Pre- and Post-9/11 Cultural Ennui in John Updike’s Terrorist, Richard Flanagan’s The Unknown Terrorist and Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar

Abstract

This research explores Cultural Ennui in the characters of Ahmad, Doll and Esther, the protagonists. Ahmed hails from John Updike’s Terrorist, who is a US born Egyptian-American. His hyphenated or double identity and consumer culture of America becomes the cause of Ahmad’s cultural ennui which makes him feel alienated and isolated in the consumerist America and he becomes morally ill. The orientalized depiction of Ahmad in the text is seen through Edward Said’s Orientalism, which shows Ahmad as uncivilized, erotic, sensual and death loving. A stereotypical representation of Muslims as terrorists is shown through the character of Ahmad; these orientalized qualities of Ahmad are unfit to live in American consumer culture, modernism and technologically advanced America. The post- 9/11 Orientalism further amplifies cultural ennui that creates strong feelings of hatred and repugnance between Americans and Muslims. Likewise, Doll from Richard Flanagan’s the Unknown Terrorist is occupied with cultural ennui on the soil of Australia in Sydney, where she is attached to a false label of terrorist on the basis of her affiliations with Tariq who is linked with radicalism and terrorism. This label of terrorist turns her life to swing between multiple identities and she becomes the victim of cultural ennui, which complicates her life and profession of pole dancing. Her survival becomes difficult and her yearning to get expensive brands, and sumptuous living is shattered .She is alienated and fed up of her job as a pole dancer with the false label of terrorist. The orientalization of Doll due to her attachment with Tariq becomes an excruciating gesture towards orientalizing her on the basis of racism and ethnicity. Similarly, Esther Greenwood from Plath’s The Bell Jar equally feels alienated and isolated in pre-9/11 American consumer culture and dual identity dilemma.