Narrative Form and Palimpsestic Memory in Namwali Serpell’s The Old Drift

Abstract

L’articolo esplora il romanzo di esordio di Namwali Serpell, The Old Drift (2019), attraverso la lente della ‘memoria del palinsesto’, individuando l’interconnessione tra memoria e migrazione. In primo luogo, si analizza il rapporto dialettico tra tempo eonico e alcuni elementi paratestuali che, nel tentativo di stabilire ordine e guidare il lettore, sembrano imitare ed evocare la stessa trama intricata del palinsesto. Quindi, si discute l’oscillazione tra narrazione extradiegetica e intradiegetica e l’uso del modello del romanzo multi-generazionale, mettendone in luce il carattere palinsestico in cui varie generazioni e storie diverse si intersecano, generando una spirale che rifrange le traiettorie multiple e invisibili del tempo.

DOI: 10.17456/SIMPLE-159

Parole chiave
Palimpsestic memory, migration, narrative form, postcolonial fiction, allegory.

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