Pettitt Perpetrators in Holocaust Narratives

Encountering the Nazi Beast
1. Auflage 2017
ISBN: 978-3-319-52575-4
Verlag: Springer Nature Switzerland
Format: PDF
Kopierschutz: 1 - PDF Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 152 Seiten

Reihe: Progress in Mathematics

This study provides a comprehensive analysis of representations of Holocaust perpetrators in literature. Such texts, often rather controversially, seek to undo the myth of pure evil that surrounds the Holocaust and to reconstruct the perpetrator in more human ('banal') terms. Following this line of thought, protagonists frequently place emphasis on the contextual or situational factors that led up to the genocide. A significant consequence of this is the impact that it has on the reader, who is thereby drawn into the narrative as a potential perpetrator who could, in similar circumstances, have acted in similar ways. The tensions that this creates, especially in relation to the construction of empathy, constitutes a major focus of this work. Making use of in excess of sixty primary sources, this work explores fictional accounts of Holocaust perpetration as well as Nazi memoirs. It will be of interest to anyone working in the broad areas of Holocaust literature and/or perpetrator studies.


Joanne Pettitt is an Assistant Lecturer at the University of Kent, UK, where she teaches on a range of undergraduate modules. Her research interests include, but are not limited to, the following: literature of the Holocaust; representations of culpability; memory discourses and politics, especially relating to memories of genocide; comparative genocide studies; trauma studies; existentialism. 

Autoren/Hrsg.

Pettitt, Joanne

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1;Perpetrators in Holocaust Narratives;3
1.1;Acknowledgements;6
1.2;Contents;8
1.3;1 Introduction;10
1.3.1;Humanising Evil;13
1.3.2;Situation Perpetration;15
1.3.3;Notes;21
2;Part I On the Humanity of Nazis: Establishing (Un-)Commonality with the Reader;22
2.1;2 Nazis in Society;23
2.1.1;Homogeneity as Identity;24
2.1.2;Notes;39
2.2;3 Subverting Connections with the Reader;40
2.2.1;Alternative Values or A New Theology;40
2.2.2;Sex and Power;47
2.2.3;Ironic Culture;53
2.2.4;Conclusion;57
2.2.5;Note;58
2.3;4 Drawing the Reader into the Narrative;59
2.3.1;Constructing Common Spaces: Writing the Reader into the Narrative;63
2.3.2;Intra-Metafiction;68
2.3.3;Conclusion;74
2.3.4;Note;75
3;Part II Between the Man and the (Nazi) Symbol;76
3.1;5 Cogs in the Machine: Testimonies of Holocaust Perpetrators;78
3.1.1;Cogs in the Machine;82
3.1.2;Rudolf Höss – A Case Study;86
3.1.3;An Existential Crisis;87
3.1.4;Beneath the ‘Face’: The Claimed Morality of Rudolf Höss;91
3.1.5;Conclusion;94
3.1.6;Notes;95
3.2;6 Adolf Hitler in Fiction and Memory;97
3.2.1;Hitler the Man and Hitler the Myth;99
3.2.2;Narrative Constructions: Intertextuality and Metafiction;101
3.2.3;Mediating Hitler’s Presence;105
3.2.4;Hitler in Modern Society;108
3.2.5;Ambiguities of Genre;110
3.2.6;Alternative Histories and New Contexts;115
3.2.7;Conclusion: Catharsis in Hitler Fiction;119
3.2.8;Conclusion;122
3.2.9;Notes;123
3.3;7 Returning to the Role of the Reader;124
3.3.1;The Reader as Witness;128
3.3.2;The Ethics of Inaction: A Brief Note on Representations of Bystanders;130
3.3.3;Responding to Bystander Ambivalence in Fiction: Returning to the Reader;134
3.3.4;Narrative Empathy and Responses to Holocaust Perpetrators;136
3.3.5;Note;140
4;Bibliography;141
5;Authors and Works Index;149
6;Index;151