First lines in Paul Auster's narrative prose

Is the most important sentence in a book is the first sentence? Is it that “[e]verything follows from it,” as Paul Auster argues? “The first words have to stop the reader in his tracks and tell him that he’s in a different place now, that he’s entered the world of the book.” (2017).

Needless to say, a beginning cannot be understood in and of itself. It relates in multiple ways to what precedes it (e.g. language, culture, a canon, a set of critical and/or creative thoughts) and to what follows it (e.g. the narrative trajectory it announces, epitomizes, informs and/or determines). First lines take many forms that, each in their own way, implant, if only imperceptibly, certain expectations in the reader’s mind and invite us to approach the ensuing story in particular ways.

With special focus on the conceptual and emotional power concentrated in narrative beginnings, this colloquium will look at Paul Auster’s verbal and visual work with a view to addressing such questions as: How do first lines affect and/or inform the story they open? To what do they refer? How do we respond to different types of verbal inception? Is there congruency between beginning and ending?

Speakers

• I.B. Siegumfeldt, (University of Copenhagen) “The most important sentence in a book is the first sentence.” Types of Beginnings in Paul Auster’s Narrative Prose.
• James Peacock, (Keele University) “These are the last things, she wrote”: Paul Auster’s In the Country of Last Things, Metalepsis and the Problem of Witness.
• Aliki Varvogli, (University of Dundee) "It was the summer that men first walked on the moon": Historicizing Paul Auster.
• Francois Hugonnier, (University of Angers) “According to family legend”: condensation in 4 3 2 1.

Programme