ABSTRACT:This article analyzes Open City by Teju Cole as an example of a Theory Generation novel, positing that neither a strictly surface reading nor symptomatic reading approach alone is adequate for this sort of text. Expanding and complicating the novel's aside on the biology of bedbugs, the article argues that Julius, the book's protagonist, can best be understood not as a flâneur, fugueur, or model cosmopolitan, but, instead, as a parasite. His narratorial perspective is more analogous to the claustrophobic touch-driven irritations of the bedbugs that infest his mentor's Manhattan apartment than to the detached scopic flights of the birds that fill his free-associative reveries (and decorate the book's cover). Drawing on the work of J. Hillis Miller and Michel Serres, I posit that Julius's parasitic mode of interaction, which relies on brief moments of contact with others who are quickly mined for their stories and discarded, is deeply tied to the novel's reliance on tangential narration. The article argues for the unsettling ethical and affective implications of the similarities between the mechanisms of mathematical and narrative tangent-making vis-à-vis Julius's treatment of other characters in the novel. It finally asserts that Julius's rape of Moji is central to understanding both the affective discomfort of the novel as a whole and the limitations of similar protagonists who parasitically plot their way through Theory Generation novels.

中文翻译：

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“仅在言语中可见”：逍遥寄生，或成为开放城市中的臭虫

摘要：本文将 Teju Cole 的 Open City 作为理论一代小说的一个例子进行分析，认为对于这类文本，无论是严格的表面阅读还是症状阅读方法都不够。这篇文章将小说的臭虫生物学放在一边扩展和复杂化，认为本书的主角朱利叶斯最好不要被理解为流浪者、赋格者或模范世界主义者，而是作为寄生虫。他的叙事视角更类似于侵扰他导师曼哈顿公寓的臭虫的幽闭恐惧症触摸驱动的刺激，而不是填充他自由联想的遐想（并装饰书的封面）的鸟类的超然视觉飞行。借鉴 J. Hillis Miller 和 Michel Serres 的工作，我假设 Julius 的寄生交互模式，它依赖于与其他人的短暂接触，这些人很快就会因为他们的故事而被挖掘出来并被抛弃，这与小说对切线叙述的依赖有着深刻的联系。这篇文章论证了数学和叙事切线机制与朱利叶斯对小说中其他角色的处理之间的相似性所带来的令人不安的伦理和情感影响。它最终断言，朱利叶斯对墨吉的强奸对于理解整部小说的情感不适以及在理论一代小说中寄生地谋划出路的类似主角的局限性至关重要。这篇文章论证了数学和叙事切线机制与朱利叶斯对小说中其他角色的处理之间的相似性所带来的令人不安的伦理和情感影响。它最终断言，朱利叶斯对墨吉的强奸对于理解整部小说的情感不适以及在理论一代小说中寄生性地策划他们的方式的类似主角的局限性都是至关重要的。这篇文章论证了数学和叙事切线机制与朱利叶斯对小说中其他角色的处理之间的相似性所带来的令人不安的伦理和情感影响。它最终断言，朱利叶斯对墨吉的强奸对于理解整部小说的情感不适以及在理论一代小说中寄生地谋划出路的类似主角的局限性都是至关重要的。