『선셋파크』에 나타난 역사의식과 탈역사적 세계관의 충돌
The Ideological Clash between Historicity and Ahistoricity in Sunset Park
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This paper explores the ambivalence in the political aspect of Paul Auster’s Sunset Park. Set in the 2008 Subprime Mortgage Crisis that has led to a significant amount of house foreclosures and the ensuing economic recession throughout the early 2010s, the novel creates an alternative space of Foucauldian heterotopia going against the logic of financial capitalism behind the Crisis. By refusing two kinds of optimistic view on history altogether – one that financial capitalism promises and the other that the American ideal of infinite progress explicates – the novel tries to redefine the political significance of “the here and now” free from the over-optimistic historicity. In doing so, however, the novel reveals quite an ironical impulse of ahistoricity, which is mostly marked by Auster’s trademarks of coincidence and chance. Its narrative heavily depends upon the idea of how coincidence and fate can change the course of life, thereby implying that the main driving force behind history – both personal and national – can be as much random as rational. This process of incorporating ahistorical randomness to the novel ends up undermining its own political premise: The whole project begins with the political impulse of criticizing contemporary American society dictated by the financial capitalist idea economically and the American belief of progress culturally, but it ends with a highly apolitical notion that all the scars you get from life can be not only random but also somewhat helpful for your inner growth.
Abstract
This paper explores the ambivalence in the political aspect of Paul Auster’s Sunset Park. Set in the 2008 Subprime Mortgage Crisis that has led to a significant amount of house foreclosures and the ensuing economic recession throughout the early 2010s, the novel creates an alternative space of Foucauldian heterotopia going against the logic of financial capitalism behind the Crisis. By refusing two kinds of optimistic view on history altogether – one that financial capitalism promises and the other that the American ideal of infinite progress explicates – the novel tries to redefine the political significance of “the here and now” free from the over-optimistic historicity. In doing so, however, the novel reveals quite an ironical impulse of ahistoricity, which is mostly marked by Auster’s trademarks of coincidence and chance. Its narrative heavily depends upon the idea of how coincidence and fate can change the course of life, thereby implying that the main driving force behind history – both personal and national – can be as much random as rational. This process of incorporating ahistorical randomness to the novel ends up undermining its own political premise: The whole project begins with the political impulse of criticizing contemporary American society dictated by the financial capitalist idea economically and the American belief of progress culturally, but it ends with a highly apolitical notion that all the scars you get from life can be not only random but also somewhat helpful for your inner growth.
참고문헌 (19)
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