Image & Narrative (Jun 2010)

"Oh no, not again": representability and a repetitive remark

  • Matt Tierney

Journal volume & issue
Vol. 11, no. 2
pp. 150 – 164

Abstract

Read online

<div style="border-bottom: windowtext 1pt dotted; border-left: medium none; padding-bottom: 31pt; padding-left: 0cm; padding-right: 0cm; border-top: medium none; border-right: medium none; padding-top: 0cm; mso-element: para-border-div; mso-border-bottom-alt: dotted windowtext .75pt;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 115%; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt; mso-border-bottom-alt: dotted windowtext .75pt; mso-padding-alt: 0cm 0cm 31.0pt 0cm; padding: 0cm;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span lang="EN-US">Abstract (E):</span></strong><span lang="EN-US"> In their most repetitive moments, literature and film can help us respond to common critical assumptions about the temporality of trauma. Rather than posit trauma's latency, anteriority, or unrepresentability, I raise questions about its obviousness, interchangeability, and cliché. Moving past trauma theory, and into general questions about repetition and representation, I therefore turn to a phrase that has often been repeated in texts across a range of forms and genres: "Oh no, not again!"</span></span></span></p></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; line-height: 115%; margin: 0cm 0cm 0pt;"><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></span></p><strong style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: ";Times New Roman";,";serif";; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: FR; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;" lang="FR">Abstract (F):</span></strong><span style="font-family: ";Times New Roman";,";serif";; font-size: 12pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: FR; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;" lang="FR"> Lorsqu’ils se font intensément répétitifs, cinéma et littérature<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>peuvent nous aider à revoir certaines hypothèses sur la temporalité du trauma. Plutôt que de revenir une fois de plus sur la latence, l’antériorité ou la non-représentabilité du trauma, je voudrais me pencher plutôt sur son caractère évident, interchangeable, stéréotypé. Afin de dépasser les théories existantes et poser de nouvelles questions sur les phénomènes de répétition et de représentation traumatiques, je voudrais pour cela examiner ici plus en détail une phrase qu’on n’a cessé de répéter dans une grande diversité de formes et de genres : « Oh non, pas encore ! ».<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" /><br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" /></span>

Keywords