LEADER 03659cam a2200385Ia 4500001 41623 005 20240621144519.0 008 000214s1996 xx r 000 0 eng d 035 (OCoLC)ocm43451831 035 41623 049 LHMA 040 LHM |beng |erda |cLHM 090 PQ4872.E8 |bZ5859 1996 100 1 Gold, Eva. 245 10 Science and the creation of objective testimony in the Holocaust works of Primo Levi / |cby Eva Gold. 250 Thesis (Ph.D.)--New York University, 1996. 264 1 1996. 300 xii, 214 pages 336 text |btxt |2rdacontent 337 unmediated |bn |2rdamedia 338 volume |bnc |2rdacarrier 504 Includes bibliographical references (pages 200-214). 520 This dissertation focuses on the Holocaust works of Italian author and Auschwitz survivor Primo Levi and the narrative strategies he employed to construct an account of his imprisonment in Auschwitz that would be received as purely factual. Levi's attempts to seem the rational scientist who merely recorded his experiences have been successful, as he earned the reputation as an objective, unemotional witness to the atrocities of the Holocaust. Yet there is a fundamental paradox in this approach to narration: all testimony to trauma is innately subjective, and therefore a perfectly objective reportage of the facts is virtually impossible for a Holocaust survivor to produce. Chapter one examines Levi's Se questo e un uomo, I sommersi e i salvati, and various short stories against the background of contemporary studies of the questions of trauma and survival in Holocaust testimonies. It focuses on Levi's strategic construction of himself as capable of scientific objectivity. In addition, building on contemporary works on trauma and the problematics of witnessing, it examines the ways in which Levi's work had to be carefully constructed in order to achieve his goal. Chapter two treats the role of language in Levi's opus: the author's own manipulation of the written word as well as his reflections on the possibility of and impact of communicability within the world of the Nazi Lager. It also deals with the Lager jargon born in the camps, as well as the violence done to language during the war and the repercussions of this violence in the subsequent literary production. Chapter three examines the issues of survivor's guilt and shame in Levi's works and discusses the ways in which, despite his "enrollment among the saved", Levi did not renounce his dignity or integrity. Chapter four illustrates that throughout Levi's writing for the Italian newspaper "La Stampa", as well as in his novels Il sistema periodico, La chiave a stella, and various short stories contained in Lilit e altri racconti and L'altrui mestiere, he consistently addressed these topics, as if seeking to convince the reader of his moral standing as a person and reliability as a narrator. 530 Electronic version(s) |bavailable internally at USHMM. 533 Photocopy. |bAnn Arbor, Mich. : |cUMI Dissertation Services, |d1997. |e22 cm. 590 Dissertations and Theses 591 Record updated by Marcive processing 21 June 2024 600 10 Levi, Primo, |d1919-1987 |xCriticism and interpretation. 650 0 Holocaust, Jewish (1939-1945), in literature. 856 41 |uhttp://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?did=739326451&sid=16&Fmt=6&clientId=54617&RQT=309&VName=PQD |zElectronic version from ProQuest 956 41 |u http://dc.ushmm.org/library/bib41623/9702019.pdf |z Hosted by USHMM. 994 E0 |bLHM 852 0 |bstacks |hPQ4872.E8 |iZ5859 1996 852 |bwww 852 |bebook