Artistic self-reflexivity in Strindberg and Bergman
Document Type
Journal article
Source Publication
TijdSchrift voor Skandinavistiek
Publication Date
1999
Volume
20
Issue
1
First Page
35
Last Page
44
Abstract
In an essay first published in 1959, Roland Barthes declared that modern literature had become “a mask pointing to itself ”.1 Barthes described this self-reflexivity as an anxious, even tragic condition, a tortured process in which literature divides itself into the two logically distinct, yet inter-related levels of object-language and meta-language. Asking itself continually the single, self-absorbing question of its own identity, literature becomes a meta-language and thereby ceases to be an object-language capable of depicting or describing anything other than itself. “It follows”, Barthes proclaims, that “for over one hundred years our literature has played a dangerous game with its own death, or in other words, with a manner of living through its own death”. Barthes conjectures in passing that this perpetual self-questioning began with the bourgeoisie’s loss of its bonne conscience. Literature’s self-reflexive turn has resulted in a variety of fascinating writerly strategies, but has also had the global effect of precluding the emergence of a literature of action and engagement. Ceasing to ask: ‘What is to be done?’, the artist can only utter the words: ‘Who am I?’
Print ISSN
01682148
Publisher Statement
Copyright © TijdSchrift voor Skandinavistiek
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Full-text Version
Accepted Author Manuscript
Language
English
Recommended Citation
Livingston, P. (1999). Artistic self-reflexivity in Strindberg and Bergman. Tijdschrift voor Skandinavistiek. 19(1), 35-44.