La perte de l’origine comme fondement des poétiques modernes de la mémoire

Abstract

The ancient and classical tradition assume the memoria , which reproduces a stable and hierarchical order, able to base the exemplary and topical value of stories. This “onto-theological” model (Kant) is radically overthrown by the one that prevails in modernity — since the end of the eighteenth cen-tury: forgetting the metaphysical foundation is becoming a paradoxical matrix of memory. Discontinuity becomes the condition of our relation to the past, which can no longer be sus-tained on an identifiable origin, but must be invented. Modern literature becomes a question of ignorance, and is condemned to construct optimistic (Novalis, Michon, Perec) or pessimistic (Senan-cour, Tieck, Conrad) answers to this question.