Rereading the Self

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

    Abstract

    This chapter puts forward a model of rereading childhood fiction in which multiple selfhoods are implicated: the adult who remembers, the adult who rereads, and the image of the child reader. This process can be understood as an active process of engaging with intriguing fragments from the past, a practice that is like digging up a time-capsule. Waller provides an account of her research with a group of adult readers who were asked to identify, recall, and reread a significant book from their youth, and builds her model through discussion of Clive (78) and his reading memories. Through analysis of this participant’s recollected responses and experience of rereading children’s literature classics, Waller demonstrates that a readerly identity can exist over time and across the boundaries of childhood and adulthood.
    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publicationMemory in the Twenty-first Century
    Subtitle of host publicationNew Critical Perspectives from the Sciences and Arts and Humanities.
    EditorsSebastian Groes
    PublisherPalgrave Macmillan
    Pages325-329
    ISBN (Print)978-1-137-52058-6
    Publication statusPublished - 2016

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