All That Remains: Post-Apocalyptic Fiction Explored Through Cormac McCarthy's The Road and Post-9/11 Discourse

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ALL THAT REMAINS

POST-APOCALYPTIC FICTION EXPLORED

THROUGH CORMAC MCCARTHY’S THE ROAD

AND POST-9/11 DISCOURSE

SUBMITTED BY TALITHA DEHAENE

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IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS IN CONTEMPORARY LITERATURE AND LITERARY THEORY

AT UNIVERSITEIT LEIDEN JULY 2015

UNDER SUPERVISION OF MARIA BOLETSI FACULTY OF HUMANITIES

WORDS: 18443

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INTRODUCTION

James Berger, author of After The End: Representations of Post-apocalypse (1999) pointedly identifies the paradox in post-apocalyptic fiction: it tells stories that happen after the end, “in which the ending, paradoxically, both does and does not take place” (XII). Post-apocalyptic fiction explores the aftermath of the apocalypse in a world inhabited by only a tiny fraction of the original population, of which every single survivor is damaged in one way or another. To summarize the essence of the genre: “It is about aftermaths and remainders, about how to imagine what happens after an event conceived of as final” (Berger XII). I have always been fascinated by post-apocalyptic fiction, however gruesome it may seem. I wanted to incorporate the genre in my master’s thesis, but during my initial explorative research I often did not find the scientific literature that I was looking for. There seem to be very few theoretical studies on post-apocalyptic fiction as a genre on its own. With this thesis, I would like to contribute a work of academic literature on the genre and attempt to take the first step towards a genre-theoretical foundation for post-apocalyptic fiction.

As my first research question I would like to find out what is so typical about post-apocalyptic fiction. A rather crude definition of the genre would require that the story takes place after an apocalypse-like event (because technically there can be no aftermath after an actual world-ending apocalypse). In genre theory, though, this requirement alone would not be enough to delineate all aspects of the particular genre. Certain characteristic conventions regarding both content and/or form are important for its distinction as an independent genre. In this thesis, I distinguish three basic elements on which the genre of post-apocalyptic fiction is based: 1) there has been an apocalypse-like event, 2) few people have survived, and 3) these sole survivors have to make do without any form (or with very little) of modern technology. These elements set the genre apart from others that share similarities, such as dystopian or apocalyptic fiction. Of course, a work of fiction can have elements of both or more genres, but this

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will be discussed later on in this thesis when I talk about genre theory. Apart from these main elements of the plot, the genre also includes a specific set of characteristic conventions. These are conventions of plot, story and narrative. They are not necessary elements of the genre and do not occur in every single work of post-apocalyptic fiction. Rather, they are familiar generic motifs and tropes that recur in the genre. My first research question is then: what are the characteristic conventions of the post-apocalyptic genre? Additionally, I want to study the literary functions of these conventions in terms of story, plot and narrative of texts within the genre. For this, I will use Cormac McCarthy’s 2004 novel The Road as a case study.

Furthermore, in this thesis I will demonstrate how The Road is not only a post-apocalyptic work of fiction, but also a post-9/11 novel. I propose that in playing with the generic conventions of the genre, the novel also responds critically to the dominant 9/11 rhetoric established by American media and the Bush administration. My second research question focuses on how exactly this happens in The Road.

The scope of this thesis is narrowed down to Western, and more specifically, Anglo-American post-apocalyptic fiction. This is mostly a practical choice, as most of the post-apocalyptic fiction known to me is Anglo-American. Additionally, shrinking the scope to a certain region is necessary in any case, because of the limited amount of time and words available for a master’s thesis. In the same sense most of the works of fiction mentioned in this thesis are contemporary.

This thesis consists of three chapters. Chapter 1 lays the theoretical groundwork by discussing the main concepts used, such as genre,

post-apocalyptic fiction, post-apocalyptic conventions, plot, story and narrative. In this chapter I also present my list of characteristic conventions of the

post-apocalyptic genre. Chapter 2 consists of two main parts. First, the

post-apocalyptic genre is situated in a historical and socio-political context as I explore its historic origins and various reasons for its overall popularity. Then, I focus on its particular popularity in times of crises. From there on, I go to the second part of the chapter and focus on the terrorist attacks of 9/11. I discuss the genre of the 9/11 novel and how it has responded to the 9/11 rhetoric of the

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Bush administration. In chapter 3, all of these topics are tied together in an analysis of Cormac McCarthy’s 2004 novel The Road as a post-apocalyptic post-9/11 novel.

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What does this mean, this oxymoron “after the end”?

Before the beginning and after the end, there can only be nothing. (Berger XI)

CHAPTER 1: THEORY

In this chapter, I will first cover the theoretical basics of the concept of ‘genre’. I will explore some theoretical classifications of genres and then establish which approach I will be using in this thesis. Furthermore, I will try to define the genre of post-apocalyptic fiction. The second part of this chapter is dedicated to the conventions that are specific to the post-apocalyptic genre. I will discuss exactly why they are characteristic and how they function in terms of story, plot and narrative within the genre.

WHAT IS A GENRE AND HOW IS IT DEFINED?

The classification of texts into genres (such as ‘western’, ‘romantic comedy’, ‘thriller’, ‘whodunit’, and so on) is not an objective, neutral or even very scientific procedure. There is often considerable theoretical disagreement about the definition of specific genres (Chandler 1). A fundamental problem with genre identification, for example, is the empiricist dilemma as pointed out by Andrew Tudor:

To take a genre such as the 'western', analyze it, and list its principal characteristics, is to beg the question that we must first isolate the body of films which are 'westerns'. But they can only be isolated on the basis of the 'principal characteristics' which can only be discovered from the films themselves after they have been isolated. (225-226)

Moreover, there is the division between the concepts of ‘theoretical’ and ‘empirical’ genres. Theoretical genres are based on a theoretical definition after

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which empirical research is conducted into existing works of fiction that might fit that definition. The definition of empirical genres is based on common features that are shared by an existing body of works. However, it is not very difficult to find texts that are exceptions to any given definition of a particular genre (Chandler 2). Christine Gledhill states that there are no rigid rules of inclusion or exclusion to genres, because they are not “discrete systems consisting of a fixed number of listable items” (60-64). Particular characteristics of a genre are not specifically unique to it: they are distinctive because of their relative prominence, combination and functions (Neale 22-23). Moreover, some definitions of genres are more loose and flexible in their conventions and boundaries than others.

A common approach to genre definition is based on the psycholinguistic concept of prototypicality, in which some characteristics and even entire texts would be widely regarded as being more typical of a genre than others (Chandler 2). Another way to theorize genres is in terms of ‘family resemblances’, which is an alternative approach that contemporary theorists often favor over more traditional, rigid approaches to genre theory (Swales 49). In this approach, a genre includes a loosely grouped family of works that are related by a set of family resemblances, instead of essential defining features. Individual texts within a genre rarely feature all of its literary characteristics, so each member of a genre family shares some of these resemblances with others but not necessarily with all the other members. This approach is focused on inclusion rather than exclusion, as it proposes that a single work of fiction can relate to a generic genre family by different degrees. The idea of a pure genre with clear boundaries is rejected. In this thesis, I adopt the ‘family resemblances’ approach for defining the post-apocalyptic genre.

Genres can often share similar conventions but still be separate genres, just like texts can exhibit the conventions of more than one genre as well (Chandler 2). For example: apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction are often studied together because they share certain family resemblances. Still, most critics and scholars generally distinguish between both genres, because even though the aftermath always presupposes an actual catastrophe that caused it, each genre is typified by a different combination of conventions.

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A genre is often recognizable and familiar because its body of works shares particular resemblances that are associated with the genre family as a whole. As readers enter the narrative, they can expect satisfaction from certain formulaic structures that they expected based on the genre family (Becker 29-30). A handful of basic characteristics clearly set post-apocalyptic fiction apart from other genres. These are three structural elements that are considered to be crucial for the genre. First of all, the typical post-apocalyptic story takes place in a world or civilization after some kind of apocalyptic disaster has happened. This is common knowledge. Secondly, although most of the human population has been wiped out, there are a few people scattered around who have survived (Hart & Holba 54). This is a necessary element because, obviously, otherwise there would be nobody to tell a story about. Finally, these survivors are forced to manage without any form (or very little) of modern technology (Broderick).

Most post-apocalyptic stories are set in a time frame immediately after the apocalypse has taken place, while some focus on a new world that has been established considerably later. In the latter cases, the aforementioned second and third basic characteristics usually do not really apply anymore. It is questionable, however, if these stories can be called ‘post-apocalyptic’ or whether they are actually just ‘regular’ science fiction set in a distant future, especially when the past apocalyptic event is merely treated as a detail to the story. If the post-apocalyptic genre would include these stories too, every modern film set in the twenty-first century could be seen as post-apocalyptic as well, because technically it is about a civilization established long after the apocalyptic event of, for example, the Ice Age. To avoid broadening the genre too much, this thesis will consider post-apocalyptic fiction a genre based on the three elements named earlier, stressing the fact that the events in these stories take place a reasonable amount of time after the apocalypse, when a new society has not yet been formed.

In this thesis, I put forward the three aforementioned basic elements as those that make up the genre of post-apocalyptic fiction and set it apart from other genres, such as apocalyptic or dystopian fiction. This means that without these three present in a text, it cannot be regarded as a work of post-apocalyptic

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fiction. Besides these main elements of the plot, there is, as explained before, a set of characteristic conventions that are specific to the genre as well. These do not necessarily make up the genre or appear in every work of post-apocalyptic fiction. Rather, they are familiar generic motifs and tropes of plot, story and narrative that have acquired new impetus in the post-apocalyptic scenario (Broderick).

CONVENTIONS OF THE GENRE

In this part of the chapter I will explore the most prevalent and, in my opinion, important characteristic conventions primarily found in contemporary Anglo-American post-apocalyptic books and films. I will discuss exactly why they are so characteristic and how they function in terms of story, plot and narrative within the genre.

When discussing the functions of these conventions in terms of story, plot and narrative in works of fiction it is important to understand the difference between these concepts (Cobley). Story refers to the set of relevant events in chronological order: how the events of the story told in a book or film actually happened, with all of the details in between. For example: the main character waking up, brushing his teeth, washing his hair and having breakfast before going to work. Plot refers to the way in which certain events are sequenced and selected into a certain structure for telling the story with maximum effect. Instead of telling the entire sequence of events of that morning, the plot could jump from ‘the main character wakes up’ to ‘he leaves for work’ instead. A traditional way of organizing the plot is by following Gustav Freytag’s pyramid of plot, in which the story is divided into five parts: exposition (of the situation: who, where, what, etc.), rising action (through the inciting of an incident and conflict), climax (the turning point), falling action (when everything comes together and falls into place) and resolution. Finally, narrative refers to the way the plot and story are communicated to the reader. This includes, for example, the focalization and mode of narration, The narrative is what connects the separate events in a meaningful way. If the main character would, for example,

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decide not to brush his teeth or have breakfast before leaving for work, the narrative could link these events by explaining that he got up too late so he has to hurry. Authors can also use narrative techniques such as flashbacks and –forwards to accomplish this (Cobley).

I initially composed a list of conventions based on my own findings. Later on, I combined it with information I found in literature on the genre, removing any feature that wasn’t mentioned at least once. Eventually, the following list was composed.

SURVIVAL VERSUS HUMANITY

“When nature dies, so do language, culture and ethics. Concepts that previously made sense are rendered absurd and dysfunctional”, says Inger-Anne Søfting (707). When the world as we know it has ended, so have our society and its rules. Of course, people always try to hold on to the ethics and morals they are used to. But in the post-apocalyptic world, what is the use of that? In the aftermath, important things such as shelter, food and water are scarce. Depending on the number of survivors, sooner or later conflicts rise about the much-needed resources. And not everyone wants to hold on to the ethical rules of the pre-apocalyptic times, simply because these would get in the way of what they want. Every individual has to fight to survive, but the question is: how far will they go? How much of their humanity are they willing to give up for food or shelter? Would they still be willing to help other people when winter comes and they do not have any solid shoes or warm blankets, while the starving old man does? Which ethical rules of the past do they hold on to, which do they let go of, and why would any of it matter anyway? Mick Broderick calls the situation I have sketched above “the (ir)relevance of pre-holocaust social mores and institutions in the post-nuclear world.” What is ‘good’ and what is ‘evil’ when the world in which these concepts were invented no longer exists? What is humanity in its essence? These are serious questions that are generally explored within this genre, because as a consequence of the post-apocalyptic situation, the categories of good and evil become blurred (Hart & Halbo 56).

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The ethical dilemma of preserving one's humanity or doing what is necessary to survive is a key narrative element within the genre as it serves to engage the audience. It makes you think about what is right and what is wrong: where exactly should the line between right and wrong be drawn in a dramatic situation like the apocalyptic aftermath? This dilemma touches on our personal emotions as well: where would we stand in all of this? What would we, as individuals, do to survive? The engaging effect is exactly why the humanity versus survival aspect of events in post-apocalyptic stories is often stressed.

This specific dilemma has been getting much attention within the genre, particularly in the last few years. An important work of fiction in this respect has been The Walking Dead: Season One (2012), a video game by Telltale Games based on the graphic novels series of the same name. In this game, you are Lee, a man who wakes up in a forest after an unknown virus has caused people to turn into zombies. Throughout the game, you meet different people and have to make crucial decisions. You choose who you want in your group. You choose whether you leave a girl in the street to die after a zombie has bitten her. You choose which one of your two friends you save when zombies attack both of them. This game is probably the closest any of us would ever come to experiencing just how difficult it is to have to make these kinds of choices when every one of them is a matter of survival. The story and, with it, the way the other characters treat you change according to your decisions. At the end of the game, statistics are shown in which your decisions are compared to those of others who have played the game. The Walking Dead: Season One explores the dilemma of humanity versus survival that is characteristic of the post-apocalyptic genre in a way few other media have been able to do before, because not only does it place you at the heart of the story and forces you to make the decisions yourself, you also have to deal with the consequences for the rest of the story.

The apocalypse unveils the world to its final transparent nakedness, says James Berger (38). In the traditional post-apocalyptic scenario, things like feminism, democracy and social justice are considered decadent luxuries (Berger 8). These are concepts from the past that hold no actual value in the present. Nonetheless, he says, most post-apocalyptic fiction shows characters trying to preserve a version of humanity in the midst of an inhuman world (10). Usually,

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the main characters in post-apocalyptic fiction are shown struggling with this dilemma of humanity versus survival. They try to maintain what little is left of human values and solidarity in the post-apocalyptic world, as long as it does not threaten their own survival. The protagonists are almost always the ‘good guys’, so the audience feels sympathetic towards them. Because of the generally deep exploration of the moral aspects of survival, the audience can understand better the sometimes rather harsh choices the characters make.

Moreover, the ethical dilemma of humanity versus survival has a reassuring function. It tells us that no matter how bad things could hypothetically get, there will always be decent human beings left. There will always be some sort of morality. Trying to maintain your humanity does not mean you are necessarily the loser who will die first. In other words: there is hope. Additionally, the audience can imagine themselves being among the few good people left, doing the right thing after all, which makes them feel good about themselves.

JOURNEY TOWARDS HOPE

The aftermath is never pretty. There is always destruction, wasteland and devastation. The size of it depends on the cause of the apocalypse. This is why characters in post-apocalyptic fiction almost always travel: they look for a better place. There is often no way of communicating with other parts of the country (or the world) anymore, so they need to see for themselves that everything has been destroyed, everywhere. Besides that, it is also an inherently human quality to always assume, or at least suspect, that the grass is greener elsewhere. In certain post-apocalyptic conditions, traveling the country can also simply be the wisest option: fleeing a capital city because of the dead bodies piling up, or just trying to stay away from roaming gangs are examples of what motivates characters to move. Whatever the reason, most post-apocalyptic fiction centers on survivors undertaking a journey.

Wolfe characterizes this as the “journey through the wasteland” stage of post-apocalyptic fiction. He points out as well that journeying is often one of the

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most important elements in post-apocalyptic fiction. This would, at least partially, serve as a form of purgation of despair of the main characters (10). In any case, it serves the plot well. The journey provides the protagonists with an endless array of possible locations to see, people to meet and situations to get stuck in. It also makes sure there is a certain flow in the narrative: the story does not just linger on in the same spot, it moves at a certain pace because of the traveling. The plot only features some parts of the journey: the start, some issues in the middle (such as conflicts in the group or some other action-packed situations) and the endpoint, which is hopefully the intended destination.

In the 2009 TV series The Walking Dead, (based on the graphic novels series of the same name as well) the main characters are on a journey across the country for most of the time. After a while, they end up in an abandoned prison with enough food and water to last them a very long time. This situation goes on for quite a while, but eventually something happens that forces them to leave the safety of the prison and wander around looking for a new place again. They need to get out on the road because this brings with it a whole new sort of suspense and mystery. The audience wonders if they will ever reach their destination. And also: what will happen then?

The journey also serves the narrative as it often sets the scene and tone of the story. There is a lot of room for scenic descriptions of the post-apocalyptic world they travel through. This works well in both novels and films because it achieves maximum dramatic effect. Moreover, a journey through a post-apocalyptic land is often very dangerous, so there is also an added layer of suspense in the narrative.

AN ULTIMATE GOAL AND/OR FIXABLE CAUSE

This common post-apocalyptic journey of course has a particular destination. Most of the times the goal is to get away from something, to seek refuge or shelter. The survivors need a place with more food, easier access to water, better defenses from people with bad intentions or better shelter for the cold winter months. In terms of its function in the narrative, the journey has a goal because

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there needs to be an actual climax to work up to, a sense of suspense over the expectations of the final destination and usually also a clear ending for the story. This course of events is an excellent example of Freytag’s pyramid for plot as mentioned earlier.

However, reaching the intended destination or goal does not always end the story. In The Walking Dead the survivors travel in search for a good place to stay for a while, then catch their breath at a prison for a season and a half, but ultimately leave again. Their goal had been reached and this usually means the end of the story. However, because the series continued, they had to leave again, but with a new goal. So in the most recent season, they were travelling towards a refugee camp called Terminus. In The Stand (1978) by Stephen King, a deadly type of influenza wipes out 99,4% of the human population. The book focuses on different groups of people who are travelling the country for different reasons: Fran, Harold, Stu and Glen are one their way to the CDC in Stovington to find someone of authority, while Larry is heading towards the coast for the summer. The journey is a very common theme but always comes with a clear and hopeful goal. With this, the narrative turns optimistic and hopeful because of an ultimate goal in sight.

Some post-apocalyptic stories go even further and imply that the cause of the apocalypse is fixable. The main characters then have to try and find the solution. In the first season of The Walking Dead, the party of main characters undertakes a big journey to reach a CDC laboratory in Atlanta, Georgia, where they hope scientists have developed a cure for the zombie outbreak. In World

War Z (2013) the main character travels to South Korea, Israel and Wales to trace

Patient Zero and find a vaccine for the zombie virus. And in The Stand protagonists Nick, Tom and Ralph travel to Nebraska searching for Mother Abigail, an old woman who has appeared in their dreams and who they hope will be their savior. There is always hope in post-apocalyptic stories, even when the world has ended (Andrade 5).

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Post-apocalyptic fiction cannot be entirely separated from the apocalyptic genre: the world after the end must and will be seen in light of the world before it, and its actual apocalypse. Or, as Berger puts it, post-apocalyptic fiction “straddles the boundary between before and after some event that has obliterated what went before yet defines what will come after” (19).

In “Keeping The Lights on” (2011), Jeremy R. Grossman refers to cultural artifacts that pass from contemporary times through the apocalyptic event as ‘post-apocalyptic remains’ (ii). I would like to adopt the concept of the "remain" for this thesis. Remains are a very important aspect of the post-apocalyptic genre because if everything is destroyed, there simply is no “post” (Grossman 144). They function mostly as emotional reminders for the audience of what has been destroyed and are carried forward into the narrative to assist the audience in making sense of the apocalypse (Grossman 4). They form the crucial link between our contemporary world, the post-apocalyptic story and the audience. They serve both internal narrative functions and functions pertaining to the relation between the work and the audience: on the one hand, they connect sometimes unrelated pieces of the story together in meaningful ways, and on the other hand they connect the story to the audience (Grossman 6).

Remains of the pre-apocalyptic world usually evoke feelings of nostalgia within the characters. The concept of nostalgia involves dissatisfaction with the present moment, so this is especially relevant to the study of post-apocalyptic narratives. Post-apocalyptic remains usually take on heightened emotional power because of their contrast with the ravaged earth; they would not have the same poignancy if the story were set in a more utopian present (Anderson 271). Grossman has divided these post-apocalyptic remains in three categories, which I will adopt as well: material items, cultural knowledge and rituals. Remains are often material items, but can also be seen more broadly as, for example, a wide shot of a completely abandoned Times Square in New York. The broader category of cultural knowledge encompasses overt ideological beliefs, language, morality, and other identifiable aspects of thought or belief. Lastly, post-apocalyptic rituals drawn from the everyday, such as before-meal rituals, also function as remains, and particularly as reminders of a mode of living before the apocalyptic event (Grossman ii).

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Remains allow both the writer and the audience to be at two places at once: imagining the post-apocalyptic world and paradoxically ‘remembering’ the world as it was (Berger 6). They establish an emotional connection of the audience with the post-apocalyptic world, providing opportunities for the audience to vividly imagine how horrible it would be to see entire cities abandoned, school yards destroyed and libraries untouched; to see all of that waste of everything the contemporary world has to offer. Major iconic devices include the deserted city, the discovery of incongruous human skeletal remains and newspapers as testimonials to events immediately preceding the apocalypse (Broderick). The presence of remains generally achieves dramatic, nostalgic and emotional effect. The remains are often connected to narrative techniques such as flashbacks, which illuminate the contrast between (fictional) past and present.

CAUSE OF THE APOCALYPSE

As mentioned before, the post-apocalypse cannot be seen separately from the apocalypse itself. The cause for the apocalypse is therefore almost always known. It is always the prerequisite for the story, as post-apocalyptic fiction only exists in the aftermath of it. The cause is not very often directly depicted as the starting point for the plot, though. There is usually more mystery attached to it. Sometimes it is shown or narrated by the characters through flashbacks. Sometimes, however, the audience has to put the pieces together themselves through the visible consequences. Lots of different events can cause the end of the world: alien invasion, environmental disasters, zombies, nuclear attack, technology, war, disease, population explosion and meteors are among the most common (Murphy 235). Knowing what caused this post-apocalyptic situation is often vital: it justifies the journey and provides both a goal and opposed forces to fight off. Moreover, a known cause also makes it possible to conceive of a remedy or solution. When described or shown, it satisfies the audience’s fascination for destruction of familiar things. In most cases, it enhances the didactic function of warning in post-apocalyptic works of fiction as well.

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GROUPS

Survivors generally cluster together in groups. Usually the story starts out with one or two survivors who already had a bond before the apocalypse (they are family, lovers or friends). On their journey towards whatever goal they have, they meet new people who join them, forming a group. The element of the group gives the writer several creative options with room for new forms of conflict, romance, etc. (Meyer 33). This provides the story with a lot of dialogue and often also an extra layer of suspense. There is generally a clear group dynamic in the stories, often in the form of a democratic organization led by one person (very likely the protagonist). A recurring element is that all the different personalities clash at one point. The group is diverse because all the members have been thrown together very randomly: all they have in common is the fact that they are survivors of the apocalypse. This often leads to a power struggle and a growing frustration over the fact that although democracy seems to be the fairest way to organize the group, democratic decision-making slows them down. The mix of different personalities sometimes gets in the way of making tough decisions. Apart from all these obstacles, though, the group-formation usually proves to be very useful in the post-apocalyptic world, as tasks can be divided and there is a better chance of fighting the enemy effectively.

GOOD GUYS VERSUS BAD GUYS

The group of main characters is generally portrayed as that of ‘the good guys’. This suggests that they need a counterpart: the Others. Most post-apocalyptic stories have an obvious good versus evil plot line (Hart & Halbo 56). When the cause of the apocalypse is war or alien invasion, it is clear who these Others are. With a deadly or dangerous disease, the infected become the Others. When there is no obvious culprit, other survivors become the bad guys. Although everyone is essentially a victim of the apocalypse, this perception of all characters as victims only seems to be promoted when there is a main enemy that has caused the

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apocalypse. Otherwise, only the good guys are seen as victims, while the other survivors are usually seen as primarily dangerous.

Falling Skies, a 2011 science fiction TV series where aliens have invaded

the Earth, showed an ‘evil’ motor gang in the first season, but had them turn into good guys as well after the first few episodes showed just how evil the actual Others (the alien invaders) were. In The Walking Dead, even the bad guys are portrayed as mere victims of the zombie apocalypse, just like everyone else, because in the end the zombies are the real enemy. In the 2006 TV series Jericho, however, there are no clear Others, so everybody outside of the town (and some bad seeds within it) function as the bad guys. They are the looters and the gangsters, even though they are technically as much victims of the situation as the protagonists are.

The ‘good versus bad guys’ narrative is recurrent in many genres, but is particularly prominent in post-apocalyptic fiction. “Everyone knows how the world ends”, Michael Chabon wrote in his review on The Road for The New York Review (2007).

First radiation, plague, an asteroid, or some other cataclysm kills most of humankind. The remnants mutate, lapse into feudalism, or revert to prehistoric brutality. Old cults are revived with their knives and brutal gods, while tiny noble bands cling to the tatters of the lost civilization.

Because the situation is often so dire and hopeless, it is almost logical that some survivors will turn ‘evil’. They will show more violent, ruthless and in general less sympathetic behavior than what is morally accepted in Western societies nowadays. They become more selfish and focused on their own survival, which often means robbing or cheating other survivors. In very extreme cases, it can mean they allow themselves to divulge in excesses such as rape, slavery and even cannibalism. The element of good versus evil often goes hand in hand with the ethical issues brought on by the humanity versus survival dilemma. It is interesting for the story because it is suspenseful, dramatic and in a way also reassuring, as there will always be good guys to fight off the bad ones. The

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narrative is very dependent on the protagonists, as they influence the concepts of ‘good’ and ‘bad’. Although they often have to hurt or even kill other people as well, their reasons are portrayed as more just, precisely because the story is usually focalized from their perspective, and hence the dominant narrative is theirs.

(DIS)ADVANTAGED CHARACTERS

The diverse group of survivors at the center of post-apocalyptic stories usually features at least one character with special skills and one with a disadvantage. The latter can be a pregnant woman and/or (later on) a mother with a baby/toddler, an elderly, a disabled or very sick person, a convict, etc. People can be considered a disadvantage to the group when they need more care or protection than the rest, when they cannot be left alone or cannot be expected to perform the same tasks as the others. A character with special skills is much more useful, however. This can be a doctor or nurse, a farmer, a mechanic or a hunter: everyone with a set of skills that is particularly useful in primitive post-apocalyptic conditions. Characters with special skills are important to the story because they allow the group to survive for much longer or achieve much greater things than they would otherwise have, if they would have all been accountants or librarians.

A number of interesting plot lines can spring from having at least one of each of these two types of characters. Characters with disadvantages cause extra problems and stress for the group because they slow them down or need special items (such as baby food or medicines) that are hard to come by in a post-apocalyptic setting. There is also the ethical dilemma of whether or not to leave them behind. The skilled character, on the other hand, is vital to the survival of the group, so a lot of suspense and drama would be created if something bad happened to them (they could go missing or become very sick). These characters then add extra challenges to the quest of survival. Moreover, disadvantages often bring an extra emotional effect, as for example is the case with a baby born amidst the ruins of a zombie-infected prison in The Walking

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Dead. Typical examples of skilled characters are doctors/veterinarians (Anne in Falling Skies, Eric in Jericho, Dan in the 1959 novel Alas, Babylon, Hershel in The Walking Dead), police- or military men (Colonel Weaver in Falling Skies, Peter in

the 1959 film On The Beach, Rick in The Walking Dead), scientists (Robert in the 1954 novel I Am Legend) and hunters (Eli in the 2010 film The Book of Eli, Daryl in The Walking Dead). Skilled characters are essential to the story because without them, there would not even be one. If none of the survivors possess any useful skill, they will simply die.

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We all love after-the-bomb stories. If we didn't, why would there be so many of them? There's something attractive about all those people being gone, about wandering in a depopulated world, scrounging cans of Campbell's pork and beans, defending one's family from marauders. Sure it's horrible, sure we weep for all those dead people. But some secret part of us thinks it would be good to survive, to start over. Secretly, we know we'll survive. All those other folks will die. That's what after-the-bomb stories are all about. (Varley 210)

CHAPTER 2: POST-APOCALYPTIC GENRE AFTER 9/11

In this chapter, I will explore the historical development of the post-apocalyptic genre within an Anglo-American context. For this purpose, I will offer a short overview of the genre to place it into historical context. This overview will range from the first published work of post-apocalyptic fiction (The Last Man by Mary Shelley, published in 1826) up until now, with the exclusion of religious texts. I will explain how the genre has come to be so popular, especially in times of crisis. From there on, I will focus on the apocalypse-like events in New York City on September 11, 2001. I will explore the genre of the 9/11 novel and how this is linked to that of post-apocalyptic fiction. Lastly, I will discuss 9/11 rhetoric and how these have been addressed in 9/11 novels.

ORIGINS OF THE GENRE

Post-apocalyptic fiction originated as a form of social and/or political critique. Beale (1) views apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic works as “criticisms of life [that] express a great dissatisfaction with the way things are.” The apocalypse as an imagined event has been around in recorded literature at least since the Book of Revelations and even then it already functioned as a social critique, according to James Berger:

Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic representations serve varied psychological and political purposes. Most prevalently, they put forward a total critique of any existing social order. From the Book

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of Revelation’s condemnation of Babylon, through the millenarian movements of the Middle Ages [sic], to more recent apocalyptic thinking – both religious and secular – visions of the end and its aftermath emphasize that no social reform can cure the world’s diseases. (7)

Life after the apocalypse, however, has only been imagined and fictionalized much later on. The first known work of post-apocalyptic fiction is Mary Shelley’s 1826 novel The Last Man. The novel not only features the aftermath, but also the apocalyptic event itself and even a part the protagonist’s pre-apocalyptic life. That is often the case with similar stories and illustrates perfectly how it can sometimes be rather difficult to distinguish between apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction. Historically, both have peaked in popularity over certain periods of time, especially during global crises. This part of the chapter gives a brief historical overview of these periods and I have tried to focus on post-apocalyptic fiction, but some of the works mentioned can be considered apocalyptic in nature as well.

The social and/or political critique issued through post-apocalyptic fiction most commonly stems from feelings of dissatisfaction with the present situation or society as a whole, but can also function as a response to major global threats, such as pollution, capitalism or multi-continent wars. Certain scholars, such as Angela Becerra Vidergar in her doctoral dissertation “Fictions of Destruction: Post-1945 Narrative and Disaster in the Collective Imaginary” (2013), have noticed an increase in the post-apocalyptic genre in both literature and film after major global events, such as the First and Second World War, the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Cold War threat, the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and the widespread attention for global warming after Al Gore’s impressive 2006 documentary An Inconvenient Truth.

The First World War, for example, ended an era of optimism about the future. Afterwards, utopian literature was very difficult to write, whereas the idea that humanity was flawed was prominent in many dystopian views (Beale 2). Of course, this makes perfect sense. The war’s impact on people’s thoughts about, and feelings towards, the future was inevitable, as it put an end to a previous

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optimism, which was mainly grounded in the rapid succession of technological advances. The general idea of the Western public in the late nineteenth century was that all of these technological evolutions would certainly make the world a better place. Together with the modern democratic political systems of that day and the seemingly unstoppable rise of global liberal capitalism, there was a sense that the world was heading in the right direction, on the road to genuine progress. But then the First and Second World War came along and showed everyone the dark side and easy abuse of those modern ‘advancements’. Technology as a cause of apocalypse spawned a lot of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction after both World Wars: Quinzinzinzili (1935) by Régis Messac, The Death Guard (1939) by Philip George Chadwick and The Black Flame (1948) by Stanley G. Weinbaum, to name a few.

By the end of the Second World War, Hiroshima and Nagasaki put the bitter cherry on top. For the first time, humanity experienced a weapon that could literally annihilate the planet (Beale 2). Humanity became aware of its own destructive capacity and its ability to produce an actual end to the world (Becker 2). It then comes as no surprise that fears of nuclear destruction were played out in both film and literature afterwards. Films such as Five (1951), The World, the

Flesh and the Devil (1959), On the Beach (1959) and Panic in Year Zero (1962) hit

theatres. Literature such as Mr. Adam (1946) by Pat Frank, Second Variety (1953) by Philip K. Dick, The Chrysalids (1955) by John Wyndham, The Long Tomorrow (1955) by Leigh Brackett and Alas, Babylon (1959) by Pat Frank was published. All of these are examples of post-apocalyptic narratives that came out after the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The proceeding Cold War fed the nuclear fear even more. In that era, The

Aftermath (1982), Warriors of the Apocalypse (1985) and America 3000 (1986)

were released and The Rats (1974) by James Herbert was published. Dozens of articles have been written on the reflection of this mushroom cloud paranoia in post-apocalyptic fiction of that time, such as “Monsters, Mushroom Clouds, and the Cold War” by Keith Booker (2001) and “Paranoia, the Bomb and 1950s Science-Fiction Films” by Cyndy Hendershot (1999). To put it in James Berger’s words: “The most dystopic [sic] visions of science fiction can do no more than replicate the actual historical catastrophes of the twentieth century” (XIII). To

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him, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic writing itself are remains: aftermaths of some disorienting catastrophe (7). The narrativization of existential fears in post-apocalyptic fiction can often be seen as an effort to come to terms with a crisis-ridden present. The stories afford the audience a glimpse of futures based on fears and fantasies derived from the current sociopolitical context.

Post-apocalyptic fiction in the aftermath of one or both of the World Wars then gradually came to serve an extra purpose:

However comically presented, representations of the apocalypse are often (…) meant to serve as a type of warning, implying that the apocalypse is not a desirable end. This is, of course, the premise for social critique within post-apocalyptic narrative. (Grossman 59)

Post-apocalyptic narratives warned the world about possible consequences if nothing would change, thus performing an additional didactic fiction. They showed the wasted land, the ashes in the sky, the corpses along the streets, all of the destruction on the big screen. They described the gruesome details of the aftermath, of trying to survive, the utter hopelessness when everything and everyone you once knew are gone. This is what war will ultimately bring. This is what will happen if we don’t change our ways of dealing with the environment. This is the bitter downside of our hunger for technological advancements. Post-apocalyptic fiction often functions as one big fat obvious warning sign, according to Mick Broderick.

More often than not [post-apocalyptic] movies articulate overt messages of warning both through expository dialogue and in the depiction of dehumanized futures the survivor species struggle to inhabit.

This applies specifically to the previously mentioned works created in the first two decades after both World Wars, but also to those created during the suspense of the Cold War or the never ending bad news show of global warming

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today (Booker; Hendershot). Contemporary post-apocalyptic fiction generally focuses on problems of the twentieth century, such as environmental issues (for example, the 2008 film WALL-E) and biological warfare (for example, Stephen King’s The Stand and the 2007 remake of I Am Legend).

POST-APOCALYPTIC FICTION AND THE 9/11 NOVEL

The notable increase in production of post-apocalyptic fiction after major global events is not a one-sided phenomenon. Time and time again, the audience has seemed unable to resist indulging in fictional depictions of their own worst case scenarios. Whereas other genres clearly functioned as distracting entertainment during stressful times such as, for example, the Cold War, post-apocalyptic fiction focused exactly on the impending global threat causing the stress. Yet, it seems like the genre hardly ever flourished more than during that particular historical period. This is because, apart from serving as a warning for all kinds of horrible threats, post-apocalyptic fiction at the same time also satisfies the audience’s need for reassurance caused exactly by those threats. Nadia de Boer states in her thesis “The Development of the Apocalyptic Genre in Film and the Influence of 9/11” (2010) that post-apocalyptic fiction appeals to many people because they are actually scared that the world is going to be hit with apocalypse-like events, so they develop a paradoxical need to see their worst fears being realized. Afterwards, they can just get up from the theatre seats and go home, having lived through it all. This provides them with a much-needed feeling of survival:

The instinct for survival, for living through disasters, is deeply imbedded in human nature, which makes these movies appeal to us as much as they do. The audience feels safe in the knowledge that many people “died”, that the world fell apart, but they still manage to get up and leave as soon as the lights come on in the theatre. The spectators enjoy their survival of the disaster that had just enfolded right in front of them, which now leaves them reassured and hopeful. (de Boer 12)

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At the same time, post-apocalyptic stories can easily be discarded as fiction, purely meant for entertainment. This takes away the gravity of the feared events, which adds to the feeling of reassurance. According to Becker, the primary appeal of post-apocalyptic fiction lies in the opportunity for readers to indulge fantasy worlds into which they may, in reality, fear to tread. In this way, “readers can participate in the unraveling of a world of nightmare prophecies without being vaporized by a nuclear blast, infected with a deadly virus, or devastated by a colossal natural disaster” (52-53)

Exactly that sort of participation seems to be, in fact, very appealing to various people. “There is a kind of pleasure that people get in seeing familiar things destroyed”, James Gunn says (Beale 1). It is so hard to imagine our entire society being annihilated that it becomes a fascination: trying to imagine the unimaginable. As de Boer puts it:

The images of this destruction have a certain morbid way of fascinating us as an audience, since we have proof that such disasters can and did happen. However, most of us have (fortunately) never encountered these circumstances in reality, so the images are not familiar to us, which is exactly what sparks our interests, namely, the unknown. (16)

This fear for, and fascination with, imagining the end of days has ingrained itself into artistic post-apocalyptic imagination, with writers envisaging brave new worlds and wastelands (Mavri 1).

Global destruction can also serve its reassuring function in the sense of a clean slate. This brings us back to the subject of post-apocalyptic fiction as a form of political and/or social critique: when the human race is the main cause of the apocalypse, its (nearly) complete extinction can be regarded as a sort of purification of the earth. This utopian view hopes that, when the apocalypse has finally ‘cleansed’ the planet, the few surviving humans might eventually be able to build a new, infinitely better world, purified as they are through the sacrifice of a larger percentage of its members (Bartter 148). Apocalyptic destruction could

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be seen as the ultimate opportunity to finally make everyone equal. Of course, you and I would both die. But at least all of the self-righteous and complacent individuals and institutions we all know would die as well. Finally everyone gets their comeuppance, with nobody receiving any sort of special treatment (Berger 32)! We are all human, and most of us would probably find some sort of satisfaction in this idea.

Moreover, James Berger suggests that there is also an intense cultural fixation on the image of the Survivor. Since the late 1970’s the fascination with, and authority vested in the figure of, the survivor has been one of the defining features of the American post-apocalyptic sensibility (47).

We see this fascination in the revival of interest in the testimonies of Holocaust survivors, in the changing evaluations given the Vietnam veteran, in the explosive issues surrounding child abuse and incest, in the bizarre world of the talk show, in court TV, in “real life” police and rescue shows, in accounts of “near death” experiences and alien abductions, and in the pervasive public appetite for first-person accounts of all kinds. (47)

This theory can be expanded to the rest of the contemporary Western world, where paramount value is being placed on the figure and the testimony of the first-hand witness: the one who has experienced, who has passed through and has emerged from an event seen as both catastrophic and revelatory (Berger 47). The reasons for the popularity of post-apocalyptic fiction seem to be heavily intertwined: authors and audience alike seem to both need and love it. Post-apocalyptic stories often function as a mirror image for contemporary issues and can be seen as forms of social and/or political critique. They often emerge from stressful times of crises and global threats. Post-apocalyptic fiction can have a didactic function but, at the same time, also give the audience a sense of reassurance. In this way, the genre gives the truth but also covers it up – it offers a realization of fantasies and fears about the future but also appeases these fears by ‘fictionalizing’ them.

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Kristjan Mavri argues that the ideological underpinnings for the twenty-first century surge in popularity of the post-apocalyptic genre are then plain to see: the aftermath of September 11, the war in Iraq, global warming, and the impending ecological disaster (2). Stephan Keane argues in his book Disaster

Movies (2006) that in times of crisis the need for survival seems to thrive within

the cinematic world (5). This, de Boer says, is exactly what has transpired after 9/11. According to her, people needed to be reassured after 9/11 and this task was partially taken on by the entertainment industry (4). Post-apocalyptic fiction flourished once again in the post-9/11 decade. Films like I Am Legend, World War

Z, Maggie, Snowpiercer, Zombieland, WALL-E, 28 Days Later, After Earth, The Book of Eli and Oblivion were released. TV networks aired series like Falling Skies, The Walking Dead, Jericho, The Last Man on Earth, The 100, Z Nation and Revolution.

Books like The Road, Wool and Survivors: A Novel of the Coming Collapse were published. There were even post-apocalyptic games, like The Last of Us, Ace

Combat Infinity, The Walking Dead, Brink and Rage. For many people, the terrorist

attacks in New York City on September 11, 2001 felt like an apocalyptic event. In the aftermath, the Western world has changed completely. Witnessing apocalyptic images on a smaller scale in real life, surprisingly, sparked a new interest in the post-apocalyptic genre.

The apocalyptic feeling surrounding the attacks also fueled another, entirely new genre: the 9/11 novel. At first, there was some hesitation among writers. “Can I bear to narrate this into normality?”, novelist Jonathan Lethem wondered publicly in The New York Times Magazine nearly two weeks after watching the Twin Towers collapse from his “helpless window” in Brooklyn. His bewilderment was familiar, says Ruth Franklin (2011), as it appears in all literatures of disaster.

Writers who survived various kinds of catastrophes—the Holocaust, Hiroshima, the Vietnam war—have been stymied by the tension between their desire to communicate accurately what they saw and their fear of obscuring the horror with phrases too nicely turned. (...) If the very nature of narrative imposes a false

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coherence upon events that by definition resist understanding, the novelist is caught in a terrible bind.

It reminds us of the famous words uttered by philosopher Theodor Adorno, that “writing poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric.” Also regarding the Holocaust, the theologian Michael Wyschogrod remarked that “art takes the sting out of suffering” (Franklin). In the same sense, in the weeks that followed 9/11, writers asked themselves and the world what the future of fiction could be after such a rupture. Yet nearly fifteen years later, so many 9/11 novels have been published that they easily constitute a distinct genre, despite their diversity. It is striking that stories within the genre of the 9/11 novel are often very resonant of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction, even if they do not strictly fit the definition of those genres. They do bear, however, certain family resemblances.

The genre of the 9/11 novel embraces every work of fiction that, directly or indirectly, touches upon the events, its aftermath, its discourse and/or its consequences. Initially, Ruth Franklin divided the genre into three broad segments, based on their temporal focal point: novels that focus on the day itself, novels that focus on the lives of New Yorkers in the days before the attacks and the novels that focus on its aftermath. Then she added a subgenre of novels in which the terrorist attacks appear but do not play a central role, as well as those that merely allude to the day itself but are dominated by its shadow. These are the so-called post-9/11 novels. So some novelists have tackled the events head on, others have used the attacks as a backdrop for smaller and more intimate stories, and after a few years the authors emerged who have used 9/11 as a spur to look at the Western world shaken out of its complacency (The Economist). It seems as though the time that passed allowed for healing and a much needed distance to contemplate what happened. In Out of the Blue: September 11 and the

Novel (2009) Kristiaan Versluys commented on the “discursivization” of 9/11

and how this changed over time, drifting from the dramatic facts and emotional data, such as the publication of the telephone messages left by the victims in the towers on the answering machines of their loved ones, to more reflective responses.

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It is obvious that the purpose of the 9/11 novel and the post-9/11 novel is not to tell us what happened on that day, as the vast majority of the Western world has already seen everything for themselves on television. The purpose of this newfound genre is, or rather, ought to be, to tell us what 9/11 means (Franklin). The world, and especially the Western and Middle-Eastern part of it, has changed since then, but we don’t quite know how. This unresolved question, Franklin says, nags at the post-9/11 novelists, “whose characters are often in thrall to forces they don’t understand.” In Jonathan Franzen’s 2010 novel

Freedom, the main characters Walter and Patty Berglund are tormented by the

fear that they might not be as free as they think they are, what Franklin calls “a quintessential post-9/11 confusion.” This is a completely contradictory sentiment to that of the characters in Franzen’s earlier novel The Corrections – which was coincidentally published on September 1, 2001. There, both the younger and older generations are overwhelmed by having (had) too much freedom, too many choices and too much possibility. The problems faced by the characters in Freedom are often summarized in the novel’s catchphrase “mistakes were made.”

According to Franklin, one of the most urgent questions on the aftermath of 9/11 is if we in the Western world still, after nearly fifteen years, helplessly see the events as an unimaginable fact (dixit Jonathan Lethem), so overpowering and enormous that they often overshadow and dominate the fictional elements of a novel. The kind that literary novelists usually shy away from as the backdrop to a story (The Economist). Or, do we regard the attacks as a result of a toxic tangle of historical, religious and political forces? It is in 9/11 novels that we might seek the answer, according to Kristiaan Versluys.

The novelistic practice of viewing a situation in its full complexity entails the denial of the reductive logic of terrorism, the black-and-white ideological view that legitimates indiscriminate violence. It equally goes against the simplifications of patriotic rodomontade and revanchist rhetoric. (24)

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RHETORIC OF 9/11

Kathryn Lee has tried to demonstrate in Fiction as Resistance: The post-9/11

novel as an alternative to the dominant narrative (2012) how certain 9/11 novels

create spaces for the reader to re-examine and re-imagine the causes for, consequences of and responses to 9/11. They accomplish this through their resistance to the dominant narrative that was constructed and maintained by both the media and the Bush administration during the aftermath of 9/11. She has identified three aspects of this dominant narrative. The first aspect is that of “America the Brave.” Americans suffered enormous loss of life and significant trauma after the attacks, but both the media and the government deliberately chose to focus firmly on the heroics surrounding the events, rather than the more uncomfortable and tragic elements. In an attempt to avoid having the wound inflicted on the nation being seen as irreparable damage, those in power sought out to manipulate (inter)national sentiment to believe that America the Brave was so strong that, although she was badly wounded, she would not be defeated. According to Lee, it was“under this edict that the Falling Man photograph taken by Richard Drew and other images and footage of the people who fell from the towers before their collapse were removed from view and replaced with triumphant images of fire fighters and American flags across New York City” (8). In the same spirit, the fire fighters that attended the scene were elevated to the status of national heroes. Though nobody will argue that these brave men and women did an excellent job trying to save lives that day, the narrative surrounding their deaths was manipulated in line with the idea of America the Brave as well. Many fire fighters died because malfunctioning communication equipment made them unable to hear the evacuation orders. Instead of addressing this failure of equipment, the story told to the public was that they did hear the orders but had chosen to stay in the building anyway, thus dying an even more heroic death (Dwyer & O’Donnell). It is interesting, Lee argues, that this kind of suicidal behavior was glorified and “held up as a shining example of heroism, [while] the people who leapt from the upper floors of the towers to escape the fires were ignored and marginalized,” as their acts did not fit the fantasy of triumphalism (11).

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Far better to hold up New York’s finest as heroes rather than admit to the shameful truth that they were doing a dangerous job ill-equipped and under-resourced and were let down by those in power. (Lee 10-11)

Don DeLillo’s Falling Man (2007) is an example of a 9/11 novel that disrupts the dominant narrative on this point, by reinstating Drew’s censored photograph by the same name and “thereby rectifying the undemocratic editing of what was to be included in the photographic history of 9/11” (Lee iii).

The second aspect Lee points out was clearly stated by then President Bush, when he addressed the nation in a joint session of Congress on September 20, 2001, as he said “You are with us, or you are with the terrorists.” This ethos effectively ruled out other ways of dealing with the terrorist threat than those he had just described. It not only forced Congress, but the American people and the rest of the world as well, to approach the War On Terror from a single perspective. With this single famous sentence President Bush denied the possibility of dissenting voices or questioning the actions of the government, as those were accused of being un-American and unpatriotic. Moreover, there was an exuberant usage of words such as ‘we’, ‘us’, ‘our’ and ‘them’ in his speech. ‘We’ was actually the most used word in the entire speech. This is an example of a persuasive technique that is commonly used in political speeches to generate public sentiment for a specific platform (Ajitsingh). With this technique, President Bush had skillfully put the tragedy of 9/11 in a ‘us versus them’ narrative, stressed by statements such as: “Our grief has turned to anger, and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice or justice to our enemies, justice will be done.” Bush stated that Americans were asking, “Why do they hate us?” They undoubtedly did ask themselves this question after the suggestive statement. He proceeded to answer it himself, with several examples of ‘our way of life’, which involves democracy and freedom that ‘we’ have and ‘they’ do not. It is ironic then that during the same speech, Bush also claimed that America was a “country called to defend freedom,” when his own words created an oppressive atmosphere of conformation that went against the very

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ideal of freedom of speech and democracy (Lee 8). An example of a 9/11 novel that resisted this aspect of the dominant narrative is The Reluctant

Fundamentalist (2007) by Mohsin Hamid, which tells the story of a Pakistani man

who represents those of Middle Eastern descent whose voices were elided from the dominant narrative (Lee iii).

The third aspect Lee describes is that of the United States as an innocent victim and the terrorists as evil perpetrators. The dominant narrative refuses to acknowledge the idea that the United States might be, in a way, culpable for the attacks because of, for example, their foreign policy and interference with the issues of other nations. Instead, the dominant narrative claims that the terrorists attacked because of a blind and irrational hate for the country (Lee 9). President Bush stated in his speech that “They hate what they see right here in this chamber: a democratically elected government. (…) They hate our freedoms: our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other. (…) They stand against us, because we stand in their way.” The narrative dictates that the terrorists were motivated by hate and evil, so there is no need to look inwards and question in what way the United Stated may be partially culpable themselves.Lee gives Ian McEwan’s Saturday as an example of a resisting 9/11 novel. The book troubles the conceptualization of invasion by questioning who is at fault for the invasion of the household of protagonist Perowne, who represents Western privilege, by Baxter, who represents the evil outsider (Lee iii).

Dan Hassler-Forest argues that Bush’ speech on the matters was significant in that it defined, framed and narrativized the historical events of 9/11 on the basis of narrative tropes and simple dichotomies of good versus evil you usually only see in movies, instead of the other way around. American victims and survivors were consistently described in terms of absolute goodness, while the perpetrators were presented as the embodiment of true evil. After so many years of exposure to eerily similar scenarios in innumerable Hollywood action films, it was easy to think that America had “suddenly encountered an Evil which fits the most naive Hollywood image: a secret organization of fanatics who fully intend, and plan in detail, a terrorist attack whose aim is to kill thousands of random civilians” (Žižek 75). As Žižek’s words illustrate, reality was thus defined

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on the basis of fictional tropes, rather than the other way around (Hassler-Forest 33).

Another persuasive device used by the President is the so-called Transfer

Device, which he used to create an association between his position and the

ideals of America’s religious right (Ajitsingh). He did this by saying:

The course of this conflict isn’t known, yet its outcome is certain. Freedom and fear, justice and cruelty, have always been at war, and we know that God is not neutral between them.

The President associated his own position with the religious ideals held by the majority of Americans by mentioning God in his speech. Moreover, he was insinuating that ‘our’ side was good, because ‘we’ had God on ours. Unfortunately, a tragic consequence of this remark has since been that Muslim terrorist groups such as Al-Qaida have used it for their own propaganda, trying to convince other Muslims that this is indeed a Holy War: Christians fighting Muslims. Bush referred to “our enemies” as plotting “evil and destruction” and following in “the path of fascism, Nazism and totalitarianism.” As “the civilized world is rallying to America’s side”, everyone who did not do this was considered uncivilized. Moreover, both the media and the Bush administration emphasized the fact that the attacks had been carried out by non-American terrorists. In this way, Lee argues, “they succeeded in not only making people fearful and therefore compliant, but also getting Americans to see themselves as a unified group who must strike back at this external enemy who had caused them all so much pain” (11). This external enemy, or the ‘Other’, was clearly marked. “Muslim men with beards became synonymous with the concept of terrorist” (Lee 11).

The controversial use of ‘us’ versus ‘them’ in Bush’ speech has been widely interpreted as meaning ‘the West’ versus ‘Islam’, a discursive change derived from Samuel P. Huntington’s theory of a clash of civilizations. Instead of viewing geopolitical conflicts in terms of ideology, he posed to see them in terms of a clash of civilizations. The Bush doctrine of ‘good versus evil’ can be seen as a subtler version of this narrative. In Huntington’s 1996 book The Clash of