O norte impossível: ficção, memória e identidade em narrativas de Milton Hatoum

Abstract

This work is an analysis of identity construction processes in the novels of Milton Hatoum. The assertion of identity has been an issue widely discussed within the field of cultural studies, due to the recent fragmentation of its models and the emergence of several new ascendants systems of identity. In the novels of Hatoum, this problem will manifest itself through the elimination of regionalism, which dilutes the references to identify, from memory, which search all the time to order the past, as well as the various dilemmas bandied about in the course of the narrative: the uncertainty as to the origin, the condition of foreign and immigrant, the family relations, the ethical values of East and West, those issues that will focus primarily on the characters of the plots, especially the narrators, the brothers Omar and Yaqub, of Dois irmãos, and Mundo, of Cinzas do Norte, for whom questions about the identity will become crucial in defining the paths followed by each of them.