Auditory Perception in Twentieth-Century Self-Narratives

Examines the connection between auditory perception and the formation of subjectivity and identity in 20th-century autobiographical literature, drawing a parallel between poststructuralism and the decentered subject in self-narratives. Throughout the 20th century, auditory perception became a significant area of inquiry across diverse disciplines, particularly within psychoanalysis, philosophy, and through the lens of poststructuralist thought.Auditory Perception in Twentieth-Century Self-Narrativesidentifies how these theories converged in their understanding of hearing as a fundamental aspect of development and experience, which in turn led to a decentering and reformulation of the written autobiographical self. Claudia Cerulo draws connections between auditory perception and the formation of the self in both theoretical and literary texts. Drawing from both psychoanalysis and poststructuralism, the first part of the book engages with the interest of 20th-century theorists in sound, examining terms and usage from Derrida, Lacoue-Labarthe, Nancy, Irigaray, Kristeva, and Cixous. The second part of the book then close-reads three autobiographical works, Elias Canetti’sDie gerettete Zunge (The Tongue Set Free), Nathalie Ginzburg’sLessico famigliare (Family Sayings),and Nathalie Sarraute’sEnfance (Childhood). In these three case studies, acoustic perception is more than a mere episode or decorative element. Instead, it interacts, either directly or indirectly, with all levels of discourse, ranging from the stylistic to the metaphorical. These works thus artistically anticipate what would be theorized only a few decades later and create the conditions for a pre-verbal apprehension of the world, raising questions about the ineffable source of writing and the writing process itself. This book examines how acoustic perception shapes autobiographical writing in the latter half of the twentieth century, focusing on works by Elias Canetti, Natalia Ginzburg, and Nathalie Sarraute. Through analysis of their autobiographical texts, it demonstrates how attention to sound, voice, and listening fundamentally transforms both the content and structure of self-narrative. The theoretical foundation emerges from the intersection of phenomenological reexamination of sensory experience, psychoanalytic reconceptualization of subjectivity, and post-structuralist critiques of autobiography. These theoretical strands converge in what the author terms ‘oto-bio-graphy’ – a mode of self-writing that prioritizes acoustic perception and treats the narrative subject as fundamentally resonant rather than reflexive. The study reveals how these writers develop narrative techniques that present identity as inherently multiple and relational, challenging traditional autobiography’s emphasis on unified selfhood and visual metaphors of reflection. Their innovative approaches to childhood memory, family discourse, and pre-verbal experience demonstrate how attention to sound enables sophisticated engagement with questions of truth and representation. The investigation combines close textual analysis with theoretical investigation, examining how specific narrative techniques manifest broader philosophical and psychological insights about memory, identity, and perception. This work contributes to ongoing reconsideration of twentieth-century literary innovation while suggesting new directions for understanding both literary representation and lived experience.