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Kevin Richard Kaiser VARIABLE KINDNESS Posthumanist Ethics in the Fiction of George Saunders Kevin Richard Kaiser TESI DOCTORAL UPF / 2018 DIRECTOR DE LA TESI Dr. Pere Gifra Adroher DEPARTAMENT D’HUMANITATS A tots els animals. En memòria de l'Spencer. iii Agraïments Primer i abans que res, gràcies a la UPF per acceptar-me en el programa de doctorat. També, gràcies al Dr. Pere Gifra per la seva orientació, suggeriments i suport en aquest projecte. El procés d'escriure aquesta tesi hauria estat molt menys viable sense la seva ajuda. Igualment, sense l'ajuda de l'Ángels Bertran, navegar a través dels processos administratius del doctorat hauria estat molt més confús. En totes les consultes que li he fet, George Saunders, com sempre, ha estat d'allò més generós, malgrat la seva creixent fama. Dos petonets a cadascun dels meus amics de Barcelona—la Jésica i en David, la Renata i en Joan, la Laure i l’Enric—amb qui vaig beure molt de Vichy Catalan i herba mate. No hauria pogut acabar aquesta tesi sense la paciència i suport de l’Angela, que em va aportar una altra perspectiva. També, m’agradaria agrair el suport dels meus pares, que hi han sacrificat molt i han fet tot això possible. Finalment, vull mostrar també el agraïment als meus mestres no humans, que inclouen en Ponyboy, en Buddy, i la Friede i tots els que viuen al Zoo de Barcelona. Que algun dia puguin viure més lliurement! v Abstract This thesis examines the fiction of contemporary American author George Saunders in terms of how it presents situations applicable to the chief notions of posthumanist ethics and how these conceptions of ethics concern nonhuman animals, which are prevalent in his writing. Posthumanist ethics can help us understand what is at play in Saunders’s fiction. Meanwhile, his fiction can help us understand what is at stake in posthumanist ethics. This interdisciplinary project may be beneficial both to conceiving new notions of ethics that are more inclusive and, more implicitly, to understanding the relevance of Saunders’s fiction to the current American sociocultural climate. Keywords: George Saunders, posthumanism, ethics, fiction, animals. vii Resum Aquesta tesi analitza la ficció de l'escriptor nord-americà contemporani George Saunders, tot centrat-se en com presenta situacions aplicables als principals conceptes de l’ètica posthumanista i en com aquests conceptes ètics afecten els animals no humans, que apareixen amb freqüència en els seus escrits. L'ètica posthumanista pot ajudar-nos a entendre el que està en joc en la ficció de Saunders. Mentrestant, la seva ficció pot ajudar-nos a comprendre el que està en joc en l'ètica posthumanista. Aquest projecte interdisciplinari pot esdevinir beneficiós tant per concebre noves nocions d'ètica més inclusives com, més implícitament, per comprendre la rellevància de la ficció de Saunders dins el context sociocultural nord-americà actual. Paraules clau: George Saunders, posthumanisme, ètica, ficció, animals. viii Preface I approach the fiction of the award-winning American author George Saunders from the critical stance of posthumanism. This relatively recent theoretical development has taken many different paths, but the one that I am most interested in following is its deconstruction of anthropocentrism and repositioning of ethics to include “the Other.” Specifically, I am concerned how human and nonhuman animal others relate, especially in terms of ethics, and what this means to determinations of ethicality. The fiction of Saunders, which is often characterized as being both satirical and ethical, provides a place in which to explore notions of posthumanist ethics. His stories, novellas, and his novel all include nonhuman animals, either as characters or as details. Frequently, they are met with violence, abuse, and death. While Saunders does not write about nonhuman animals due to any particular agenda, their appearance in his fiction indicates how interactions with them may become ethical moments in quotidian American life. It is my belief that a study of posthumanist ethics through the acclaimed fiction of Saunders will allow for a greater awareness of just what posthumanist ethics is and what is at stake in conceiving new notions of ethics while also providing a critical examination of what is at play in his fiction and how he achieves what critics hail as his satirical yet ethical style. ix x Index Agraïments .......................................................................................v Abstract...........................................................................................vii Preface.............................................................................................ix INTRODUCTION............................................................................ 1 1. EMPATHY AND SATIRE: THE FICTION OF GEORGE SAUNDERS .................................................................................. 15 1.1. “The Moral Acculturation of Empathy”: Saunders and Satire .......................................................................................... 15 1.2. “America 101:” Peers, Influences, and David Foster Wallace ...................................................................................... 23 1.3. “Radical Kindness”: A Posthuman Literature of Compassion .............................................................................. 30 1.4. “An Inherently Ethical Activity”: Reading Saunders Critically ..................................................................................... 40 2. BEYOND HUMANISM: POSTHUMANIST ETHICS .......... 49 2.1. “A Potential in Our Culture": The Emergence of Posthumanism .......................................................................... 49 2.2. “We are Animals”: The Discourse of Species .............. 80 2.3. “Who Comes Before and Who is After Whom?”: The Animal Question ....................................................................... 90 2.4. “There Can Be No ‘Science’ of Ethics”: Posthumanist Ethics as (Im)possibility.........................................................102 3. THE ETHICS OF RACCOONS AND HUMANS: “THE 400- POUND CEO” .............................................................................117 3.1. “A Very Clear Moral Valence”: Writing Nonhuman Animals ....................................................................................117 xi 3.2. “Welcome to America”: Satire, Ethics, and American Culture .....................................................................................122 3.3. “A Very Beautiful, Exaggerated Experience”: Experiential Fiction.................................................................130 3.4. “A Substantive Difference”: Who is “the Other”?.......136 3.5. “Eliminating a Piece of Filth”: What is Ethically “Right”? ..................................................................................................142 4. LANGUAGE, MEAT, AND POWER: “PASTORALIA” .....153 4.1. “Some Guttural Sounds and Some Motions”: What is Language? ..............................................................................153 4.2. “My Steak and My Shoes”: Carnophallogocentrism .171 4.3. “The Maximum Good for the Overall Organism”: Ethical Loyalty......................................................................................188 5. DETERMINING WHO LIVES AND WHO DIES: THE VERY PERSISTENT GAPPERS OF FRIP AND THE BRIEF AND FRIGHTENING REIGN OF PHIL ............................................197 5.1. “Except of Course the Fish”: Anthropocentrism and the Lives of Fish ............................................................................197 5.2. “Less Stupid”: The Problem of Size Mattering...........204 5.3. “Take for Example a Duck”: Humanity as a Human Trait ..........................................................................................207 5.4. “When Someone Goes Genocidal”: Genocide, Politics, and Nonhuman Animals........................................................216 6. BIG PHARMA AND THE CHRIST-MONKEY: “93990” ...225 6.1. “The Christ-Monkey”: Nonhuman Animal Sacrifice for Human Well-Being .................................................................225 6.2. “Scientifically Defensible”: The Problem of the So- Called Impartial Observer .....................................................239 xii 7. THE ANIMALITY OF THE HUMAN: “PUPPY”..................255 7.1. “Perfect:” Narrative Dummies, Communicating Vessels, and Motif..................................................................255 7.2. “Tethered Like an Animal:” Questioning Animality and Ethics .......................................................................................263 7.3. “Maybe That’s What Love Was”: Complicating Ethics ..................................................................................................273 7.4. “Don’t Look Back”: Naming, Sacrifice, Shame, and the Abyssal Limit ...........................................................................283 8. BEING NONHUMAN: FOX 8 ...............................................289 8.1. “Yuman”: Dominionism and Human Verbal Language ..................................................................................................289 8.2. “Try Being Nicer”: The Ethics of Fox 8........................306 9. BETWEEN THE DEAD AND THE LIVING: LINCOLN IN THE BARDO ...............................................................................319 9.1. “I’ve Peaked!”: The Significance of Saunders’s First Nove l ........................................................................................319 9.2. “I am Horse”: Life, Death,
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