Männliche Macht e Weibliche Ohnmacht? Declinazioni della sottomissione femminile in Thomas Bernhard ed Elias Canetti

[Männliche Macht and Weibliche Ohnmacht? Variations of feminine submission in the works of Thomas Bernhard and Elias Canetti]

Abstract

Women play a specific and analogous role in the narrative of Elias Canetti and Thomas Bernhard. Such characters never appear as the only protagonists, but provide a counterpart to male figures, by whom they are often subjugated and marginalized. It is therefore the aim of this article to examine and compare the different ways in which the male characters of Canetti’s Die Blendung and Bernhard’s Das Kalkwerk and Ja dominate and exploit female figures, in an attempt to emphasize similarities and differences in the works of the two authors.