Date of Degree
2010
Document Type
thesis
Degree Name
MA (Master of Arts)
Department
Comparative Literature
First Advisor
David Wittenberg
Abstract
This thesis examines how Chang-rae Lee's A Gesture Life (1999) represents the issues of war crimes. Writing the comfort women issue, Lee handles the bitter history of the Second World War in a postmodernist way. Against the modernist perspective on war history that draws on a simple and moral conclusion, Lee's writing underscores the function of narrative and the influence of trauma in the representation of the war crime. It offers a literary approach to the issue that complicates the role of the perpetrator and the victim, thus distances itself from the common understanding of war crimes. I argue this literary representation of the history of war crimes could be more powerful than historical writings, because it will ultimately challenge the concept of war itself.
Pages
iv, 60
Bibliography
59-60
Copyright
Copyright 2010 Ying-bei Wang
Recommended Citation
Wang, Ying-bei. "History, narrative, and trauma: writing war crimes in Chang-rae Lee's A Gesture life." thesis, University of Iowa, 2010.
http://ir.uiowa.edu/etd/620.