Abstract
This project seeks to better understand the sinister cultural impacts of nuclear weapons in America through its literature and that literature’s attempts to resist the oppressive, atomizing structures that the nuclear epitomizes. Through a reading of three postmodern novels: Thomas Pynchon's 1973 Gravity’s Rainbow, Don DeLillo’s 1986 White Noise, and David Foster Wallace’s 1996 Infinite Jest, this project explores the relationship between the movement and nuclear weapons. In doing so, it calls for a new historical understanding of America’s engagement with nuclear weapons throughout the latter half of the twentieth century. This perceptual shift reveals a far deeper entanglement with nuclear weapons than many historical accounts suggest and requires us to reckon with postmodern literature as a form specifically of and for the nuclear age.
Advisor
Shaya, Greg
Department
History
Recommended Citation
Bevis, Andrew, "The Nuke in Our Souls: The Apocalypse Comes Down to Earth in Three Postmodern Novels" (2015). Senior Independent Study Theses. Paper 6941.
https://openworks.wooster.edu/independentstudy/6941
Disciplines
American Literature | American Popular Culture | Cultural History | Literature in English, North America | Modern Literature | Social History
Keywords
Nuclear, nuclear weapons, postmodernism, postmodern literature, Pynchon, DeLillo, Wallace, David Foster Wallace
Publication Date
2015
Degree Granted
Bachelor of Arts
Document Type
Senior Independent Study Thesis
© Copyright 2015 Andrew Bevis