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Narratives of Nothing in 20th-Century Literature
Narratives of Nothing in 20thCentury Literature Author:Meghan Vicks The concept of nothing has been an enduring concern of 20th-century literature, philosophy, art, music, physics, and mathematics. As Martin Heidegger proposed that nothing is essential to the creation of a knowable being, as Jacques Derrida demonstrated how all structures are built upon a nothing within the structure, and as mathematicians argue... more »d that zero ? the number that is also not a number ? allows for the creation of our modern mathematical system, Narrative of Nothing in 20th-Century Literature suggests that nothing itself enables the narrative act, thereby allowing meaning to come into existence. Focusing on the literary works of Vladimir Nabokov, Samuel Beckett, and Victor Pelevin, Meghan Christine Vicks traces how and why these writers give narrative form to nothing, demonstrating that nothing is essential to the creation of narrative ? how our perceptions are conditioned, how we make meaning (or madness) out of the stuff of our existence, or how we exist in language.« less