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Primo Levi, Dante, and The Meaning of Reading
Sewanee Review Pub Date : 2016-01-01 , DOI: 10.1353/sew.2016.0089
David J. Rothman

In the spring of 2013 I was asked to teach an advanced topical composition course at the University of Colorado entitled “The Rhetoric of the Holocaust.” At first I was reluctant. I know the literature fairly well and believe it is essential to know it, but I find it difficult to spend extended time with such discouraging work. Indeed I have often explained my own lack of enthusiasm for genres such as horror and the Gothic because the aestheticization of sadism and hatred provide an all too chilling reminder of what human beings can actually accomplish if they put their minds to it. Such strategies for entertainment generally leave me cold. We have the real thing too close at hand. The greater challenge is how to integrate it into genres that offer, if not hope, sustenance, and even pleasure, if that is possible. Still, having seen how poorly many Holocaust classes are taught, I decided to teach the course and duly assembled a reading list that covered a wide range of historical and imaginative genres. The students ranged from orthodox Jews to non-Jewish students who had never visited a synagogue. One student told me she knew nothing about Judaism, but signed up for the class because she was deeply troubled by her grandparents’ aggressive anti-Semitism. For the majority the material was tremendously difficult, not only because of its harrowing content, but because of its historical, moral, spiritual, emotional, and literary complexity. Interestingly enough, and even somewhat surprisingly, it was the last category, “literary complexity,” that turned out to be the analytical key to decoding the other categories for many of my students. Especially in our discussion of Primo Levi, close reading of such complexities helped them to begin to understand how the literary imagination can occasionally succeed in addressing horrific evil more powerfully and truthfully than even the most articulate history and philosophy.

中文翻译:

Primo Levi、但丁和阅读的意义

2013 年春天,我被要求在科罗拉多大学教授一门名为“大屠杀修辞学”的高级主题作文课程。起初我很不情愿。我对文学相当了解,并相信了解它是必不可少的,但我发现很难在这种令人沮丧的工作上花很长时间。事实上,我经常解释我自己对恐怖和哥特等类型缺乏热情,因为虐待狂和仇恨的审美化提供了一个非常令人不寒而栗的提醒,提醒人们如果他们全神贯注,他们实际上可以实现什么。这种娱乐策略通常让我感到寒冷。我们手头有真实的东西。更大的挑战是如何将其融入能够提供(如果不是希望)、寄托甚至愉悦(如果可能的话)的类型。仍然,看到许多大屠杀课程的教学质量如此之差,我决定教授这门课程,并适时地整理了一份阅读清单,其中涵盖了广泛的历史和想象类型。学生的范围从正统犹太人到从未去过犹太教堂的非犹太学生。一位学生告诉我,她对犹太教一无所知,但报名参加了这门课,因为她对祖父母激进的反犹太主义深感困扰。对大多数人来说,这些材料极其困难,不仅因为其内容令人痛心,还因为其历史、道德、精神、情感和文学的复杂性。有趣的是,甚至有点令人惊讶的是,最后一个类别“文学复杂性”被证明是我的许多学生解码其他类别的分析关键。
更新日期:2016-01-01
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