Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation

Lyotard defines the postmodern as “incredulity towards metanarratives.” Indeed, the rise of existential and postmodern ideas has meant the relinquishing of religious ideals in society and in Literature. However, even with postmodernism’s strong sense of disapproval of religious doctrines, it is pecu...

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Main Author: Zaidah Rahmat
Other Authors: Angela Anne Frattarola
Format: Final Year Project
Language:English
Published: 2009
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Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10356/15212
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Institution: Nanyang Technological University
Language: English
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spelling sg-ntu-dr.10356-152122019-12-10T11:09:00Z Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation Zaidah Rahmat Angela Anne Frattarola School of Humanities and Social Sciences DRNTU::Humanities::Literature::English Lyotard defines the postmodern as “incredulity towards metanarratives.” Indeed, the rise of existential and postmodern ideas has meant the relinquishing of religious ideals in society and in Literature. However, even with postmodernism’s strong sense of disapproval of religious doctrines, it is peculiar to see that religion is still very much employed in postmodern literature. It also looks like this compulsion to include religion in such literature has the effect of legitimising readings of the text from a religious lens. Because of this, works of postmodern literature can also be interpreted as portraying religion positively instead of the commonly thought “purging” effect they have on religious ideals. By “positive portrayal” I mean that postmodern texts do not show religion to be an oppressive, antagonistic “concept”. My thesis explores postmodern literature “mogul” Samuel Beckett’s work from a religious standpoint to show how his works have the potential to become advocators of religion. I will also push this argument further and examine works by British playwright Harold Pinter, Irish writer Flann O’Brien and American writer Thomas Pynchon to show that Beckett is not the only writer who writes favourably about religion, and that such a “trend” is pretty widespread. In a nutshell, my thesis is incredulous towards the incredulity towards metanarratives and will seek to show that works of postmodernism are not as anti-religion as previously thought. The primary texts that will be used in this thesis is Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, Pinter’s The Caretaker, O’Brien’s The Third Policeman and Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49. Bachelor of Arts 2009-04-13T05:51:25Z 2009-04-13T05:51:25Z 2009 2009 Final Year Project (FYP) http://hdl.handle.net/10356/15212 en Nanyang Technological University 44 p. application/pdf
institution Nanyang Technological University
building NTU Library
country Singapore
collection DR-NTU
language English
topic DRNTU::Humanities::Literature::English
spellingShingle DRNTU::Humanities::Literature::English
Zaidah Rahmat
Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
description Lyotard defines the postmodern as “incredulity towards metanarratives.” Indeed, the rise of existential and postmodern ideas has meant the relinquishing of religious ideals in society and in Literature. However, even with postmodernism’s strong sense of disapproval of religious doctrines, it is peculiar to see that religion is still very much employed in postmodern literature. It also looks like this compulsion to include religion in such literature has the effect of legitimising readings of the text from a religious lens. Because of this, works of postmodern literature can also be interpreted as portraying religion positively instead of the commonly thought “purging” effect they have on religious ideals. By “positive portrayal” I mean that postmodern texts do not show religion to be an oppressive, antagonistic “concept”. My thesis explores postmodern literature “mogul” Samuel Beckett’s work from a religious standpoint to show how his works have the potential to become advocators of religion. I will also push this argument further and examine works by British playwright Harold Pinter, Irish writer Flann O’Brien and American writer Thomas Pynchon to show that Beckett is not the only writer who writes favourably about religion, and that such a “trend” is pretty widespread. In a nutshell, my thesis is incredulous towards the incredulity towards metanarratives and will seek to show that works of postmodernism are not as anti-religion as previously thought. The primary texts that will be used in this thesis is Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, Pinter’s The Caretaker, O’Brien’s The Third Policeman and Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49.
author2 Angela Anne Frattarola
author_facet Angela Anne Frattarola
Zaidah Rahmat
format Final Year Project
author Zaidah Rahmat
author_sort Zaidah Rahmat
title Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
title_short Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
title_full Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
title_fullStr Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
title_full_unstemmed Existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
title_sort existing in harmony : the postmodernism-religion reconciliation
publishDate 2009
url http://hdl.handle.net/10356/15212
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