Description
Book SynopsisIn the face of strong moral and aesthetic pressure to deal with the Holocaust in strictly historical and documentary modes, this book discusses why and how reenactment of the Holocaust in art and imaginative literature can be successful in simultaneously presenting, analyzing, and working through this apocalyptic moment in human history.
In pursuing his argument, the author explores such diverse materials and themes as: the testimonies of Holocaust survivors; the works of such artists and writers as Charlotte Salomon, Christian Boltanski, and Armando; and the question of what it means to live in a house built by a jew who was later transported to the death camps. He shows that reenactment, as an artistic project, also functions as a critical strategy, one that, unlike historical methods requiring a mediator, speaks directly to us and lures us into the Holocaust.
We are then placed in the position of experiencing and being the subjects of that history. We are there, and
Trade Review
"Caught by History is a finely balanced, scholarly narrative of van Alphen's encounters with Holocaust literature, testimony, and art. It brings to our attention little-known artists, and tackles convincingly the bothersome issue of the validity of art in the face of catastrophe, and particularly this catastrophe." -- Geoffrey Hartman * Yale University. *
Table of Contents
Introduction: caught by history: how this book came about; 1. History's other: oppositional thought and its discontents; Part I. 2. The seduction of directness; 2. Testimonies and the limits of representation; 3. Autobiography as resistance to history: Charlotte Salamon's 'Life or Theatre?'; Part II. The Historical Approach to Memory, With a Difference: 4. Deadly historians: Christian Boltanski's intervention in Holocaust historiography; 5. Touching Death: Armando's quest for an indexical language; Part III. The Imaginative Approach to Memory: 6. The revivifying artist: Christian Boltanski's efforts to close the gap; 7. A master of amazement: Armando's self-chosen exile; Part IV. Giving Memory a Place: 8. Sublimity in the home: overcoming uncanniness; Notes; Works Cited; Index.
