Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Nevada, Reno, 2005. / "August, 2005." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 217-227). Online version available on the World Wide Web. Library also has microfilm. Ann Arbor, Mich. : ProQuest Information and Learning Company, [2005]. 1 microfilm reel ; 35 mm.

This dissertation studies the fictional and non-fictional responses of David Foster Wallace, Jonathan Franzen, and Richard Powers to their felt anxieties about the vitality of literature in contemporary culture. The intangible nature of literature's social value marks the literary as an uneasy, contested, and defensive cultural site. At the same time, the significance of any given cultural artifact or medium, such as television, film, radio, or fiction, is in a continual state of flux. Within that broad context I examine some of the cultural institutions competing with literature for public attention, as well as some of the cultural developments impacting the availability of public attention for literary concerns. With Wallace, I study his efforts in fiction and essays to establish an anti-ironic mode of literary rebellion, in opposition to the culturally pervasive tone of self-protective irony modeled by television. Franzen opens discussion about the transience of cultural authority, a situation in which the imprimatur of the academy, for instance, confers a cultural significance different in kind but not degree from the imprimatur of a popular televised book club. My study of Franzen in particular demonstrates the impact of proliferating sites of cultural authority, addressing the emergence of middlebrow culture and audiences from contested space to authoritative cultural arbiter. The chapter on Franzen also examines the increasing role of corporate interests in the production of cultural artifacts with an eye toward their financial viability more than their cultural impact. And finally, my study of Powers focuses on the animosity between the sciences and the humanities. Powers produces fiction that serves as an indispensable tool for communicating between disparate and otherwise isolated disciplines, and for helping those specialized fields synthesize their information with others.

This dissertation studies the fictional and non-fictional responses of David Foster Wallace, Jonathan Franzen, and Richard Powers to their felt anxieties about the vitality of literature in contemporary culture. The intangible nature of literature's social value marks the literary as an uneasy, contested, and defensive cultural site. At the same time, the significance of any given cultural artifact or medium, such as television, film, radio, or fiction, is in a continual state of flux. Within that broad context I examine some of the cultural institutions competing with literature for public attention, as well as some of the cultural developments impacting the availability of public attention for literary concerns. With Wallace, I study his efforts in fiction and essays to establish an anti-ironic mode of literary rebellion, in opposition to the culturally pervasive tone of self-protective irony modeled by television. Franzen opens discussion about the transience of cultural authority, a situation in which the imprimatur of the academy, for instance, confers a cultural significance different in kind but not degree from the imprimatur of a popular televised book club. My study of Franzen in particular demonstrates the impact of proliferating sites of cultural authority, addressing the emergence of middlebrow culture and audiences from contested space to authoritative cultural arbiter. The chapter on Franzen also examines the increasing role of corporate interests in the production of cultural artifacts with an eye toward their financial viability more than their cultural impact. And finally, my study of Powers focuses on the animosity between the sciences and the humanities. Powers produces fiction that serves as an indispensable tool for communicating between disparate and otherwise isolated disciplines, and for helping those specialized fields synthesize their information with others.

This study discusses works by Martin Amis and Don DeLillo in the context of several key scientific and technological transformations that occur in the aftermath of the Second World War. I begin by revisiting one of the most-discussed aspects of DeLillo's work: the currents conspiracy and paranoia that recur in his novels and, he claims, pervade the wider culture. By demonstrating how paranoid narratives strive to accommodate contemporary technologies, I create a context in which the paranoia addressed in works such as Libra and Underworld becomes intelligible as a response to the specific technological character of surveilance and control in the post-War period. The sciences of information and cybernetics also cohere in the years folowing the War, and the second chapter explores the creative tension between metaphors of entropy and information in Amis's fiction as wel as DeLillo's. The third chapter focuses on television as a constitutive element of postmodernity, and traces how DeLillo and Amis adopt narrative strategies that enable them to represent subjects who have grown accustomed to living within an environment mediated, to an unprecedented degree, by visual imagery supplied by or formatted for television. Another product of postmodern technology, commercial air travel reconfigures relationships to place and to time for inhabitants of industrialized countries. Both the liberating and limiting consequences of living in the latter half of the century of flight are addressed in the fourth chapter. The final chapter offers an assessment of the role contemporary media and technology play in establishing the characteristics associated with postmodernity, and concludes with a brief discussion of the role the internet might play within the context of the specific technologies discussed in the body of the thesis.

This study discusses works by Martin Amis and Don DeLillo in the context of several key scientific and technological transformations that occur in the aftermath of the Second World War. I begin by revisiting one of the most-discussed aspects of DeLillo's work: the currents conspiracy and paranoia that recur in his novels and, he claims, pervade the wider culture. By demonstrating how paranoid narratives strive to accommodate contemporary technologies, I create a context in which the paranoia addressed in works such as Libra and Underworld becomes intelligible as a response to the specific technological character of surveilance and control in the post-War period. The sciences of information and cybernetics also cohere in the years folowing the War, and the second chapter explores the creative tension between metaphors of entropy and information in Amis's fiction as wel as DeLillo's. The third chapter focuses on television as a constitutive element of postmodernity, and traces how DeLillo and Amis adopt narrative strategies that enable them to represent subjects who have grown accustomed to living within an environment mediated, to an unprecedented degree, by visual imagery supplied by or formatted for television. Another product of postmodern technology, commercial air travel reconfigures relationships to place and to time for inhabitants of industrialized countries. Both the liberating and limiting consequences of living in the latter half of the century of flight are addressed in the fourth chapter. The final chapter offers an assessment of the role contemporary media and technology play in establishing the characteristics associated with postmodernity, and concludes with a brief discussion of the role the internet might play within the context of the specific technologies discussed in the body of the thesis. / Arts, Faculty of / English, Department of / Graduate