Herman and Arich-Gerz: Darstellungen von Dora

[jbor at bigpond.com]

'Darstellungen von Dora' by Luc Herman and Bruno Arich-Gerz. 
_Arcadia_ 39.2. Berlin, 2004,  pp. 390-409.

Abstract
The literature on representing the concentration camp complex of 
Mittelbau-Dora and the adjacent underground rocket factory Mittelwerke 
is so large that comprehensive approaches to the topic need a broad 
methodological framework. We propose a model that distinguishes between 
fictional, historiographical, and what we tentatively term 
"traumatographical" modes of writing on the subject. Focusing on the 
Dora-related passages in Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow (1973), we 
show that privileging one of these modes at the cost of the others 
leads to a one-sided depiction of the historical referent. Every 
individual representation should therefore situate itself in relation 
to the other two modes of representation.

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