Autobiography as invention of the self in Friederike Mayröcker's Prose Works. A poststructuralist textanalysis and its theoretical consequences.

This research project concentrates on the works of the Austrian woman writer Friederike Mayröcker, on whom there is until now hardly any serious material available. The project has two aims: to make an analysis, based on literary theory, of Mayröcker's prose works since 1988, and to contribute to the theory on autobiographical writing. After a thorough study of the existing feminist and poststructuralist theories, five of Mayröcker's proze works will be subjected to a close reading. The following aspects will be studied: the subject building of the I; the body as epistemological force; (the deconstruction of) autobiography as confession; the rhetorical play with the reader. The research results will form a supplement and a refinement of the existing theories on autobiographical writing. The project is conceived as a monography on Friederike Mayröcker.