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To whom does a letter belong? Psychopathology and epistolography in the asylum letters of Antonin Artaud and Camille Claudel

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Wilson, Susannah (2021) To whom does a letter belong? Psychopathology and epistolography in the asylum letters of Antonin Artaud and Camille Claudel. Modern Languages Open, 1 (1). pp. 1-18. doi:10.3828/mlo.v0i0.360

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Official URL: http://doi.org/10.3828/mlo.v0i0.360

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Abstract

This article analyses the published letters of two important artists, Camille Claudel (1864–1943) and Antonin Artaud (1869–1948), who were incarcerated in French psychiatric asylums in the early twentieth century. It argues that although asylum letters deviate from standard modes of epistolography, and pose interpretive difficulties, they remain sophisticated and hyper-meaningful communications. Contending that the language of ‘schizophrenia’ and ‘paranoia’ is not one of disconnection or primitive drives, but one of hyper-reflexivity, the article analyses how these writers responded to the constraints of the communicative situation in which they were placed. It suggests that singular aspects of the texts, related to their materiality and psychotic patterns of thinking, reveal the limitations of traditional theories of epistolarity.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BD Speculative Philosophy
P Language and Literature > P Philology. Linguistics
P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General)
Divisions: Faculty of Arts > School of Modern Languages and Cultures
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Claudel, Camille, 1864-1943 -- Correspondence , Artaud, Antonin, 1896-1948 -- Correspondence , Psychiatric hospital patients in literature , Letter writing -- History and criticism, Knowledge, Theory of, Mental illness in literature
Journal or Publication Title: Modern Languages Open
Publisher: Liverpool University Press
ISSN: 2052-5397
Official Date: 18 May 2021
Dates:
DateEvent
18 May 2021Published
18 December 2020Accepted
Volume: 1
Number: 1
Page Range: pp. 1-18
DOI: 10.3828/mlo.v0i0.360
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: Published
Access rights to Published version: Open Access
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