"... a certain tenderness for the old Zipper!": unfulfilled nostalgia for the father and the son's failure in "Zipper and His Father ", by Joseph Roth

Abstract

The father-son relationship has long been a cornerstone of psychoanalytic research. This article examines one such relationship, as present in Joseph Roth's novel Zipper and His Father (Zipper und sein Vater, 1928), in the relevant historical and psycho-social context. Tracing a parallel between the fatherly figure of the Austro-Hungarian Emperor, Franz Joseph, and Arnold Zipper's father, as well as drawing upon the narrator's (and Roth's own) personal experience, the article presents an analysis of the importance of the fatherly figure and the devastating consequences of its absence.