Multifacetedness of Collective Memory and Identity in Elie Wiesel’s The Fifth Son

Abstract

The paper analyses the important aspects of the multifaced operation of collective memory and its influence on identity formation in Elie Wiesel’s The Fifth Son (1985). To shape an outlook on society collective memory plays a significant role in shaping individual consciousness and social outlook. The paper investigates the sociological theories of collective memory based on the theoretical findings of the French philosopher Maurice Halbwachs (1992) and the sociologist David Sontag Rieff (2016). It provides a detailed study of the influence of collective memory and the collective trauma of suffering experienced by the Jewish community. By adopting the qualitative textual analysis, the paper examines how the protagonist Ariel Tamiroff navigates inherited trauma across three developmental stages. Wiesel is a fine craftsman with an extraordinary talent for portraying the exact realities of historical trauma. His virtuosity is a tool to reveal the significance of the cultural, social and religious elements in Judaic tradition. He also discusses the influence of all these elements in shaping the collective history of the community. In The Fifth Son, Wiesel voices the anxieties, traumas, hysteria and unending guilt the children of the second-generation of the Holocaust experience. As a real victim of the troubles of the Holocaust, he shares the impact of the pain of being displaced while transplanting the collective memory of an entire social community.