'Grievous Loss': Reading Nicholas Royle's 'Mother: A Memoir'

Ulrika Maude

doi:10.1080/0950236X.2025.2488617

'Grievous Loss': Reading Nicholas Royle's 'Mother: A Memoir'

Ulrika Maude

Department of English

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article (Academic Journal) › peer-review

Abstract

This paper considers grievous loss from the perspective of a memoir. It briefly considers other types of memoirs, poetic, novelistic and musical, as well as the effects of grieving on the experiencing subject. It considers Freud’s essay,’ Mourning and Melancholia’ (1917) and Derrida’s response to it in Mémoires for Paul de Man (trans. 1986), where he argues that ‘the other resists the closure of our interiorizing memory’. The paper concludes with the suggestion that a memoir, in whatever form, might constitute a tender rejection, a place for the lost other to be.

Original language	English
Number of pages	5
Journal	Textual Practice
Early online date	14 Apr 2025
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1080/0950236X.2025.2488617
Publication status	E-pub ahead of print - 14 Apr 2025

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Publisher Copyright:
© 2025 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.

Keywords

grief
mourning
melancholia
Sigmund Freud
Jacques Derrida

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title = "'Grievous Loss': Reading Nicholas Royle's 'Mother: A Memoir'",

abstract = "This paper considers grievous loss from the perspective of a memoir. It briefly considers other types of memoirs, poetic, novelistic and musical, as well as the effects of grieving on the experiencing subject. It considers Freud{\textquoteright}s essay,{\textquoteright} Mourning and Melancholia{\textquoteright} (1917) and Derrida{\textquoteright}s response to it in M{\'e}moires for Paul de Man (trans. 1986), where he argues that {\textquoteleft}the other resists the closure of our interiorizing memory{\textquoteright}. The paper concludes with the suggestion that a memoir, in whatever form, might constitute a tender rejection, a place for the lost other to be.",

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AB - This paper considers grievous loss from the perspective of a memoir. It briefly considers other types of memoirs, poetic, novelistic and musical, as well as the effects of grieving on the experiencing subject. It considers Freud’s essay,’ Mourning and Melancholia’ (1917) and Derrida’s response to it in Mémoires for Paul de Man (trans. 1986), where he argues that ‘the other resists the closure of our interiorizing memory’. The paper concludes with the suggestion that a memoir, in whatever form, might constitute a tender rejection, a place for the lost other to be.

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KW - melancholia

KW - Sigmund Freud

KW - Jacques Derrida

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ER -

'Grievous Loss': Reading Nicholas Royle's 'Mother: A Memoir'

Abstract

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Keywords

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