Det vidunderlige, det vanvittige og det umulige. En studie i fire litterære reiser i det 20. århundre

Abstract

My master thesis is called "The wonderful, the insane, and the impossible. Four literary travels in the 20. century." My hypothesis is that each era influence the reasons why people travel, as well as their goals. And my main question is: In a world where "everything" is discovered and colonized, why does the modern and postmodern protagonist travel? In an attempt to answer this question, I have analyzed four modern and postmodern novels: Ikaros, by the Norwegian writer Axel Jensen, The Beach, by the British writer Alex Garland, Platform, by the French writer Michel Houellebecq and finally, The Goldfish by the French writer J.M.G. Le Clézio. The novels apparently represent different travels and different goals, but as I have discovered during my work, the protagonists travel for the same reasons - mainly to escape the modern and postmodern civilization and to find love, belonging, and intimacy with other people. But as I have concluded for each novel, the projects do not succeed. In Ikaros and The Beach, the main problem of the protagonists seems to be the impossibility of escaping from their own minds and their backgrounds.Their pasts haunt them even if they are on the other side of the world. The reason why the projects fail in Platform and The Goldfish is that the cruelty of mankind is global and universal. The protagonists escape from different civilizations, but they both discover that wickedness exists everywhere.

Masteroppgaven min omhandler fire moderne og postmoderne litterære reiseskildringer, henholdsvis Ikaros av Axel Jensen, The Beach av Alex Garland, Plattform av Michel Houellebecq og Gullfisken av J.M.G. Le Clézio. Hovedprosjektet mitt er å undersøke hvilke mål og beveggrunner som driver den moderne og postmoderne protagonisten ut i verden. I løpet av oppgaven presenterer jeg hovedpersonenes ulike reiseprosjekter, og diskuterer deretter hvorfor eller hvorvidt de mislykkes.