Date of Award
5-4-2022
Degree Type
Thesis
Degree Name
Master of Arts (MA)
Department
English
First Advisor
Dr. Christopher Kocela
Second Advisor
Dr. Paul Schmidt
Third Advisor
Dr. Mark Noble
Abstract
This thesis examines how Thomas Pynchon and Stephen Wright challenge Western imperialism in V. and Meditations in Green, respectively. Both works, whose initial publication dates bookend the Vietnam war, are critical of the West’s efforts to whitewash colonial violence: V. in Southwest Africa, and Meditations in Green in Vietnam. These criticisms call into question how historical events are (mis)remembered in the West, whose agencies have historically been recognized within Western discourses, and whose lives the West has traditionally considered grievable. Both novels work to undo these ‘misrememberings’ of history. Ultimately, in this undoing, both works can be read as rejecting American exceptionalism—defined by William V. Spanos as “an ontological interpretation of the American national identity” which feels a transcendental right to the domination of space. V. and Meditations in Green look to disrupt that identity.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.57709/28908285
Recommended Citation
Elrod, F. Tyler, ""[H]earing beyond what we are able to hear: Reframing Grievable Lives in Thomas Pynchon?s V. and Stephen Wright?s Meditations in Green." Thesis, Georgia State University, 2022.
doi: https://doi.org/10.57709/28908285
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