Archival Futurism in Paul Auster’s The Book of Illusions
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 8895899 |
|---|---|
| Authors | David Huebert (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2016 |
| Volume | 46 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 245-264 |
| Publication date | 2016-05-13 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Canadian Review of American Studies (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0007-7720 • E-ISSN: 1710-114X |
| Publisher | University of Toronto Press Inc. (UTPress) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.3138/cras.2015.007 |
| OpenAlex | W2385050224 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 15 |
Through a reading of Paul Auster’s 2002 novel The Book of Illusions, this article explores the archival impulse in the context of queer theorist Lee Edelman’s schematization of “reproductive futurism.” I argue that The Book of Illusions positions the archive, rather than the child, as the object of futurity and suggest that Auster explores what I term “archival futurism” through two competing visions of the archive: David Zimmer, the protagonist of The Book of Illusions, seeks to extend human life through the archive, exhibiting a pathological archive mania following the death of his family; Hector Mann, in contrast, exemplifies a queered vision of the traditional archive, rejecting futurity by destroying the archive of films he has been making for sixty-odd years. Mann ultimately overcomes the archive while Zimmer remains feverishly devoted to it
Art · Art history · Context (archaeology · Illusion · Literature · Object (grammar · Psychoanalysis · Queer · Theology · Vision · Cinema and Media Studies · Contemporary Literature and Criticism · History · Philosophy · Psychology · Themes in Literature Analysis
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |