Death, Doubles and Dissociation: Reading Donna Tartt’s The Secret History and Bret Easton Ellis’s Lunar Park Through the Lens of Gothic-postmodernism

• Main Author: Berry, Jessie
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bret Easton Ellis; death; Donna Tartt; Gothic; Gothic-postmodernism; loss of reality; loss of self; Lunar Park; postmodernism; sublime terror; The Secret History

This thesis applies the theory of Gothic-postmodernism formulated by Maria Beville to the novels The Secret History by Donna Tartt and Lunar Park by Bret Easton Ellis. As a relatively new theory, Gothic-postmodernism has not been applied to many novels. Moreover, little scholarship has been devoted to discussing Tartt’s writing. Therefore, with this thesis I hope to contribute to the field of Gothic-postmodernism and to add to the academic work on The Secret History. Through a close reading of the two texts, the thesis examines the authors’ use of Gothic and postmodern characteristics and the ways in which they work together to create sublime terror. It is shown that sublime terror primarily takes three forms: the loss of self, the loss of reality, and death. In line with Beville’s argument that Gothic-postmodernist literature expresses the fears of contemporary society, my thesis also pays attention to which societal anxieties are evident in the novels. I argue that two main fears are present in The Secret History: fears about the corrupting influence of university campuses and the dangerous knowledge imparted there, and concerns about immoral youth. As an American novel written after the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, Lunar Park reflects anxieties about living in post-9/11 America. It also demonstrates parental fears regarding vulnerable children. In concluding, the thesis suggests that even though both novels exhibit the features of many different genres and are very dissimilar novels, it is the features of postmodernism and the Gothic which are the most significant in both, making the theory of Gothic-postmodernism a particularly useful lens through which to read them. Furthermore, this thesis proposes that far from being an irrelevant genre in literature today, the Gothic has evolved to play a role in postmodern fiction.