El sujeto exiliado y la construcción de la memoria colectiva en Quanta, quanta guerra… de Mercè Rodoreda

Abstract

Considering Michel de Certeau's ideas about spatial stories, my objective is to analyze the exiled subject and the construction of collective memory (in Maurice Halbwachs's terms) in Mercè Rodoreda's Quanta, quanta guerra… (1980). I first analyze the exiled subject taking into account how the novel, in the tradition of the Bildungsroman, narrates the travel story of its protagonist, Adrià Guinart, from his departure from home to his return as the mythic hero in search of a truth, or as the picaresque antihero of the Quest-Romance. Concurrently, I study the construction of collective memory from the protagonist's individual memory, as he passes from infancy—when he runs away from home to go to war—to adulthood—when the war ends—where he undergoes a wide range of experiences to become a man.