Literary Representations of Memory: Juan Rulfo and Julio Llamazares

Within the last 25 years, “memory” has not only turned into a transversal theme in cultural studies, but also in medical science, biology, and clinical psychology. These disciplines are usually classified as neuroscience. The objective of neuroscience is to analyse the functions of the human brain. Its main focus lies on brain damage, ranging from constraints on the capacity of the individual to remember up to the temporary or entire loss of the autobiographical (episodic) memory. At the same time, research on the collective or the cultural memory has been promoted by cultural studies. As in empirical neuroscience, nowadays cultural studies consider episodic memory to be a process of permanent (re-)construction. Up to now, in Spanish-speaking countries, studies on post-dictatorial memory are shaped by the research on memory in cultural studies. Memory itself is mainly studied in the context of historic traumata. Our interdisciplinary research project, however, will analyse the literary representation of individual as well as collective memory by taking into account the research results from neuroscience and cultural studies. The project includes the critique of the construction and the functionalization of the past in literature. In the first phase of the project (2011 to 2013), we will analyse the literary representation of memory in the prose of Mexican writer Juan Rulfo and Spanish writer Julio Llamazares. Memory is an essential theme and a stimulant of the narrative process in the texts of both authors. 

The aim is to analyse the inscription of literary memory into the collective memory and, at the same time, its dissociation from official memory as it becomes manifest in anniversaries, monuments, historiography, etc. In 2012, we published the interdisciplinary volume "Culturas de la memoria. Teoría, historia y praxis simbólica".

In einer ersten, dreijährigen Projektphase ist ein Vergleich der Repräsentation von Erinnerung in der Prosa des Mexikaners Juan Rulfo und des Spaniers Julio Llamazares geplant. Erinnerung bildet in den Texten beider Autoren ein zentrales Motiv sowie Stimulanz des Erzählprozesses.

2012 ist der interdisziplinäre Sammelband "Culturas de la memoria. Teoría, historia y praxis simbólica" erschienen.