Conception de l'histoire, concept de culture européenne chez Jean Améry et Imre Kertész

In the 20th century the European literature had to face the difficulties of History's representation. Its most evident example is the Shoah: although the genre of novel always has kept a critical attitude towards the traditions of the European philosophy it had to realize neither that nor the narration of the 19th century's novel neither the 20th century's literary discourse could be able for the authentic representation of History. This experience is called 'the zero point of History" (Imre Kertész) and our goal is to show that which way and which measure the genre of the novel and the essay tend to rebuild the lost validity of the different languages. Though the XXth century' literature made significant efforts to represent History, its referenciality has been transformed in the non- fiction literature. Our interest is focused on the essays as a potential way of speaking of the Auschwitz – paradigm. Proceeding from Imre Kertész's phrase: "the concentration camp is imaginable only and exclusively as literature, never as reality" the essay is going to re-read the History and Europe's cultural memory based on the theories of Ricœur's History, Memory, Forgetting. This re-reading supposes and represents a dialogue between Améry's and Kertész's texts. The reflection is focused on the important but problematic links between history and faith, history and writing, history and freedom, history and ethics, history and totality, history and identity.