The Rings of Saturn by W.G. Sebald - 1335 Words

W.G. Sebald’s novel The Rings of Saturn explores the relationship between toleration and persecution through a first person narrative. The novel is preoccupied with loss and the ways we have tried to come to terms with mortality. It is a meditation on the destructive nature of history, the human lives affected, and the restorative power of art. However, his work is not simply a record of these human-induced catastrophes, but also attempts to fashion new representational tools for the purpose of acknowledging and coming to terms with the realities of modern human history. Sebald’s critcism tends to focus on the biographical and psychological backgrounds of the writers he mentions. He draws heavily on the canon of twentieth-century Marxist thought, including works from Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer. His complex thesis draws specifically on their work The Dialectic of Enlightenment. The Enlightenment was an intellectual movement that spread through Europe during the ei ghteenth century, which involved a radical change in the way that philosophers and others understood the role of reason. It valued independent thought and promoted reason to a higher status and for some came to replace faith. Intrinsic in Sebald’s work is the idea that the Enlightenment project was programmed by violent distrusts of the non-identical and a coercive desire to eliminate otherness. Specifically, Sebald draws on Horkheimer and Adorno’s critique of civilization articulated in The Dialectic of theShow MoreRelatedThe Rings of Saturn by W.G. Sebald1115 Words   |  4 Pagesphilosopher spoke of an eternal present in which one could move through time and space and interconnect all things. This sentiment is captured by W.G. Sebald’s travelogue The Rings of Saturn where he uses memory to live in the present, past and future and explores his understanding of the world around him, be that world the reality or simply his mental perception. Sebald takes the r eader on an outward journey of Suffolk, England, but as is quickly understood, the journey goes beyond the external present andRead MoreEssay about The Disputed Reign of Dowager Empress Tz’u-hsi3139 Words   |  13 Pageshistorians. It was these early historians who have established the widely accepted perspective that Tz’u-hsi hungered for power, abused it, and retained it using any means necessary. This understanding is echoed today by authors such as W.G. Sebald, author of The Rings of Saturn. There are many differences between the accounts of the Western perspective and that of Sebald’s, but the overall idea of Tz’u-Hsi as a conniving and unworthy Empress is intact between the two. Still, the investigation is not over