EROS AND THANATOS – DEATH AND DESIRE ON CAMPUS
EROS AND THANATOS – DEATH AND DESIRE ON CAMPUS

Summary/Abstract: The paper examines the ways in which works belonging within the sub-genre of the academic novel deal with the human preoccupation with illness and death. Don DeLillo’s White Noise (1985) and Philip Roth’s The Dying Animal (2001) have been selected as representative portrayals whose thematic concern is not only closely related to the world of higher education, but also stretches across the American cultural landscape with its expressed fear of aging and death. Philip Roth and Don DeLillo differ in their writing styles, but in their novels both depict the American male academic trapped by the fear of dying and illness. The paper explores the transformation of the social and psychological landscape of America, which redefined modern American culture with its perceptions of aging, dying, death, and grieving. The aim of this paper is to show how these two novels reflect the modern American cultural denial of death through characters engaged in a daily struggle between Eros and Thanatos.

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