An Autobiography of Her Own—Matalon’s The Sound of Our Steps

• Published in: The Comparatist 2019-10, Vol.43 (1), p.228-251
• Main Authors: GALON, TAMMY FRADE, MAOZ, ADIA MENDELSON
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: African Americans; Autobiografía; Autobiographies; Belgian literature; Cixous, Helene (1937- ); Comparative literature; Culture; Feminism; Feminismo; French literature; GENERAL ARTICLES; Hebrew language; Jewish literature; Jewish people; Judíos; Kristeva, Julia (1941- ); Lengua hebrea; Literary canon; Literatura comparada; Literatura femenina; Matalon, Ronit; Narratives; Novela; Novels; Oppression; Persecución; Persecution; Plot (Narrative); Race relations; Racismo; Womens literature; Writing
• ISSN: 0195-7678; 1559-0887; 1559-0887
• DOI: 10.1353/com.2019.0013

Kol tse-adenu (2008), The Sound of Our Steps is Matalon's most personal novel. It is not defined as an autobiography, although it incorporates major experiences and descriptions that hint at the life of the author. The novel describes the problematic coming of age of the protagonist as a Mizrahi woman by implementing a new discursive approach to space and language that works to question the pillars of the Israeli Zionist literary canon.In terms of its political and gendered stance and its innovative writing style, The Sound of Our Steps gains from being read in conjunction with the discourse of African American women's autobiographical writing as exemplified by bell hooks, and as a form of deterritorialization of the autobiographical genre, as defined by Deleuze and Guattari. The novel is structured in a rhizomatic way that undermines causality and linearity and vitiates the notion of a singular life narrative. It describes mother-daughter relations in a way that is not aimed at a fixed normative identity, but rather constitutes a constant search for a "line of flight" from her restricting surroundings. Reading the novel in the light of hooks and Deleuze and Guattari helps highlight the unique artistic nature of the book, which constitutes a critique of race and gender-based oppression in the margins of Israeli society, and offers an unconventional clue for reterritorialization.