Reading Martin Amis’s Recreation of the Perpetrator’s Gaze in The Zone of Interest

Aída Díaz Bild

doi:10.26754/ojs_misc/mj.202410052

Authors

Aída Díaz Bild Universidad de La Laguna https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7543-5872

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.26754/ojs_misc/mj.202410052

Keywords:

The Zone of Interest, perpetrator, Holocaust, Martin Amis, Auschwitz, buffoon

Abstract

The Zone of Interest is a historical novel set in Auschwitz in the months from August 1942 to April 1943, and which belongs to the category of perpetrator fiction. This
article centres on the character of Paul Doll, the camp commandant, who represents the banality of evil and, through whose voice Amis gives the readers a sharp picture
of the abominations committed by the Nazis, while he recounts the causes and devastating consequences of the perpetrators’ actions. By transforming Doll into a buffoon, Amis offers a different perspective on the Holocaust and makes the reader realise that those responsible for the worst crimes were neither monsters nor exceptional human beings, but normal, vulnerable people who had the fate of millions of Jews in their hands.

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