Destabilising Binary Oppositions in Anthony Doerr’s “All the Light You Cannot See”: Synergetic, Thanatological and Cognitive Perspectives

This article examines the instability and semantic permeability of fundamental binary oppositions in Anthony Doerr’s “All the Light We Cannot See”. Employing a synergetic approach in conjunction with cognitive poetics, sensory narratology, and thanatological studies, the paper analyses the oppositional structures of light/darkness, childhood/adulthood, individual/collective, and duty/morality. Rather than functioning as fixed conceptual categories, these oppositions emerge as dynamic and mutually interdependent constructs whose boundaries are repeatedly destabilised by the experience of war. Particular attention is devoted to the representation of death and the transformation of the categories of life and future under the conditions of World War II. The article argues that A. Doerr’s narrative constructs a polyphonic thanatological discourse in which death acquires multiple symbolic manifestations conditioned by individual consciousness and cultural memory. The study further demonstrates that sensory experience – especially tactile and olfactory perception – constitutes an essential epistemological principle within the novel and contributes to the formation of a distinctive synesthetic mode of representation. The ambivalent nature of scientific knowledge is likewise explored through the opposition between cognition and destruction. By integrating insights from comparative literature, trauma studies, and cognitive literary criticism, the paper demonstrates that A. Doerr’s novel challenges rigid dichotomous thinking and proposes a more fluid understanding of ethical, existential, and epistemological categories.