Geographies of Affectivity in the Writings of Margarita Karapanou: Phenomenological and Psychoanalytic Interpretations

Abstract

In novels written between the early 1980s and the 2000s Greek writer Margarita Karapanou employs experimental, fragmented narratives, and extensive spatial and topological metaphors, to describe affective personal and social relationships. In Karapanou's writings, these affective relationships develop within specific geographies that are often intimately involved in the precarious conditions of existence of the portrayed characters. Situated at the intersection between phenomenology, psychoanalytic philosophy, and contemporary affect and queer theory, this article revisits relationships of subject/object and mind/body in the context of affective geographies, as they are described in four novels by Karapanou: O Ypnovatis [The Sleepwalker] ([1985] 2001. Northampton, MA: Clockrootbooks); Rien Ne Va Plus ([1991] 2009. Northampton, MA: Clockrootbooks); Nai: Mythistorema [Yes: A Novel] (1999. Athens: Okeanida); and Lee kai Lou [Lee and Lou] (2003. Athens: Okeanida). By drawing on phenomenological and psychoanalytic theories, the article makes the case for reconsidering social attachments to geographies through affect and queer theory. It further argues for the critical potential for rethinking an affective sociality and its geography in order to exceed normative schemes of affectivity.