Overview
Explore the intricate dance between memory and oblivion. In
Forgetting, Gabriel Josipovici delves into the profound cultural shift from societies grounded in ritual remembrance to our modern world, haunted by the fear of forgetting. This insightful work examines how this fear shapes our culture, from personal anxieties about Alzheimer's to the manipulation of historical events by demagogues.
Josipovici navigates a landscape of ideas, drawing on literary giants like Beckett, Nietzsche, and Shakespeare, and analyzing cultural touchstones such as Holocaust memorials and burial rituals. He challenges us to confront the complexities of memory, identity, and the very nature of the self. Is it possible to find peace in a world obsessed with remembrance? Discover a new perspective on history, art, and the human condition.
Author Biography
Gabriel Josipovici was born in Nice in 1940 of Russo-Italian, Romano-Levantine parents. He lived in Egypt from 1945 to 1956, when he came to Britain. He read English at St Edmund Hall, Oxford, graduating with a First in 1961. From 1963 to 1998 he taught at the University of Sussex. He is the author of nineteen novels, three volumes of short stories, eight critical works, and numerous stage and radio plays, and is a regular contributor to the Times Literary Supplement. His plays have been performed throughout Britain and on radio in Britain, France, and Germany, and his work has been translated into the major European languages and Arabic.