Il paradosso della coscienza: oblio e consapevolezza in The Suffering Channel di David Foster Wallace

Abstract

Starting from the reconstruction of the literary context and the theoretical assumptions that derive from it, the article aims to analyze the "paradox of consciousness" in David Foster Wallace's The Suffering Channel. It is a vicious circle in which the exaggeration of self-awareness leads to its semantic opposite, oblivion, understood in the dual sense of "unconsciousness, unawareness" and "heedlessness" (designating an attitude of indifference and inattention). The linguistic representation of this narcissistic mental loop, which alienates the characters from the intersubjective environment and makes every attempt at communication self-referential and futile, is offered by the relational mechanisms of identity performance and dialogic manipulation. The paradoxical logic of oblivion is also systematically configured within a "rhetoric of reticence", so that the crucial facts of the story are only indirectly evoked, through ellipses and allusions that, by determining the lacunarity of the narrative, reflect the lacunarity of consciousness. Through textual analysis, the article will therefore examine the concept of "oblivion" understood as a constant thematic and stylistic feature.