Memento provides a Rosetta Stone to decode deeper meaning within his larger-scale efforts, offering a window into the complex paradoxes that add thematic weight to his intricately plotted stories. Nolan's films often jump from a familiar genre archetype. In Memento, Guy Pearce's Leonard Shelby recalls the weary antiheroes of film noir, but his filmography is full of familiar figures ranging from superheroes to great men of history.
Excellent descriptions of trauma abound, including memoirs, but they are logical and descriptive, constrained by the conventions of straightforward narrative. But trauma itself upends the usual modes of narrative by which we think about our lives: out of sequence and unintegrated, traumatic memories defy the logic that guides our sense of our lives as stories with a past, present, and future. Literary tools such as symbol, allegory, and narrative structure can embody a visceral sense of the ways that trauma can disrupt and diminish a life.
In recent years, some of the most talked-about literary novels have not given their readers much to talk about, at least when it comes to plot. In the late 2010s, authors such as Rachel Cusk, Ben Lerner, and Sheila Heti wrote books that are heavy on interiority and light on events; they have few of the markers of a traditional rise-and-fall story structure, and instead prioritize voice and close description.