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The Ethics of Infidelity in <i>Country of My Skull</i>


K Rostan

Abstract



For some readers, Antjie Krog's integration of others' personal testimonies and her
fictionalised, extramarital romance in Country of My Skull were controversial approaches
to representing personal and political atrocities. This essay argues that these two
prominent literary features in her book – the citations and the romantic affair – are in fact
the basis for its ethics of acknowledgement and inclusive community. I argue that Krog's
extensive citations convey loss so powerfully in part because they illustrate the very limits
of her language as well as the radical decontextualisation of the traumatic events
themselves. Likewise, the fictional affair is a figure for the larger loyalty to others that
Krog proposes, an acknowledgment of others that feels like a betrayal of all that one knows.

Current Writing Vol. 19 (2) 2007: pp. 144-162

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eISSN: 2159-9130
print ISSN: 1013-929X