ABSTRACT
In Jonathan Miles's 2013 novel Want Not, Crabtree, an older ex-inmate out on parole, whose income comes from collecting cans from dumpsters/bins, confronts Talmadge, a young freegan picking out his next meal from a nearby dumpster. Maddened by the ridiculous scene of a seemingly well-off, able-bodied white man picking produce out of the trash, Crabtree asks: "The fuck you doing?... You eating from the trash?" (emphasis original) (2013, 9). Talmadge says that yes, yes he is, and that the excesses of capital are ruining society: people are starving while supermarkets dump perfectly good food. Crabtree responds that Talmadge is crazy if he thinks anything is changed by going through the garbage. Crabtree was with Bobby Seals and the Panthers, really making a difference, "but this shit... this shit is worthless man. You ain't even got a right" (10). Talmadge offers to share his finds, but the frustrated Crabtree refuses him, preferring to collect cans for cash and to buy a meal where civilized people eat. Although the argument is framed in rather comical fashion, with Crabtree finding a used condom amidst Talmadge's "dinner," the underlying values (of autonomy, justice, choice, and capitalism) belie the tensions between symbolism and materialism of food and waste.
