Supernatural's Reactionary Road Trip

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Issue 22 - 2013 ISSN 2044-8031

"All I saw was evil": Supernatural's Reactionary Road Trip

Also in this issue Enlightened Independence and the Origins of its American Radicalization

Letter from New York: A Victory in the Culture Wars?

In this year’s issue Enlightened "All I saw was 3 Independence 14 evil": and the Origins Supernatural's of its American Reactionary Radicalization Road Trip By Joel Wilson, Florida by Dr. Brian Ireland, Senior Lecturer Atlantic University in History, University of Glamorgan is the official journal of the Ameri- can Studies Resource Centre, The Joel Wilson argues that Aldham Robarts Library, Liverpool America, as a nation and John Moores University, Liverpool idea, could not ever have fully L1 9DE accepted the European model of Enlightenment articulated Tel: +44 (0)151-231 3241 by Emmanuel Kant and e-mail: [email protected] others. web site: www.americansc.org.uk Supernatural debuted in 2005 Editor-in-Chief: Dr Bella Adams Letter from New on the Warner Brothers Editor: David Forster York: 13 network in the US. Creator Editorial assistants: Rebecca Eric Kripke envisaged the Fielding, Victoria Hoffman, Gemma A Victory in the story as a mythic road trip Jones, Marcus Munroe, Siju Sa- Culture Wars? across America, with two dare brothers travelling through by Lenny Quart Layout and graphics: David Forster small-town America, fighting evil and righting wrongs. The views expressed are those of Although the brothers' iconic the contributors, and not neces- On a range of issues from gay car and the road genre sarily those of the centre or the marriage and gun control to university. template establish immigration, as the Supernatural as a distinctly © 2013, Liverpool John Moores demographics of the US American production, the University and the Contributors. changes, conservative values thematic fight between good Articles in this journal may be seem to be in retreat, but can and evil has attracted a wide freely reproduced for use in sub- Obama capitalise on this so international audience. This scribing institutions only, provided long as Republicans remain in article places these themes in that the source is acknowledged. control of the Congress? the context of post-9/11 America. Book reviews Cover illustration © Olly Muxworthy. See more at Culture Follow the ASRC on Twitter 20 @AStudies http://www.flickr.com/photos/ ollymuxworthy/ Environment 25

History 25 or Facebook.

http://www.facebook.com/AmStuds Literature 28 Politics 35

Race and ethnicity 35 2 Enlightened Independence and the Origins of its American Radicalization By Joel Wilson, Florida Atlantic University

Through a thematic comparison of the notion of the United Nations or the international community at large. On a independence found in Immanuel Kant's seminal more domestic level, the recent essay, "What is Enlightenment?" and various matter of obligatory healthcare in- texts of the Radical American Enlightenment, Joel surance and whether or not its man- date infringes on the rights of free Wilson argues that America, as nation and idea, citizens as well as the more perni- could not ever have fully accepted the European cious issue of gun control after the model of Enlightenment articulated by Kant and series of tragic mass shootings in 2012 has proved controversial to others. Americans’ sense of individual independence. Truly, the “fierce spirit of Il y a en effet une passion mâle et légitime pour l’égalité qui excite les independence,” to use Irish states- hommes à vouloir être tous fort et estimés. … mais il se rencontre man Edmund Burke’s eighteenth aussi dans le cœur humain un goût dépravé pour l’égalité … qui century description, that pervades réduit les hommes à préférer l’égalité dans la servitude à l’inégalité American society must have tracea- dans la liberté. ble roots (Burke 237). It is my purpose in this article to delineate one “There is in effect a manly and legitimate passion for equality which root, specifically the radical Ameri- excites men to all want to be strong and esteemed … but in the can Enlightenment, by which I refer human heart, there exists also a depraved taste for equality … which to a catalog of diverse ideologies reduces men to prefer equality in servitude than inequality with found objectionable by the main- liberty.” stream Enlightenment, including the belief in fundamental rights en- --Alexis de Tocqueville, De la démocratie en Amérique, I.iii dowed by a Creator and not birth, limited to no government, uninhibit- he spirit of America is the spirit ty, is, in itself, a manner of demon- ed freedom of speech, an insistence T of independence. Roll your strating the spirit of independence on one’s individual prerogative over eyes, scoff at my presumptuous- as manifested in the rhetoric fos- communal benefit, and individual ness—but do not make the mistake tered by the United States and not- access to providence instead of of dismissing it as nationalistic hys- ed by de Tocqueville almost two progressive and secular rationality. teria. I am no gun-toter; I am no hundred years ago. Through a thematic comparison neoconservative; I am no immigrant This spirit of independence to which between Immanuel Kant’s formative -hater—my opening statement is I refer can be traced throughout the essay, “What is Enlightenment?” grounded wholly in nonpolitical rhet- history of the United States—from and writings of the American found- oric, and it is precisely this kind of the very inception of the history of ing fathers, I will establish that from rhetoric of which I avail myself in this country and its ideals, as rec- the arrival of the first emigrants in order to gaily express myself both in orded in the rhetoric of Winthrope’s Massachusetts, Americans have public and in this article. The mere “City on a Hille,”2 to contemporary perceived themselves to be Enlight- fact that I, as an American, can rhetoric demanding an end to de- ened in a manner that would ulti- speak so audaciously while another pendence on foreign oil and sup- mately prevent the European mod- American can summarily dismiss porting America’s entitlement to act erate Enlightenment from taking my statement as rightwing orotundi- unilaterally, without the backing of root in the American mind. 3 Kant’s Enlightenment and rope’s progressive move towards sought to correct, was not their con- American Exceptionalism Enlightenment, America could never cern. The Puritan emigrants felt that be the realization thereof for at least genuine faith lacked in Europe, and three reasons. For one, colonial their deliverance proved that God history did not inspire an intimate purposed their establishment of the community; the colonies frequently scripturally foretold New Jerusalem. had more enmity with one another While a boon to their community’s than England, and more to the freedom of worship, the establish- point, each sought colonial interest ment of Puritan havens in the New instead of communal welfare. Addi- World did not bring about the kind of tionally, emigrants to the Americas enlightenment Kant and his contem- frequently transplanted themselves poraries would later seek. However, in the name of freedom and inde- the American Puritans, as a group, pendence. not a view to the amelio- believed themselves chosen as the ration of a community.5 Yet the most cornerstone of God’s recreation. As germane reason that America’s such, they were “answerable only to Early Republic could never have God and to his or her own con- adopted the principles of the moder- science” (Innes 116). On into the ate Enlightenment in the context of early 1700s, New World prosperity, this discussion of Kant’s “Sapere coupled with the subjugation of aude” is that both radical and mod- America’s natives and nature, fur- erate thinkers in colonial America ther nourished their spirit of Excep- Immanuel Kant freely accepted tutelage, to use one tionalism. New Englanders in partic- English translation of Kant’s Un- ular, enjoying a lifestyle equal to or mündigkeit, to a bygone era’s man- superior to many Europeans, con- Though Kant praised the American ner of thinking, stemming from the sidered themselves blessed for their Revolution3 and throughout his oeu- colonization of the New World: efforts to establish an enlightened, vre, extols independence as noble American Exceptionalism. 6 theocratic society. virtue, it is important to separate this term from its contemporary connota- The first leaders in America— tions. Kant’s usage did not predicate William Bradford, John Winthrop, “[direct] democracy; racial and sexu- among others—believed their indi- al equality; individual liberty of life- vidual church was synonymous with style; full freedom of thought, ex- the New Jerusalem prophesized in pression, and the press; eradication the Bible. These men believed they of religious authority from the legis- were delivered from heathen Eu- lative process and education; and rope by the mighty hand of God full separation of church and Himself, and though such providen- state” (Israel, Revolution vii-viii). tial deliverance led men like Brad- Such liberties are conspicuous in ford and Winthrop to be “what we the writings of, among others, would think of today as a civic- Thomas Paine and Thomas Jeffer- minded citizen[s],” they by no son—men who were Kant’s contem- means “believe[d] in democracy” or poraries, but not likeminded philoso- individual liberties beyond the right phers. Kant’s independence is far to worship as Puritan church lead- more subjective. In his celebrated ers saw fit (Söderlind 245). In 1754, essay from 1784, “What is Enlight- when Jonathan Mayhew writes that enment?” he outlines the overarch- America’s first emigrants were William Bradford ing goals of the on-going European “smitten with a Love of Liberty,” it Enlightenment.4 Yet from his first was not the kind championed by the Individualized Exceptional- few words, distinctions between Enlightenment’s leaders, including American radicalism and European Kant—it was not secular, nor was it ism moderateness are palpable. Kant’s egalitarian; early New England Puri- In the first half of the eighteenth principal aphorism: “Sapere aude,” tans’ love affair with independence century, Jonathan Edwards played “Dare to Know,” his motto for the had everything to do with the Angli- a crucial role in extending Excep- Age of Enlightenment, presents the can Church (Mayhew 23). For these tionalism beyond just Puritan Ameri- first challenge to the American early Americans, something was ca. He writes, “Beautiful as Tirzah, mind, legally formed just eight years fundamentally wrong in the Old comely as Jerusalem, and terrible before the publication of his essay. World, but the plight of the average as an Army with Banners”—“Put on Despite being the progeny of Eu- citizen, which the Enlightenment thy beautiful garments, O America,

4 the holy city!”7 In coupling his rejec- law to obey. Such identity politics Crèvecœur 50). In his 1775 Decla- tion of the Enlightenment’s sense of bled into all facets of life, most nota- ration of the Causes and Necessity progressive, secular societies with bly in public rhetoric, literature, and of Taking Up Arms, Thomas Jeffer- an ever-expanding sense of individ- poetry, such as that of Philip Fre- son defends Americans’ right to ual Exceptionalism, Edwards plant- neau who, using another Biblical radical independence. Jefferson ed the seeds of a radical independ- idyll, praises America as “A Canaan weds the secular and religious rhet- ence during the First Great Awaken- here,” one he prophesies “shall ex- orics of his time, without obscuring ing.8 According to Edwards, Ameri- cel the old” (Freneau 82). From the his focus on individual: “We do then ca constituted “the holy city,” not Puritan settlers to Freneau’s com- most solemnly before God & the just the Puritan communities there- patriots, Americans, first communal- world declare, that … we will wage in. The eminent scholar Sacvan ly then individually, supposed them- with bitter perseverance, exerting to Bercovitch aptly argues that selves intimate with God and capa- their utmost energies all those pow- “Edwards’s arrogance reflects a set ble of making enlightened decisions ers which our creator hath given us of widely shared beliefs[,] … Ed- before that term was ever popular- to preserve that sacred Liberty wards drew out the protonational- ized. In effect, they were not part of which He committed to us in sacred istic tendencies … [and he] retained an Age of Enlightenment Kant said deposit, & to protect from every the Puritan vision of personal/ was ongoing in 1784, but the culmi- hostile hand our lives & our proper- communal exceptional- nation of it. ties” (Jefferson 123). Through his ism” (Bercovitch 105-106). Indeed, repetitious use of the first person Edwards “opened the ranks of the While this enlightened Exceptional- plural pronoun, Jefferson’s concern American army of Christ to every ism is unambiguous in political rhet- over the individual is clear. By the white Protestant believ- oric of the Revolutionary Era, rhetor- time of the American Revolution and er” (Bercovitch 106). These soldiers ical antecedents are conspicuous the authoring of the Declaration of needed guidance from God, Ed- Independence, a sense of special wards in effect argues, yet once propriety pervaded the colonists, they received it, they were free to one that from its onset diverged make morally sound judgments as from the path of Kantian ethics and they, and not solely their society, the moderate Enlightenment. were divinely enlightened. Such Divinely-granted individual sover- decisions thus did not need to have eignty was never Kant’s intent. the community’s benefit in mind. While Kant does acknowledge “The Edwards coalesced Puritan Excep- public use of one’s reason must tionalism and the revivalism of his always be free,” he does contrast own age, advancing colonials’ this with “The private use of reason” sense of independence while tacitly which he argues must be “very nar- linking it to the emerging belief in row” (Kramnick 3). He elaborates: America’s mission. Hence, fifty “By the public use of one’s reason I years prior to Kant’s manifesto, Jonathan Edwards understand the use which a person Americans had already developed makes of it as a scholar before the clear notions of singular and superi- throughout America’s colonial litera- reading public” (Kramnick 3). Mili- or individuality which endowed them ture. In 1710, Cotton Mather speaks tary officers, clergymen, and gov- with a belief that their actions were of America as the fulfillment of ernment officials, to use Kant’s ex- inherently nobler and more enlight- prophecy: “Mal. 1. 11. From the amples, can use their positions as ened. Edwards essentially molded Rising of the Sun even unto the citizens to voice their opinions and the Puritan belief to fit the ever in- going down of the same, my Name exercise their independence. A cler- creasing American population, hun- shall be great among the Gentiles. gyman, for example, may denounce gry for individual identity and individ- AMERICA is Legible in these Prom- teachings of his church while not in ual opportunity, hungry for individual ises” (Mather 31). Little variation of front of the pulpit entrusted to him self-assertion, into a self-righteous Mather’s tropos is found in secular by the church. In effect, individuals mass of individuals believing their writings even decades later. J. Hec- have the right to break character. In personal relationship with the Al- tor St. John de Crèvecœur’s prerev- this way, institutions are upheld for mighty endowed them to an exalted olutionary third letter in his Letters the benefit of society while those position in His design. from an American Farmer praises within them encourage gradual America for having “no princes, for change, which “leads the govern- The colonies came to represent, at whom we toil, starve, and bleed: we ment to relax its restrictions on pub- least in the minds of colonists and are the most perfect society now lic discourse,” thus creating a “self- newly-émigré, a new Eden, where existing in the world. Here man is perpetuating motion” towards great- individual independence was part of free; as he ought to be; nor is this er and greater civil freedom for the a providential plan, much like when pleasing equality so transitory as benefit of the society, not solely the the Biblical Adam had but a single many others are” (emphasis mine, individual (McCumber 269). Com- 5 menting on Kant’s notions of re- note the stark contrast between tive power is separated from stricted private freedom, John Dew- attitudes emanating from the mod- the legislative. Despotism is ey notes the schism between en- erate French Enlightenment and the where the legislator executes lightened freedom and radical, mer- religiously driven radical Enlighten- cenary independence when he ment in America: “I had remarked his own laws, so that the writes that Kant’s Enlightenment among [the French] that religion private will of the chief is ushers “the coming of age on the and the spirit of independence al- substituted for the will of the part of humanity,” and not the idio- most always marched in opposite public. Here was a device syncratic individual. Humanity will directions. [In America], I have enabling Kant to reject de- find “Genuine growth … in the slow found them intrinsically united with growth of science and philoso- one another in rulership over the mocracy as a form of despot- phy” (Dewey 76). “True freedom,” same land” (Tocqueville 222). Be- ism while fusing central Eu- according to Dewey, “is inner free- yond mere text, the wedding of ropean enlightened absolut- dom, freedom of thought” based these two ideologies is no more ism, or forms to it, with repre- solely on enlightened thinking rela- apparent than in Jefferson and Ben- sentation and republicanism. tive to the age in question (Dewey jamin Franklin’s first proposed offi- (Israel, Democratic Enlight- 76). This inner independence, when cial seal for the United States: Mo- practiced by the mass of society, enment 818) gradually leads to greater, progressive freedom for society and com- The colonies came to represent a munal—again, not individual— benefit. Put simply, unrestricted reason new Eden, where individual only may reign free when the individual, in Kant’s words, “regards independence was part of a himself … as a member of the whole community or of a society of world citizens, and thus in the role providential plan. of a scholar who addresses the public” (Kramnick 3). ses leading the Israelites across the Kant argued for a compromise be- Red Sea. Such visual rhetoric al- tween monarchs and their subjects, Certainly this call for communal ludes to the kind of independence where royals would permit freedom enlightenment is a far cry from the many Americans believed they had of expression for the creation of a American jeremiad of the mid to late gained. Whether or not every colo- proto-republican system, thus per- eighteenth century, employed not to nist avowed such exceptional, en- mitting gradual changes to be effec- incite rationality and reason but to lightened independence or if it was tuated in society while the subjects, stir nationalistic sentiment against a necessary bathos meant to boost gracious for their freedoms, remain the British Empire, which was sup- wartime morale and subsequent obedient and reap the gradual ben- posedly limiting individual freedom. nationalism is debatable. What is efits enlightened societies receive: Religiosity was thus bound up with not, however, is that fervent faith, reason, rights, and liberty, all within America’s sense of post- not tempered reason, fueled the the parameters of the moderate Enlightenment and Exceptionalism. American Revolution. Enlightenment. As God had chosen the American people, He too had already granted In his masterpiece, Democratic En- While Kant astutely recognizes that the nation communal Enlighten- lightenment, Jonathan Israel ex- “there will always be some inde- ment. Nathaniel Niles, preaching in plains how Kant attempts to draw a pendent thinkers,” for a general 1774, demonstrates the entrenched compromise between the growing public to find real Enlightenment, opposition against the moderate number of radicals in Europe and sovereign “freedom,” the citizenry’s Enlightenment when he writes, America and the more conservative ability to speak freely as literate and “Liberty is not an absolute right of Enlightenment thinkers. To para- learned individuals, is required, our own.” Liberty, independence, phrase Israel, Kant had to introduce which in turn culminates in “throwing and free thought, not inherent to subtle ideas that allowed princely off the yoke of tutelage … [and in- man, are all “a loan of heaven, for rule to continue, as a single execu- stead] disseminate the spirit of the which we must account with the tive power would, Kant surmised, rational appreciation of both their great God” (Niles 1774). The impli- more effectively permit a gradual own worth and every man’s voca- cation is clear—if Americans did not Enlightenment to occur in society. tion for thinking for him- capitalize on providential liberty and Israel continues: self” (Kramnick 2). Such lofty princi- support the revolution, they were ples, as outlined in Kant’s essay, not demonstrating their commitment ‘Republicanism,’ in his view, seem to explicitly enshrine the indi- to their own Exceptional Enlighten- is the political principle ac- vidual freedoms articulated in the ment. Such fervent beliefs led cording to which the execu- political rhetoric of the radical found- Tocqueville, over fifty years later, to ers of the United States. Yet Kant’s 6 position on the ends of the Enlight- moral and practical dimensions of then subsequent ages would be in enment is clarified a year later in his Christian teaching” (Schmidt 7). tutelage to bygone ages. Unequivo- Fundamental Principles of the Meta- Kant and moderate Enlightened cally, Kant declares, “That would be physics of Morals, where he writes thinkers saw “no conflict between a crime against human nature, the that there is “one categorical imper- enlightened reason and Chris- proper destination of which lies pre- ative, and that is: Act only on that tian” (Schmidt 7). cisely in this progress” (Kramnick 4). maxim by which you can at the This section of Kant’s essay con- Regarding Kant’s own views against same time will that it should become cludes by justifying a rejection of the established churches, Curtis a universal law” (Kramnick 301).9 unwarranted decrees and a revolu- Peters writes, Kant “was particularly Under Kant’s meta-moral frame- tion by those who unilaterally re- incensed over the fact that ecclesi- work, the independence for which ceive them from previous ages. The astical authorities were inhibiting he advocates is meant to produce Enlightenment, in Kant’s under- development of people’s full moral an individual will that is “not merely standing, is in perpetual forward autonomy. … [A] person can only good as a means to something motion towards human societal per- ‘please God,’ according to Kant, else,” such as personal gain or enti- fection; Enlightenment is not an age through autonomous moral puri- tlement. Rather, such a will ought to but a defining quality of one, de- ty” (Peters 95). Thus, Kant articu- be obedient “to a self-imposed law,” pendent upon the varying degrees lates another guiding principle of the “good in itself, for which reason [is] that individuals of that age claim Enlightenment: regulations, and absolutely necessary. … For reason moral and ethical maturity and au- particularly those concerned with recognizes the establishment of a tonomy for themselves and for their good will as its highest practical a society. Inheriting Enlightenment destination,” moral duty to society was categorically out of the question (Schmidt 488; Kramnick 297-98). for moderate thinkers—and yet as Kant argues that if individuals act we considered, that is just what according to this “categorical imper- Mather, Edwards, Niles, saying ative,” an ethical supercode as it nothing of Jefferson, Paine, Frank- were, acts of individual independ- lin, and others, supposed they had ence would qualify as universal been bequeathed. guidelines. Thus, societies, even the world’s citizenry as a whole, would (Radical) America’s Birth act for universal betterment and The ingrained “Holier than thou” enlightenment. attitude, in addition to “general living standard [which] seems to have Kant is not dismissive of religion as equaled or surpassed that of any such; rather he praises Frederick European country,” compounded by the Great who, according to Kant, Cotton Mather victories over the French and Indi- “holds it his duty to … [leave] each ans in 1763, gave way to Ameri- man free to make use of his reason matters of faith, must be era- cans’ pervading sense of “‘millennial in matters of conscience. Under him appropriate. Kant argues that nei- optimism,’” a mindset that supersed- venerable ecclesiastics are al- ther clergymen, lawmaker, nor any- ed the need for Europe’s moderate lowed” (Kramnick 6). Kant, though one else may justifiably petrify the Enlightenment (Bercovitch 115- dismissive of religion for its long truth of their respective age for all 116).10 This embracing of the radical history of combatting reason and time. “Such [a contract], made to Enlightenment’s undercurrent is no rationality, permits clergymen to shut off all further enlightenment more obvious than in the pivotal express their beliefs as scholars, from the human race, is absolutely document of America’s history: the “submit[ting] for public testing their null and void,” Kant declares, be- Declaration of Independence. The judgments and views which here cause “An age cannot bind itself writers of the Declaration took it and there diverge from the estab- and ordain to put the succeeding upon themselves to radicalize the lished symbol” (Kramnick 6). Kant one into such a condition that it can- principles of Kant, Hume, and other grants such freedom to clergy be- not extend its (at best very occa- continental European thinkers, cause he did not fear the effects of sional) knowledge, purify itself of demonstrating a proclivity towards a true Christianity—what he consid- errors, and progress in general en- much greater public independence ered to be morality based on an lightenment” (Kramnick 4). In limit- than that with which the moderate ethical use of rationality. Many of ing laws, doctrines, and principles to Enlightenment felt comfortable. The the clergy preaching in Berlin, even a specific age, Kant stresses the preamble of the Declaration articu- to Frederick himself, taught Christi- need for each age to enlighten itself, lates what is essentially the heart of anity through a doctrine called using the independent public reason radically enlightened liberalism: the “neology,” which “combined histori- accorded to its aggregate citizenry universal right to individual self- cal and critical approaches to the by an enlightened despot like Fred- determination beyond the political interpretation of Scripture with an erick. If one age determined for all context. Allen Jayne further high- emphasis on the primacy of the ages what is true Enlightenment, 7 that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness” (US 1776). Yet the founding document of America as nation, not just idea, makes no reference to a Kantian- like ethical, moral, or universal code, nor does it invoke societal welfare which provides the backdrop for enlightened public expression of freedom. The essence, then, of the Declaration of Independence can be likened to newly erected walls of a house sans foundation; such deficiency in construction cannot provide an enduring tenement. With Jefferson’s Declaration, then, America preemptively built the walls of an enlightened future without the social foundation necessary on which to sustain an enlightened society.11 In effect, America’s founding declaration borrowed from the Enlightenment’s autonomous morality irrespective of the governing ideological superstructure of a society seeking communal welfare and not that of its discrete constituents. Kant does not justify an unbridled use of freedom, perhaps even to the detriment of other free individuals, the kind of independence Declara- tion indirectly permits. He concludes “What is Enlightenment?” with the Thomas Paine, copy by Auguste Millière, after an engraving by William realization that “A greater degree of Sharp, after George Romney, circa 1876 civil freedom appears advantageous to the freedom of mind of the peo- lights the Declaration’s emphasis on According to Kant’s categori- ple, and yet it places inescapable individualism when he affirms that cal imperative, [moral ac- limitations upon it; a lower degree of the preamble “gave the common tions] must have universal civil freedom, on the contrary, pro- man a basis to reject and resist any- vides the mind with room for each value and target all of hu- one who claimed authority over him man to extend himself to his full without his consent, since equals manity. In other words, I capacity” (Kramnick 7).12 By way of have no authority over should subordinate my natu- contrast, the Declaration of Inde- equals” (Jayne 109). The Declara- ral egoism in consideration pendence concludes with: “With a tion of Independence thus serves as of others, ‘always at the firm reliance on the protection of the amalgamation of both American divine Providence, we mutually same time as an end and political rhetoricians’ ideals inherited pledge to each other our Lives, our never as a means.’ And as from the Enlightenment and their Fortunes, and our sacred Hon- notions of American Exceptionalism. for this exigency, no one or” (US 1776). Kant’s conclusion Its idealist expression, however, other than me may impose it reinforces the communal good cul- serves as the commencement of its upon myself. Kant thus forms minating in individuals finding their own downfall as it lacks a Kantian the autonomous morality. “full capacity” within society; the system of communal ethics. In this Declaration ends on the powerful (Tavoillot 72) regard, which Pierre-Henri Tavoillot chord of guaranteed divine protec- notes: A Kantian autonomous morality is tion and American Exceptionalism, echoed in the illustrious words: “We only further emphasized by the rep- hold these truths to be self-evident, etitious use of our—a telling word 8 choice of Jefferson’s—coupled with mon American man, as an individu- this did not lead to wholesale aban- the plural lives and fortunes, sug- al, has “every opportunity and every donment of these ideals. gesting discrete lives, fortunes, and encouragement … to form the no- honor. Should Kant be correct, un- blest, purest constitution on the face American Radicalism: Back restricted freedom presents dangers of the earth[,] … to begin the world to the Future to morality, ethics, society, and ulti- over again” (Paine 109). To Paine, The radical ideals of Benjamin mately to man himself. Likewise, the as with so many of his countrymen, Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John early American values enshrined in America was the grand culmination Dickinson, Samuel West, in addition the Declaration, further reinforced of the Enlightenment, and like the to Paine and Jefferson, took root in by individual states’ declarations of patriarch Noah after the deluge, the early American consciousness rights, would lead to a society dead- America could refashion its own even though the great majority of locked by incommensurate opinions destiny sans the guidance of politi- the revolutionary class became emanating from its great mass of cal rulers. members of a subsequent reaction- singular citizens seeking egoistic As grand as Paine’s recreation of ary class that sought to secure its interests, reminiscent of Tocque- the world through America may own prominence and power. In pro- ville’s “tyrannie de l'opinion.”13 seem, many newly independent, posing a government based on the aristocratic Americans, similar to moderate Enlightenment in 1775, Herein lies another issue: America’s moderate continental thinkers, saw Alexander Hamilton quoted philoso- “tyrannie de l’opinion” left millions the common man as not worthy of pher David Hume verbatim: disenfranchised for numerous rea- the independence entrusted to him sons, race, religion, being on the In contriving any system of by Jefferson, Paine, and other radi- wrong side of the political pendu- government, and fixing the cals. For a certainty, they wanted an lum. In Kant’s Prussia, though Fred- America free and enlightened, but several checks and controls erick was considered a benevolent ultimately “limited” to “gentry, law- of the constitution, every and enlightened ruler, being the yers, officers, and upper-class con- man ought to be supposed a source of executive power left an tractors and professionals,” those knave; and to have no other entire nation subjugated according who have learned to exercise ration- to one of the radical Enlighten- end in all his actions, but ality (Israel, Democratic Enlighten- ment’s most vociferous anti- private interest. By this inter- ment 462). The extreme freedoms monarchical voices, Thomas Paine. In his treatise Common Sense, Paine makes a powerful and per- The great mass of Americans were suasive call in his independent and radical rhetoric for a break from summarily removed from the “we, subjection to any monarch, even those considered to be enlightened the people” of the Declaration, (Paine 82).14 Paine provides ample reason for his abject disdain for enlightened despots: “If we inquire leaving their ideals unfulfilled. into the business of a king, we shall find that in some countries they hallowed by Jefferson’s Declaration, have none,” and regarding Eng- Paine’s canon, as well as the jere- est, we must govern him, land’s regent: “A pretty business miads leading up to the Revolution and by means of it, make indeed for a man to be allowed eight were incommensurate with practi- him co-operate to public hundred thousand sterling a year calities of governing a nation. While good, notwithstanding his for, and worshipped into the bar- much of these writers’ emphases insatiable avarice and ambi- gain!” (Paine 78-79). In characteriz- foregrounded the independence of 15 ing European royalty as a gaggle of the individual, the individual was tion. (Hamilton 2:55) wasteful vagabonds, full of deceit, left, in the end, not in a pure democ- A year later John Adams confesses ostentatiousness, and wicked- racy but a limited republic based on to James Sullivan: “It is certain, in ness—qualities not only unchristian, the Constitution, a far more moder- theory, that the only moral founda- but unenlightened—Paine sets up ate document when compared to tion of government is the consent of his key contrast: “Of more worth is the Declaration. In essence, Ameri- the people. But to what an extent one honest man to society, and in ca’s radical Enlightenment was a shall we carry this princi- the sight of God, than all the means to an end for those who ple?” (Adams 135).16 Both Adams crowned ruffians that ever would become its leaders. The great and Hamilton, like Kant, clearly had lived” (Paine 79). Implicit in Paine’s mass of Americans were summarily reservations about “the people.” The words is that America possessed removed from the “we, the people” American gentry at large saw the not one honest man but a nation of of the Declaration, leaving their ide- inherent good in the theories of radi- them. He maintains that the com- als unfulfilled and yet, paradoxically, cal Enlightenment but feared that 9 the implementations of these theo- wrote Walden, regarding which one tale about Kant himself that greatly ries would end in anarchy. After all, anonymous reviewer writes, highlights the difference between did not God’s consecrated nation of “Whatever may be thought or said the American attitude characterized Israel still need a king? Less dra- of this curious volume, nobody can by the platitude, “It’s a free country,” matically, however, such power and deny its claim to individuality of and Kant’s attitude towards his fel- independence entrusted to the un- opinion, sentiment, and expres- low person.17 Nine days prior to his reasoned masses would lead to sions” (Kirklighter 66). Whitman death, Kant was visited by his physi- unenlightened choices in leadership followed a year later, and at the cian. He rose from his chair to wel- and would cultivate egoism and self- onset of his 1855 Leaves of Grass come the visitor to his home. “Old, ill interest. Paine himself had already writes, “The President’s taking off and nearly blind, he … stood trem- manifested his anarchist tendencies his hat to [the people] not they to bling with weakness and muttering by 1792; he writes in The Rights of him” (Whitman 3). Later in the same unintelligible words.” The doctor Man, “Society performs for itself work, Whitman writes of authors, could not understand why Kant almost everything which is ascribed “The messages of great poets to would not retake his seat after to government” (Paine 266). The each man and woman are, Come to greeting his visitor, until he realized Constitution took many years to us on equal terms, Only then can Kant would not do so until the doc- ratify across the newly formed you understand us, We are no bet- tor took his; only then would Kant states, heavily contested on the ter than you” (Whitman 14). Wheth- once again take his seat. After re- grounds that a federal government er presidents took off their hats to gaining his strength, Kant said to would infringe on individuals’ rights the citizenry or the citizenry sat the doctor, “Das Gefühl für Humani- to liberty and independence. down equally with Whitman, we can tät hat mich noch nicht verlassen”— be dubious—yet the “Land of the “The sense of humanity has not yet Into the nineteenth century, this Free” and outlook of Americans left me.” Kant’s humanity—his un- concern over entitlement persisted continued to characterized by the selfish concern, sympathy, respect in the American psyche. For exam- “fierce spirit of independence.” for others, in other words, his will- ple, Herman Melville’s 1852 novel ingness to forgo his own comfort Pierre opens with a paean to Ameri- Delineating the expansion of radical and prerogative for the sake of his can Exceptionalism and the creation American individualism from Whit- fellow human—prevailed over the of a New Canaan, where man was man’s Leaves of Grass to today is inherently selfish penchants of hu- free to exercise unregulated free- an exercise best left to sociologists mankind and the kind of independ- dom. Emerson and Transcendental- and cultural anthropologists. There- ence proponed by the radical Ameri- ism—the belief that man had good- fore, instead of speculating about can Enlightenment. Its version of ness inherent within him, that he Kant’s likely views on twenty-first independence pales in front of the need only be self-reliant—provided century America’s divisive issues— 81-year-old Kant’s a governing philosophy for Ameri- international affairs, gun-control, “sense of humanity.” ca’s infatuation with personal inde- abortion, welfare, tax policy, 99%, pendence. Thoreau, Emerson’s multiculturalism, and the list contin- intellectual son, followed suit and ues—allow me to conclude with a

10 Notes ceptionnelle, et il est à croire unenlightened manner. qu'aucun peuple démocratique 1 Translation from Tocqueville’s “Il 13 Prior to the 1776 Declaration of n'y sera jamais pla- y a en effet une passion mâle et Independence, more than half of cé” (Tocqueville 58). And yet légitime pour l’égalité qui excite the thirteen colonies already had even before that, he notes, “Les les hommes à vouloir être tous their own declarations of rights. Américains sont un peuple très fort et estimés. … mais il se ren- Consider Article 1 from the Vir- ancien et très éclairé, qui a rencontre aussi dans le coeur hu- ginia Declaration of Rights: “That contré un pays nouveau et im- main un gout dépravé pour l’éga- all men are by nature equally mense dans lequel il peut lité … qui réduit les hommes a free and independent and have s'étendre à volonté, et qu'il fé- préférer l’égalité dans la servi- certain inherent rights, of which, conde sans peine. Cela est sans tude a l’inégalité dans la liberté.” when they enter into a state of exemple dans le society, they cannot, by any 2 See Massachusetts Historical monde” (Tocqueville 57). See compact, deprive or divest their Society 52. Tocqueville, vol. 3, 56-64. posterity; namely, the enjoyment 3 See Beck, Lewis Wi. “Kant and 7 Originally from Edwards, Jona- of life and liberty, with the means the Right of Revolution.” Journal than. Works. Ed. John Erskine. of acquiring and possessing of the History of Ideas 32:3 New York, 1849; vol. 1, p. 484- property, and pursuing and ob- (1971): 411-422. 486, cited in Bercovitch 99. taining happiness and safe- ty” (Virginia 1776). Interestingly, 4 While the precise date of the 8 Regarding recent scholarship on unlike the United States’ Decla- commencement of the Enlighten- Edwards and the Enlightenment, ration, Article 15 of this document is debated, 1650-1700 is a see John Smith, The Princeton ment does in fact point to reasonable period. During this Companion to Jonathan Ed- “fundamental principles” meant period, Spinoza, Locke, Bayle, wards, 34-41. The Great Awak- to provide the groundwork for and Newton began publishing ening, usually dated from the the liberty of a free people. the works that would later be- 1730s to 40s, contributed greatly Tocqueville, vol. 3, 335. come the foundations for later to the wedding of early American Enlightenment thought. The lead- politics and religion; see 14 Emily García notes that “the ing historian on this age, Jona- Bercovitchch. 3, 4. evocation of universalism in than Israel, contends, "After Common Sense [is] evidence of 9 Der kategorische Imperativ ist 1650, everything, no matter how Paine’s indebtedness to Enlight- also ein einziger, und zwar fundamental or deeply rooted, enment notions of sympathy and dieser: handle nur nach was questioned in the light of reason,” to which Paine himself derjenigen Maxime, durch die du philosophic reason" (Israel, Radi- attests when he suggests that, zugleich wollen kannst, dass sie cal Enlightenment 3). “Europe, and not England,” is ein allgemeines Gesetz werde. the ideological “parent country of 5 J. Hector St. John de Crèvecœur 10 The original expression America” (Söderlind 54-55; makes a point of informing his “millennial optimism” is dis- Paine 81). She further cites Eliz- readers that “The great number cussed in detail in Hatch 409. abeth Barnes and John Highman of European emigrants yearly when she contends that Paine’s coming over here informs us that 11 I borrow the term, “Jefferson’s “simple facts” and “plain argu- the severity of taxes, the injustice Declaration,” from Allen Jayne’s ments” implies “that there exists of laws, the tyranny of the rich, book bearing the same name. In a natural, universal ‘character of and the oppressive avarice of the it, he expresses his explicit intent man,’” which evokes “sympathy church; are intolerable as ever. of his work: “To demonstrate … for the suffering of humanity … This country, providentially the interdependence of political everywhere” and services patri- intended for the general asylum thought and philosophical theol- otism, but is not “an extension of of the world, will flourish by the ogy in Jefferson’s worldview as it” (Söderlind 54-55). oppression of their peo- expressed in the Declaration of ple” (Crèvecœur 119). Independence” (Jayne 8). 15 Compare Hume, Essays and Treatises on Several Subjects, 6 Alexis de Tocqueville is often 12 Interestingly, the German word vol. 1. London, 1764, 37. accredited with exceptionalizing translated here as civic is bür- Americans. Though used first in gerlicher, can also signify bour- 16 My emphasis; originally John 1835, Tocqueville makes refer- geois, or even more pejoratively, Adams to James Sullivan, May ence to that status existing far commoner. Hence, Kant explicit- 26, 1776, in Adams, ed., Works before his neologism. He writes ly argues that greater freedom of John Adams, 9:375. in his De la démocratie en amé- for the middle-class everyman is 17 Paraphrased and partially cited rique: “La situation des Améri- counterproductive in that he will from Marie Hochmuth Nichols, cains est donc entièrement ex- inexorably use his freedom in an Rhetoric and Criticism, 6.

11 Works Cited Holcroft, Thomas (Trans.). Political, James Brown, 1838. Print. Adams, Willi Paul. “The First Ameri- Philosophical and Satyrical Miscel- Mayhew, Jonathan. A Sermon can State Constitutions.” Republi- lanies by Frederick II. London: G. G. Preach’d. Boston: 1754. Print. J. and J. Robinson, 1789. Print. canism and Liberalism in America McCumber, John. “Unearthing the and the German States, 1750-1850. Hutcheson, Francis. A System of Wonder: A ‘Post-Kantian’ Paradigm Eds. Jürgen Heideking and James Moral Philosophy vol. 1. London: R. in Kant’s Critique of Judgment.” Henretta. Cambridge: Cambridge and A. Foulis Printers, 1755. Print. Aesthetics and Cognition in Kant’s University Press, 2002. Print. Innes, Stephen. Creating the Com- Critical Philosophy. Ed. Rebecca Baird, A. Craig. Rhetoric: A Philo- mon Wealth: The Economic Culture Kukla. Cambridge: Cambridge Uni- sophical Inquiry. New York: The of Puritan New England vol. 2. New versity Press, 2006. Print. 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Liberty Fund, 1999. Print. sity Press, 2001. Print. Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd ed. Crèvecœur, J. Hector St. John de. Jayne, Allen. Jefferson’s Declara- September 2011. Oxford University Letters from an American Farmer. tion of Independence: Origins, Phi- Press. Web. 23 March 2012. New York: Fox& Duffield, 1904. losophy and Theology. Lexington: www.oed.com. Print. The University of Kentucky Press, Paine, Thomas. The Thomas Paine Dewey, John. German Philosophy 1998. Print. Reader. Eds. Michael Foot and and Politics. New York: Van Rees Jefferson, Thomas. The Works of Isaac Kramnick. London, Penguin, Press, 1942. Print. Thomas Jefferson vol. 2.Ed. Paul 1987. Print. Ferguson Robert. American Enlight- Leicester Ford. New York: G. P. Peters, Curtis H. Kant’s Philosophy enment 1750-1820. Cambridge: Putnam’s Sons, 1904. Print. of Hope. New York: Peter Lang, Cambridge University Press, 1994. Kirklighter, Cristina. Traversing the 1993. Print. Schmidt, James, ed. Print. Democratic Borders of the Essay. What is Enlightenment: Eighteenth- Century Answers and Twentieth- Fergusson, Rosalind. Shorter Dic- Albany: State University of New Century Questions. Berkeley: Uni- tionary of Catch Phrases. London: York Press, 2002. Print. versity of California Press, 1996. Routledge, 1994. Print. Kramnick, Isaac, ed. The Portable Print. Freneau, Philip Morin, and Fred Enlightenment Reader. New York: Smith, John E. The Princeton Com- Lewis Pattee. The Poems of Philip Penguin, 1995. Print. panion to Jonathan Edwards. Ed. Freneau, vol. 1.Princeton, C.S. Ru- Leibniz, Gottfried. Essais de Théodi- Sang Hyun Lee. Princeton: Prince- binson & Co. University Press, cée sur la Bonté de Dieu, la Liberté ton University Press, 2005. 1902. Print. de l'Homme, etl'Origine du Malvol. Söderlind, Sylvia and James Taylor Hamilton, John C., ed. The Works of 1. Amsterdam: François Carson (eds.). American Exception- Alexander Hamilton, vol. 1. New Changuions, 1747. Print. alism: from Winthrop to Winfrey. York: John F. Trow, 1850. Print. Madison, James, Alexander Hamil- Albany: State University of New ton, and John Jay. The Federalist Hatch, Nathan. “The Origins of Civil York Press, 2011. Print. Millennialism in America: New Eng- Papers. New York: Penguin, 1961. Tavoillot, Pierre-Henri. “Deux ou land Clergymen, War with France, Print. trois raisons de croire en l’homme.” and the Revolution.” The William Marshall, George L. Jr. “The Rise Philosophie Magazine 24 (2008): 70 and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, and Fall of the Newburgh Conspira- -73. Print. 31:3 (1974): 407-430. Web. 28 cy: How General Washington and March 2012. his Spectacles Saved the Republic.” Tocqueville, Alexis de. Oeuvres complètes d'Alexis de Tocqueville, Holbach, Paul-Henri. Système so- Early America Review (Fall 1997). vol. 2, 3. Paris: Michel Lévy frères, cial, vol. 1.London, 1778. Print. Web. 29 March 2012. 1864.Print. ---. La politique naturelle, ou dis- Massachusetts Historical Society. Whitman, Walt. Poetry and Prose. cours sur les vrais principles du Collections of the Massachusetts New York: Literary Classics of the gouvernement, vol. 1, 4. London: Historical Society, Third Series, Vol. United States, Inc., 1996. Print. 1773. Print. 7. Boston: Charles C. Little and 12 hard to predict. But an immigration Letter from New York by Lenny Quart reform bill has gained the agree- ment of the bipartisan Gang of A Victory in the Culture Wars? Eight, and hopefully if it passes will both boost border security and put or more than three decades, little political capital could be gained 11 million immigrants in the U.S. F an alliance of evangelical by attacking supposedly subversive illegally on a path to citizenship. Christians and Republicans have and profane works of art. The Amer- Gun control is another matter. Ex- used social and personal issues to ican public has just never cared panded background checks have help them to win away Southern enough about art to get politically the support of 80% of the popula- evangelicals and Midwestern and disturbed by its content, and pruri- tion, and are probably the only re- Northern working class whites from ent sex plays a prime role on net- sponse to our rampant gun violence the Democratic Party. Emphasizing work television, and porn is a multi- that can get through Congress. Oth- race, religion, and sexuality, the billion dollar business. er elements of gun-control legisla- alliance has used issues like abor- In the last month or so, cultural is- tion like a ban on rapid-firing assault tion, school prayer, welfare, affirma- sues - gay marriage, gun control, weapons and limits on the capacity tive action, and gay rights as a immigration, and even the loosening of ammunition magazines seem to wedge to place the Democrats on of prohibitions on pot use - are in have little chance, given a gerry- the defensive. The Democrats tend- the news again. But this time the mandered House whose members ed to switch the discussion to eco- Democrats have taken the lead in are elected by “love-our-guns” dis- nomic issues, where they thought trying to pass legislation on these tricts that demand that they toe the they could hold on to their working issues, and have the general sup- line on gun-control. It's hard to class support. port of the young, minorities, and make headway when a defense of The low point of these culture wars the growing number of religiously guns is seen as a defense of a way occurred when Republican political unaffiliated voters. And the momen- of life. strategist Lee Atwater attacked tum of history is on their side, since Obviously, a grand cultural revolu- Democratic Presidential candidate white blue-collar voters are in de- tion is not in the offing - there are Michael Dukakis in the 1988 elec- cline, and the nation's new demo- just too many red state legislatures tion by running a nefarious ad blam- graphic reality is that the fastest and regions that will be fighting rear- ing him for the crimes of a black growing populations are now His- guard actions. But a tipping point Massachusetts convict., Willie Hor- panic and Asian. has been reached, and thankfully ton, who had raped a white girl and In 2013 the greatest leap of support the country is moving in a different tied up her boyfriend after escaping is in the area of gay rights. For the cultural direction. One pessimistic from prison while out on a weekend first time, Gallup Polls show a ma- right wing commentator wrote: pass. The ad promoted the idea that jority of Americans support full mar- “Conservatives have largely lost the Dukakis was soft on crime, and bla- riage equality for gay couples, while culture, and it can't be won back by tantly played on racial stereotypes - in 2003 most Americans (58%) were passing some landmark piece of stirring white fears of black criminali- opposed to allowing gays and lesbi- legislation. Instead, it's going to be a ty. It helped George H.W. Bush de- ans to marry legally, and just 33% long, hard slog.” feat Dukakis in the 1988 election. were in favor. That's just one piece (Atwater subsequently apologized But if there is hope for cultural of American society's growing ac- for the scurrilous campaigning he change through legislation, there is ceptance of homosexuality. It's had engaged in.) little sign that the Congressional been an utter reversal from the time stalemate on creating jobs by re- The culture wars were also pursued when Bill Clinton signed the De- building our infrastructure, providing by right-wing politicians like Jesse fense of Marriage Act in 1996 and preschool for every child in America, Helms and Pat Buchanan, along few politicians were willing to stand and tying the minimum wage to the with religious leaders like Donald up for gay rights. cost of living will be broken. It's just Wildmon and Pat Robertson, when Of course, positive poll numbers much harder to take on the corpora- they launched a concerted attack on don't mean that the Roberts-led tions and break from our reflexive the National Endowment for the Arts Supreme Court in late June will distrust of big government than to for supporting artists and venues strike down the constitutionality of change our sexual attitudes. As engaged in “anti-Christian bigotry”. anti-gay marriage legislation. But if political commentator Michael To- They had some success passing there is no sweeping decision for masky writes, Obama must stress in legislation forbidding the NEA from gay marriage, the results will proba- the 2014 campaign that “the Repub- funding artists and institutions that bly bring encouraging changes for licans are the problem and you must “promote, disseminate or produce its advocates. throw them out. Give me a Demo- obscene or indecent materials”. cratic House - it's the only way we'll That aspect of the culture wars did- What will ultimately happen with the get anything done in the next two n't make much progress, and con- immigration and gun control bills is years.” servatives began to understand how 13 "All I saw was evil": Supernatural's Reactionary Road Trip by Dr. Brian Ireland, Senior Lecturer in History, University of Glamorgan

Supernatural is a highly-rated television series, after 9/11, Christian evangelists Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson which debuted in 2005 on the Warner Brothers blamed the attacks on pagans, network in the US. Creator Eric Kripke envis- abortionists, feminists, gays, lesbi- aged the story as a mythic road trip across ans and the American Civil Liberties Union, stating “All of them who try to America, with two brothers travelling through secularize America, I point the fin- small-town America, fighting evil and righting ger in their faces and say you wrongs. Although the brothers' iconic car (a helped his happen.” In a similar vein, Dinesh D’Souza’s The Enemy 1967 Chevy Impala) and the road genre tem- At Home: The Cultural Left and Its plate - Sam and Dean are named after Sal and Responsibility for 9/11 (2007) was Dean, from Jack Kerouac's 1957 novel On the perhaps the most prominent of many publications by social and Road - establish Supernatural as a distinctly political commentators blaming 9/11 American production, the thematic fight between on America’s liberal values, most good and evil has attracted a wide international notably those inspired by the supposed immorality of the 1960s. In a audience. This article explores these themes tirade against the children of the and places them in the context of post-9/11 counterculture, D’Souza called prominent liberals “domestic insur- America. gents” (291) who aimed, apparently, to transform America into “a shining the aftermath of 9/11, Amer- origin) and a desire for revenge. For beacon of global depravity, a kind of In icans struggled to make some, the attacks seemed to be an Gomorrah on a Hill” (284). sense of the mass murder of almost affirmation of their belief in the exist- While these views garnered some 3000 citizens. Why had America ence of evil, not just the physical support, many Americans found been attacked? How would events presence of dark-skinned foreign them objectionable, and the cantan- affect the country? And what should jihadists, but also an evil ideology kerous national debate continued be the proper response? While that was manifestly anti-capitalist, about the meaning of 9/11, its caus- there was no single, collective na- undemocratic, unchristian and un- es, and who was to blame. During tional mood — the destruction, American. While the good versus these deliberations, the left and right shown live on television, was too evil battle could be fought physically of American politics sought to define traumatic and the issues too compli- through military crusades against right and wrong, moral and immoral, cated for that — the attacks did, Islamic terrorists, the enemy’s value and good and evil by claiming own- however, generate concerns about system also had to be defeated and ership of traditional American val- the vulnerability of the ‘homeland’, that meant identifying and confront- ues. While it was tempting to be- paranoia about foreigners ing adversaries at home. For in- lieve that after 9/11 the world had (particularly those of Middle-Eastern stance, on The 700 Club, two days changed forever, in reality these

14 arguments were nothing new: they tablishes its credentials as a “road ations in tone and style. As the road were in fact just another rendition of story” by utilising a number of recur- narrative offers multiple interfaces culture wars between liberalism and ring genre themes, images, and plot with other genres, it can be more conservatism. If 9/11 was different it devices. These are, typically, an all- useful to think of it as both a genre was in the scale of the trauma. With male cast of characters, tension and a style. This flexibility allows thousands dead, scars on the land- between urban and rural life, the consideration of Supernatural as a scape, and the country brought to a enduring mythology of the American traditional road tale, relying on geo- standstill, 9/11 had the characteris- frontier experience, and most im- graphic movement to reacquaint tics of both a physical and psycho- portantly the picaresque nature of viewers with familiar American val- logical national wound, and like post travelling which offers the opportuni- ues (family, friends, music, culture) traumatic stress disorder, its effects ty to critique American society. but its dark gothic style simultane- would be felt in multiple spheres, These repetitions and patterns cre- ously allows a critique of the coun- including that of the televisual dra- ate expectations based on previous try’s seedier side with plots featuring ma. While most television genres knowledge of road tales, the primary racism, child abuse and domestic are suitable for discussions of sin one being emphasis on “social re- violence. These themes imbricate and virtue, horror stories are partic- bellion” (Corrigan 148); how the with Kripke’s utilisation of the road ularly apposite for the task. With, for producers of road stories utilise journey framework to explore Su- example, typical storylines about recurring genre conventions and pernatural’s overarching theme of redemption and sacrifice, horror manage expectations is therefore entropy — holding the line against stories tend to “play out narratives of good versus evil” (Braun 88). In ...in its depiction of women, its addition, horror stories tend to be reactionary, preserving the status quo and punishing the deviant: Ste- attitude to race and its portrayal of phen King argues, for example, that “the horror story, beneath its fangs religion, Supernatural is and fright wig, is really … conservative as … its main purpose is to unreflectively conservative reaffirm the virtues of the norm by showing us what awful things hap- crucial to critical understanding of forces of chaos and disorder to pro- pen to people who venture into ta- their work. In Supernatural, the con- tect the “American way” against boo lands” (442-3). This conserva- formity that is a feature of the horror those who seek to disrupt or subvert tism made the horror genre a vehi- genre grates uncomfortably against it. As Stephen King has noted, terror cle for stories which, directly or by the rebellious tendencies of the se- “often arises from a pervasive sense allegory, represented and con- ries’ road narrative format. As will of disestablishment; that things are versed with the events of 9/11 and be demonstrated, in its depiction of in the unmaking” (22). Just as Krip- the War on Terror. As the New York women, its attitude to race and its ke was attracted to horror and sus- Times predicted soon after 9/11, portrayal of religion, Supernatural is pense tales because “You learn a “The horror movie is just sitting unreflectively conservative, often lot about a culture by discovering there waiting to deal with this. It is making hegemonic assertions about what that culture is afraid of” (18), one of the most versatile genres out conservative cultural norms that are Supernatural offers a window into there, a universal solvent of virtually similar in tone and ideology to the the “unmaking” caused by 9/11. any news issue” (23 Oct. 2001). views expressed by Falwell, Robert- The direction travelled in road narra- son and D’Souza. Throughout, the tives is significant: normally, protag- Supernatural as Road Trip main characters grapple with an onists journey westwards towards Supernatural (2005-) provides an important tenet of Christianity, the California, following the nation’s opportunity to discuss America’s Biblical claim of free will, as they are supposed “Manifest Destiny”. For post 9/11 mood, particularly connec- asked to choose between the Dio- example, in John Ford’s The tions between its more reactionary nysian possibilities presented to Grapes of Wrath (1940) California’s aspects and portrayals of morality them by the freedoms of the road reputation as a land of milk and and evil in the post 9/11 era. Series and their Apollonian duty to restore honey is the catalyst for the Joads’ creator Eric Kripke envisaged it as a order and normality by defeating the epic trip; whereas in Dominic Sena’s mythic road trip across America, forces of evil. Kalifornia (1993), the state is de- with two formerly estranged broth- Road stories are diverse in scope scribed as “a place of hopes and ers, Sam (Jared Padalecki) and and theme, and are articulated in a dreams, a chance to start over.” To Dean Winchester (Jensen Ackles) variety of mediums. The genre en- modern-day conservatives, howev- (named after Sal and Dean, from compasses, for example, comedy, er, California represents everything Jack Kerouac’s 1957 novel On the romance, action-adventure stories, wrong with America. As the epicen- Road), travelling Route 66 and dramas, melodramas, and tales of tre of the counterculture in the fighting evil (18). Supernatural es- terror and suspense, with wide vari- 1960s, California was the birthplace 15 of the permissive society, and while Republican Governor Ronald Reagan was horrified by hippies, Hells Angels, acid rock, free love, and free speech, contemporary conservatives rally against supposed high taxes, social welfare spending, and excess immigration. In Super- natural, the direction of travel de- fines the series’ politics. It begins, for example, with Dean collecting Sam from university in California, so in a sense all of their travels are eastwards, away from the state. The direction of their journey implies a rejection of contemporary California, with its liberal politics, multiculturalism, and tolerant attitude to same- sex relationships, and denotes a return to supposed middle-American values of religion, family and community. The Gothic Tradition and race Eric Kripke – Comic-Con 2010 – "Supernatural" Panel original photo by Not wanting to alienate a section of vagueonthehow modified by Supernino Supernatural’s potential audience, which is, according to April Boggs, genre’s interface with gothic con- his incredible guitar talents; and in “18 to 34-year-old women” (1) and a ventions. For example, Lloyd Smith “Bloodlust” (2:3) the brothers en- group more likely to identify as points out that the gothic “is about counter Gordon Walker (Sterling K. Democrats than Republicans, Krip- the return to the past, of the re- Brown), the only black demon ke palliates the potentially deterrent pressed and denied, the buried se- hunter shown in the first five sea- nature of the show’s conservative cret that subverts and corrodes the sons. In “Crossroads Blues”, white values by portraying the brothers as present, whatever the culture does and non-white characters make tolerant and open-minded individu- not want to know or admit, will not different deals with a demon: whites als with a “live and let live” attitude or dare tell itself” (1). In the Ameri- sell their souls for socioeconomic towards life. For instance, despite can gothic tradition, Supernatural success, whereas non-whites like having some of the attributes of unearths the racism of the past. Johnson and the painter George Southern “good old boys”, neither However, it also infers that racism Darrow ask for talent but, signifi- Sam nor Dean exhibits any racist belongs to the past, and in defeating cantly, not fame, which means they attitudes or tendencies. Indeed, in the racist spirit it has been buried for will not attain great wealth. As Julia the handful of episodes featuring good. This is essentially a conserva- Wright has noted, these portrayals black characters, Kripke is careful to tive position that denies contempo- are racialised as they imply that portray his two main characters as rary racism and suggests a histori- white people are naturally interested non-racist. Nevertheless, the resolu- cal narrative of continual progress in economic success whereas non- tion of the plots of these episodes rather than the traditional gothic whites desire “cultural rather than betrays their conservative leanings. theme of cycles of historical vio- material success” (12). The internal lence and repression. It also reflects logic of this paradigm explains In the episode entitled “Route the post-9/11 narrative of national therefore why black Americans are 666” (1:13) the brothers investigate unity against an external threat. less likely to achieve economic suc- a series of racist murders of black cess: it is not the result of racism, men, apparently carried out by a The brothers’ role in exorcising this but instead black Americans are long-dead racist infuriated by an act evil, together with Dean’s revelation themselves to blame as they do not of miscegenation. It is significant about his girlfriend, helps obviate have the proper work ethic. Wright that this event happened at least the easy presumption that the Win- also points out that the script of this two decades previously, and possi- chesters may be racist. However, episode goes to some lengths to bly as early as the 1960s. While two episodes in the second season avoid showing an interracial kiss, road tales often reflect contempo- are more troubling: “Crossroads which leads her to conclude that this rary concerns, the genre’s hybrid Blues” (2:8) recreates the Robert plotline “is unreflectively conserva- nature allows facets of other genres Johnson myth that the blues singer tive” in its attempt to “maintain racial to come into effect, in this case the sold his soul to the devil in return for 16 segregation in depictions of sexuali- cess of assembling, plotting, prepar- Driver. In almost every episode ty” (12). ing to give assault” (235). Like those women are portrayed either as dec- who saw 9/11 as vindication of their orative diversions or as helpless “Bloodlust” also explores the theme worldview that America’s enemies victims. Most are disposed of as of the gothic doppelganger: at first it are everywhere, Supernatural exists victims or are left behind after appears Gordon and Dean share an in a closed space where peace is an providing amorous diversions for the identical philosophy about their life- illusion and everyone is a potential brothers. To be sure, there are style. Friedrich Nietzsche warned, enemy. Central to that illusion is the some recurring female characters though, “He who fights with mon- promise of suburban family life. In who prove resourceful: bounty sters should be careful lest he road genre tales, such a nine-to-five hunter Bela Talbot (Lauren Cohan) thereby become a monster” (54), existence is an anathema as main- manages to outwit the brothers on and it soon becomes clear that taining a stable home requires time, occasion; Ellen (Samantha Ferris) is Walker is a cold-blooded killer who effort and a sense of responsibility a bar owner with knowledge of hunt- enjoys his work a little too much. In that is often lacking in road genre ing and her daughter Jo (Alona Tal) gothic texts, the doppelganger’s protagonists. For males, the home not only wants to be a hunter but appearance often invokes a discus- is often depicted as a feminised also resists Dean’s trademark flirta- sion about the duality of human space, which acts as an anchor to tion; however, they are the excep- nature. However, according to Da- hold men in place when they would tion rather than the norm. However, vid Punter, it is also a metaphor for rather be on the road. In the handful the introduction of these characters wider concerns about imperial de- of female-orientated road tales, the adds a new dynamic about the role cline. Punter claims that the doppel- home is often portrayed as a claus- of family in the brothers’ lives. For ganger raises questions about de- trophobic world of domestic abuse example, after the roadhouse is generation and debasement, as it and unattained ambitions. As a re- destroyed in the finale of season poses the query “how much can one sult, in road narratives “the family two, Ellen and Bobby Singer share lose — individually, socially, nation- unit [is] preserved only as a memory a tender moment with romantic ally — and still remain a or desire with less and less sub- overtones, which suggests that El- man?” (240). Dean is invited to criti- stance” (Corrigan 145). Sam and len might replace Bobby’s dead wife cally examine his motivations, his Dean reject the comfortable exist- and thus become a symbolic mother fear that he does not in fact serve a ence available to them, choosing to Sam and Dean. This demon- higher purpose and instead may simply be like Walker, a cold blooded killer. In asking how much of Supernatural exists in a closed oneself can be retained when one absorbs the qualities of the debased other, the doppelganger paradigm is space where peace is an illusion apposite for the American situation in the post 9/11 world. American and everyone is a potential enemy. hegemony, which had dominated instead to continue their own “war strates Kripke’s sedulous attempts the post-World War II world and on terror”. To do otherwise would to restore order, his impulse to reu- triumphed with the fall of the Soviet allow America’s enemies free reign nite the family unit even though this Union, was suddenly revealed on to terrorise the innocent. This phi- goes against the flow of the road 9/11 to be vulnerable. In turn, the losophy allies the brothers with a narrative, with its tendency to fea- American response to 9/11 invited “foundational military ethic in which ture loners and outcasts. an inward analysis of the nature of self-sacrifice” is the central motiva- American character and American Kripke’s attachment to the family tion (Wright 15). violence. unit evokes the national dialogue In general, women in Supernatural about family which followed 9/11. Gender roles and the family play the role usually assigned to McGuire and Buchbinder contend, The wealthy and privileged feature them in American road stories, as for example, that in the aftermath of in many Gothic tales and often there burdens to be left behind, incidental 9/11 family was used as “both a is a suggestion either that their characters, or playthings for males. metaphor for and a metonym of the wealth masks dark secrets or that it Corrigan notes, for example, that nation and the disarray and continu- comes at a high cost to themselves, the genre is “traditionally focused, ing disruption caused by the threat their friends and/or their family. almost exclusively, on men and the of international terrorism” (300). Fredric Jameson claims that such a absence of women” (143). Super- Robertson, Falwell and D’Souza life “seal[s] you off from other peo- natural is unapologetically nostalgic identified the family as a core Amer- ple” and, in so doing, creates a for the casual, unthinking sexism ican value, those threatening the sense of fear about what is on the found in the road narratives of Hen- family became, by default, immoral other side of that “protective wall ... ry Miller, Hunter Thompson and allies of the evil forces threatening behind which … all kinds of envious Kerouac, or in films such as Easy America. So while “family values” forces may be imagined in the pro- Rider, Two-Lane Blacktop or Taxi plots are hardly new to television 17 drama series, conservative attempts admits that maybe he has seen the its conservative tone is softened to align their concept of family with embodiment of “God’s will” in action. and masked by the portrayal of its patriotic narratives gave familial In “Sin City,” Dean is asked directly two main characters as blue collar representations in shows such as if he believes in God and his re- everymen. They are apolitical and Supernatural an added moral em- sponse is “I’d like to” (3.4). In sea- appear tolerant of socially marginal phasis. It is perhaps for this reason son four Kripke introduces biblical characters. As likeable “good old that Kripke killed off Bela Talbot, supernatural beings for the first boys”, they are antiheroes in the who featured in six episodes of sea- time, particularly the enigmatic an- tradition of The Dukes of Hazard son three. Unlike Sam and Dean, gel Castiel. In so doing, Kripke di- (1979-85) rather than Deliverance Talbot’s association with the super- verges from the existential leanings (1972). Given the potentially sinister natural is for material gain: she is a of many road genre tales wherein connotations of a show featuring mercenary rather than a hunter. An travelers make their own moral code two white vigilantes, Kripke consci- attractive, strong-willed character, and are not reliant on religion or entiously allays suspicions about who often outmanoeuvres the Win- society’s morals, and instead brings Supernatural’s potentially racial chesters, Talbot also has many of Christian values to the fore. Dean subtext. However, those few epi- their antihero attributes. However, completes his conversion in “When sodes featuring black characters like most female characters in the the Levee Breaks”: when Castiel only repeat past racial typecasting road genre, her sexuality threatens asks him to swear to obey the word and in its treatment of race, the se- both the “buddy” relationship be- of God as he would his own father, ries sticks to a simplistic black-white tween Sam and Dean, and their Dean agrees (4.21). The “hero’s racial binary, ignoring America’s familial bond: she flirts with Dean, journey” has clearly taken Dean diverse multicultural demographic. taking advantage of his overdevel- from a mindset in which he acknowl- In opposition to the core rebellious oped libido to betray the brothers. edges that evil exists and can mani- impulse of the road story, the series’ Like U.S. soldier Lynndie England, fest in solid form to a position where Christian storylines are designed to who in 2005 was implicated with he accepts God, Heaven and an- appeal mainly to an American audi- human rights abuses at Abu Ghraib, gels also exist and that in fighting ence, three quarters of whom self- Talbot is proof of Nietzsche’s warn- evil he is doing God’s work. identify with one of the Christian ing about becoming a monster. Hav- churches (Engstrom & Valenzano The major plot arc of the first two ing literally sold her soul to a de- 70). By employing a postmodern seasons is the good versus evil mon, Hellhounds drag her into the pop cultural style, with numerous struggle against Azazel, a demon chasm when the contract becomes references to popular television cited in the Book of Leviticus, with due. programmes, movies and music, recurring allusions to Judeo- Kripke invokes a sense of nostalgia Christian themes. Seasons four and Apocalyse Now for an idealised America before five are almost entirely concerned Such biblical imagery distinguishes 9/11’s “unmaking”. While nostalgia with Christian mythology about the Supernatural from most of its para- is not always conservative, it does Apocalypse, including appearances normal forerunners. It does not uti- provide an easy emotional outlet for by angels, the Antichrist and the lise Christian symbols for dramatic reactionary feelings. Furthermore, Four Horsemen. By this point, all effect only: in fact, Christianity plays its emotional impact is driven by the non-Christian religions have been a central role. From the first season, realisation that the past is lost and marginalised, and their demons and Kripke establishes that Sam has irrecoverable, and in the aftermath gods vanquished. The brothers use faith in God: for example, in an ex- of 9/11 the idea that “the world had Christian symbols such as holy wa- change between the two brothers in changed” forever became a familiar ter, the crucifix and rosaries to fight “Faith”, Sam challenges Dean to refrain, with the inference being that evil, and they banish demons with “have a little faith” and later in the Americans had been too compla- Latin chants and exorcisms. While episode the sceptical Dean offers to cent, too used to their soft consum- these icons are overt and theatrical, pray for a dying woman (1.12). er culture, which blinded them to making them useful tools for a tele- While Dean remains unconvinced, enemies home and abroad. While vision drama series like Supernatu- Sam’s faith in a higher power re- Supernatural strives hard to appear ral, they also establish the brothers’ mains constant and in the season “middle-of-the-road”, the centre de- credentials as crusading Christian two episode “Houses of the Holy” it pends always on the width of that warriors. The cumulative weight of is revealed that he prays to God road. In the landscape it inhabits, these themes indicates that Christi- every day (2:13). In this episode, and in its traditional exploration of anity is the primary religion featured Dean states “There’s no higher themes such as family values, gen- in the series, and its prominence power, there's no God. There’s just der, race and holding the line suggests it is meant to convey more chaos and violence, random unpre- against evil, Supernatural follows a authority than all other religions. dictable evil, that comes outta no- narrow path, by champi- where, rips you to shreds.” Howev- Supernatural is, therefore, relent- oning conservative val- er, after witnessing what appears to lessly conservative in its use of visu- ues as the norm. be the spirit of a dead priest, Dean al and aural iconography. However,

18 Works Cited Valenzano. “Demon Hunters and Knowledge, the Supernatural, and Hegemony: Portrayal of Religion on the Psychic Detective.” Canadian Boggs, April R. No Chick Flick Mo- the CW’s Supernatural.” Journal of Review of American Studies 40.3 ments: ‘Supernatural’ As a Mascu- Media and Religion 9.2 (2010): 67- (2010): 289-307. line Narrative. Masters Thesis. 83. Bowling Green, 2009. Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm. Be- Jameson, Fredric. “Nostalgia for the yond Good and Evil: Prelude to a Braun, Beth. “The X-Files and Buffy Present.” Frank Lentricchia & An- Philosophy of the Future. The Com- the Vampire Slayer: The Ambiguity drew DuBois. Eds. Close Reading: plete Works of Nietzsche Vol.12. of Evil in Supernatural Representa- The Reader. Duke UP, 2003: 226- Trans. Helen Zimmern. Forgotten tions.” Journal of Popular Film and 42. Books, 2008 [1923]. Television 28.2 (2000): 88-94. King, Stephen. Danse Macabre. Punter, David. The Literature of Corrigan, Timothy. “Genre, Gender, London: Time Warner, 2005. Terror. A History of Gothic Fictions and Hysteria: the Road Movie in from 1765 to the Present Day. Vol. Outer Space.” A Cinema without Kripke, Eric. “Lore & Order.” Super- 2. The Modern Gothic. London: Walls: Movies and Culture after natural Magazine 1 (Dec-Jan 2007- Longman, 1980. Vietnam. London: Routledge, 1991. 08). Wright, Julia M. “Latchkey Hero: Dinesh D’Souza, The Enemy at Lloyd Smith, Allan. American Gothic Masculinity, Class and the Gothic in Home: The Cultural Left and Its Fiction: An Introduction. New York: Eric Kripke's Supernatural.” Gen- Responsibility for 9/11. New York: Continuum, 2004. ders OnLine Journal 47 (2008). Broadway, 2007. McGuire, Ann and David Viewed 15 Feb. 2012. http:// Engstrom, Erika, and Joseph Buchbinder. “The Forensic Gothic: www.genders.org/g47/

19 Book Reviews

absence of political cinema in Holly- Culture wood? If so, you should read Swir- ski’s next chapter devoted to the must-read book on American litera- Ars Americana, Ars Politi- cult comedy hit Bulworth and politi- ture and politics, Ars Americana, ca: Partisan Expression in cal political art in the context of the Ars Politica. Filling in a pronounced American Literature and 1990s, including the L.A riots, and gap in contemporary scholarship, the political apolitical media includ- Culture. By Peter Swirski. Ars Americana focuses on Ameri- ing Fox. Finally, the reader is treat- Montreal, London: McGill- can literature - fiction and nonfiction, ed to a chapter on Michael Moore Queen’s University Press, left-leaning and conservative, popu- and his mega-bestseller Stupid lar and mainstream - that rarely if 2010. White Men, which gives Swirski an ever receives attention from aca- ISBN: 0773537651 (hardcover), opportunity to take a fresh look at demic critics. This is because, de- ISBN:077353766X (paperback). Moore’s bestselling nonfiction litera- spite much talk about art bringing 230pp. ture and his partisan credentials. Is the world to justice, hardly anyone Michael Moore a liar, as rightwing Reviewed by Alice Lee, Associate takes time to examine political art propaganda makes him out to be? Professor, University of Hong Kong that reaches tens of millions of read- Swirski’s answer is, as always, im- ers and citizens in the hope of turn- peccably researched and docu- ing couch potatoes into political mented, making this chapter, much animals. Hardly anyone, that is, like his entire book, an alpha and except Swirski in a series of studies omega on modern American litera- that include not only Ars Americana ture and politics. but also American Utopia and Social Engineering (2012) and, judging by Greven, David. Represen- his website, the forthcoming War on tations of Femininity in Errorism: American Literary and Political Fictions. American Genre Cinema: The Woman’s Film, Film The Man occupies the second chap- Noir and Modern Horror. ter of Ars Americana - the first is devoted to sorting out the tangled New York: Palgrave Mac- web of critical presuppositions that millan, 2011. accompany political art and political Pp. 214. ISBN: 978-0-230-11251-3 criticism (or rather the absence ouglass Dilman, not Barack thereof). In Chapter Three Swirski Reviewed by Dr. J. M. Wagner, Uni- versity College of Maastricht D Obama, was the first black examines Richard Condon’s (of The President of the United States, mak- Manchurian Candidate fame) forgot- ing Irving Wallace’s mammoth best- ten masterpiece, Death of a Politi- seller from the 1960s, entitled simp- cian. One of the most caustic and ly The Man, not just a work of fiction hard-hitting political novels of the but future history. No less prescient- modern era, the shady career of its ly, in the same book Wallace killed political anti-hero is modelled in an American president only days remarkable detail on the shady ca- before Kennedy left for Dallas to be reer of America’s 37th president, assassinated military-style. Also in Richard Milhous Nixon. Subse- The Man he forecast an armed, quently Swirski focuses his critical black-clad, direct-action Black Pow- attention P.J. O’Rourke’s Parliament er group a full two years before of Whores, a political satire to prove Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale that rightwing political writers are far founded the Black Panther Party for from the sour-faced bores many Self-Defense. take them to be. This chapter allows Swirski to analyze political literature These are only some reasons why on the other (Republican) side of his political epic is a must-read for the spectrum and the political revo- avid Greven’s 2011 study is anyone interested in American liter- lution under Reagan. D an intriguing exploration into ature and politics, as Peter Swirski the woman’s film, a distinct genre Have you ever wondered about the makes abundantly clear in his own that existed between the 1930s and 20 the early 1960s after which it sup- sexual development, it is troubling Leonard Quart and Albert posedly disappeared. Greven as- that rape and sexual coercion of the Auster, American Film and serts a number of arguments daughter seem either disregarded Society since 1945 (Fourth throughout the book regarding this for the sake of the framework, or genre, the first and most important assumed to be part of the standard edition). Santa Barbara, being that what is known as the female experience and therefore not CA.: Praeger, 2011 woman’s film did not end in the worthy of mention. The use of this 305pp Paperback £21.91 ISBN 1960s as previously thought, but framework in a project that consid- 1440800790 effectively went underground and ers itself “feminist” and “queer” (41) “transform[ed] into the female- without some kind of preface re- Reviewed by Brian Neve, University centered form of modern horror” (2). garding these important limitations of Bath, UK Just as the woman’s film transforms of the framework itself is troubling. its protagonists, Greven suggests, With that said, however, there is the genre transformed itself through much in Greven’s project that is not complex intersections of various troubling. A third argument, that gay genres, a kind of “multigeneric hy- males can sometimes identify with bridization” (39). Along this line of “women characters, even in miso- argument Greven is especially care- gynistic and homophobic narra- ful and perceptive. The arguments tives” (5), is an underresearched put forth on this front and the evi- phenomenon that has become pop- dence supporting his assertion that ular in the last decade. The project modern horror is rife with the trap- sets a high bar in utilizing both femi- pings of the woman’s film is effec- nist and gay readings of the wom- tive and fruitful. an’s film, and insightfully synthesiz- A second argument suggests that es these theories. At times, howev- the Demeter/Persephone myth be er, there seems an imbalance, as used as a framework to read female the gay readings are overshadowed sexual development in place of by the more general analysis. How- Freud’s Oedipus complex. Although ever, this is offset slightly in the final “equally traumatic” to the Oedipus chapter with lengthy provocative myth, the Demeter/Persephone gay readings of monsters, horror, his is a very welcome new myth more appropriately fleshes out and femininity. edition of a book that has both the daughter’s and the moth- T The overall project is clearly written proved itself critically over the years er’s experience (17). According to and thoroughly researched, and yet since the first edition was published Greven, it more suitably engages in two small issues should be ad- way back in 1984. It combines a the fraught relationship between dressed: although discussed in thoughtful, liberal-leaning account of mother and daughter, and daughter/ passing throughout, the titular prom- post-WWII political history with a wife and husband. This suggestion ise of film noir as a major genre of careful, broadly chronological as- seems a logical one, for the Oedi- exploration remains unfulfilled; and, sessment of how the films connect pus complex has long been seen as rather than a sound whole, the with their era, and with today. The a poor guide for the development of study often reads like a set of arti- two writers are not wedded to any girls, and to be sure, the Demeter/ cles strung together, where short one critical system, but they draw Persephone myth allows for much sub-sections are used to transition on an eclectic mix of approaches more complexity regarding female between larger ideas. Both of these and telling literary references. They relationships; however, there is one are minor problems; however, in are forthright at times but never problem with this framework: it be- relation to the solid and provocative narrowly partisan, still less conspira- gins with rape. Regardless of its work this book performs. Overall, torial. The result is an elegantly writ- suitability for the female narrative, the study is an engaging read. ten survey of politics and film in the since this narrative begins with the United States from the 1940s to the daughter (Persephone) being vio- end of the first decade of the twenty lently taken from her mother -first century. For any intelligent (Demeter) and ends with her being reader interested in this strand of coerced into staying with her captor filmmaking, and any group of stu- (Hades) for a third of each year, the dents eager to explore issues of framework seems flawed from the meaning and context relating to start, which diminishes its adaptabil- what Michael Wood has called the ity to the more general circumstanc- ‘public classics’ of American cine- es of women. Although the myth ma, this book is an essential point of does seem potentially more apt an departure. analogy – or allegory – for women’s 21 There is much in the work that scope five important postwar Ameri- theories of social and behavioral draws on Albert Auster’s expertise can novels. First, B.F. Skinner’s engineering discussed in the five in visual culture and American histo- behaviorist utopia, Walden Two, chapters. The amount of research ry, and on writing from Leonard easily the most vilified and scandal- that must have gone into American Quart (in Cineaste and elsewhere) izing social blueprint in the history of Utopia and Social Engineering stag- that is always well and clearly writ- American psychology. It and the gers the mind. Yet, much as in his ten and nuanced and penetrating as author’s discussion of it lay the previous studies, notably Ars Ameri- to both politics and aesthetics. The groundwork for the entire book in cana, Ars Politica: Partisan Expres- new chapter on the last decade is a terms of social engineering in the sion in Contemporary American particularly strong one, engaging as American context (political and his- Literature and Culture, the author it does with a series of films that torical). He then follows with Ken transforms this serious and studious served a global audience sceptical Kesey’s microcosm of social and book into a page-turner that com- of the George W. Bush wars. When political conformity, One Flew Over bines the liveliness of a detective even Clint Eastwood, last seen as I the Cuckoo’s Nest, which he takes novel with the analytic clarity (and write playing a cameo role in Mitt as a point of departure for a thor- perhaps moral outrage) of an inves- Romney’s decline and fall, ques- oughgoing analysis of American tigative journalist. tions some of the certainties of the electoral woes and how to solve This moral dimension fits into Swir- ‘victory culture’ of World War II, in them. Bernard Malamud’s beast ski’s discussion here and elsewhere Flags of Our Fathers, then you fable and allegory, God’s Grace, of some of the finest (canonical and know that things have changed. The not) examples of contemporary downside, as the authors admit, is American art engagé. After all, as the marginalising of such films de- he makes a convincing case in signed for the adult audience and Chapter Five, emotions are implicat- the frequent triumph of style over ed in all kinds of adaptive behaviors, substance. But for audiences inter- from aggression right down to think- ested in measured but critical explo- ing and decision making. They are rations of a tradition of films engag- the psychological fuel that fires up ing in myriad ways with the political any human undertaking, and as realm, from the era of The Best such they must be engaged if there Years of Our Lives and Force of ever is to be any hope of engineer- Evil, to that of United 93, Brokeback ing a better political and social union Mountain and Good Night and Good in America or anywhere else in the Luck, this book is recommended in world. the highest terms. leads to a breathtaking analysis of oral literature in the context of social The Rey Chow Reader, Peter Swirski, American and antisocial ‘vectors’ in the human Utopia and Social Engi- edited by Paul Bowman. psyche and their effect on social New York: Columbia Uni- neering in Literature, So- behavior and cohesion. Walker Per- cial Thought, and Political cy’s thriller about an illegal experi- versity Press, 2010 History (Routledge Trans- ment in social engineering, The ISBN 978-0-231-14995-2, Pp352 national Perspectives on Thanatos Syndrome, centers on the £19.00 possibility of engineering behavior American Literature). New through invasive (i.e., pharmacologi- Reviewed by Bella Adams, Senior Lecturer in English, LJMU York, London: Routledge, cal) means both in the novel and in 2011. the United States at large. Finally eginning with a definition of the reader is treated to a chapter on Cultural Studies as a dynamic, ISBN 0415891922 (hardcover). B Philip Roth (who has just publicly heterogeneous field organized ISBN 0415816874 (paperback). xiv announced his retirement from writ- around relationships between the + 255 pp £28.00 ing) and The Plot against America personal and the political, the local Reviewed by Alice Lee, Associate which, as Swirski aptly highlights, and the global, the theoretical and Professor, University of Hong Kong serves as a frightening novelistic the empirical, Paul Bowman won- ow to create a better society reminder of what eight years of so- ders “how are we to select, organ- H without repeating the mis- cial engineering under George W. ize, and orient our scholarly, analyti- takes that America suffers from? Bush and Dick Cheney were about. cal, and interpretative efforts? What is deemed important, and on what The answer, surprisingly enough, Swirski is clearly at home in the grounds?” (pp. ix-x). Stuart Hall comes from literature, although con- world in literature as well as in provides him with an answer of sidered more broadly than some American political and social history. sorts, a “yes” and “no” answer to literary critics may be accustomed But what astounds is his grasp of these relationships that Rey Chow’s to. the scientific and technological nu- interventions in cultural, feminist Peter Swirski takes under his micro- ance of the various methods and 22 and postcolonial studies serve to as well as in literature, film and key concepts, and his explanation of illustrate. As Bowman explains in technologies. Chow’s positionality - them is succinct and clear, visuality, his Editor’s Introduction, she grew up in British Hong Kong, visibility and coercive mimeticism all moved to the US as a student, and having their parts to play in keeping Chow consistently says (or now is Anne Firor Scott Professor of the other in place, as a target or an “performs” a) “yes” to post- Literature at Duke University (see image to be observed, managed structuralist theory but “no” Bowman’s Chapter 2 for biograph- and, indeed, self-managed as this to some of its biases and ical details) - is reflected in her other other is compelled to become “the contingencies. ... Chow also research interests in East Asia, spe- ethnic subject,” apparently without cifically Chinese Studies and Chi- any irony. In “the case of nonwhite says “yes” to the fraught, felt, nese film, and questions of cultural ethnic critics, scholars, and aca- lived, and very real political identities and cross-cultural relation- demics ... [Chow] argues they are stakes, exigencies, and ur- ships. pressured directly and indirectly to gencies that congregate, behave “properly” - to act and think condense, and flare up and ‘be’ the way ‘they’ are supposed to act and think and be as around aspects and issues nonwhite ethnic academic sub- of race, ethnicity and cultural jects” (p. xviii). Should they “forget” identity. But this “yes” is ac- or “mimic and perform ethnicity,” companied by a clear “no” to they will also be deemed essentialist thinking or any- “turncoats” (Chow, qtd, p. xviii). It seems like an impossible situation, thing thinking that would help yet fortunately Chow is not dissuad- notions of race, ethnicity, ed but energized by it since for her and nationalism to persist in Cultural Studies exercises in ways that are violent (p. xi). “cultural literacy” (Chow, qtd, p. xxii) enable understanding of questions New readers to Chow may find such of power in and beyond academia. a summary of her work to be per- plexing. For this reason, it would be The Rey Chow Reader should be of useful to reread Bowman’s Introduc- The Rey Chow Reader is divided interest to American Studies schol- tion after reading the pieces select- into two parts, each accompanied ars, especially in terms of Chow’s ed in The Rey Chow Reader, for by brief further commentary from analyses of Area Studies and the instance (and with respect to the Bowman. The first part focuses on US academy. While Bowman’s In- above quotation), Chapter 4, “Modernity and Postcolonial Ethnici- troduction represents a critical inter- “Brushes with the-Other-as-Face: ty” and the second, on “Filmic Visu- vention in its own right, and the Stereotyping and Cross Ethnic Rep- ality and Transcultural Politics,” to- chapters he selects from Chow’s resentation” and Chapter 6, “When talling thirteen chapters (with exten- oeuvre serve new and old readers Whiteness Feminizes: Some Con- sive notes) from Chow’s first book very well, I am left wondering sequences of a Supplementary Log- Woman and Chinese Modernity whether an (his) interview with ic.” It goes without saying that (1990) through to Sentimental Fabu- Chow could have been included - Chow’s work is also worth reread- lations (2007). Bowman begins the but that can be found in his special ing, not least because she is, as collection with “The Age of the issue of Social Semiotics 20.4 Caren Kaplan rightly asserts, “one World Target: Atomic Bombs, Alteri- (2010). of the most interesting and icono- ty, and Area Studies” from Chow’s clastic theorists writing in English 2006 book of (almost) the same today” (back cover). name, which highlights links between American military and cultural Bowman’s Introduction highlights hostilities towards non-western oth- how Chow has been influenced by ers. Fundamental to these hostilities Derrida, Foucault and other post- are the concepts of “visuality” and structuralist thinkers, although he is “visibility” (p. xiv). In much of her keen to emphasize that “rather than work, Chow focuses on ways of ‘being’ poststructuralist or decon- seeing: how the I/eye sees the other structionist, Chow ‘does’ decon- and how the other sees itself, typi- struction” (p. xiii), often in unex- cally in terms of “coercive mimeti- pected ways on topics that are fa- cism” (p. xviii; also see Chapter 3 of miliar, even everyday. To this ex- Chow’s 2002 book, The Protestant tent, her theorizing seems Ethnic and the Spirit of Capitalism). “concrete” (p. xv), grounded in personal experience and world events, Bowman usefully italicizes Chow’s

23 Portraying 9/11: Essays on In this charged political atmosphere zines released in the immediate Representations in Com- Americans turned to the arts, not aftermath of 9/11. Matthew J. Cos- ics, Literature, Film and just to escape from real-life horrors, tello’s essay on portrayals of 9/11 in but also because the arts provided superhero comics continues the Theatre. Edited by Ve- coping and healing mechanisms. high standard of analysis: Costello ronique Bragard, Chris- Through their craft, writers, filmmak- points out, for example, that Captain tophe Dony and Warren ers and musicians reacted to and America (John Ney Reiber: 2002) Rosenberg. Jefferson, created representations of the elides the simplistic revenge fanta- N.C.: McFarland & Co, events of 9/11, its aftermath, and sies that are perhaps expected of 2011. the subsequent “War on Terror”. For the medium and instead depicts a example, Hollywood films such as world in which American innocence ISBN-13: 978-0786459506 paper- War of the Worlds (2005), Clover- is exposed as a sham. While all the back, 176 pages. field (2008) and Skyline (2012) fea- essays are of a high standard and ture sneak attacks on America by offer interesting insights into their Reviewed by Dr. Brian Ireland, Sen- ior lecturer in American History and an unknowable enemy, with mas- subject matter, the best of the rest is American Studies at the University sive destruction and loss of civilian Gerry Canavan’s essay about the of South Wales, Pontypridd, Wales. lives. Television dramas were more 2006 films World Trade Centre and direct: Sleeper Cell, NCIS, CSI: NY, United 93. Canavan uses the analo- 24 and Homeland all featured plots gy of a “singularity” - a concept like- about terrorism and domestic inse- ly to be familiar to Star Trek fans - to curity. The literary arts also re- explain the American situation after sponded, with works by Don DeLillo, 9/11. While this essay is a little Art Spiegelman and Sherman Alexie speculative, Canavan deserves receiving critical acclaim. Musicians praise for intellectual innovation and fought cultural battles about the general chutzpah. Also of note is meaning of 9/11: controversial re- Frances Pheasant-Kelly’s essay marks from the Dixie Chicks about about United 93, which focuses on President Bush brought this to na- technical aspects of film making tional attention, while fellow country such as cinematography and editing music stars Toby Keith (“Courtesy that contribute to the film’s realistic of the Red, White and Blue”) and depiction of events. The author ar- Darryl Worley (“Have You Forgot- gues that such realism had a ca- ten?”) released patriotic songs in thartic effect for the audience, but support of the War on Terror. left a number of critics puzzled as to he 9/11 attacks caused both the film’s intentions and meaning. T physical and psychological These cultural reactions have been wounds. Like a person recovering the subject of considerable academ- The chapters in Portraying 9/11 are from trauma, Americans coped with ic attention: for example, the Journal organised by medium in three sec- the ordeal in a variety of ways. of American Culture (Wiley) devoted tions: comics, literature and perfor- While President George W. Bush its entire March 2005 publication to mance. These delineations are a sought out enemies abroad, naming essays on 9/11, and there have little arbitrary: for example, one three countries as an “Axis of Evil” been countless journal articles, con- could pick fault with the decision to and instigating a policy of “regime ference papers, and books devoted include Krause’s New Yorker essay change” in Afghanistan and Iraq, to the subject. The question is, then, in the section on comics. Neverthe- conservatives at home conducted a do we need one more example of less, the structure effectively organ- McCarthy-like witch-hunt of sup- this as in Portraying 9/11? The an- ises a diverse range of essays. This posed enemies of Americanism. swer, resoundingly, is yes. This is a collection is aimed, primarily, at an The US Congress passed the Patri- revealing and insightful collection of academic audience: for example, ot Act, supposedly to give law en- essays that goes some way towards the authors often assume prior forcement officers the tools with mapping the cultural responses to knowledge of the ideas of the likes which to fight terrorism, and the 9/11. Timothy Krause begins with a of Edward Said and Benedict An- Orwellian-sounding Department of robust defence of the project, as- derson and, on occasion, the lan- Homeland Security was established serting that the “culture industry” guage would seem impenetrable to to coordinate responses to terrorism was keen to impose a mono- a more general audience. Further- attacks and other major disasters. narrative on events, telling a patriot- more, this is a subject that invites Critics charged that the Department ic story about innocence and sacri- lavish illustration but instead we are of Homeland Security and the Patri- fice. These claims, Krause argues, presented with only a handful of ot Act stripped away from Ameri- rest on contestable assumptions black and white images. These cans many of their constitutional about the causes, effects and choices will limit the book’s audi- protections, particularly the rights of meanings of 9/11. He demonstrates ence, which, given the high quality privacy and free speech. his point with an insightful critique of of the essays, is a missed oppor- the cover art of New Yorker maga- tunity by the publisher. 24 Environment In short this is largely a publisher’s second edition, not a second edition the authors illuminates their chosen created by the authors. But an at- The Making of the Ameri- tempt to conceal this has been can Landscape, 2nd edi- themes. These range from ‘Recognizing Nature’s bequest’ to made by altering the chapter titles. tion, Edited by Michael P. ‘Paving America for the automobile’, ‘Spanish legacy in the borderlands’ Conzen New York and and Conzen’s own chapter on large- for example, reappears as London: Routledge, 2010 scale consumer landscapes. In be- ‘Refashioning Hispanic landscapes’, tween we examine American Indian, while ‘Settlement of the American Pp. 543, £61.75 (hbk), and £36.99 Hispanic, French, and English influ- grassland’ becomes ‘Remaking the (pbk), ISBN 978-0-415-95007-7 ences on the land, the evolution of prairies’. The long gap between Reviewed by David McEvoy, Liver- plantation agriculture, the rectangu- editions surely entitles the reader to pool John Moores University lar survey system and its conse- more thorough updating. If the ad- quences, the clearance of the for- vancing age of some contributors ests, the settlement of the prairies, has prevented this, it should have and the irrigation of deserts; then been signposted rather than con- comes the ethnicity chapter, one on cealed. Hoskins still sells unamend- religious landscapes, another on ed. manufacturing, and one on cities; this is followed by an examination of History the impact of federal, state and local governments, a look at landscapes Alexander Hamilton, John of civil society, and an assessment of the influence of private power and Jay, and James Madison, wealth. The Federalist Papers, ed., Lawrence Goldman The new edition far surpasses the (Oxford: Oxford University excellent illustrations of the first. Every chapter now has more pho- Press, 2008), he first edition of this book, tos, most in full colour. Previous ISBN13: 978-0-19-280592-8, T partly inspired by maps and diagrams are either en- 512pp . W.H.Hoskins’s seminal 1955 work larged or coloured, or both, and The Making of the English Land- many new ones are added. A previ- Reviewed by Christopher F. Minty, Ph.D. candidate, University of Stir- scape, appeared in 1990, and was ous reviewer’s complaint that a map ling favourably reviewed, both as a stu- of the manufacturing belt was re- dent text and as an enjoyable and quired has been satisfactorily ad- informative work for the general dressed, and two new double-page reader. The editor explains the maps of America’s natural and cul- book’s focus is on ‘interpreting cultural landscapes are provided as tural landscapes as comprehensive, endpapers. intertwined, regionally distinctive, material expressions of human set- For those who haven’t read the first tlement history on the ground’. It edition of this book, this new version aims to do this in an evolutionary comes thoroughly recommended, manner, and highlights elements of but with one criticism for those al- the past still apparent today. ready familiar with the first edition. The revision may be a disappoint- The years since the first edition ment because about half the original have allowed and necessitated chapters reproduce the original text changes to the content. Two of the virtually unaltered, and others add original eighteen contributors have occasional sentences and the odd died, and the editor has modestly paragraph or an updated table. replaced himself as author of a Most have some recent references ithin the New York Public chapter on the impact of ethnicity. added, but none have been thor- Library there is a loose man- Second edition inflation of a hun- W oughly revised. In one chapter the uscript listing all the Federalist es- dred pages has allowed three fur- only textual change I could detect says written by Alexander Hamilton, ther contributors, and a new contri- was the addition of an ‘a’ at the be- John Jay and James Madison. The bution by Conzen himself, making ginning of ‘esthetically’. Elsewhere day before his fatal duel with Aaron twenty in all. we find ‘fuelwood’ becomes ‘fuel Burr, on 11 July 1804, Hamilton All the chapters are clearly written, wood’, but ‘pin prick’ changes to visited the home of Egbert Benson, and the exemplary scholarship of ‘pinprick’, and there is minor revi- noted New York lawyer, with this sion to paragraphing. 25 sheet of paper with the ostensible Revolution, the newly-formed United Federalist Papers upon the mantle thought of literary and ideological States entered into an incredibly of western political thought. In this posterity. Benson, however, was significant era where all their words, sense, Goldman is particularly con- out, but the obdurate Hamilton ideas, and actions from 1775–1783 vincing as he offers a nuanced inter- rushed past Benson’s servant and were put to the test as they attempt- pretation of the psychological and cannily placed the sheet of paper in ed to form a government founded philosophical premises of Hamilton, a copy of Pliny’s Letters. As soon as upon Thomas Jefferson’s Declara- Jay and Madison. Moreover, anoth- Hamilton left with thoughts of the tion of Independence. Indeed, the er strong aspect of The Federalist duel plaguing his mind, Benson’s fact that most of the proposals put Papers is the extremely detailed servant rushed to the bookshelf and forward in the eighty-five Federalist notes Goldman offers. This is argu- hungrily devoured the contents of essays were enacted confirms their ably the strongest contribution. It is Hamilton’s loose scrap of paper. status as among the most signifi- a truism to suggest that The Feder- The document read: cant documents in United States alist Papers are, at times, difficult to history. Goldman writes “The Feder- read. To expedite the process and “No: 2–3–4–5–54–J: alist Papers bring us as close to the to figuratively pull the reader into the “No: 10–14–37 to 48 inclusive–M:– outlook and rationale of those who world in which the authors lived, created the United States as it is Goldman provides a series of suc- “No: 18–19–20–M: & H: jointly– possible to get.” (p. x) Quite; but the cinct notes that detail the wonderful “All others by H:–” fact remains: why purchase Gold- complexity and historical under- man’s text? tones of The Federalist Papers. It is The hankering of Egbert Benson’s because of this that Goldman’s edi- servant to read Hamilton’s writing Despite the historical introduction’s tion should be viewed as an utterly illustrates the considerable appeal frustrating outline of the imperial essential component to introductory of The Federalist Papers in nine- crisis and the American Revolution- U.S. history courses in High teenth-century America. Although ary War (“the Revolution was in- Schools and Colleges alike. Rather they did not have an impact compa- spired by a radical ideology derived than pushing the students away rable to Thomas Paine’s Common from a particular reading of seven- from the complexities of the Early Sense and they by no means con- teenth and eighteenth-century Eng- Nation with the arduous rhetoric of vinced the people to vote for the lish History.”, p. xiii), Goldman’s the Federalist, students with Gold- Constitution, the eighty-five Federal- primary goal is to suggest that The man’s edition in hand should be ist essays did comprise a key part of Federalist Papers should receive able to contextualise the series with the debate. Today, the lure of The greater recognition. In Goldman’s a greater appreciation of their holis- Federalist Papers arguably out- view, they form a fantastically vital tic significance. With Goldman’s weighs their historical significance. text to the history of western political edition, we will be able to under- Indeed, the original newspaper es- thought. To illustrate this, he divides stand the abstract complexities of says were read by fewer people his introduction into three sections: Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and than we may perhaps realise, and the first adopts a neo-Whig ap- James Madison with far greater when published in book form the proach to the imperial crisis and transparency. sales were particularly small. And Revolutionary War, 1763–1786; the yet, the Federalists essays occupy a second examines sociability and the Gordon S. Wood, Empire key position in the history of the human mind in the immediate post- of Liberty: A History of the Early Nation. Amid a fantastically War era; and the final section his- Early Republic, 1789–1815 diverse range of scholarship focus- toricizes the Federalist essays with- ing on the authors of The Federalist in the broader remit of early-modern (Oxford: Oxford University Papers, Lawrence Goldman has political thought. Press, 2009), recently republished the papers in a The first section is particularly frus- 800pp, ISBN 978-0-19-503914-6 . pithy single-volume edition with Ox- trating. Goldman, perhaps operating ford University Press. Since we now Reviewed by Christopher F. Minty, through a lens crafted by the hands live in a digital age, where all the Ph.D. candidate, University of Stir- and mind of Bernard Bailyn, gives a ling Federalist essays are findable via teleological account of the origins of Google in less than ten seconds, ordon S. Wood is a historian the American Revolution, placing all one may be left looking for a justifi- well known in the halls of colonists under the amorphous ae- G cation to purchase them. schools, colleges, and universities gis of “they,” subsequently ignoring around the world. His magisterial At the beginning of the text there is the not numerically insignificant Creation of the American Republic a detailed introduction that effective- Loyalists and those who would clas- (1969) and The Radicalism of the ly contextualises the situation in sify themselves as Neutral. The American Revolution (1992) helped which Jay, Hamilton, and Madison following two sections take a partial reshape the contours of early Amer- were rather uncomfortably located shift away from Bailyn, whilst simul- ican history, and he has been between Oct. 1787 and Aug. 1788. taneously pulling in J. G. A. Pocock around for almost as long as any- Following the end of the American and Gordon S. Wood to place The one can remember. Indeed, in 2010 26 Wood’s contributions were recog- in an attempt to convey to the read- cans. It is rather surprising that nised by the U.S. government as he er just how tricky it actually was. It is these issues were not covered and received the National Humanities split up into two sections; the first is is indeed extremely disappointing. Medal, the same year in which his largely chronological and runs up to These omissions impose a series of historiographical mentor, Bernard 1800, giving a comprehensive ac- limitations upon Empire of Liberty Bailyn, received the same award. count of various political challenges that cannot be ignored. Without Wood’s most recent contribution, the United States encountered. In them, Wood fails to adequately en- Empire of Liberty, carefully follows this section, Wood does not offer gage in the complexities of the Early on from the two aforementioned anything new, but his aesthetic liter- Nation. texts and will be among those seen ary expression and structural coher- These issues, however, should not as vital to anyone who has a keen ence gives it a considerable degree necessarily detract from the overall interest in American history. of cadence. Moreover, Wood also utility of Empire of Liberty. Many gives focused and succinct ac- When the American Revolution offi- will, of course, take a great deal counts of recent literature, which will cially ended in 1783, it signed off from it, and so they should. Despite significantly aid undergraduates and one chapter and began the next. its occasional histrionics and some- postgraduates alike, and conse- The American founders - Washing- what parochial focus, it is struc- quently the opening section of Em- ton, Jefferson, Hamilton, Madison, tured, engaging, informed by metic- pire of Liberty should be considered Adams et al - were frustratingly ulous research, and more than ade- utterly essential reading for the peri- aware of the new perils that awaited quately engages with the extant od. The second section is arranged the new nation, and worryingly cog- literature in the field. And it is for thematically. Beginning with the nizant of the ominous question be- those reasons that it will become election of 1800, Wood moves on to ing thrown around coffee houses another seminal text in Early Ameri- discuss the West; the independent and local taverns as infectious gos- can History courses. judiciary and judicial review; sip: would the United States of “Republican Reforms”; slavery; America last? Wood’s Empire of R. B. Bernstein, Thomas American art, literature, and archi- Liberty seeks to demonstrate that Jefferson (Oxford: Oxford tecture; and religion, before moving they were up to the task. University Press, 2005). on to the War of 1812 and a brief account up to 1815. Throughout the ISBN13: 9780195181302. £12.99, text, Wood’s primary argument is 288pp . that Americans became increasingly Reviewed by Christopher F. Minty, cognizant of their independence and Ph.D. candidate, University of Stir- political liberties; in other words, a ling national appreciation of the holistic progression and development of the United States as they cast aside any distant memories of life under Great Britain and George III. Despite Empire of Liberty following on from his other seminal works in overall argument, in this text Wood has definitely added an unfortunate degree of teleogical triumphalism. When America emerged from the When Thomas Jefferson remarked long Revolutionary War, “suddenly,” that the United States was “the Wood writes, “everything seemed world’s best hope,” it instantly cap- possible.” It was “the freest nation in tured the visceral appreciation the the world” and “ordinary Americans” Founding Fathers had for the vari- thought they were “anybody’s ous opportunities and threats that equal”. Empire of Liberty frequently awaited them. Indeed, the challeng- connotes various nationalistic images were many as the weight of an e all know Thomas Jeffer- es of flag-raising, Fourth of July amorphous nation rested on the W son. The notable William celebrations, and various other shoulders of the few. The sheer and Mary student has been the fo- Americanized modes of self- volume of complexity presents the cus of dozens of scholarly mono- congratulation. More importantly, historian with an absolutely unenvia- graphs and articles, and has also however, Wood also neglects a ble task. In an attempt to circumnav- been subjected to a degree of spec- series of historical topics that have igate this, Wood has constructed ificity that is seldom seen by any of become popular in recent years, Empire of Liberty with a considera- the other ‘Fathers’ of American his- most notably the Atlantic world, ble degree of fluidity and symmetry tory. We have been bombarded with slavery, women, and Native Ameri- books that can offer us a window 27 from which to understand Jefferso- shrewdly illustrates the apparent Jefferson (New York: Times Books, nian views on wine, gardening, mu- contradictions of Jefferson’s political 2003); Joseph J. Ellis, American Sphinx: sic and, of course, his “little moun- beliefs and shows the reader that the Character of Thomas Jefferson (New tain”, Monticello. Moreover, if one not only did Jefferson pen the most York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1997). wants to examine almost any aspect important document in US history; of the American Revolution and the he also implemented the 1807 Em- Literature Early Republic, the voluminous Pa- bargo Act and used American pers of Thomas Jefferson are utterly troops to search for smugglers Gandal, Keith. The Gun essential; and, thanks to the assidu- around its own shores. and the Pen - Hemingway, ous work of the University of Virgin- Thomas Jefferson has not and will Fitzgerald, Faulkner, and ia Press, they are now widely avail- not revolutionise scholarship sur- the Fiction of Mobilization. able online. rounding the man from Monticello. Oxford University Press, R. B. Bernstein is one of the latest When Oxford University Press 2008. scholars to examine one of the most states that it is the “first concise ambiguous figures in American his- biography” of Jefferson in over half 271 pp. Index. £17.00. ISBN: 978-0- tory. Bernstein’s Thomas Jefferson, a century, it ignores other useful 19-974457-2 £29.99 however, does not, has not and short works by Norman Risjord and Reviewed by Dr Teodora Domotor probably will not occupy columns in Joyce Appleby, and Joseph Ellis’s The New York Times or other na- fantastically readable American tional newspapers listing its numer- Sphinx: the Character of Thomas ous controversies and/or debatea- Jefferson.1 Moreover, Bernstein’s ble arguments. Towards the end of work is not the lengthiest biography 2012, Henry Wiencek’s Master of available and there are times where the Mountain: Thomas Jefferson an astute Jeffersonian academic and his Slaves sparked widespread would call out for further detail, and controversy as he painted a far so they should. Bernstein is espe- more ominous portrait of Jefferson. cially weak on race and slavery, and Indeed, he suggests that by the there are several errors. Although 1790s Jefferson was fantastically the errors are not major, they are cognizant of the commercial value there. For example, Haiti did not of slavery. “It was all about the mon- become an independent republic in ey,” Wiencek writes. If we distance 1801 (see p. 146) and St. George ourselves from the histrionics of Tucker’s A Dissertation on Slavery Jefferson, Bernstein’s omission from (1796) was not predicated upon the the national news is no bad thing. government purchasing all the his book sets out to investigate His primary task is to present a brief slaves (see p. 114). historic events and their liter- biography of Jefferson’s life that T It is almost a truism to suggest that ary representations in the works of attempts to navigate through his Jefferson’s complexities cannot be Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzger- considerable ambiguity and contra- explained in under two hundred ald and William Faulkner. Merging dictions. Bernstein notes that “this pages. This does not mean that literary analysis and military history, book seeks a balanced understand- Bernstein’s text is unusable or with- Gandal offers an innovative per- ing of Jefferson,” (xviii) and, to a out merit. For the senior high-school spective on how World War I affect- large extent, he accomplishes his student or early university under- ed human lives in the United States goal. graduate, Thomas Jefferson could as well as contemporary cultural In his short text, Bernstein’s primary and probably should act as a start- productions depicting them. His audience is the undergraduate gen- ing point from which to carry out readings of Hemingway's The Sun eration who are looking to increase research for the next presentation, Also Rises (1926), Fitzgerald's The their knowledge of the United essay or dissertation. It is snappy, Great Gatsby (1925) and Faulkner's States’ third president. He explains focused and gives succinct and The Sound and the Fury (1929) moments like the imperial crisis, the readable accounts of the major document the paradoxical nature of Revolution and the Jay Treaty (Nov. events of Jefferson’s life. For the an era in which America's mobiliza- 1794) in a succinct fashion to osten- academic, however, Bernstein’s tion efforts took place. sibly encourage the reader to go Thomas Jefferson does not go into Firstly, Gandal postulates that the searching for the more heavyweight the level of detail we would ordinari- novels under scrutiny were motivat- Jeffersonian tones. As referred to ly hope for when we pick up a text ed not by the authors' personal ex- earlier, however, the primary on the man from Monticello. periences of the war but rather by achievement of Thomas Jefferson is 1 Norman K. Risjord, Jefferson’s Ameri- the lack thereof: Hemingway, Fitz- its goal: to reflect upon the ambigui- ca, 1760–1815 (Madison: Madison gerald and Faulkner were consid- ty of Jefferson’s life. Bernstein House, 1991); Joyce Appleby, Thomas ered unsuitable for military service. 28 Accordingly, they felt emasculated - cal context of the mobilization and is nonetheless perceived as a ha- a traumatic state that they frequent- explains methodologies for the ven for waifs and strays, turning the ly portray in their works. As the title study of modernist fiction; 'Part II: narratives of orphanage and adop- of Gandal's book implies, the pas- Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Faulkner, tion from tales of woe and loss into sivity of spectatorship (that writing, and the 1920s' analyses each novel success stories, a chance for new or the Pen, represents) is in sharp from points of view of ethnic egali- beginnings and a reason for hope. contrast with the physical activity tarianism, mobilization wounds, The paradoxes and ambiguities in (Gun) that was expected from men emasculation, and modernist sym- adoption narratives are teased out at that time. The authors' adherence bolism; 'Part III: The 1930s and Af- by Carol Singley in Adopting Ameri- to exemplary American masculinity ter' delves into the literary represen- ca, whose very title gestures, in its is challenged in this respect. The tation of postmobilization, sexuality grammatical ambivalence, to the embarrassment of being disqualified and venereal disease; finally the complexity of the country’s dual self- from military action produces men's 'Afterword' examines William Bur- definition. Itself an orphan of sorts, sense of inferiority to fellow males roughs's Junky in relation to World America famously relies on applica- as well as the "other" (women and War II mobilization. tion and nurture rather than genetic minorities). The Gun and the Pen succeeds in inheritance and nature; it also hank- The secondary focus of The Gun demonstrating the impact of the ers for the discovery of its roots, and the Pen lies on US military ob- Great War on American men. The while simultaneously basking in jectives to promote equality and argument is consistent and coher- freedom and championing a pio- inclusion in the militia. Discrimina- ent. Archival research and unique neering spirit. Similar contradictions tion was deemed unacceptable for photographs further enhance the beguile its role as a foster parent: in servicemen. Gandal's multidiscipli- quality of the work. It is a highly turn, it has embraced with open nary study tackles such complex recommended reading for students arms suitable additions to its family, issues as racial, ethnic and gender of history, literature and sociology and succumbed to the fear of un- identity in post-war United States alike. The book's general appear- welcome immigrants, often met with with special emphasis on the coun- ance is also pleasing and relevant; suspicion and treated as lesser chil- try's Jewish population. The chapter the cover image (Psychological dren. on The Sun Also Rises is particular- Tests at Army Camp, Camp Lee, ly fascinating. The analysis high- Virginia, November 1917, Courtesy lights how Hemingway constantly of the National Archives) matches reminds the readers that Robert the title perfectly. The publication Cohn is a Jew. He did not simply contains all but one of the neces- create an unlikable character who sary appendices: contents, illustra- happens to be Jewish: Cohn repre- tions, index and notes are available; sents unpleasantness because he is bibliography is missing. Jewish. He remains an outsider who is separated from his circle of Adopting America: Child- friends (and society) because of his hood, Kinship, and Nation- "otherness". The novel reveals, al Identity in Literature by however, that no one made him Carol J. Singley. Oxford race-conscious while attending mili- and New York: Oxford Uni- tary school; discrimination against him only began to occur in higher versity Press, 2001, education. Gandal evaluates en- pp.224. trance quotas and restrictions im- ISBN 978-0-19-977939-0 Spanning the history of the country posed on Jewish students at univer- from its Puritan beginnings to the sities in post-war America, which Reviewed by Stefania Ciocia, Can- terbury Christ Church University, UK early twentieth-century, with fre- sounds slightly irrelevant consider- quent, insightful forays into the more ing that Cohn's academic admis- n Letters from an American recent past, Singley’s study makes sion, abilities and achievements Farmer (1782), Crèvecoeur cele- I a compelling case for the integral (middleweight boxing champion and brates the “great American asylum” role of the adoption trope in the na- star pupil at Princeton) are very for its power to give a new lease of tional rhetoric and the collective much accentuated in the novel de- life to disaffected Europeans, imagination of the United States. spite his perceived reality of being “stamping on them the symbol of The volume combines cultural and rejected. adoption”. America is configured as a benign foster figure, even at a literary analysis, always contextual- The book is divided into four parts, time when it has barely taken its first ized through wider historical refer- each containing several subhead- steps as an independent nation, ences, and enriched by illuminating ings for easier understanding. 'Part having just broken the filial bond biographical notes about the au- I: Introduction' recovers the histori- with Britain. Newly bereft, America thors under scrutiny. In fact, the 29 reading of life stories alongside ca- up to its promise to make a valuable the interethnic turn because of its nonical and non-canonical texts is addition to childhood and adoption focus on “in-betweenness” - be- one of Singley’s strengths, as wit- studies. It will appeal to specialists tween Asia and America, and be- nessed by her exposure of the sig- and non-specialists alike for its per- tween black and white. Contempo- nificantly disparate impact of the suasive discussion of adoption as a rary Asian American novels further taint of illegitimacy on Benjamin key blueprint for American narra- reinforce this status through shared Franklin and Ann Sargent Gage – a tives, in a manner not unlike other tendencies to focus on “the inter- comparison which brings poignantly foundation myths – such as the Pu- ethnic sublime” (p. 29), “interlingual to the fore a deep-seated prejudice ritan “city upon a hill” or the frontier imaginings” (p. 30) and “interethnic against female adoptees. – behind the development of the romance plots” (p. 33), as they gen- U.S. as a nation. erate, in Rody’s words, “an Ameri- The exploration of America’s differ- can ground rendered ‘thick and ent expectations of illegitimate The Interethnic Imagina- busy’ with crisscrossing ventures, mothers, female adopters and tion: Roots and Passages Asian American ventures to name adoptees against their male coun- and claim a home not in a fixed, terparts is a running theme through- in Contemporary Asian white, monolingual, unmoveable out the volume; it is complemented American Fiction, by Caro- Gold Mountain, but in an America by a close look at racial bias in the line Rody. Oxford: Oxford remapped by cross-ethnic exchange chapter of Harriet Wilson’s Our Nig University Press, 2009 and interrelationship” (p. 46). and indentured service, seen as an 216pp £38.00 978-0-19-537736-1 exploitative variation on the parent- Interethnic Imaginings certainly con- child relationship. Reviewed by Bella Adams, Senior veys a sense of these crisscrossing Lecturer in English, LJMU ventures, particularly in the first Although not devoid of more posi- chapter and in the “interchapters” tive case studies – most notably, where Rody draws on a variety of perhaps, Cotton Mather’s celebra- contemporary literary and cultural tion of adoption as a conduit for theories from Asian American Stud- spiritual salvation – Singley’s analy- ies and beyond, and discusses nu- sis never lets us forget the danger- merous “interethnic American nov- ous interpretative malleability of els,” typically about intersections adoption narratives: given that between blackness, Jewishness adoptees are always under a dual and Asianness. These chapters influence – the birth family’s genetic provide a context for her detailed legacy and the foster family’s nurtur- analyses, in Chapters 2-4, of three ing care (or lack thereof) – the suc- popular Asian American novels, all cess or failure of their story can be from the 1990s: Chang-rae Lee’s ascribed to either pressure, accord- Native Speaker, Gish Jen’s Mona in ing to the ideological message one the Promised Land, and Karen Tei wants to convey. Louisa May Al- Yamashita’s Tropic of Orange. Also cott’s conservatism, for example, important to her discussion of inter- shines through in the Little Women ethnicity in these novels are consid- series, when it is intimated that the hile Caroline Rody is careful erations of class, gender, historical young Dan Kean remains unsus- W to emphasize that legacies, and globalization, with the ceptible to Jo March/Mother Bhaer’s “interethnicity cannot be called a ethnically mixed children in each formidable guardianship because of new phenomenon” since ethnic allowing Rody to imagine a multicul- his presumed Indian origins. American identity formation has invariably depended on dynamic tural American future of significance The intrinsic ambivalence of adop- relationships of difference between to students and researchers in tion plots, and America’s own fluctu- ethnic groups, most compelling for American Studies. ations in its enthusiasm and reser- her in “the center of one’s imagina- Rody does an excellent job of repre- vations towards adoptive relation- tive life” (p. 4), Rody nevertheless senting the diversity and dynamism ships, are reiterated by Singley with observes from the Civil Rights peri- of twentieth-century Asian American great insistence. The constant re- od onwards a paradigm shift regard- fiction, and is clearly energized by it, turn to this central thesis makes ing interethnicity. In particular, liter- her tone, although celebratory, is individual chapters easily self- ary history makes this “interethnic not uncritical. For instance, when contained, and one suspects that turn” (p. viii) visible via characteriza- she discusses the endings of Lee’s, Singley’s take on The Scarlet Letter tion, for example, increasing em- Jen’s and Yamashita’s novels, all of as “arguably the most famous cus- phases on ethnically mixed children, which represent variations on the tody case” in American fiction will be often in multicultural and transna- interethnic romance plot, a form that well-thumbed by literature students. tional settings, as well as in hybrid has been criticized in Asian Ameri- Altogether, Adopting America lives literary forms. For Rody, Asian can Studies for offering easy resolu- American literature best exemplifies 30 tions to social conflicts and inequali- cultural theorists Masao Miyoshi tion using “more experimental ties, Rody argues that these three and Arif Dirlik to highlight the social forms, structures, and contents” to novels offer “self-consciously melo- and environmental losses incurred “mirror” and question “the changes dramatic endings - an old-fashioned under global capitalism, before dis- taking place in the larger, political, novelistic device with a postmodern cussing in detail the ways in which social and global arena” (p. xviii). touch” (p. 143); as such, these end- Asian North American writers also Unfastened is in three parts, com- ings can only ever “momentarily” evidence “critical globality” or “acute prising six chapters, plus an intro- keep at bay “the forces of greed, awareness of the inequalities that duction and “Coda: Rethinking the division, and animosity” (p. 158). have resulted from the globalization Hyphen.” Each part discusses four While Rody is right to highlight the of the markets, the overuse and texts. Part I focuses on the dangers incompleteness of resolution vis-a- misuse of the environment and nat- of globalization, particularly for poor vis such forces, her characterization ural resources, and the conse- Asian men and women who were of these forces seems more psycho- quences of the breakdown of na- and are forced to do “Global Dirty logical than structural or institution- tional geographical or spatial lim- Work,” which in novels by Brian al, which raises a further yet related its” (p. xii). Developing the concept Ascalon Roley, Han Ong, Lydia Kwa problem with terminology in Inter- of critical globality, Ty’s monograph and Nora Okja Keller involves crime ethnic Imaginings: Rody’s privileg- negotiates between celebratory and and prostitution. While their respec- ing of “ethnic” over “race” can rein- cautionary responses to globaliza- tive protagonists are victims of glob- force a neoconservative agenda. Of tion in order to understand the com- alization, and lead abject lives, Ty recent ethnicity-based theories, plexity of experiences under globali- persuasively argues that represen- Michael Omi and Howard Winant ty, most notably, “displacement as tation is also “recuperation” (p. 20), argue in Racial Formation in the movement ... suggests agency and thus helping to transform the protag- United States that they “fail to rec- subjectivity” (p. xxvii), beyond its onists into “heroic” figures (p. 19, p. ognize at all adequately, either his- standard formulation as loss. For xxxvii). Part II complicates dominant torically or in the present, the quali- Ty, like James Clifford and others, assumptions about transnational tative differences between white mobility and displacement can serve mobility by focusing on the disabled and non-white groups’ encounters both to constrain and empower. protagonists in the plays Mother with U.S. society. Or to put it anoth- Tongue and Rice Boy, while the er way, they fail to grasp the extent other two plays discussed represent to which U.S. society is racially more positive experiences of global- structured from top to bottom” (pp. ization, with transcultural hybridity 49-50). While Rody does under- in Toronto’s Asian diasporic com- stand race as a structure, it is still munities suggesting “the vibrancy of worth considering why she chooses being between worlds” (p. 86). Part interethnicity as her paradigm rather III looks at non-realist, feminist nov- than interraciality. els by Chitra Divakuruni, Larissa Unfastened: Globality and Lai, Hiromi Goto and Ruth Ozeki Asian North American Nar- that critique global capitalism, par- ratives, by Eleanor Ty. ticularly its efforts to “discipline” the female body and the natural envi- Minneapolis: University of ronment (p. 89). Minnesota Press, 2010 Ty’s selection of texts focused on ISBN 978-0-8166-6508-2 216pp everyday and typically unequal ex- £17.00 periences of globalization help to Of particular interest to Ty are vari- convey the complexity of an “age of Reviewed by Bella Adams, Senior ous formal and thematic globality,” of the plurality of Asian Lecturer in English, LJMU “unfastenings” in contemporary North American identities (and liter- ncreasingly, globality is regard- Asian North American narratives. atures). Importantly, as she ed as a condition rather than a Traditional emphases on realist acknowledges in “Coda,” such plu- process that exceeds corporate forms, particularly autoethnography, I rality does not result in the loss of and economic interests to include and the struggle of claiming Ameri- political identities such as “Asian everyday experiences of increased ca and Canada may have empow- American” or “Asian Canadian”; mobility and “the unfastening of ered an older generation of Asian rather, these identities are regarded identities from ... national affilia- North Americans, but for a younger as more mobile, their positions tions” (p. xii). Such unfastening can generation such concerns can be changing in relation to different and feel liberating, as Eleanor Ty as- aesthetically, politically and theoreti- dynamic power structures - perhaps serts, but not without also acknowl- cally constraining. Ty’s selection of not unfastened, but definitely in a edging that it can generate experi- recent Asian North American narra- process of unfastening. ences of dispossession, dislocation tives demonstrates how they are and displacement. Ty references unfastening themselves from tradi- 31 In the UK, Unfastened may not get cal artefacts of her poems, allowing the effects of her constant revision the attention it deserves, mainly this fascinating writer to be viewed process on the development of indi- because Asian North American nar- in a new light. vidual poems. ratives, especially the more recent Having published very few works As the book progresses, the chang- ones selected by Ty, tend not to be during her life, much of Dickinson’s es in Dickinson’s poetry and work- included in university syllabi. Never- work was developed in letters to ing methods become apparent. theless, Ty’s work here and else- friends and family. Socarides con- Socarides observes that Dickinson’s where (e.g. The Politics of the Visi- tends that this takes her work be- move from sewn fascicles to form- ble) offers much to scholars inter- yond the literary, setting it in the ing looser ‘sets’ of poems marks a ested in contemporary North Ameri- broader context of nineteenth centu- shift in her style which sees her ca with regard to understanding ry letter writing and women’s peda- mixing time and space and the ma- race, multiculturalism, diaspora and gogy. This argument is advanced by terial and the immaterial in her poet- globalization, and she represents an exploration of Dickinson’s tech- ry. It is suggested that this is led by important debates in lively and re- nique of sewing poems into fasci- the move away from bound fasci- freshing ways. cles,1 which reflects the spirit of cles to the less ‘final’ form of loose Dickinson Unbound: Pa- copying poetry and the artisanal sheets. Although it is not known per, Process, Poetics, by techniques taught in female educa- whether this change was brought Alexandra Socarides. tion in the period. By placing Dickin- about by practical concerns or by a son back in her immediate historical concerted change in style, it marks Oxford University Press, context, Socarides resists the gen- an enormous turning point in Dickin- 2102 eral tendency to read her “as proto- son’s work. everything” (p. 169). 224pp, ISBN 9780199858088, Socarides also attempts to revive £32.50 Perhaps the most important strand Dickinson’s later work from its state of the book is its investigation of the of critical neglect. This work, largely Reviewed by Adrian Howlett, Re- relationship between Dickinson’s consisting of poetic fragments writ- search Assistant, ASRC methods and the content of her idio- ten on scraps of paper is redeemed syncratic poetry. The often themati- as another interesting phase in a cally disparate content of the fasci- long poetic life. Again, Socarides cles reflects internal divisions in the reflects on the relationship between human psyche, denying her poetry form and content by, for example, the illusion of wholeness and reflect- tracing links between the poetic ing the playfulness inherent in her fragments written on the back of work. Moreover, Socarides explores recipes cards. According to Socar- the boundaries between Dickinson’s ides, the limited writing materials letter writing and poetry, traditionally used by the poet led to more con- taken as different aspects of her strained forms of writing which re- work. By looking at how Dickinson quired a new approach. Some of embedded fragments of poetry in Dickinson’s most existential work is her letters, the author unifies these found in this period, as she associ- two fields: Dickinson the letter writer ates “the shortness of the life…with is still Dickinson the poet. the smallness of the paper” (p. 160), thereby reinforcing the vital link be- In addition to considering Dickin- tween Dickinson’s writing materials son’s work in general, Socarides s an elusive figure whose work and her poetry . I think this link is provides closer readings of certain still provokes plenty of interest integral to understanding Dickin- A aspects of her poetry. She is partic- among readers and critics, it is no son’s writing in general, and I think it ularly interested in the implications surprise that a lot has been written adds a great deal to reading Dickin- of the fascicles for individual poems, about Emily Dickinson over the son. This book is likely to be useful for example, by suggesting that the years. Rightly, much of the focus is to anyone with an academic interest theme of death in “From Blank to on the originality and influence of in Dickinson, but it is equally likely Blank” is reinforced by its isolated her work, but considered less often to interest anyone who enjoys read- position in its fascicle, disconnected is the physical body of work left by ing Dickinson’s poetry or is interest- from neighbouring poems. This link Dickinson. In Dickinson Unbound, ed in the creative process behind between content and form is contin- Alexandra Socarides seeks to reme- poetry. ually asserted in Socarides’s read- dy this by focusing on Dickinson’s ings of Dickinson’s work, making it 1 A part, number, 'livraison' (of a work physical texts and their immediate seem even more powerful when published by instalments) (Oxford Eng- context. By looking at the writing seen in its original setting. Addition- lish Dictionary) processes of Dickinson’s poetry, ally, different versions of Dickinson’s Socarides aims to explore the physi- poems are compared, illustrating 32 Fitzgerald, F. Scott. This engagement. Fitzgerald’s third re- himself at the entrance of a labyrinth Side of Paradise. Ed. Jack- write focuses on Amory Blaine’s and roams through “the pageantry son R. Bryer. New York: actions, the significance of his of his disillusion.” (223) Amory un- name, and wartime experiences via derstands that his former and lost Oxford University Press, letters and poems in the Interlude. paradise linked to egotism has to be 2009. Bryer highlights the authenticity of metamorphosed into a regained 304 pages. ISBN: 978-0-19-954621- these letters, along with quoting paradise; his dreams have to be of 3 from the letter of acceptance by being rather than of becoming and Scribner’s and Fitzgerald’s own his selfishness has to be transcend- Reviewed by Jessica Folio, PhD in reaction to this news. ed. He goes from being a personali- American Literature, University of ty to being a personage as his jour- Bryer then discusses the impact of Reunion Island, France. ney through the self eventually the novel on the literary world, in- leads him to declare he knows him- cluding contemporary reviews. He self. also highlights its main themes: aspects of adolescent behaviors, The Letters of Gertrude the description of undergraduate life Stein and Virgil Thomson: and the failing of Victorian values. Composition as Conversa- Bryer pays particular attention to the kiss between Amory and Myra St tion, Edited by Susan Claire, and the association between Holbrook and Thomas Dil- women, sex and evil. Bryer high- worth (Oxford University lights Amory’s and the author’s fas- Press, 2010) cination towards and repulsion from ISBN 978 0 19 538663 9, 336 pag- women. Amory firstly wishes to kiss Myra, then feels disgusted by their es closeness in a manner suggestive Reviewed by Steve Harrison, Jour- of the Kristevean concept of abjec- nalism Lecturer, Liverpool Screen tion. Bryer also analyses the first School he 2009 edition of Fitzgerald’s description of the 16 year-old Isa- T first and most successful novel belle Borgé, with whom Amory ex- This Side of Paradise was originally periences a love that involves do- published in 1920. Inspired by the minion and suffering. author’s early years at Princeton, In their relationships, men and wom- this Bildungsroman form depicts en appear to play roles. Moreover, Amory Blaine’s experiences in two young women are presented as parts: “the romantic egotist” and “the “Golden Girls” (xx) who prioritize education of a personage,” separat- conventions over genuine love. The ed by a short interlude. The 2009 reader is provided with a portrait of edition offers an insightful introduc- the revolutionary girl of the Roaring tion by Jackson R. Bryer starting Twenties, called “the flapper” or “the with biographical elements that help baby vamp” (55). Women are to establish the historical canvas of femmes fatales, merciless beauties Fitzgerald’s novel, between his un- characterized by their Dionysiac finished academic career and his drive. Fitzgerald cleverly shows the enlisting in the Army for World War game women had to play to attract I. a husband, having to pretend to be he collaboration between Ger- Bryer discusses the publishing of intellectually inferior. T trude Stein and Virgil Thomson This Side of Paradise, including the from 1927-1946 is remarkable not Bryer ends his introduction with a “remarkably encouraging letter of only for the landmarks of modern- narratological perspective that high- rejection” (ix) by Charles Scribner’s ism it generated, but for the fact that lights Fitzgerald’s patchwork form of Sons. Despite revising his unsatis- it ever happened at all. prose, poems, letters, stream-of- factory conclusion and his incon- consciousness and quotations. Bry- When they first met in 1926, the sistent depiction of incidents, Fitz- er concludes with the criticism of notoriously prickly Stein, jealously gerald is rejected by the publisher puerility attached to the novel; he shielded by Alice B Toklas, was the for a second time. Bryer also dis- shows, though, that at 23, Fitzgerald feted author of avant garde works cusses Fitzgerald’s work at an ad was able to render perfectly the including The Making of Americans ; agency, and his failure to sell any of social issues of the time. Bryer does Thomson a brilliant upcoming com- his stories, leading the woman he not mention the initiatory process poser. Both were driven, deeply loves, Zelda Sayre, to break off their undergone by Amory who situates egotistical, and unfettered by the 33 limitations of convention and expec- Sylvia Jenkins Cook, portance of writing, reading and tation. An artistic partnership Working Women, Literary education are stressed, and dis- seemed improbable. Ladies: The Industrial Rev- cusses the popular narratives of factory fiction that preached self- But because their talents lay in dif- olution and Female Aspira- reliance and self-sacrifice. The ferent directions, there was no tion. 2008. Oxford Univer- working woman narrative often pre- sense of competition between the sented yet another way for women literary lion and the brilliant new- sity Press. to be self-sacrificing in literature – comer, allowing them to work more ISBN: 978-0-19-532781-6. 292 she could now work in a factory as or less harmoniously on Four Saints pages. £16.99 well as for her family at home – but in Three Acts (1927/8) and The Reviewed by: Dr Anne-Marie Evans, Cook challenges this interpretation Mother of Us All (1946/7). These Senior Lecturer in American Litera- by arguing that several texts of this works are described by Susan ture, York St John University. period also suggest an alternative Holbrook and Thomas Dilworth in reading whereby factory work offers their introduction as “among the crucial opportunities for female edu- preeminent collaborative works of cation and emancipation. Writings modern art”. by real factory women, and specifi- The qualification “more or less” is cally from the literary journal of Low- important, since a two-year rift de- ell, Massachusetts, where the now veloped between the pair in 1931 famous Lowell Offering was pub- (not 1930, as the editors mistakenly lished from 1840, form the basis of write in their introduction) which was a fascinating chapter that explores never fully healed, as reflected in the political possibilities of female the sometimes strained nature of working class writing. This is rein- the later correspondence. forced through a discussion of Mar- garet Fuller’s writing for the Dial that At its heart, though, this is the por- considers women’s relationship with trait of a largely affectionate rela- the potential for a literary and intel- tionship between two outsiders lectual life beyond the factory floor. (both were gay, both determinedly Cook extends her analysis by in- experimental in their art) who cluding the work of three male nov- helped shape the artistic landscape n Working Women, Literary La- elists, Sylvester Judd, Nathaniel of the 20th century. dies, Sylvia Jenkins Cook exam- I Hawthorne and Herman Mel- ines the portrayal of the working This edition of their letters is a minor ville, who all wrote about working class women of nineteenth and ear- miracle of scholarship which eluci- women’s developing engagement ly twentieth century America who dates Stein’s cryptic handwriting, with public life in their fiction. A worked in the factories and aspired and Thomson’s often equal obscure chapter spent examining Lucy to participate in literary culture. Set allusions. As well as setting the cor- Larcom’s 1875 epic poem An Idyl of against the backdrop of rapid indus- respondence in context, Holbrook Work, which clearly situates the trialisation and increased mechani- and Dilworth also place it chronolog- working women of the factory as sation, Cook explores the emer- ically, as several letters had previ- forming a fully functioning intellectu- gence of writings about factory life ously been misdated or misinter- al and literary community, is another through an examination of fiction, preted. highlight of this study. In the 1880s poetry, autobiography and journal- and 1890s the rise of the unions A mysterious reference to Stein’s ism. Beginning with the concept of and the growth of labour organisa- dog Basket having had “fleas but no the ‘factory fictions’ genre, where tions changed the demographic of almonds” was thought to be a result female characters were presented workers in America, and this study of the illegibility of her hand, until with educational opportunities that charts the evolution of the role of the editors linked it with an undated had to be navigated alongside sev- women workers. One of the real note from Thomson recounting a eral complex economic and social strengths of this project is Cook’s dream in which Basket “instead of issues, Cook guides the reader from ability to weave historical detail with fur had almonds stuck in him” - at a the New England factory to the New literary analysis in a seamless and stroke confirming the reading of York sweatshop and offers an en- convincing discussion. Meticulously Stein’s phrase and placing Thom- gaging, thoughtful and persuasive researched, this is a complex and son’s letter in its correct sequence. analysis of women’s culture. nuanced study that is a significant This delightful edition also contains Cook starts with novels about facto- contribution to scholarship. letters from Toklas and Stein’s liter- ry life, such as Sarah Savage’s The ary agent Bradley – the exchange Factory Girl (1814), which examines between Thomson and Toklas con- the phenomenon of the working tinued for a further 16 years follow- woman in a text where the im- ing Stein’s death in 1946. 34 involvement in political controversy Politics in an election year. By upholding Obama in this crucial case, Toobin bling of the wording of the presiden- Jeffrey Toobin, The Oath: argues, Roberts has "insulated the tial oath in Obama’s first inaugura- The Obama White House court from political challenge for a tion (necessitating a second private and the Supreme Court, long time”. ceremony in case anyone should Doubleday 2012, challenge the legality of Obama’s The Oath is an important and huge- ISBN 978-0385527200, 325 pages. presidency), the relationship got off ly enjoyable book which anyone to a tense start. A year later in Citi- with an interest in American law and Reviewed by Mark Rathbone FHA, zens United v. FEC, the Court over- politics should read. History and Politics teacher and Head of Academic Administra- turned many of the restrictions on tion at Canford School, Wimborne, corporate spending in election cam- Race and ethnicity Dorset paigning, a decision which Obama pointedly criticised in his State of the Union Address, with Chief Jus- Cultivating Food Justice: tice Roberts and several other Jus- Race, Class, and Sustain- tices present. ability Edited by Alison There is little doubt whose side Hope Alkon and Julian Toobin is on. The Roberts Court, he Agyeman Cambridge, argues, is reinterpreting the Consti- Massachusetts: The MIT tution with a remarkable disregard Press, 2011 for even recent precedents. "It used ISBN 978-0-262-51632-7, 376pp to be that what it meant to be a con- £18.95 servative on the Supreme Court was respect for precedent and slow- Reviewed by Bella Adams, Senior moving change," he writes. "What's Lecturer in English, LJMU. so different about the Roberts court is the way they are burning through many of the precedents they don't J effrey Toobin is well known to like." students of the US Supreme The court’s decision to uphold the Court, both as senior legal analyst legality of President Obama’s re- at CNN and as the author of The form of medical provision in The Nine, an excellent study of the Affordable Care Act Cases in June court’s recent history, published in 2012 comes in for close examina- 2007. His new book, The Oath, is tion. The Chief Justice’s surprise essentially a follow-up to his earlier vote with the four liberal justices work, bringing the story up to date saved Obama’s flagship policy and by looking at the court’s record dur- on the face of it seemed to suggest ing President Obama’s first term. that Roberts was rowing back from Based on interviews with the justic- his usual conservative agenda. es and a large number of their law Toobin, however, points out that clerks as well, inevitably, as press Roberts upheld the key provision to reports and analysis, Toobin illumi- fine individuals who fail to buy tilizing Michael Omi and How- nates the complex relationships health insurance because it was ard Winant’s influential con- between the nine justices. Personal effectively a federal tax, not be- U cept of racial projects, Alison Hope friendships often transcend ideologi- cause it was legal under the Com- Alkon and Julian Agyeman argue in cal differences (who would have merce Clause. their Introduction to Cultivating Food guessed that conservative Justice By declaring that the Affordable Justice that the US food system is Antonin Scalia and liberal Justice Care Act was not legal under the one such project that from produc- Ruth Bader Ginsberg are apparently Commerce Clause, the Court’s abil- tion to consumption reproduces the best of friends when not on the ity to use a conservative interpreta- dominant racial hierarchies. These bench?). tion of the clause to curtail other racial hierarchies are also class But it is the often tense relationship activities of the federal government hierarchies that adversely affect non between the Obama White House in future cases remained intact. By -white and working-class communi- and the Roberts Court which is at declaring that it was nevertheless ties forced to inhabit toxic urban and the heart of this book. With the legal for other reasons, Roberts was rural environments where there is Chief Justice’s uncharacteristic fum- protecting the Court from unseemly little or no access to fresh, healthy 35 and sustainable food. In “food de- cannot afford to buy the food they Scottsboro: A Tragedy of the Ameri- serts” (p. 6), these communities grow. Part III articulates ways of can South, published as long ago as suffer from poor physical health, the “growing food and justice” (p. 149) 1969, and a similarly-titled Emmy main antidote to which in the form of through community projects respon- award-winning PBS television docu- the alternative food movement sive to other farming traditions, in- mentary, Scottsboro: an American seems to exceed them both eco- cluding indigenous, Hmong and Tragedy was released in 2001 and nomically and socially. An alterna- Nation of Islam. White privilege is later broadcast in the UK on BBC4. tive food philosophy such as vegan- also highlighted and questioned in James Miller’s book does not at- ism, for example, is, as A. Breeze activist discourses, for example, tempt to present a detailed account Harper argues in her contribution to veganism and environmentalism, a or analysis of the case, although in the volume, typically “assumed questioning that continues in Part places there are elements of such (consciously or not) to be white by IV, “Future Directions,” as the edi- an analysis. The unseemly quarrel default, with the dialogue within tors demand a food justice move- between the NAACP and the Inter- often coming from a place of white ment that is more self-critical and national Labor Defense about which privilege” (p. 221). international. of the two organisations should pro- Cultivating Food Justice highlights With its emphasis on California, vide the Scottsboro Boys’ defence is how privileged whites have histori- Cultivating Food Justice is ideal for well covered. The chapter about cally shaped dominant and alterna- scholars interested in the history of Hayward Patterson, widely regarded tive food systems, thereby necessi- the American West, although such a as the most assertive of the defend- tating the formation of a food justice narrow focus may come as a sur- ants and the only one who wrote a movement that develops the in- prise to some considering the wide- full-length account of his experienc- sights of the alternative food move- ranging subtitle - “race, class, and es, published as Scottsboro Boy in ment and the environmental justice sustainability’ - and a cover image 1950, is fascinating. movement against industrialized that perhaps looks more “global” food production and consumption. than “American.” Although this is a Responsive to the relationship be- book for social scientists, specifical- tween food, race and class, the vol- ly for scholars in Environmental ume also demonstrates how non- Studies and Food Studies, there is white food histories can inform a much in it for researchers and stu- more sustainable and diverse or dents in American Studies. Alto- “polycultural” (p. 10) food system gether, it makes an excellent case committed to social and environ- for the relevance of race and class mental justice agendas. to environmental and food discourses, and vice versa. Cultivating Food Justice has fifteen chapters divided into four sections, James A Miller, Remem- the majority of which focus on food bering Scottsboro: The production and consumption in Cali- fornia typically in the form of case Legacy of an Infamous Tri- studies about Native American, Afri- al, Princeton University can American, Asian American and Press 2009 Latino/a food systems. Part I high- ISBN 978-0-691-14047-6, 280 pag- But most of the book is a work of lights how a history of institutional es. literary criticism, which examines racism involving genocide, slavery, the influence of the Scottsboro case immigration exclusion, land laws Reviewed by Mark Rathbone FHA, in poetry, novels and plays both in and labour laws represents a History and Politics teacher and the 1930s and more recently. Miller Head of Academic Administration at “continuing legacy” (p. 23) for non- is more concerned to chart the de- Canford School, Wimborne, Dorset whites. For example, the Karuk peo- velopment through literature of what ple’s poverty and hunger are tied to he ‘Scottsboro Boys’ were a he calls the ‘Scottsboro Narrative’ environmental degradation under T group of 9 young African than to examine the lives of the un- European colonization and white Americans who were falsely ac- fortunate victims or the wider effects laws about land and resource man- cused and convicted of raping two of the case. The case clearly was agement that limit access to healthy white women on a train in Alabama influential in the narrowly literary food and “food sovereignty,” or the in 1931. The US Supreme Court sense which interests Miller. For “right to define their own food and ruled in 1932 that they had been example, John Wexley’s play They agricultural systems” (p. 8). Food denied proper legal representation Shall Not Die was a straightforward insecurity is also a focus of Part II, in their original trial, and in 1935 that dramatization of the case, drawing especially in California’s urban and the exclusion of African Americans heavily on court transcripts. Numer- rural food deserts where immigrant from the original jury had been un- ous poems, such as Countee Cul- workers, including farm workers, constitutional. The best known ac- len’s Scottsboro, Too, is Worth Its count of the case is Dan T. Carter’s 36 Song, address the case directly. The Old South’s Modern Covering a broad range of subjects The best chapter is the final one Worlds: Slavery, Region, from a number of different scholarly which examines the most famous and Nation in the Age of approaches, the fourteen essays in novel in which the influence of the collection can be pigeonholed Scottsboro is obvious, Harper Lee’s Progress, Edited by L. Di- into four broad topic areas: the Old To Kill a Mockingbird. ane Barnes, Brian Schoen South and its global relations; economic modernization and the do- This is all very well, but at times we and Frank Towers. Oxford mestic slave trade; urbanization and seem to be taken quite a long way and New York: Oxford Uni- industrialization in the South; and, from Scottsboro. For example, Paul versity Press, 2011 finally, the impacts of modernity on Peters and George Sklar’s 1934 Pp. 352, £61.75 (hbk), £18.99 (pbk), antebellum Southern culture. Two play Stevedore features a false rape ISBN 978-0-19-538402-4 key points really hold the collection allegation and racial conflict, but is together and are elucidatory for the story of a labour dispute in New Reviewed by Patrick J. Doyle, Uni- scholars of antebellum America. Orleans. Worth a mention no doubt versity of Manchester The first point is most apparent in as it shares some themes with the Frank Towers’s essay on Southern real events at Scottsboro, but we cities before the Civil War, which are treated to eight pages about the urges historians to be cautious play, including extensive quotations. when judging Southern modernity Guy Endore’s novel, Babouk, also during the antebellum period published in 1934, is about a slave against the supposed standards of revolt in late eighteenth-century the Northern US states and Britain. Haiti, whose links to Scottsboro are A more globally comparative ap- even more tenuous, but it too gets proach, particularly in relation to the full treatment. other Atlantic slaveholding republics The book’s title refers to Scotts- demonstrates that in terms of urban- boro’s ‘Legacy’, not just its literary ization, railroad mileage, and other legacy. Whilst the Scottsboro case measures of modernity, the Old undoubtedly had a strong literary South was making significant pro- influence, its most important result gress. A global more perspective is surely the fact that it led to two of thus challenges, if not reverses, the the first major Supreme Court cases traditional views of Britain and the which produced decisions favoura- ne of the most enduring de- Northern states regarding the ble to African American civil rights. O bates amongst historians of South’s static, even backward The cases, in 1932 and 1935, repre- American slavery and the antebel- worldview . sent a hugely important turning of lum South over the last fifty years The second key point outlined in the tide, which went on to bring vic- has been whether the region de- this collection is that modernity is tories for civil rights from Gaines v. serves the appellation ‘modern’. As not simply about material achieve- Canada (1938) to Brown v. Board of demonstrated by disagreements ments but also cultural outlook. The Education (1954 & 1955) and count- between Eugene D. Genovese and essays by L. Diane Barnes and Lar- less other cases. Robert W. Fogel, this debate has ry E. Hudson, Jr., looking at ante- often rested upon semantics. What The legal legacy of Scottsboro still bellum industrial workers in Peters- exactly does modernity mean, and impacts hugely on the lives of Afri- burg, Virginia, and rural enslaved can a society based upon coerced can Americans today, yet this gets workers, respectively, make this labour, as opposed to free labour, scant mention in Miller’s book, point most forcefully. Barnes and really be considered modern? Or, which seems to me a major short- Hudson demonstrate how deep conversely, can a society equally coming. modern thinking, through time keep- based by 1860 on capitalism, con- ing, desires for material acquisition, sumerism, and market driven be- and other market orientated behav- haviour be considered un-modern or iour, had permeated into the South- pre-modern? Despite the evidently ern psyche, not just of the white amorphous nature of the term, L. master class but of black slaves as Diane Barnes, Brian Schoen, and well. Put simply, when questioning Frank Towers have brought togeth- how modern the Old South was, it is er a host of leading scholars in the important to address quantifiable field that collectively suggest, as measures and the mindset of its does much recent scholarship, that people who did not think of their in many important respects the Old society as being ‘old’ in any mean- South was looking increasingly ingful way. modern by the eve of the American Civil War. 37 In summary, this collection forces ous consideration (in Marc Egnal’s lent collection of cutting edge schol- scholars to complicate the way in chapter) and ultimately refutation in arship is a must-read for scholars which they characterise the Old this book. Through a more globally with an interest in both antebellum South. The stereotypical ‘moonlight comparative framework and a re- Southern life and the age of pro- and magnolia’ image so beloved by fined appreciation of the cultural gress in an international context, as popular culture, of the antebellum dimensions of modernity, the con- well as being highly suitable for South as a timeless and parochial tributors to this book do a first rate classroom use. space, insulated against the forces job in highlighting the Old South’s of change around it, receives seri- modern worlds. Indeed, this excel-