Fantazmaty dziecięce w prozie autobiograficznej José Mauro de Vasconcelosa

Abstract

The article discusses a trilogy of the author’s autobiographical works encompassing My sweet orange tree, Let’s light the sun up and At the crossroads. These works can be seen as phantasmal stories for children and youth, which are based on author’s memories from childhood, significantly embedded in phantasmata that he has created as a child. An important feature is presenting childhood from the perspective of a child who becomes the imagining subject. This image of a childhood thus becomes rich in depictions stemming from fairy tales. Deciphering meanings of these depictions allows to underscore their cathartic character. The child’s experiences of transitional moments is here purposefully embedded in the sphere of compensatory projections. It is in his autobiographical prose that Vasconcelos therefore not only recreates the events that has shaped them, but first and foremost explores the sphere of children’s phantasm as an example of child’s magical thinking about the world and the self. These thoughts direct a child towards significant, though often tragic reflections.

Keywords

• Autobiography
• autobiographical writing
• child
• phantasm
• dream