‘Dissidence’ in Holocaust Memorials in Literature: Jáchym Topol’s The Devil ’ s Workshop ( Chladnou zemí ).

Established Czech precedent has made the town of Terezín an important literary symbol of Holocaust memory, used in the 1960s to construct myths of Czech innocent victimhood. Jáchym Topol’s novel,The Devil’s Workshop(2009), returns to the theme with great originality, avoiding such myths by using a c...

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Publicado en:Central Europe Vol. 13; no. 1/2; pp. 87 - 103
Autor principal: Chew, Geoffrey
Formato: Essay
Publicado: Taylor & Francis Ltd Nov2015
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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        atl: ‘Dissidence’ in Holocaust Memorials in Literature: Jáchym Topol’s The Devil ’ s Workshop ( Chladnou zemí ).
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        au: Chew, Geoffrey
        affil: Royal Holloway, University of London, UK
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        Devil's Workshop, The (Book)
        Topol, Jáchym, 1962-
        Adorno, Theodor W., 1903-1969
        Holocaust memorials
        Memorials in literature
        Czech literature
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          Devil's Workshop, The (Book)
          Topol, Jáchym, 1962-
          Adorno, Theodor W., 1903-1969
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        Belarus
        Benedict Anderson
        committed literature
        ethics in literature
        Holocaust literature
        Jáchym Topol
        Jáchym Topol
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        Theresienstadt
        Timothy Snyder
        video games in literature
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        Benedict Anderson
        committed literature
        ethics in literature
        Holocaust literature
        Jáchym Topol
        Jáchym Topol
        Katyń
        Katyń
        Khatyn’
        Khatyn'
        memory in literature
        museumization
        Terezín
        Terezín
        Theodor Adorno
        Theresienstadt
        Timothy Snyder
        video games in literature
      ab: Established Czech precedent has made the town of Terezín an important literary symbol of Holocaust memory, used in the 1960s to construct myths of Czech innocent victimhood. Jáchym Topol’s novel,The Devil’s Workshop(2009), returns to the theme with great originality, avoiding such myths by using a compromised first-person Czech narrator, who is involved in setting up ‘dissident’ commemorative museums at Terezín and in Belarus. These draw on documented accounts of real atrocities for their authenticity. Competitive in national terms, commercialized, and ethically compromised, they are finally, arguably inevitably, silenced. Topol’s ‘truth-telling’ is discussed in the context of Theodor W. Adorno’s criticism of committed Holocaust literature, Benedict Anderson’s interpretation of museums as commercialized constructions of nationality, and Timothy Snyder’s historical account of the killings in Eastern Europe; the ambiguous pessimism of his novel stands up well to criticism and, it is argued, has lessons even for historians of the Holocaust.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Essay
      src: R
    language: English
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