ABSTRACT
In cultural memory studies, the notion of the novel as a monument is well established. Aleida Assmann (2011) has shown how textual monuments have for long periods been valued over their stone counterparts for their greater durability. The invention of writing and even more so of printing, she reminds us, once sparked the hope of eternal communication on permanent material carriers. The word ‘monument’ derives from the Latin noun monumentum, which in turn comes from the verb moneo: ‘to remind, to bring to the notice of, to tell of’. This implies a temporal gap, and, in order to bridge that gap, an act of testimony is needed. Indeed, a monument should be able to manipulate our sense of time in such a way as to render the past present. It allows us to leave a deliberate physical marker for posterity, an ‘I was here’ or ‘we were here’ to an unknown future recipient.
