Resumen de Unlocking the door to shadow and substance: Nona Fernández’s "La dimensión desconocida"
This paper critically examines Nona Fernández’s La dimensión desconocida (2016), within the broader context of Chilean literature and memory narratives, offering a unique exploration of silence, memory, and the interplay between reality and imagination. Fernández’s narrative is deeply rooted in her engagement with The Twilight Zone television series, using it as a symbolic lens to navigate the liminal spaces between sound and silence, memory and forgetting. The sustained vacillation between the narrator and implied author’s work as an investigative reporter and her childhood memories, firmly scaffolded to the dystopian imagination of parallel worlds presented through its interface with The Twilight Zone series, provides a compelling exposé of the present moment. The article analyzes the structural intricacies of the novel, divided into four sections corresponding to different ‘zones’, drawing parallels between the narrative structure and the episodes of the show. Through this, Fernández skillfully addresses the complexities of memory work, intertwining personal recollections with journalistic investigations into the crimes of the Pinochet era. The significance of Fernández’s work lies not solely in its recording of a traumatic past but in its exploration of the temporal indeterminacy inherent in all exercises in memory that recall violent events.
Through her intricate narrative and thematic choices, Fernández contributes significantly to the ongoing discourse on memory narratives and the ethical responsibilities associated with remembering historical trauma.
