Polyphonic Autofiction and Authorship in Tatiana Salem Levy’s A chave de casa

Abstract

This article seeks to analyze Brazilian author Tatiana Salem Levy’s debut novel A chave de casa (2007) as a dialogical autofiction. I show how Salem Levy’s interventions in the genres of autobiographical and autofiction writing provide a fertile terrain for the reconstruction of female subjectivities in the aftermath of both personal and collective traumas. In opposition to the historical taxonomy established by Harold Bloom regarding the Oedipal need for the male author to outwrite his literary forefathers in a metaphoric parricide, Salem Levy’s interventions in self-writing show that Gilbert and Gubar’s concept of “anxiety of authorship” experienced by female authors (such as the protagonist of A chave de casa) can be overcome through intergenerational, maternal, and filial solidarity and co-writing, rather than through a revolt against patriarchal literary authority. This article will focus on the mother-daughter relationship in order to illustrate how A chave de casa breaks with the paradigms of autofiction.