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Postmodern themes and tropes in Carver's short stories - Coggle Diagram
Postmodern themes and tropes in Carver's short stories
Low-rent tragedy
Daily life
poorer communities where people cannot escape their conditions
"One more thing"
economic impotence and spiritual ennui of the
postmodern American working class of the 1970s and 1980s
lack money, no meaningful connections
no solace or meaning in life
no professional advancement
Disillusionment and the Desire for Distraction or Escape
1) people no longer care what happens to others
2) nothing makes any real difference any longer
world is changing has left them without a sense of purpose
economically, sexually or otherwise impotent
distraction in sex, drinking, and mindless tv
problems manifest in dreams
desperate for an escape
Disconnection
“fell to pieces long ago”
breaking up of relationships
Troubled
communication plagues the characters.
Characters resist meaningful dialogue
sense of alienation in society = American dream is devastated
Alcohol, violence and misogyny
alcoholism leads to violence, misogyny, racism, masochism
violence threatened or repressed
emphasises the mood of powerlessness and anxiety
glimmer of hope for
redemption = alcoholics need to tell their stories
Questioning traditional identity structures
Postmodern experimentation with new structures
alternative norms could emerge
stories create spaces to explore, deconstruct, and
sometimes reconstruct the way we view structures of power and meaning
normative
masculine identity is brought into question
Authorial Self-reference
Author refers to themselves by drawing attention to themselves as another character = special relationship with the reader
metafiction = constructedness of the story
social niceties, rather than meaningful discourse
frequently acknowledges the
reader’s presence
asks retorical references
narrator depicted as an authentic, but far from omniscient
individual – also challenges the narrator’s reliability
Postmodern Treatment of Allegory
Offers no solution to the reader
irony
Background
Carver wrote short stories because he didn't have time to write novels = demise of the grand narrative
No single universal truth = just little moments of meaning
Patchwork of American society
