O Eterno Retorno como assinatura em César Aira

Abstract

In this article, we analyze what constitutes Eternal Return in the work of Argentine writer César Aira. The main book studied is Cumpleaños (2001), in which Aira seems to shed all masks and finally reveal the name behind all names, or the Aira-author behind the many characters which, throughout his long history of self reinvention, personal myth-making, narrative deliria, and Dadaist fairy tales, have born his name. The analysis also uses Otobiography, a seminar in which Jacques Derrida analyzes the autographic writings of Friedrich Nietzsche Ecce Homo. There is no absolute equivalency between Ecce Homo and Cumpleaños, but both works offer "writings of the self" which reveal "how someone becomes what they are," or how the author thinks, or the character that takes the author's role to discuss him. This way, in an imaginary banquet, we accept the (supposedly) unmasked mind that César Aira offers on a silver platter and go on the offensive.