I stället för en annan: Minnesplatser och vittnesretorik i Göran Rosenbergs Ett kort uppehåll på vägen från Auschwitz

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Abstract

In the Stead of Another: Memory Places and the Rhetoric of Witnessing in Göran Rosenberg’s A Brief Stop on the Road from Auschwitz (I stället för en annan. Minnesplatser och vittnesretorik i Göran Rosenbergs Ett kort uppehåll på vägen från Auschwitz)

As the last witnesses of the Nazi genocide disappear, the question of who can speak in their stead about the horrors of the Holocaust surfaces with renewed urgency. In this article I study a mode of testimony that consists in the act of bearing witness to another person’s suffering. By elucidating the role of place in the memoir of the son of a Holocaust survivor — Göran Rosenberg’s A Brief Stop on the Road from Auschwitz (2012) — I show how the text invites the reader to approach the trauma of the author’s father at different geographical locations. The rhetorical address of the text thereby gives shape to a community of vicarious witnesses that can attend to victims of the Holocaust beyond the ideal of immediate empathetic involvement.
Original languageSwedish
Pages (from-to)83-103
Number of pages21
JournalSamlaren
Volume143
Publication statusPublished - 2023

Subject classification (UKÄ)

  • Specific Literatures

Free keywords

  • Holocaust
  • witnessing
  • memory studies

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