Leiden University Student Repository

Haan, Joost (2015)

Postmodern fiction, author and biography: The avant-garde case of Alfred Jarry.

Bachelor thesis | Film- en literatuurwetenschap (BA)

The French writer Alfred Jarry (1873-1907) is seen as a forerunner of avant-garde movements such as futurism, Dadaism and surrealism. In this study, his influence on postmodernism is evaluated by close reading his most important fictional texts, but also several of his biographies. Jarry can be considered postmodern because of the great amount of ontological doubt in his work and in his life. His biographers augmented this by (intentionally or not) emphasizing the ontological confusion. Their ‘facts’ were the result of interpretation and representation.

Alfred Jarry

postmodernism

'pataphysics

biography

Author

Haan, Joost

Faculty

Faculty of Humanities

Specialisation

Film- and Literary Studies

Supervisors

Korsten, Frans Willem

ECTS Credits

10

Language

en