Peace, Isolation, Purity. Salvation and its Antithesis in Katherine Dunn's "Geek Love"

• Stephanie Weber ^[1]
  1. [1] University of Vienna

     University of Vienna

     Innere Stadt, Austria

     
• Localización: Comparative Critical Studies, ISSN 1744-1854, Vol. 14, Nº. 2-3, 2017, págs. 347-369
• Idioma: inglés
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• Resumen

  • This paper investigates how salvage and its antithesis are linked to the promise of salvation in Katherine Dunn's novel Geek Love by looking at the dynamics of social interaction forming normative as well as non-normative identities in the sideshow setting of the novel. The consent to give up and eradicate the Self when faced with internal dilemma and the promise of salvation, as it is depicted in Geek Love, rewrites Freudian and Jungian notions of group psychology, theology, and cult experiences. The processes which lead to the freak being treated as the ‘holy grotesque’ and the ‘Secret Self’ are analysed to show how the character Arty's motto ‘Peace, Isolation, Purity’ promises a kind of salvation from the Self and the burden of normalcy, which nonetheless ultimately leads to non-salvation.