Overview

Drawing on theories of historiography, memory, and diaspora, as well as from existing genre studies, this book explores why contemporary writers are so fascinated with history. Pei-chen Liao considers how fiction contributes to the making and remaking of the transnational history of the U.S. by thinking beyond and before 9/11, investigating how the dynamics of memory, as well as the emergent present, influences readers’ reception of historical fiction and alternate history fiction and their interpretation of the past. Set against the historical backdrop of WWII, the Vietnam War, and the War on Terror, the novels under discussion tell Jewish, Japanese, white American, African, Muslim, and Native Americans’ stories of trauma and survival. As a means to transmit memories of past events, these novels demonstrate how multidirectional memory can be not only collective but connective, as exemplified by the echoes that post-9/11 readers hear between different histories of violence that thenovels chronicle, as well as between the past and the present.

Full Product Details

Author:   Pei-chen Liao
Publisher:   Springer Nature Switzerland AG
Imprint:   Springer Nature Switzerland AG
Edition:   1st ed. 2020
Weight:   0.283kg
ISBN:  

9783030524944

ISBN 10:   3030524949
Pages:   203
Publication Date:   20 September 2021
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
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Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Introduction: Beyond and Before 9/11: A Transnational Historical Turn.- Chapter 2 “The Second Coming”: The Resurgence of the Historical Novel and American Alternate History.- Chapter 3: “America First”: Fear, Memory, Activism, and Everyday Life in Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America.- Chapter 4: “In Memory of Toyoko H. Nozaka”: Life Writing, Cultural Memory, and Historical Mediation in Julie Otsuka’s When the Emperor was Divine.- Chapter 5: “Walking a Tightrope”: Illusion and Disillusion of American Innocence and Exceptionalism in Colum McCann’s Let the Great World Spin.- Chapter 6: “What about the Names?”: Post-9/11 Commemorative Culture and Islamaphobia in Amy Waldman’s The Submission.- Chapter 7: Conclusion: Connective Memories and Histories.  

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Author Information

Pei-chen Liao is Associate Professor of Foreign Languages and Literature at National Cheng Kung University, Taiwan, and the winner of the 2017 FAOS Innovative Young Scholar Award. Her publications include‘Post’-9/11 South Asian Diasporic Fiction (2013) and articles in Life Writing, Review of English and American Literature, EurAmerica, and several other journals.

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