In the Cave: Lawrence Norfolk Rewrites Paul Celan

Lawrence Norfolk's historical novel In the Shape of a Boar explores truth and authenticity in representations of the past by incorporating a postmodernist, epistemological scepticism which regards the past as inaccessible or un-narratable. Its plot turns on analogies conveyed by intertextual and intratextual allusions: between events in ancient and Nazi-occupied Greece, and between its protagonist, Samuel Memel, and Paul Celan. This article highlights the novel's overlooked German dimension, assesses the cogency of Norfolk's asserted likenesses and metaphorical correspondences, and considers problematical aspects of counterfactual invention in what masquerades, in Part ii, as a realistic roman-à-clef