Literature as salvation?
Literature as salvation; Critique of ideology; Literary criticism.
This thesis consists in a critique of the ideology of literature as salvation in order to demonstrate what it consists of, its assumptions, implications, and how it manifests in the literary field. In Chapter I, some of the roots of the ideology of literature as salvation in Western culture are discussed, as well as its organization in the literary field. In Chapter II, an analysis of the novel Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury is presented. The aim throughout this chapter is to problematize how the ideology of literature as salvation is materialized in this novel. Next, in Chapter III, it is studied the novel The Reader by Bernard Schlink. In this novel, the paradigm of salvation confronts the problem of evil and, ideologically, emerges victorious, seemingly disregarding all evidence to the contrary. If in Fahrenheit 451, evil was practiced by those who distanced themselves from books, in The Reader, the problem is formulated in the opposite direction, questioning the limits and potentialities of literature in relation to the practice of evil. Lastly, in Chapter IV, the manifestation of the ideology of literature as salvation in the context of literature produced in concentration and extermination camps, as well as about them, is discussed. Focusing on the analysis of the works If This Is a Man by Primo Levi, a critique is presented of the interpretive paradigm that primarily sees this literature as "spiritual resistance.