Collective Memory in a Post-Apocalyptic World: Reading Alden Bell’s The Reapers Are the Angels Heidi Toikkonen University of Tampere School of Language, Translation and Literary Studies English Philology Pro Gradu Thesis May 2014 Tampereen yliopisto Englantilainen filologia Kieli-, käännös- ja kirjallisuustieteiden yksikkö TOIKKONEN, HEIDI: Collective Memory in a Post-Apocalyptic World: Reading Alden Bell's The Reapers Are the Angels Pro gradu -tutkielma, 71 sivua toukokuu 2014 Tutkielmassani tarkastelen Alden Bellin romaania The Reapers Are the Angels (2010) kollektiivisen muistin näkökulmasta. Bellin romaani sijoittuu zombiruton kurittamiin Yhdysvaltain etelävaltioihin ja se on luonteeltaan post-apokalyptinen, eli kuvaa elämää maailmanlopun jälkeen. Tämä tarkoittaa sitä, että lähes kaikki yhteiskunnalliset rakenteet ovat romaanin maailmassa romahtaneet ja harvat selviytyjät elävät enimmäkseen pienissä yhteisöissä tai yksinäisinä vaeltajina: ihmisten elämästä on tullut hyvin eristäytynyttä ja monet sosiaaliset sidokset ovat kadonneet. Kollektiivinen muisti on kuitenkin riippuvainen näistä sidoksista, ja juuri siksi se nouseekin mielenkiintoni keskiöön tässä tutkielmassa. Teorianäkökulmakseni olen valinnut Maurice Halbwachsin ajatukset kollektiivisesta muistista ja sen sosiaalisista viitekehyksistä: hänen mukaansa yksilö ei oikeastaan edes kykene muistamaan ilman ryhmän tukea. Halbwachsin teoria on jo melko vanha, mutta vaikutusvaltaisuutensa takia siihen viitataan edelleen aina kollektiivisesta muistista puhuttaessa. Otan huomioon myös uudempia kollektiiviseen muistiin liittyviä kehityssuuntia, kuten Jan Assmanin kulttuurisen muistin. Lisäksi teorialuvussa esittelen identiteetin ja trauman käsitteet muistin näkökulmasta, koska ne mahdollistavat romaanin päähenkilön, Templen, maailmankuvan ja persoonan ymmärtämisen ja analysoinnin. Templen muistot erityisesti hänen pikkuveljestään Malcolmista muodostavat tärkeän rinnakkaistarinan romaanissa. Templen ohella keskityn analyysissäni yleisemmin romaanissa kuvattuun maailmaan ja siinä näkyviin jälkiin menneisyydestä. Varsinkin zombit näyttäytyvät olentoina, jotka muistattavat ihmisiä sekä menneisyydestä että nykytilanteesta, ja niillä jopa vihjaillaan itselläänkin olevan kyky muistaa jotakin. Vaikka yhteiskuntaa ei Bellin romaanissa enää käytännössä ole olemassa, elää sen maailmassa silti perheitä, jotka vievät sukupolvien välistä kollektiivista muistia eteenpäin: annan tutkielmassani kaksi esimerkkiä tällaisista perheistä, joilla on hyvin erilaiset tavat selvitä maailmanlopun haasteista. Kuitenkin väitän, että muistaminen on vahvasti läsnä molempien ryhmien elämässä, kuten se on koko romaanissa yleensäkin. Maailmanloppu on koetellut ja muuttanut kollektiivista muistia, mutta kokonaan kadonnut se ei ole. Asiasanat: kollektiivinen muisti, maailmanloppu, sukupolvet, identiteetti, zombit Table of Contents 1. Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 1 2. Collective Memory .......................................................................................................................... 6 3. Memory and Society ...................................................................................................................... 21 3.1. Traces of the Past .................................................................................................................... 21 3.2. The Chain between Generations ............................................................................................. 31 4. Memory and the Individual: The Case of Temple ......................................................................... 42 4.1. Born into this World ............................................................................................................... 42 4.2. The Story of Malcolm ............................................................................................................. 53 5. Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 65 Works Cited ....................................................................................................................................... 69 1 1. Introduction The apocalypse, then, is The End, or resembles the end, or explains the end. But nearly every apocalyptic text presents the same paradox. The end is never the end. The apocalyptic text announces and describes the end of the world, but then the text does not end, nor does the world represented in the text, and neither does the world itself. In nearly every apocalyptic presentation, something remains after the end. (Berger 1999, 5-6, emphasis original) As Berger notes, the existence of the literary genre that is post-apocalyptic fiction is indisputably paradoxical. This is because an apocalypse is supposed to be the end of the world, which would certainly also entail the end of stories. Evidently, however, this is not the case: almost invariably, something is spared from destruction, and that something then becomes the root of a post-apocalyptic text. Also, because the apocalypse resembles the end in that it often includes the wrecking of many of the foundations human society is built upon, the world after can evolve to be quite different from what it used to be – or, it can be filled with the eerie ghosts of the past, or anything in between. It would seem reasonable to suggest that what the world after an apocalypse becomes is, to a large extent, dependent on what is remembered of the old one. In this thesis, I will study Alden Bell's1 post-apocalyptic novel The Reapers Are the Angels (2010) from the point of view of collective memory. It can be debated whether this is a novel for young adults or adults: the protagonist is a teenager struggling with her identity, which would point towards young adult fiction. However, the graphic violence that is occasionally depicted as well as, for example, the unexpectedly hopeless ending would seem more at home in a novel aimed at the adult market. Perhaps it is for each reader to decide where they would place this work on that particular continuum. To my knowledge, The Reapers Are the Angels has not received any academic attention thus far, which makes studying it both challenging and exciting. The sequel to the novel, published in 2012 and named Exit Kingdom, will not be discussed in this thesis, because it presents a separate story from the first book even though some of the characters are the same. A third novel is 1 Alden Bell is actually a pseudonym for Joshua Gaylord. 2 also planned for the series, but the date of its publication has not yet been announced. It is my understanding that this third book, similarly to the second one, will have a separate plotline from the previous ones although it may contain some familiar elements, the most notable of which is the post- apocalyptic setting. At the time that The Reapers Are the Angels takes place, it has been a quarter of a century since people began turning into zombies. Consequently, society has crumpled to mere pockets of survivor groups here and there. Temple, a 15-year-old illiterate orphan girl, has never experienced the world before the apocalyptic infestation of the living dead. At the beginning of the book, she is living alone on an island somewhere off the coast of Florida: however, she has to leave because her home is becoming unsafe. She finds a place with a large group of other people and considers staying with them, but her plans are crushed when she accidentally kills a man whose brother, Moses Todd, wants revenge. She flees from the compound and keeps running away, but Moses seems to follow her wherever she goes. During her flight that takes her through the ravaged U.S. South all the way to Texas, Temple meets people from many walks of life: friendly travellers, a family who attempt to live like the apocalypse never happened, rueful refugees, and people who have mutated themselves into monsters. Her path also crosses with that of Maury, a mentally handicapped man who never speaks, and they become travelling companions. It becomes Temple's mission to deliver Maury to his relatives, provided they are still alive. Nevertheless, there is a parallel story line evident in the novel which consists of Temple's memories. As the story progresses, the ghosts of Temple's past are slowly revealed to the reader as well: what happened to the boy named Malcolm who may have been Temple's brother, and why Temple now regards herself as evil. My aim is to show that memory and remembering are central themes in the novel for a multitude of reasons: not only are there traces of the past detectable everywhere in the landscape and in the people because of the post-apocalyptic situation, but the journey Temple is on for the duration 3 of the story is at least as much down memory lane as it is across state lines. The topic of memory has been very popular in the last two or three decades, and Erll suggests that this is largely due to its applicability in a wide range of academic as well as popular discourses (2011, 1). She states that “the focus of memory studies rests . . . not on the 'past as it really was' but on the 'past as a human construct'” (ibid., 5). This resonates with the main theoretical angle I employ in this thesis, which is Maurice Halbwachs' theory of collective memory. Essentially, Halbwachs argues that we remember only as members of groups and within the social frameworks provided by those groups (1992, 43). He also maintains that what is remembered is influenced by the social needs currently arising from the aforementioned groups (ibid., 49), which means that we do not always remember things as they were, but as what best serves the present. Arguably, this is exactly what Erll considers the focus of memory studies, whereas the 'past as it really was' is reserved for historical research. Apart from Halbwachs and Erll, I will utilise the thoughts and works on memory of, to name a few, David Lowenthal, Jan Assman, Barbara Misztal and Anne Whitehead, in order to gain a more comprehensive as well as a more current basis for my analysis of The Reapers Are the Angels. In comparison with the academic popularity of the topic of memory, post-apocalyptic fiction has been nothing short of a phenomenon in recent years. The genre has stepped out of the nerdy science fiction niche with works such as Cormac McCarthy's The Road (2006) and Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games (2008). Moreover, zombies in particular have also gained a formidable audience, especially since the graphic novel series The Walking Dead was converted into television format (2010-): this horror drama has been renewed for a fifth season and has enjoyed the attention of millions of viewers every episode. Other popular zombie fictions include Carrie Ryan's The Forest of Hands and Teeth (2009) and Max Brooks' World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War (2006), which was recently made into a film. Taking all this into account, I argue that The Reapers Are the Angels is a part of a phenomenon that should be researched more because of its influence on the popular consciousness. 4 Many of the existing studies of post-apocalyptic fiction are concerned with environmental destruction and the aspect of human guilt, whereas zombies specifically have been seen as, for example, a metaphor for mindless consumption (Boluk and Lenz 2011, 7) or as symbols of internal fears and threats since they splay destruction by turning others into what they are (Paffenroth 2011, 18-19). Linking the post-apocalyptic and memory is by no means a completely unique idea either: particularly the already mentioned novel The Road by Cormac McCarthy has been the subject of a couple of such academic studies.2 However, when we take into account the fact that post-apocalyptic worlds often consist mostly of the ruins of the past, and that the role of the few survivors frequently is to serve as guardians, to a greater or lesser extent, of what is left of civilisation, it is somewhat surprising how little research there is on memory and post-apocalyptic fiction. It is also notable that even if memory has not been a central concern in academic studies of this genre, it certainly is a prolific fascination in less formal sources that talk about the post-apocalyptic.3 It seems that the so- called fandom is ahead of academic interest in this field. This thesis is divided into three major sections, in the first of which I will outline my theoretical framework. It is there that I will introduce Halbwachs' collective memory in detail, offer some criticisms against it and bring newer developments to the discussion, as well as go deeper into such facets of memory studies that have to do with identity and trauma, because those will be of critical importance for my analysis. The two analysis chapters are each further divided into two subchapters, and I approach the novel by moving from the more general to the more specific: I start by discussing the physical environment and traces of the (social) past that characterise the setting of The Reapers Are the Angels in 3.1., and then introduce two different families with intergenerational ties as examples of post-apocalyptic communities in 3.2. Chapter 4 will be entirely about Temple: in 4.1., I will talk about her identity as someone who has grown up in a post-apocalyptic world and what 2 See Godfrey, Laura Gruber. 2011. ”'The World He'd Lost': Geography and 'Green' Memory in Cormac McCarthy's The Road”. Critique 52, 2: 163-175. 3 See Campbell, Josie. 2014. Snyder Steers ”The Wake” into its Apocalyptic Future. [Internet] Available from http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=51229. [Accessed 4 May 2014] 5 that means from the point of view of collective memory. I conclude my analysis by delving into her traumatic memory of Malcolm in 4.2., arguing that the fact that she has not shared it collectively has been a hindrance for her healing from that incident. It is my hope that applying the theory of collective memory to a fictional text describing a world in which collective memory is under threat will render it tangible in a new way and be of help in developing the theories on memory further. 6 2. Collective Memory We speak so much of memory because there is so little of it left. - Pierre Nora The above citation (quoted in Erll 2011, 23) is a somewhat famous characterization of the circumstances that led to the so-called boom in memory studies that started in the 1980s and that is still ongoing. Ironically, it appears in Nora's introductory essay for Realms of Memory (Les Lieux de Mémoire 1984-1992), which is a seven-part book series Nora edited and which focuses solely on the memory and history of the French nation, never mind the rest of the world. However, I did not mention this particular quote to dispute it, but because it works as a perfect justification for the current thesis: why study collective memory in a post-apocalyptic setting? Because an apocalypse represents a break in memory as societies collapse, means of communication are severed, archives fall to destruction, and people die or lose contact with one another. Therefore, it becomes interesting to study what is left of memory after, and how that remainder has changed. In this section, I will outline the theoretical framework for my analysis of the importance of memory in Bell's The Reapers Are the Angels. I will start with Maurice Halbwachs' collective memory and the central concepts related to it, such as social frameworks of memory, intergenerational memory and shared versions of the past. I then move onto criticism directed at Halbwachs' theory and introduce Jan Assman's cultural memory as a necessary extension to it. After thus defining collective memory and explaining it in detail, I will discuss it in relation to such matters as identity and trauma which will be fundamental for my reading of The Reapers Are the Angels. Here I will also explain how and why forgetting is as important for collective memory as remembering is. I will conclude the chapter with some remarks on the practice of commemoration which will help explain the behaviour of certain characters in the novel further on. All in all, I have chosen these facets of collective memory to scrutinise because I think that they are the most helpful and appropriate tools for me to use in my analysis and that by utilising them I will be able to prove my argument of memory's centrality in the novel. 7 According to Whitehead, the concept of memory was first distinctly defined in Platonic philosophy, even though practical knowledge of memory is certainly older (2009, 4-5). It is in the texts of the ancient Greeks that we can also find the earliest notions of the memory of groups (Russell 2006, 792). Since then, the theme of memory has recurred in Western thought through the centuries again and again, sometimes changing shape but retaining much of the same fascinations, such as inscription and spatial metaphors (Whitehead 2009, 9). What are meant by these is, for example, how writing something down affects memory and also how spaces, real or imagined, can act as aids or triggers for memory. This recurrence of ideas can hardly be considered surprising, since memory is ”fundamental to our ability to conceive the world” (Misztal 2003, 1), and as such has attracted the attention of several academic disciplines. These include such diverse fields of study as, to name a few, psychology, sociology, anthropology, neurology, (oral) history, and literature and cultural studies, of which this thesis is a part. The multidisciplinary nature of memory studies is also one reason for the vast quantities of research conducted on it, especially over the last three decades. It is well beyond the scope of this thesis to delve into most of this research, so I have narrowed my theoretical framework down to mainly include research that has been done on collective memory specifically, and further to Halbwachs and his legacy. The reason for choosing his work over others' is that, in my understanding, the concept of collective memory would not exist as it is known today without Halbwachs' ideas on the subject, such as his denial of there being any actual individual memory (Halbwachs 1992, 43). Additionally, his ideas have been both criticised and used as a basis for new theories of memory numerous times, creating a promising pool of research. In this way, his theory, while quite old, has seen many revivals in other people's hands. Maurice Halbwachs (1877-1945) was a French philosopher and sociologist. As Whitehead tells us, Halbwachs embarked on his career under Henri Bergson whose philosophy emphasizes individualism (2009, 125). However, he later rejected Bergson's focus on the individual and became