Why do we still want to believe? The case of Annie Proulx.

Scanlon, Julie (2008) Why do we still want to believe? The case of Annie Proulx. Journal of Narrative Theory, 38 (1). pp. 86-110. ISSN 1549-0815

Full text not available from this repository. (Request a copy)

Abstract

"I Want to Believe" declares the slogan beneath a UFO on the poster behind Fox Mulder's desk in the television series, The X-Files. This expression of the character's desire for faith in an alien world beyond our own underlines his mission throughout the series to find evidence that "the truth is out there," the show's motto. It is Mulder's desire ("I want to believe"), stopping short of belief even, that sustains him on his quest for truth. I begin with this example as a conceit for seeking realism in the late twentieth to early twenty-first century. For the persistence of the desire for "the truth" in the face of obstacles to it shadows the no less incongruous desire for realist fictions in our contemporary theoretical climate.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Realism in literature, Proulx, Annie--Criticism and interpretation
Subjects:	Q200 Comparative Literary studies
Department:	Faculties > Arts, Design and Social Sciences > Humanities
Depositing User:	EPrint Services
Date Deposited:	20 May 2010 15:52
Last Modified:	12 Oct 2019 19:22
URI:	http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/id/eprint/1413

Downloads