ABSTRACT

Rewriting the American Soul focuses on the political implications of psychoanalytic and neurocognitive approaches to trauma in literature, their impact on cultural representations of collective trauma in the United States, and their subversive appropriation in pre- and post-9/11 fiction. Anna Thiemann connects cutting edge trauma theory with the historical context from which it emerged and shows that contemporary novels encourage us to reflect critically on the cultural meanings and political uses of trauma. In doing so, it contributes to a new generation of trauma scholarship that challenges the dominant paradigm in literary and cultural studies. Moreover, the book intervenes in current debates about the relationship between literature and neuroscience insisting that the so-called neuronovel scrutinizes scientific developments and their political ramifications rather than adopting and translating them into aesthetic practices.

chapter 1|18 pages

Introduction

Re-Visioning Trauma

chapter 3|28 pages

Memory and the Myth of Innocence

Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections (2001)

chapter 4|18 pages

Resuming the Cold War Game

Don DeLillo’s Falling Man (2007)

chapter 5|21 pages

The Trauma of Self-Recognition

Richard Powers’s The Echo Maker (2006)

chapter 6|23 pages

Life Writing and Black Counter-Memory

Siri Hustvedt’s The Sorrows of an American (2008)

chapter 7|24 pages

From Science to Archeology

Ian McEwan’s Saturday (2005)

chapter 8|20 pages

Cartographies of Diasporic Trauma

Teju Cole’s Open City (2011)

chapter 9|7 pages

Conclusion

Forgetting Therapy and Trauma’s Ends