INTERGENERATIONAL DIALOGUE AS A TRAUMATIC EXPERIENCE IN ELIZABETH GILBERT’S NOVEL «STERN MEN»
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.32782/folium/2026.9.34Keywords:
cultural memory, intergenerational dialogue, trauma, narrative, topos, women’s prose, literary image, identity, Elizabeth GilbertAbstract
The article examines the peculiarities of the functioning of intergenerational dialogue as a means of transmitting traumatic experience in contemporary women’s prose. Using Elizabeth Gilbert’s novel «Stern Men» as a case study, the research analyzes the mechanisms of transgenerational trauma transmission caused by patriarchal pressure, gender inequality, and the social isolation of closed island communities. The theoretical framework of the study is based on memory studies developed by J. Assmann, A. Assmann, and A. Erll, as well as trauma theory proposed by A. Müller. The study demonstrates that, in women’s literature, trauma often transcends the realm of the «unspeakable» and becomes subject to active narrativization. It is revealed that the central aspect of intergenerational trauma in the analyzed novel is the phenomenon of «silence» – an inherited inability to verbalize emotions that is transmitted from parents to children as a destructive survival strategy. It has been demonstrated that the silencing of the family past becomes a factor contributing to emotional alienation, the reproduction of conflictual patterns of behaviour, and the loss of opportunities for open dialogue between generations. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of female characters representing three generations (Jane Smith-Ellis, Mary Thomas, and Ruth Thomas), through which the functioning of intergenerational trauma and its influence on the formation of the heroines’ personal identity is explored. The study proves that the heroines’ conflict with the patriarchal Ellis family constitutes a key source of their feelings of inferiority and dependence. It is established that the overcoming of this trauma by the protagonist, Ruth Thomas, occurs through the working-through of the family past and the transformation of victimhood into active agency. In the novel, intergenerational dialogue emerges as a space for encountering one’s authentic self, where articulating the previously silenced pain of earlier generations, restoring memory, and re-evaluating the family’s past make it possible to break the cycle of destructive inheritance and establish a new model of intergenerational interaction.
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