Representing the Unspeakable and Unimaginable Horror of the Holocaust in Jerzy Kosinski’s The Painted Bird
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One of the challenges that the Holocaust victims have confessed to is that they cannot convey in language what they experienced, since the horror of that ordeal is beyond description. This paper shows that Jerzy Kosinski in his autobiographical novel, The Painted Bird, represents the unspeakable horror and violence of the Holocaust effectively by way of the graphic representation of its violence. More importantly, his representation of the unimaginable horror of the Holocaust is reinforced by focusing on the violence in daily life. That is, he accentuates the violence of East European peasants to the unnamed boy, which serves as a metaphor for the Holocaust. In so doing, Kosinski lets the readers face the horror of the Holocaust more directly, rendering them more engaged in the experience. In particular, I point out that Kosinski’s representation of the horror of the Holocaust is highlighted most in the portrayal of the unnamed boy’s degraded morality. By overlapping the Holocaust perpetuated by the Nazis and caused by racial hatred with the boy’s cruel plan to kill innocent people caused by his revengeful hatred, Kosinski shows how the boy comes to degrade himself morally like the Nazi oppressors, thereby rendering the atrocity of the Holocaust visible to the readers.
Abstract
One of the challenges that the Holocaust victims have confessed to is that they cannot convey in language what they experienced, since the horror of that ordeal is beyond description. This paper shows that Jerzy Kosinski in his autobiographical novel, The Painted Bird, represents the unspeakable horror and violence of the Holocaust effectively by way of the graphic representation of its violence. More importantly, his representation of the unimaginable horror of the Holocaust is reinforced by focusing on the violence in daily life. That is, he accentuates the violence of East European peasants to the unnamed boy, which serves as a metaphor for the Holocaust. In so doing, Kosinski lets the readers face the horror of the Holocaust more directly, rendering them more engaged in the experience. In particular, I point out that Kosinski’s representation of the horror of the Holocaust is highlighted most in the portrayal of the unnamed boy’s degraded morality. By overlapping the Holocaust perpetuated by the Nazis and caused by racial hatred with the boy’s cruel plan to kill innocent people caused by his revengeful hatred, Kosinski shows how the boy comes to degrade himself morally like the Nazi oppressors, thereby rendering the atrocity of the Holocaust visible to the readers.
참고문헌 (13)
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