Death as a Metaphor: Friedrich Nietzsche, Roland Barthes and Alvin Kernan | ||||
| هرمس | ||||
| Volume 11, Issue 1 - Serial Number 39, January 2022, Page 91-116 PDF (496.19 K) | ||||
| Document Type: المقالة الأصلية | ||||
| DOI: 10.21608/herms.2022.285539 | ||||
 View on SCiNiTO | ||||
| Author | ||||
| Mohamed Farouk | ||||
| Department of English, Faculty of Arts, Damanhour University | ||||
| Abstract | ||||
| This paper explores the interconnections between Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), Roland Barthes (1915-1980), and Alvin Kernan (1923-2018) regarding the metaphor of death. Although the death of God, the death of the author, and the death of literature may seem disparate concepts, they are actually very closely related. They move in a linear trajectory that seems to be chronological. Madness, and perhaps insight, may be underlying the thoughts of these three critical thinkers. This is what is uncovered through analyses of their relevant texts: various works by Nietzsche, “The Death of the Author” (1968) by Barthes and The Death of Literature (1990) by Kernan. The death of God foreshadows the death of the author as the former overthrows the Absolute Author with all His Authority in the universe, paving the way for overthrowing the authority of the author over his literary text. Both the death of God and the death of the author are the deconstructive backdrops of the death of literature at the hands of post-modernism, mass media and mass culture. | ||||
| Keywords | ||||
| death of God; death of the author; death of literature; Friedrich Nietzsche; Roland Barthes; Alvin Kernan | ||||
|
Statistics Article View: 136 PDF Download: 142 |
||||
