States of Exception in the Contemporary Novel

In the aftermath of the September 11 terror attacks, the political situation in both the United States and abroad has often been described as a 'state of exception': a situation in which the normal rule of law is suspended. This book investigates the aesthetics, ethics, and politics of decisions in post-9/11 contemporary fiction.

In the aftermath of the September 11 terror attacks, the political situation in both the United States and abroad has often been described as a 'state of exception': a situation in which the normal rule of law is suspended. This book investigates the aesthetics, ethics, and politics of decisions in post-9/11 contemporary fiction.

Dedication; Acknowledgements; List of Illustrations; Introduction: Decision Time; A. September 11 and the Aesthetic Decision; B. The Chapters; C. Schmitt, Hobbes, Benjamin, Burnham; Chapter One: States of Exception in Yann Martel's Life of Pi; A. Introduction; B. Political State of Exception; C. Psychic State of Exception; D. Theological State of Exception; E. The Politics of Allegory; Chapter Two: Autobiography and Human Rights in Jeffrey; Eugenides' Middlesex; A. A Failure of Reading; B. Reading Human Rights; C. The Political Life of Sex; D. Sex in Theory; E/ Autobiography and Messianism; Chapter Three: Literary Economies in J.M. Coetzee's Disgrace; A. Disgrace, Once More; B. The Circular Economy of Violence; C. Reading Incest; D. Lucy's Count; E. Lucy as "the part of those who have no part"; F. From Animals to Aesthetic Economy; Chapter Four: Architectures of Exception in W.G. Sebald's Austerlitz; A. Architecture, Trauma, and the Camps; B. Reading Fortifications; C. The Cabinet of Wonder; D. Architectures of the Uncanny; E. Moving Testimony; F. The Novel in Motion; or: The Politics of Austerlitz's Aesthetic; Conclusion: From Exception to Care; A. Crisis and Play; B. Biopolitics, the Novel, and Care; Bibliographic References; Index.