BEYOND DEMONS AND DARKNESS: A GENEALOGY OF EVIL IN AMERICAN FANTASY LITERATURE FOR YOUNG ADULTS SINCE 1950 A Thesis submitted to the Faculty of The School of Continuing Studies and of The Graduate School of Arts and Sciences In partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Liberal Studies By Louise Pisano Simone, M.F.A Georgetown University Washington, D.C. September 18, 2015 BEYOND DEMONS AND DARKNESS: A GENEALOGY OF EVIL IN AMERICAN FANTASY LITERATURE FOR YOUNG ADULTS SINCE 1950 Louise Pisano Simone, BSFS, MA, MFA DLS Chair: Rebecca Boylan, Ph.D. ABSTRACT This thesis investigates the portrayal of evil in young adult fantasy novels (books written for readers between the ages of 12 and 18) over the last 60 years as it relates to the notion of Otherness. Using an interdisciplinary approach, I analyze select fantasy novels through the lens of Western ethics to examine the American historical, political and social environment between 1950 and 2014. Using Western ethicists as a guide, reading of the texts exposes underlying themes concerning war and American values of good and evil. The portrayal of war in fantasy fiction for young adults has important implications for understanding how American culture responds to its enemies or anyone who falls outside the white Judeo-Christian mainstream. In the 47 young adult novels examined, I find that American attitudes about war and their enemies, and how we respond to them, have changed since the beginning of the Cold War and the continuing international struggle against terrorism. Beginning with the 1950s’s fantasies examined, novelists equated the fictional battle between good and evil with the defense of freedom and prosperity. Protagonists defend humanity in a just war against forces whose stated or implied goal is the enslavement or destruction of the human race. In these early novels (those written ii between 1950 and 1970), evil is portrayed as a force of nature or the result of the meddling of supernatural beings in the affairs of humans. Later novelists (beginning by 1970 and continuing through the 1980s) portray evil as an outcome of human choice. Inherent in this portrayal remains the belief that the cause the hero fights is just. Human freedom rests on the hero’s victory. The final group of novels, those written in the era after the collapse of the Soviet Union (1990 through 2014), authors explore the danger of seeing the world in binary terms of good and evil, instead positing the idea that the battle itself is the greatest threat to human freedom, prosperity and happiness. In addition, these later novelists explore alternative means of overcoming evil besides eternal conflict and revenge. Finally, I include guiding questions concerning teaching fantasy literature for the purpose of understanding how fantasy literature reflects and addresses issues of social justice in the reader and writer’s consensus reality. iii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS No words can come close to expressing my gratitude for the help and support I received in writing this thesis. My deepest thanks go to Rebecca Boylan for her guidance and patience, but especially for her kind, supportive words, and advice. Her consistent probing and meticulous reading of the various drafts of this work, I am certain, pushed me to take the analysis deeper. In addition, without the help and advice of William O’Brien and Tobin Anderson concerning the depth, purpose, and scope of the initial idea, this thesis would not have been possible. To my husband David, thank you for your faith in me, your patience, and your love. Thank you to Kathleen. You really are quite good at what you do. To Alec, thank you for keeping me honest. To Rosa Maria Barreiro, thank you for your sustained interest and probing questions. Without Anne Ridder, this thesis would be in shreds on my office floor. Thank you for your keen eyes and calm presence. None of these people should be held responsible for errors of content, expression, or editing. I did those all on my own. Finally, I am grateful and indebted to Georgetown University for its courage and foresightedness in creating the Doctor of Liberal Studies program and opening the space for a rigorous exploration of ideas that allowed me to achieve a life-long goal. iv CONTENTS ABSTRACT ……………………………………………………………… ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ……………………………………………………………… iv INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………………………… 1 CHAPTER 1. CHILDREN’S AND YOUNG ADULT LITERATURE: 23 THE IMPORTANCE OF STORY CHAPTER 2. DEFINING FANTASY: A DISCURSIVE ART 38 INVOLVING WRITER, READER, TEXT AND THE WORLD CHAPTER 3. ROSEMARY JACKSON AND MICHEL FOUCAULT: 74 FANTASY AS A LITERATURE OF SUBVERSION CHAPTER 4. DEFINING EVIL: ETHICAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL 98 APPROACHES TO GOOD AND EVIL IN WESTERN THOUGHT CHAPTER 5. THE 1950S: THE COLD WAR, CONFORMITY, 136 CONTAINTMENT AND CONTRFRONTATION WITH THE OTHER CHAPTER 6. THE 1960S: THE WORLD IT WAS A-CHANGING 176 CHAPTER 7. 1965-1989: AMERICAN FANTASY LITERATURE 218 SEARCHES THE HUMAN SOUL CHAPTER 8. BEYOND SUPERPOWERS AND THE ARMS RACE: 254 DARKNESS, CHAOS AND FATE IN ROBERT JORDAN’S WHEEL OF TIME SERIES CHAPTER 9. BEYOND CERTAINTY: SEPTEMBER 11th AND THE 291 WAR ON TERROR –– HOPE, FORGIVENESS, LOVE AND UNDERSTANDING AS A PATH TO VICTORY OVER HATE AND FEAR CONCLUSION ………………………………………………………………. 328 AFTERWARD USING FANTASY NOVELS IN A SOCIAL 338 JUSTIC CURRICULUM BIBLIOGRAPHY ……………………………………………………………… 348 v INTRODUCTION The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon. ~Brandon Sanderson, The Way of Kings “Sing in me, Muse, and through me tell the story.…”1 Few opening lines to a tale embody the nature of storytelling as powerfully and succinctly as Homer’s invocation of the Muse in The Odyssey. After calling on the mythical source of inspiration and lending her his voice, Homer spins a fantastic tale that, nearly three thousand years later, still inspires new generations of readers. Like Homer, throughout the long millennia of human history, men and women have communicated with to one another through stories about gods and monsters, magic and demons. Whether the poet or listener believed in these impossible elements or not matters little to the story’s success, and, to this day, literature that includes elements of the fantastic continues to offer readers insights into human life: suffering and joy, triumph and defeat, love and fear, and life and death. Stories, all stories, open windows into worlds beyond our imagination or into our own backyards. Through stories a people communicates to the world its most fundamental truths. Carl Jung, Sir James George Frazer, and Joseph Campbell all document the way our earliest ancestors used myth to posit answers to their questions about the world and life: where did we come from? why are we here? what happens when we die? In addition, legends, fairy tales, and the literature of every culture on Earth further explore questions that have baffled humankind throughout the millennia of human consciousness: what 1 Homer, The Odyssey, trans. Robert Fitzgerald (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 1998), 1. does it mean to be good? why does evil exist? what is evil’s origin? In every culture, in every corner of the globe, some of the most memorable stories that respond to these questions fall in the realm of the fantastic. In this thesis, I explore how American fantasy literature expresses America’s most deeply held beliefs about the nature of good and evil and the Other. Specifically, I examine American fantasy novels written for or read by young adults––readers between the ages of 12 and 18—since 1950. Through these works, I examine the way fantasy writers portray good and evil. I place those portrayals side by side with the images American young people have encountered about who we are as a nation in the pages of newspapers, in political rhetoric, on television, and on the Internet in an effort to uncover whom Americans have defined as the enemy over the last 65 years. Understanding whom the United States sees as Other is especially important in an environment in which American commercial and military power remain the strongest in the world. On a daily basis American youth witness the effects of diverse and often conflicting belief systems on world events. In fantasy literature, protagonists’ responses to evil convey messages about approaching the Other. Deciphering those messages remains urgent for educators and parents preparing young people to understand the confusing, contradictory, and often frightening confrontations with Otherness that they encounter through modern media and in their textbooks. Why Young Adult Literature While some works of fantasy such as the Harry Potter series by J. K. Rowling, The Lord of the Rings, by J. R. R. Tolkien, and The Chronicles of Narnia, by C. S. Lewis 2 have received in depth scrutiny, critics have largely overlooked fantasy works written for young adults, until recently. Research on fantasy is currently in a state of flux as both the publishing industry and academic communities respond to the explosion of works in the genre written specifically for children and young adults over the last two decades. Furthermore, scholarship on children’s literature has traditionally fallen outside the domain of university English and literature departments, and is commonly considered the purview of Language Arts and Reading departments of Schools of Education. In fact, much of the discussion concerning books written for children and young adults is addressed to teachers and librarians. Although fantasy literature received little notice from academic critics until recently, currently the field is experiencing a burgeoning of interest as more new and established writers begin to create fantasy works for young adults. Furthermore as the body of fantasy literature matures, the critical literature follows in its wake.