TRAUMA, MEMORY AND THE ACT OF WRITING IN RUTH KLUGER'S AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL PROJECT

This essay intends to shed light on the motivation behind Ruth Kluger's autobiographical project by examining the relationship between trauma, memory and the act of writing. Exploring the catalyst for writing reveals that Kluger's autobiographical texts have a dual function: they serve as a public call for dialogue, as well as a kind of therapy allowing her to work through the traumas of her past. I demonstrate that for this reason, it is crucial to take into consideration not just the well-known weiter leben: Eine Jugend (1992), but also its revised English self-translation Still Alive: A Holocaust Girlhood Remembered (2001). Writing, editing, revising and translating create a space for Kluger's continuous engagement with her past and its traumas - an engagement that is ongoing, continuing beyond the first writing of the text, and that stems from an innate desire to understand better the driving forces of her own life and her survival against all odds.