Narrating a Valley in Max Frisch’s Der Mensch erscheint im Holozän: Material Agency, Rain, and the Geologic Past

Bibliographic Details
Title: Narrating a Valley in Max Frisch’s Der Mensch erscheint im Holozän: Material Agency, Rain, and the Geologic Past
Authors: Kiley M. Kost
Source: Humanities, Vol 10, Iss 1, p 43 (2021)
Publisher Information: MDPI AG, 2021.
Publication Year: 2021
Collection: LCC:History of scholarship and learning. The humanities
Subject Terms: material ecocriticism, rain, geology, scale, Max Frisch, Der Mensch erscheint im Holozän, History of scholarship and learning. The humanities, AZ20-999
More Details: The complex narrative composition of image and text in Max Frisch’s Der Mensch erscheint im Holozän discloses entanglements between humans and nonhuman entities that impact the narrative and that demand careful consideration. The story depicts the aging protagonist’s struggle with memory loss and his careful examination of the valley’s mountain formations in fear of a landslide. In this analysis, I show that both of these threats can be read as entangled with nonhuman agents. By focusing on the material dimension of the text, two central and related shifts occur: the background element of rain becomes foregrounded in the narrative, and the natural formations of the valley that are assumed to be static are revealed to be dynamic. These shifts lead to an interpretation of Frisch’s text focused on the impacts of rain and the temporal scale of the text’s geologic dimension. Approaching the text through the lens of material ecocriticism unveils the multiple agencies at play, decenters the human, and illustrates the embodied experience of climate change.
Document Type: article
File Description: electronic resource
Language: English
ISSN: 2076-0787
Relation: https://www.mdpi.com/2076-0787/10/1/43; https://doaj.org/toc/2076-0787
DOI: 10.3390/h10010043
Access URL: https://doaj.org/article/ad512b6ca0624c4ca0689cf779d29462
Accession Number: edsdoj.512b6ca0624c4ca0689cf779d29462
Database: Directory of Open Access Journals
More Details
ISSN:20760787
DOI:10.3390/h10010043
Published in:Humanities
Language:English