Originally published in Margaret Atwood Studies, vol. 10 (December, 2016) ABSTRACT: In this article, I 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
Written in the 1980s at the height of Thatcher’s Britain, Alan Moore’s V for Vendetta is a politically charged graphic novel set in a dystopian near-future world in which Britain has fallen into fascism following a brief nuclear exchange. The
Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot is often used as an example of a work astride two movements: modernism and postmodernism. It was written in 1955 when modernism was experiencing something of a revival in the wake of the Second World
Umberto Eco’s final novel is a fast-paced historical thriller centred on a newspaper that will never be published, and a conspiracy theory surrounding the death of the Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. At just under 200 pages, Numero Zero is the shortest
Roberto Bolaño’s By Night in Chile is a study in unreliable narration. It tells the story of the writer/priest/critic Sebastian Urrutia Lacroix as he reflects, from his death-bed, on certain events in his life, particularly those in connection to the Pinochet regime.
Italo Calvino was an Italian writer associated with both neorealism and postmodernism. He published a number of works during the latter half of the twentieth century and won a number of awards including the World Fantasy Award for lifetime achievement.