Reaganism, Thatcherism and the Social Novel

215 Pages·2008·1.462 MB·English

by  Colin Hutchinson (auth.)

Reaganism, Thatcherism and the Social Novel
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Reaganism, Thatcherism
and the Social Novel
Colin Hutchinson
© Colin Hutchinson 2008
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2008 978-0-230-21045-5
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this
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Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication
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The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this
work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2008 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN
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registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke,
Hampshire RG21 6XS.
Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin's Press LLC,
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ISBN 978-1-349-30308-3 ISBN 978-0-230-59490-6 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9780230594906
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully
managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing
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country of origin.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hutchinson, Colin, 1958–
Reaganism, Thatcherism, and the social novel / Colin Hutchinson.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index.
1. English fiction–20th century–History and criticism. 2. Political fiction,
English–History and criticism. 3. American fiction–20th century–History
and criticism. 4. Political fiction, American–History and criticism. 5. Social
problems in literature. 6. Right and left (Political science) in literature.
7. Thatcher, Margaret–Influence. 8. Reagan, Ronald–Influence. 9. Politics and
literature–Great Britain–History–20th century. 10. Politics and literature–
United States–History–20th century. I. Title.
PR888.P6H87 2008
823(cid:1).9109358—dc22 2008016429
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08
To Anne
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Contents
Acknowledgements viii
Introduction 1
1 Reagan, Thatcher and the 1980s 15
2 Complicity and British Fiction 38
3 Liberal Guilt and American Fiction 65
4 The Communitarian Turn 90
5 Futures and Pasts 112
6 The Battlefield of the Self 136
Conclusion 168
Notes 179
Bibliography 195
Index 203
vii
Acknowledgements
The author and publishers wish to thank the following for permission
to reproduce copyright material:
Taylor & Francis Ltd. for Stan Lindsay, ‘Waco and Andover: An
Application of Kenneth Burke’s Concept of Psychotic Entelechy’
Quarterly Journal of Speech (1999), 85 (3).
Americana: The Journal of American Popular Culture for Alex E. Blazer,
‘Chasms of Reality, Aberrations of Identity: Defining the Postmodern
Through Bret Easton Ellis’s American Psycho’ (2002), 1 (2).
Pynchon Notes for Johan Callen, ‘Tubed Out and Movie Shot in Pynchon’s
Vineland’ (1991), volumes 28–29; M. Keith Booker, ‘Vineland and Dystopian
Fiction’ (1992), volumes 30–31; Barbara L. Pittman, ‘Genealogy, History
and the Political Left in Vineland’ (1992), volumes 30–31; Philip
Gochenour, ‘The History Written on the Body: Photography, History
and Memory in Pynchon’s Vineland’ (1993), volumes 32–33; Eva C.
Karpinski, ‘From V to Vineland: Pynchon’s Utopian Moments’ (1993),
volumes 32–33; and John Johnston, ‘An American Book of the Dead:
Media and the Unconscious in Vineland’ (1994), volumes 34–35.
Sage Publications for Herbert Kitschelt, ‘Austrian and Swedish Social-
Democrats in Crisis: Party Strategy and Organization in Corporatist
Regimes’ in Comparative Political Studies (1994), 27 (1); Thomas Robbins,
‘Cults, Converts, and Charisma: the Sociology of New Religious
Movements’ Current Sociology (1988), 36 (1); and Lori Kendall, ‘Nerd
Nation: Images of Nerds in US Popular Culture’ International Journal of
Cultural Studies (1999), 2 (2).
ARIEL: A Review of International English Literature for Berthold Schoene-
Harwood, ‘Dams Burst: Devolving Gender’ in Iain Banks’s The Wasp
Factory (1999), 30 (1).
Oxford University Press for N. Katherine Hayles, ‘Postmodern Parataxis:
Embodied Texts, Weightless Information’ in American Literary History
(1990), 2 (3); and Xuejun Sun, ‘Thatcher’s Man’ Cambridge Quarterly
(1994), 23 (4).
viii
Acknowledgements ix
Kudlow & Co. for Lawrence Kudlow, ‘Reaganomics, What Worked? What
Didn’t?’ (1997), available at www.ronaldreagan.com/experiment.html;
accessed on 16 June 2008.
The Dalkey Archive Press for Jonathan Franzen, ‘I’ll Be Doing More of
Same’ The Review of Contemporary Fiction (1996), 16 (1).
The English Association for Paul Edwards, ‘Time, Romanticism,
Modernism, and Moderation in Ian McEwan’s The Child in Time’, and
Jeremy Green, ‘Millennial Hysteria in Don DeLillo’s Mao II’ in English:
The Journal of the English Association (1995), volume 44; and Patricia
Horton, ‘Trainspotting: A Topography of the Masculine Abject’ English
(2001), volume 50.
Heldref Publications for David Porush, ‘ “Purring into Transcendence”:
Pynchon’s Puncutron Machine’ Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction
(1995), 36 (4); and Jago Morrison, ‘Narration and Unease in Ian Mcewan’s
Later Fiction’ Critique (2001), 42 (3).
Bomb magazine for an excerpt from an interview between Jonathan
Franzen and Donald Antrim (2001), issue 77.