Canetti, Elias | Sigurd Paul Scheichl (essay date 1992)
Sigurd Paul Scheichl (essay date 1992)
SOURCE: Scheichl, Sigurd Paul. “Is Peter Kien a Jew? A Reading of Elias Canetti's Auto-da-fé in its Historical Context.1” In The Jewish Self-Portrait in European and American Literature, edited by Hans Jürgen Schrader, Elliott M. Simon, and Charlotte Wardi, pp. 159-70. Tübingen, Germany: Max Niemeyer Verlag, 1996.
[In the following essay, originally read at the universities of Poznan and Coimbra in 1992, Scheichl examines historical events in Canetti's lifetime that appear, literally or representatively, in Auto da fé.]
The English title of Elias Canetti's only novel, Auto-da-fé (1935, finished in 1931)2 refers to the end of the book, when the protagonist burns himself and his library. The German title, Die Blendung, “The Blinding”, refers to something quite different: to the loss of the central character's ability to see reality, but also to...
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