The time-space of the archive: on the shadow texts of Sara Lidman
As a place for scientific research the archive may be stationary or mobile – or even a virtual site. Alongside its function as a source for empirical study, the archive holds several other crucial qualities which highlight the complexity of all epistemological endeavour, including its metaphorical or symbolical aspects. Thus, ”archive” or ”archival” has been frequently used keywords in recent debate and research, from feminist theory to art theory. Jacques Derrida’s striking metaphor of ”mal d’archive” – archive fever – has been followed by several more or less related thought figures, such as Sara Ahmed’s image of ”the Unhappy Archives of Feminist Theory” och Ann Cvetkovich’ ”Archive of Feelings” has been most influential.
However, among archives, an author’s archive always holds an exceptional position, located as it is on the treshold between private, personal and public. Remaining objects, imprints of intimate articulations of emotions in diaries and letters are systematized side by side, often in chronological order, with manuscripts, drafts, articles etc. As such, an author’s diary never tells just one story – but shelters the potential of many, written and unwritten; manifest or hidden. In this way an author’s archive can be said to form a ”time-space” of its own, where the material layerings of memories, narrative patterns and lived experiences which both resists and challenges archival ordering principles.
Taking its departure from the archive of Swedish novelist Sara Lidman (1923-2004), the aim of this article is to reflect on the encounter between the researcher and the author in an archival context. The methodological and stylistic approach is experimental, making use of personal diary writing as a means to enfold the tactile and sensual aspects of the ”archival experience”. The article thus wants to argue that archival research must be recognized as an emotional as well as epistemological and intellectual practice.