The Hinge of Time: Mothers and Sons in Barthes and Augustine

Giusti, Francesco

doi:10.1080/10412573.2021.1965731

Exemplaria

2021

DOI: 10.1080/10412573.2021.1965731

|View full text |Cite

The Hinge of Time: Mothers and Sons in Barthes and Augustine

Francesco Giusti

Help me understand this report

Search citation statements

Order By: Relevance

Paper Sections

Select...

Citation Types

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Year Published

2023

Publication Types

Select...

Book1

Relationship

Self Cite0

Independent1

Authors

Journals

Cited by 1 publication

References 21 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

‘My Mother Tongue Is a Foreign Language’

Bo¹

2023

Cultural Inquiry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

This chapter examines Edmond Jabès, who chose to write his oeuvre in French despite his Jewish-Arabic origins and his being conversant in both Hebrew and Arabic. French was never a true ‘mother tongue’ to him but rather ‘a foreign one’. This poetical choice was also instrumental to his creation of a cosmos that is very clearly defined by la page blanche, or the ‘blank page’. His writing develops this idea, both literally and metaphorically. A blank sheet is the only thing a writer has to work with at the start of every writing act, therefore it represents a kind of material opposition that all writers must overcome. It represents in this context an existential nothingness that precedes and simultaneously escapes both human and divine creation. In Jabès’s writings, a blank page has two connotations at once: a condition for writing and nothingness. This ambivalent condition results in the paradoxical assumption that his ‘mother tongue is a foreign language’, because it cannot offer the same spiritual intimacy as another language, say, the Holy Language, and because the writer’s ‘mother tongue’ — and, by extension, human language — is always impure and infiltrated by foreignness.

show abstract

‘My Mother Tongue Is a Foreign Language’

Bo¹

2023

Cultural Inquiry

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.

Contact Info

customersupport@researchsolutions.com

10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614

Henderson, NV 89052, USA

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Blog Terms and Conditions API Terms Privacy Policy Contact Cookie Preferences Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information

Made with 💙 for researchers

Part of the Research Solutions Family.

The Hinge of Time: Mothers and Sons in Barthes and Augustine

Cited by 1 publication

References 21 publications

‘My Mother Tongue Is a Foreign Language’

‘My Mother Tongue Is a Foreign Language’

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About