Abstract
This paper concentrates on multilingualism in a three-part autobiography of Elias Canetti: The Tongue Set Free, The Torch in My Ear and The Play of the Eyes. The multiplicity of languages plays an important role in the part of autobiography which depicts author's childhood, but also in the evocation of time shaping his artistic approach in the 20s and 30s of the 20th century.
Theme of the language is in Canetti's autobiography permanently present and is enriched continuously with new layers of meaning. However multilingualism is expressed not only in the thematic level of autobiography, but also at the level of composition.
In this article we present how the plurality of language is used in the third part of the Canetti's autobiography The Play of the Eyes. The specific effects of the work are based on the tension between the literariness and the non-fictional status of the genre of autobiography.
The analysis of Canetti's text serves as a case study in theoretical delimitation of an autobiographical narrative.