Sjukdomens gränsland. Studie av gränsen från två sidor i Torgny Lindgrens roman Hummelhonung

Caroline Haux, Department of Culture and Aesthetics, Stockholm University Borderland of Disease: Analyses of the Border from Two Directions in Torgny Lindgren’s Hummelhonung (Sjukdomens gränsland. Studie av gränsen från två sidor i Torgny Lindgrens roman Hummelhonung) This article investigates how disease as a predicament of human existence is posed as both problem and solution. The border is at the centre of the study — that which both divides and connects, hinders and channels, establishes opposites and makes fusion possible. Two perspectives are laid out: one in which the border that also can be understood as difference is investigated in a sphere of immanence; the other situates the border where transcendence is possible. The first angle is theorized with the help of René Girard’s concept of “triangular desire”, the second angle is investigated through the discourse of mysticism, represented by Simone Weil and Jacob Boehme. Both perspectives posit the border as a switchboard between self and other. With the border at the centre, the article pursues the emergence of an ethical subject