1st Edition
Trauma, Gender and Ethics in the Works of E.L. Doctorow
This project approaches four of E. L. Doctorow’s novels—Welcome to Hard Times (1960), The Book of Daniel (1971), Ragtime (1975), and City of God (2000)—from the perspectives of feminist criticism and trauma theory. The study springs from the assumption that Doctorow’s literary project is eminently ethical and has an underlying social and political scope. This crops up through the novels’ overriding concern with injustice and their engagement with the representation of human suffering in a variety of forms. The book puts forward the claim that E.L. Doctorow’s literary project—through its representation of psychological trauma and its attitude towards gender—may be understood as a call to action against both each individual’s indifference and the wider social and political structures and ideologies that justify and/or facilitate the injustices and oppression to which those who are situated at the margins of contemporary US society are subjected.
Introduction
Chapter 1. Welcome to Hard Times; the Frontier Reconsidered
Shame, Guilt, Violence and Trauma
In Search for a New Gender Order
Discussion and Conclusion
Chapter 2. The Book of Daniel; a Memoir Gone Awry
The Trauma of a Grievous Past
Gender Oppression and/as Power
Discussion and Conclusion
Chapter 3. Ragtime; Remembering the Future
Trauma and Resilience
The Politics of Gender
Discussion and Conclusion
Chapter 4. City of God; with Eyes Past All Grief
Fictionalizing the Holocaust
Voicing Gender
Discussion and Conclusion
Chapter 5. Discussion; the Ethics and Politics of Literature
Conclusion
Biography
María Ferrández San Miguel is a lecturer at the Department of English and German Studies (University of Zaragoza). Her work has been published in journals such as Atlantis, The Nordic Journal of English Studies and Orbis Litterarum, and in volumes such as Memory Frictions: Conflict, Negotiation, Politics (Palgrave MacMillan).
