Wild Abandon: Postwar Literature Between Ecology and Authenticity
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
University of Kentucky UKnowledge Theses and Dissertations--English English 2018 WILD ABANDON: POSTWAR LITERATURE BETWEEN ECOLOGY AND AUTHENTICITY Alexander F. Menrisky University of Kentucky, [email protected] Author ORCID Identifier: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1241-8415 Digital Object Identifier: https://doi.org/10.13023/ETD.2018.150 Right click to open a feedback form in a new tab to let us know how this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Menrisky, Alexander F., "WILD ABANDON: POSTWAR LITERATURE BETWEEN ECOLOGY AND AUTHENTICITY" (2018). Theses and Dissertations--English. 66. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/english_etds/66 This Doctoral Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the English at UKnowledge. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations--English by an authorized administrator of UKnowledge. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STUDENT AGREEMENT: I represent that my thesis or dissertation and abstract are my original work. Proper attribution has been given to all outside sources. I understand that I am solely responsible for obtaining any needed copyright permissions. I have obtained needed written permission statement(s) from the owner(s) of each third-party copyrighted matter to be included in my work, allowing electronic distribution (if such use is not permitted by the fair use doctrine) which will be submitted to UKnowledge as Additional File. I hereby grant to The University of Kentucky and its agents the irrevocable, non-exclusive, and royalty-free license to archive and make accessible my work in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I agree that the document mentioned above may be made available immediately for worldwide access unless an embargo applies. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of my work. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of my work. I understand that I am free to register the copyright to my work. REVIEW, APPROVAL AND ACCEPTANCE The document mentioned above has been reviewed and accepted by the student’s advisor, on behalf of the advisory committee, and by the Director of Graduate Studies (DGS), on behalf of the program; we verify that this is the final, approved version of the student’s thesis including all changes required by the advisory committee. The undersigned agree to abide by the statements above. Alexander F. Menrisky, Student Dr. Michael Trask, Major Professor Dr. Jill Rappoport, Director of Graduate Studies WILD ABANDON: POSTWAR LITERATURE BETWEEN ECOLOGY AND AUTHENTICITY ________________________________________ DISSERTATION ________________________________________ A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Kentucky By Alexander Menrisky Lexington, Kentucky Director: Dr. Michael Trask, Professor of English Lexington, Kentucky 2018 Copyright © Alexander Menrisky 2018 ABSTRACT OF DISSERTATION WILD ABANDON: POSTWAR LITERATURE BETWEEN ECOLOGY AND AUTHENTICITY Wild Abandon traces a literary and cultural history of late twentieth-century appeals to dissolution, the moment at which a text seems to erase its subject’s sense of selfhood in natural environs. I argue that such appeals arose in response to a prominent yet overlooked interaction between discourses of ecology and authenticity following the rise and fall of the American New Left in the 1960s and 70s. This conjunction inspired certain intellectuals and activists to celebrate the ecological concept of interconnectivity as the most authentic basis of subjectivity in political, philosophical, spiritual, and literary writings. As I argue, dissolution represents a universalist and essentialist impulse to reject self-identity in favor of an identification with the ecosystem writ large, a claim to authenticity that flattens distinctions among individuals and communities. But even as the self appears to disintegrate, an “I” always remains to testify to its disintegration. For this reason, dissolution performs a primarily critical function by foregrounding an unsurpassable representational tension between sense of self and ecosystem. Each chapter explores a different perspective on this tension as it conflicts with matters of gender and race in works by Edward Abbey, Peter Matthiessen, Toni Morrison, Margaret Atwood, and Jon Krakauer. Assuming an anti-essentialist stance, all the texts I study acknowledge ecological interconnectivity as a universal condition but maintain the necessity of culturally mediated and individually constructed identity positions from which to recognize that condition. KEYWORDS: American literature, postwar literature, ecology, environmentalism, counterculture, authenticity Alexander Menrisky 13 April 2018 Date WILD ABANDON: POSTWAR LITERATURE BETWEEN ECOLOGY AND AUTHENTICITY By Alexander Menrisky Dr. Michael Trask Director of Dissertation Dr. Jill Rappoport Director of Graduate Studies 13 April 2018 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I am indebted to superb mentors and the support of friends and family for the successful completion of this dissertation. First, and most enthusiastically, to my director Michael Trask, whose guidance has been foundational to this project, my scholarship, and my career. Second, to the diligent members of my committee, Virginia Blum, Randall Roorda, and Carol Mason. Each contributed to the project in ways unexpected and always heartily appreciated. Third, to professional mentors near and far and over time, including but not limited to Michelle Sizemore, Elizabeth Connors-Manke, Jill Rappoport, Alan Nadel, Jan Hodson, Thomas Hodson, Bernhard Debatin, and Jeremy Webster, whose frequent and freely offered advice has benefited my research, pedagogy, and professional development at large. I would also like to thank the wonderful community of fellow students who have offered feedback and—more importantly—made this process worth surviving, especially Katie Waddell, Kadee Whaley, Cate Gooch, Emily Handy, Brittany Sulzener, Tess Given, Deirdre Mikolajcik, Jenna Goldsmith, Matthew Bryant-Cheney, and Daniel Cockayne. Thanks also to friends near and far, especially Rachel Mihuta Grimm, Gina Edwards, Stephanie Fisk, Rachel Collins, Lainie Chrisman, Jaclyn Bakalarski, Erin Newell, and Alyssa Sciortino, for their ability to challenge me without restraint, intellectually and politically, and for their boundless love. To my mother and father, who offer encouragement when necessary and support frequently. To my sister, whose own pedagogical commitments are an inspiration. To Justin DeCamp and Katie Kalbacher for widening the circle of what counts as family. And to Vince Dominguez for all of this and literally everything else. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iii CHAPTER 1 Introduction: Between Ecology and Authenticity ........................................ 1 “The Subversive Science” ............................................................................................. 12 The Authentic Ego ........................................................................................................ 16 Politics of Ecological Consciousness............................................................................ 21 Narratives of Wilderness Retreat .................................................................................. 29 CHAPTER 2 The Ecological Alternative: Civilization and Selfhood in Desert Solitaire and The Snow Leopard...................................................................................................... 37 Abbey’s Alternative ...................................................................................................... 49 Feeling Like a River...................................................................................................... 57 The Psychedelics of Water, Wind, and Stone ............................................................... 66 CHAPTER 3 The Universal Wilderness: Song of Solomon’s Skeptical State of Nature . 79 Dissolution and Racial Identitarianism ......................................................................... 89 Pilate and the Pastoral ................................................................................................... 97 An Admission of Fabrication ...................................................................................... 106 CHAPTER 4 The Essential Ecosystem: Surfacing’s Identity Crises ............................. 115 “The First True Human” ............................................................................................. 128 Expectation, Essence, and Environment ..................................................................... 138 An Appeal to Obliteration ........................................................................................... 143 CHAPTER 5 The Death of Alexander Supertramp: Into the Wild’s Ambivalent Ecological Consciousness ............................................................................................... 152 The Ascetic Superhero’s Boast ................................................................................... 163 Narratives of Natural Identity ..................................................................................... 171 Fatal Dissolutions........................................................................................................ 183 CHAPTER