New-Economy Zombies: Kathrin Röggla's wir schlafen nicht

Publisher： Rodopi

ISSN： 0927-1910

Source： German Monitor, Vol.76, Iss.1, 2013-05, pp. : 131-148

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Abstract

In her 2004 documentary novel wir schlafen nicht, Kathrin Röggla ventures into the destructive universe of the so-called New Economy. Cracks are beginning to show in the New Economy boom, and the reader is drawn into a world where pressure to perform has been driven to the point of absurdity amidst the mantras of competition, flexibility, efficiency, and downsizing. Drawing on Mikhail Bakhtin's concept of polyphony, this chapter considers how, through the medium of orchestrated polyphonic dialogues, Röggla imparts a trenchant criticism of man's dysfunctional and self-destructive condition under the totalising effects of a technology-based, neo-liberal economy that has spiralled out of control. The result is a disconcerting insight into the reification of the individual within a totalising economic system which, in its striving for efficiency, commodifies human beings, transforming them into zombie-like automatons.