Writing the Past in Twenty-first-century American Fiction

Abstract

Argues for a reawakened commitment to historicity in contemporary American fiction Includes brand new and intensive readings of contemporary novels by the foremost American writers of the twenty-first century Combines detailed contextual discussion with close readings of the novels Places historical events in dialogue with twenty-first-century contexts Writing the Past in Twenty-First-Century American Fiction examines contemporary novels profoundly shaped by a sense of historical consciousness. Authors including Ben Lerner, Colson Whitehead, Dana Spiotta, Hari Kunzru and Garth Greenwell each use flashbacks, historical parallels and non-sequential narrative arrangements to emphasise the re-emergence, in a twenty-first-century context, of historical structures and circumstances. This study explores how these frequent moments of temporal slippage amount to a ‘falling out of time’, as characters are forced to confront the past crises which continue to exert pressure on their own contemporary moment.