This thesis attends to depictions of food in literature and film set amid mass destruction, exploring eating after apocalypse. I take \"post-apocalyptic\" to be a flexible classification and seek to work outside the confines of genre in order to examine the novel's imaginative capacities and limits. My primary texts are Margaret Atwood's 2003 novel Oryx and Crake; Chris Abani's 2004 novel Graceland; José Saramago's 1997 novel Blindness; and the 1987 film adaptation of Babette's Feast, directed by Gabriel Axel. In them, I analyze food's connection to nostalgia, language, and the creation of meaning. I insist that food, with all its violence, indulgence, and messy significance, is everywhere in contemporary fiction—and essential to its imaginative world-building. Though the future of eating is difficult to predict, whether logically or imaginatively, these stories elucidate cultural and historical tastes, hinting at which of our gastronomic conventions and preferences should remain and which should be left behind.
"},{"label":"Degree","value":["Bachelor of Arts with Departmental Honors"]},{"label":"Author-supplied Keywords","value":["Food & eating","Post-apocalyptic literature"]},{"label":"Administrative Note","value":"Drupal Node ID: 33915