The Art Of Memory In Dora Bruder Of Patrick Modiano

2014 Nobel Prize Laureate in Literature,Patrick Modiano was awarded for the art of memory with which he has evoked the most ungraspable human destinies and uncovered the life-world of the Occupation.Since then,the writer,already very famous,has become more and more popular and is appreciated all over the world.Obviously,the memory of the past,especially of the Occupation,is an essential theme in his works.Dora Bruder,published in 1997,occupies an important place,including almost all the key words found in Patrick Modiano:childhood,mystery,research,identity,memory,Occupation...Concerning a survey of a young girl,the story begins with the discovery of the notice of missing persons and finishes with the end of the investigation of Dora.At the same time,it can be interpreted as a fragmented biography of his father,of the writer himself,and even a painting of the History.The superposition of different temporal episodes and the mixing of different literary genres constitute the particular characteristics of the art of memory in Dora Bruder.The present work is articulated around the key word "memory",and the study is divided into three chapters,using the theories of autobiography and autofiction,the concepts "places of memory","memory-duty" proposed by Pierre Nora.In the first chapter,we will analyze the traumatic memory of Patrick Modiano.His personal experience and the influence of wars are the causes of his traumatic memory.The absence of the origin is the source of his works.He wants to deliver this memory by means of writing.The second chapter is intended to explain in a textual way how Patrick Modiano describes the story of an unknown girl.At the same time,Patrick Modiano uses his own experience and that of his father to fill the blank of Dora.Therefore,Patrick Modiano mixes biography,autobiography and fiction skillfully in Dora Bruder.The third chapter attempts to describe the History of the Occupation.Dora Bruder is a memorial for all victims in wars.Confronted with forgetting of the past,we need "places of memory" to preserve and transmit memory.As a memory guard,Patrick Modiano chooses writing to memorize the past.At the same time,he hopes that more and more people will know this History.Here are his sense of"memory-duty" and his vocation as a writer.For Patrick Modiano,the art of memory is only his technique of writing,basically,the research for the past is also the research for the origin and the identity,which has a deeper meaning nowadays.