Tidskrift för Litteraturvetenskap (Jan 2019)
"Om bödeln kunde uttrycka sig"
Abstract
”If the Executioner Could Express itself ”: Writing as Resistance and an Antifascist Practice in Mirjam Tuominen’s Besk brygd In the essay Besk brygd (”Bitter Brew”, 1947), written by the Finland-Swedish author Mirjam Tuominen, the author holds everyone responsible for the fascist violence committed by Nazi Germany, even herself. In Tuominen’s writing fascism is not an isolated political event or an external force, but rather a potential, something inherent in all interpersonal relationships. As a result, for Tuominen, antifascism as a position can never be fully realized, but rather consists of different practices aimed both in-ward, at the self, as well as outwards, toward society. One of these practices is the act of writing itself. Using Hannah Arendt’s thoughts on totalitarianism and the banality of evil in conjunction with the concept of microfascism, theorized by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, this article attempts to pinpoint how Tuominen’s practices of antifascism manifest themselves both thematically and aesthetically in ”Bitter Brew”.
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