Memory, images, words: a reading of Magrite in the light of Literature

Abstract

This essay proposes the reading of the painting The memory, by Rene? Magritte, as a sort of compilation of the most important theories on memory. Therefore, the discussion will go through each element that makes up the canvas - a marble front, a rattle, a leaf, the red curtain and the sky full of clouds - seeking to understand the problematization of the concept of memory proposed by the author in images. In this sense, adjacent themes will be discussed in the analysis, among them the most recurrent memory metaphors, such as that of the book, especially in Dante Aliguieri; the relationship between memory and death, especially with regard to trauma, which we will discuss from the classic rhetorical treatise Ad Herenium, as well as the relationship between past, present and future, read here from Aristotle to Lewis Carrol. In this sense, starting from a comparative analysis between the canvas and some literary and theoretical texts, the article aims to understand what memory is for Rene? Magritte.

Keywords: memory; art of memory; writing; time; forgetting