Beyond the Threshold: Memory, Paratext, and the Semiotics of Titles in Orhan Pamuk's My Name Is Red, Snow, and The Museum of Innocence

Abstract

In modern literary studies, the notion of memory has taken on new significance, and now plays an important role in the fields of memory, history, identity and literature, where it continues to play a fundamental role in the understanding of these fields. Due to its focus on these themes, Orhan Pamuk's novel has been widely read and researched, particularly with regard to the representation of cultural memory, political struggles, nostalis and material remembrance. Yet, the critics in the past have focused on memory as experienced in the narrative; the characters, historical events, work of imagination and real-world objects are the primary sites of memory. Very little has been said so far about the use of literary names and how they lead readers towards a particular mode of memory before the story. The article mentions that the title of the books, My Name Is Red, Snow and The Museum of Innocence, are significant literary clues for the reader as they are exposed to the text, not merely as means of identification. It draws on the theory of paratext raised by Gérard Genette, as well as on the theories of Maurice Halbwachs, Jan Assmann, Paul Ricoeur, Pierre Nora, Roland Barthes and Umberto Eco, and connects the three titles with different aspects of memory. Preservation is memory's response to time in the Museum of Innocence, identifying is its response in the emphasis on identification, and concealment in Snow, quiet, and the uncertainties of historical remembering. As a collection these titles indicate a link in philosophy from self-awareness to historical memory to cultural memory/individual memory retention. This work does not detract from previous interpretations of Pamuk's work, but rather augments them, by moving the focus of past literature on memory in the story to memory before the story. It claims that literature titles are memory markers that open the literary text, from which a philosophical perspective is encouraged and which guide the reader to a symbol world which invites her to the world of the literary work from the outset. The article provides an innovative view on Pamuk scholarship and extends broader discussions in memory studies, paratext theory, and literary interpretation by placing emphasis on how titles may be an important aspect of interpretation.