Addis, V orcid.org/0000-0001-6127-7730 (2016) The “Greening” of Postmodern Discourse in Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and Graham Swift’s Waterland. Margaret Atwood Studies, 10. pp. 4-19.
Abstract
In this essay, I will argue that the groundlessness associated with postmodernism is not as entrenched within its discourse as it may appear. Graham Swift’s Waterland (1992) and Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake (2003) share an ecopostmodernist platform that raises questions about the human relationship with nature, while conforming to many of the aesthetic values of postmodernism. Both works actively interrogate the boundaries between human/animal/machine and nature/civilisation, revealing environmentally aware perspectives informed by a postmodern sensibility. In their encompassing of environmental and ecological perspectives, both novels critique elements of postmodernity and contemporary consumer capitalism, and raise serious questions about our relationship to the world around us. In defiance of traditional notions of postmodernism, Atwood’s and Swift’s novels exemplify an engagement with the natural world and present conceptions of reality that do not accept disengagement or detachment as a suitable response to the perceived ‘postmodernist cataclysms threatening the grounds of human existence’ (Stierstorfer 234).
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: | |
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | This article is protected by copyright. Reproduced with permission from the publisher. |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures (Leeds) > School of English (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 06 Sep 2018 10:00 |
Last Modified: | 25 Jun 2023 21:30 |
Published Version: | https://atwoodsociety.org/issue-10-toc-masj/ |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Margaret Atwood Society |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:135361 |