"Memory Lives Inside Us": Writing as Memory Traces in "The Secret Staircase" / “La memoria vive en nuestro interior”: la escritura como huella de la memoria en "The Secret Staircase"

The Secret Staircase is the title given to an installation presented by Caroline Isgar and Michèle Roberts at the Foundling Museum of London in 2008, and also to the accompanying book, a collection of Isgar's drawings and Roberts's eighteen narrative pieces, meant as a souvenir of the exhi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Atlantis (Salamanca, Spain) Spain), 2015-12, Vol.37 (2), p.45-62
Main Author: Villegas-López, Sonia
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Childhood
Daughters
Exhibitions
Installations (Art)
Literary criticism
Memory
Memory in children
Memory trace
Mothers
Mothers and daughters
Narratives
Narrators
Portrayals
Roberts, Michele
Staircases
White people
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Summary:The Secret Staircase is the title given to an installation presented by Caroline Isgar and Michèle Roberts at the Foundling Museum of London in 2008, and also to the accompanying book, a collection of Isgar's drawings and Roberts's eighteen narrative pieces, meant as a souvenir of the exhibition. Roberts tells the story of a daughter's recollection of her childhood and her life with her mother on the occasion of the latter's approaching death. Each piece is inspired by an object belonging either to the past or to the experience of the mother's confinement in a hospice. Roberts's contribution to the installation constitutes a memory text in its own right, and suggests that writing is the actual trace that can bring the past to life and the means by which the daughter comes to terms with the mother figure. The Secret Staircase es el título de la exposición presentada por Caroline Isgar y Michèle Roberts en el Foundling Museum de Londres en 2008, y también el del libro que la ilustraba, una colección de los dibujos de Isgar y dieciocho narraciones breves, proyectados como souvenir de la exposición. Roberts cuenta los recuerdos de infancia de una hija junto a su madre con ocasión de la inminente muerte de ésta. Cada texto se inspira en un objeto que pertenece al pasado o a la experiencia de confinamiento en el hospital. La contribución de Roberts constituye en sí misma un texto de la memoria y sugiere que la escritura es la verdadera huella que devuelve el pasado a la vida y el medio por el cual la hija se reconcilia con la figura materna.
ISSN:0210-6124