The Problem of Perception in Sandor Márai’s Embers: An Advaitic Study

The article examines how Sandor Márai's novel Embers illustrates the limits of human perception, using the Advaita Vedanta concept of pramana (a method of knowledge). The novel's narrative, set in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, centers on a triangular relationship that reveals how perception creates a shadow or reflected consciousness, preventing characters from seeing things as they really are. The authors argue that the fictional story demonstrates the genuine dilemmas and paradoxes that problematize human relationships, showing how epistemic limits quicken life's complexities.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This article attempts to study the problem of perception in Sandor Márai’s celebrated novel Embers from the standpoint of the pramana (a method of knowledge) of Advaita Vedanta. An epistemic problem, the problem of perception, concerns the overwhelming questions of life, culminating in an enigmatic amalgamation of dilemmas and paradoxes. Genuine dilemmas and paradoxes problematize human relationships, which is evident in the complex narrative of Embers. Our contention in this article is to show how, even though enacted within the periphery of the purely fictional, Embers bears testimony to the complexities of life that are quickened by the limits of human perception, which keeps one from seeing how things really are by creating a shadow or reflected consciousness. Set against the backdrop of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the novel opens up a dialogic space at the intersection of a triangular relationship enacted on the threshold of perception and its multidimensional problems.