Exploring Author’s Cogito in Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night According to Georges Poulet’s Theory

Examining the author’s cogito, which is his consciousness, is a common research strand in literary criticism and has been the focus of many renowned authors. Louis Ferdinand Celine made use of this in his novel Journey to the End of the Night through repetitive themes. According to Georges Poulet, individuals gain knowledge of the world in accordance with their surrounding world. For Poulet, place is one of the fundamental categories of communication with the world. The author’s world consciousness, as Poulet maintains, can be uncovered by the analysis of narrator’s perception of the place. The present work follows an analytical-descriptive approach and aims to exploring author’s cogito in Céline’s Journey to the End of the Night according to Georges Poulet’s theory. The study hypothesizes that the way the narrator describes space and place can reveal the author’s cogito, which is a reflection of Bardamu’s relationship with the author’s perception of the world. In this autofiction, the narrator recounts his life, wanderings and travels in different places.