Narrativizing what cannot be told: The Sand Child by Tahar Ben Jelloun as a liminal trauma narrative

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article examines The Sand Child (L’enfant de sable) by Tahar Ben Jelloun as a liminal trauma narrative. The novel is discussed as an attempt to narrativize trauma. Although trauma resists narrativization, it is in these manifestations of failure that the essence of the narrative is sought. Its liminality (fragmentation, openness, intertextuality, and inconclusiveness) results from Ben Jelloun’s intention to convey the difficulties of expressing a trauma. Thus, the oral context of the novel’s communicative situation, the rivalry of raconteurs (narrators), is described as a hypoleptic practice that results in commoning; that is, creating a community of storytellers and listeners/readers. The article also rethinks the relationship between text and reader through trauma theory to highlight the ethical responsibility of a reader who bears witness to a protagonist’s trauma. The protagonist’s reluctance to work through the trauma is regarded as a manifestation of resistance to cultural expectations, especially gender role models.