Autofiction and Cultural Memory

125 Pages·2022·2.281 MB·English

by  Hywel Dix

ROUTLEDGE FOCUS
AUTOFICTION AND

CULTURAL MEMORY

Hywel Dix
Focus
‘Autofiction and Cultural Memory offers an excellent overview of
recent thinking about the nature of autofiction and advances a
persuasive argument. Drawing on a varied range of sources, Dix
proposes a unique approach that will be useful for both literary
study and interdisciplinary approaches to cultural memory. This is
a key text for both experts and new scholars.’
Professor Timothy C. Baker, University of Aberdeen
‘Reversing the polarity of autofiction from individual to society,
Hywel Dix’s Autofiction and Cultural Memory shows how a form
once understood to be concerned with the self becomes a way of
telling collective stories and broadening cultural memory for
contemporary writers from postcolonial cultures.’
James Harker, Bard College Berlin

Autofiction and Cultural Memory
Autofiction and Cultural Memory breaks new ground in autofiction
research by showing how it gives postcolonial writers a means of
bearing witness to past cultural or political struggles, and hence of
contributing to new forms of cultural memory.
Most discussion of autofiction has treated it as an individualistic
form, dealing with the personal growth of its authors. In doing so, it
privileges narratives of private development over those of social
commitment and accords with Western concepts of ownership and
authorship. By contrast, Hywel Dix shows how a variety of writers
outside the Western world have used the techniques of autofiction in a
different way, placing themselves on the side lines of their own stories
to show solidarity with struggles against imperialism and tyranny.
Drawing on examples from Algeria, Ethiopia, the Caribbean, the
Americas, India and Turkey, Dix presents autofiction as a form which
combines the life stories of authors with the collective struggles of
their societies to restore to view historical injustices that have been
marginalised and forgotten. By contributing to new forms of cultural
memory, autofiction raises important questions about what we choose
to remember and what we value in the present. This book will be of
interest to anyone working in postcolonial studies, world literature,
trauma studies, autobiography, life writing or social justice.
Hywel Dix is Professor of English at Bournemouth University. His
research interests include modern and contemporary literature, critical
cultural theory, authorial careers and autofiction. His publications
include The Late-Career Novelist (2017) and Autofiction in English (2018).
New Literary Theory
Series editors: Andy Mousley and Jeff Wallace
Just Literature
Philosophical Criticism and Justice
Tzachi Zamir
Happiness
Jeffrey R. Di Leo
Philosophy and the Art of Writing
Richard Shusterman
Autofiction and Cultural Memory
Hywel Dix
For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/
New-Literary-Theory/book-series/NLTH
Autofiction and Cultural
Memory
Hywel Dix
First published 2023
by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
and by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an
informa business
© 2023 Hywel Dix
The right of Hywel Dix to be identified as author of this work
has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or
reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic,
mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from
the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be
trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for
identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British
Library
ISBN: 978-1-032-32223-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-32226-1 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-31346-5 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003313465
Typeset in Times New Roman
by MPS Limited, Dehradun
For my mother, Lesley Dix. I’m very proud to be your son.

Contents
Series Preface x
Acknowledgements xii
Introduction 1
1 On Autofiction and Cultural Memory 4
2 How the Author Became: Precursors and
Preludes 23
3 The Author as Minor Character: Alternative
Perspectives 48
4 The Poetics of Exile and Return 67
5 Autofiction Once, Twice, Three Times Removed 80
Conclusion 101
References 104
Index 110