"Doppelganger" Motif In Paul Auster’s The New York Trilogy

By exploring different forms of the “doppelganger” motif showed in this trilogy,this essay aims at further discussing the theme of identity in modern society. Based ona unique story, Auster explains it in three different ways and forms an amazing andintriguing trilogy. The language of these novels is similar to that in documentary filmswhich is profound and thought-provoking. Mixing Hitchcockian suspense,Kafkaesque thinking about existence and black humor, The New York Trilogy is quitea symbol and representation of novel in the postmodern world.Firstly, the doppelganger motif is showed in the relation between the author, thenarrator and among the characters. The authority of an author is questioned and theomnipresent and omnipotent third person narrator is not reliable any more. Secondly,from the perspective of the doppelganger relation between the author and his literary“fathers”, the development of literary is a process of inheriting as well as subversion.Doppelganger, as a motif, has attracted writers’ attention since the RomanticLiterature, and writers of different periods are keen on search of meaning and thenature of language, hoping to use language as their tool to find out ultimate truth andnature of the world. The last part will talk about Auster’s purposes to use thedoppelganger motif in his novel, which are quest for meaning and pure language. Thisstory shows us the various barriers and difficulties that writers, characters and thereaders encounter in the quest, the indeterminacy of the postmodern society as well asthe impossibility to achieve the ultimate meaning and nature of language.