondary witnessing, metawitnessing is the act of testifying on behalf of a witness, which is underpinned by a self-reflective meditation upon the mutually contradictory necessity and impossibility of bearing witness. Consequently, the article discusses Haenel’s both awareness of his project’s morally risky nature and ambition to offer a broader reflection upon the figure of the witness. Guided by the novel’s epigraph—“Who bears witness for the witness?”—, which paraphrases the closing stanza of Celan’s poem “Aschenglorie,” the analysis moves on to Haenel’s handling of the aporia voiced by the poem and materialized as the urge to testify to what is often felt to be unrepresentable for the absence of the absolute witnesses. Finally, drawing on Dan Stone’s considerations upon the tension between Holocaust testimony and historiography, the article posists Jan Karski as an apology of testimony, even if testimony should be—oxymoronically—a work of imagination. For, unlike history proper, eyewitness accounts can voice trauma, and can therefore testify to a differend, as Lyotard terms a situation in which victims have no means of expressing the injustice they have suffered. According to Lyotard, it is the postmodern writer’s duty to seek new artistic means to articulate the victims’ wrongs, without, however, trying to resolve the differend or substitute for those s/he is representing. The article concludes with an attempt to assess whether Haenel’s novel has done further violence to the memory of Karski and the cause he championed, or, conversely, thanks to its unconventional form, is an ethically sound testimony to the wrongs inflicted upon the Jews and their advocate.

The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action... more The research leading to these results has received funding from the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) of the European Union’s research and innovation program Horizon 2020, under grant agreement number 654786. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis [Holocaust Studies] available on https://doi.org/10.1080/17504902.2018.1468669

This article examines Philippe Claudel’s 2007 novel Brodeck (French title: Le Rapport de Brodeck) that allegorizes the Holocaust by parodying tropes and narrative structures characteristic to fairy tales and fables. While analyzing the author’s simultaneous inscription and subversion of the two ancient genres, I speculate about the possible reasons for his narrative choices and consider the meanings generated by his indirect representation of the Nazi genocide. Considering the widespread view of the Holocaust as sacred and unique, the article problematizes the novel’s universalization of the Jewish tragedy, which Claudel achieves by drawing on genres shunning historical and geographical specificity, and aiming to convey timeless and universal truths.
Keywords: Holocaust; Philippe Claudel; fable; fairy tale; parody; animal rights