Becoming an Author: Performing Authorship in the Works of Paul Auster, Candice Breitz, Sophie Calle, and Jonathan Safran Foer 

Dissertation in Culture

Mentoring team:
First supervisor: Prof. Dr. Winfried Fluck
Second supervisor: Prof. Dr. Heinz Ickstadt
Third supervisor: Prof. Dr. Laura Katzman

Dr. Sonja Longolius' dissertation was published with transcript, titled Performing Authorship - Strategies of »Becoming an Author« in the Works of Paul Auster, Candice Breitz, Sophie Calle, and Jonathan Safran Foer.

Authors not only create artworks. In the process of creating, they simultaneously bring to life their author personae. Approaching this phenomenon from an interdisciplinary point of view, this publication develops a concept of »performative authorship« by examining different strategies of becoming an author. In regard to the notion of the concept, this work offers a critical and comparative analysis of the works of Paul Auster, Candice Breitz, Sophie Calle, and Jonathan Safran Foer. Specifically, Auster/Calle and Breitz/Foer form a generational pair of opposites, enabling a discussion of postmodern and post-postmodern artistic strategies of »performative authorship«.