Novels that appear to explain terrorism may actually diagnose cultural malaise

Evidence

Updike’s book at least has the virtue of trying to imagine what alterity is like, how the world might look when seen through different eyes. Yet the target in Terrorist seems much more to be, rather than the Islamist mindset, a general cultural malaise and two possible responses to it: one of which is extreme and nihilistic and the other—in the guise of Jack Levy—jaded yet tentatively hopeful. — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 126

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Tool for reading Hamid and Naqvi — the question of who/what a novel’s real target is, which governs whether it contests or reinforces Islamophobia.
• XREF: connects to: Cultural explanations of terrorism erase political and historical differences among perpetrators — Sherene Razack, Casting Out: The Eviction of Muslims…, 125; Contrived endings in anti-jihad novels reveal a postimperial melancholia about lost white male authority — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 84; A novel can criticize explicit Islamophobia while endorsing its underlying assumptions — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 178
• yield-rescued: below the book’s yield-target cutoff, included anyway for connecting to: Cultural explanations of terrorism erase political and historical differences among perpetrators — Sherene Razack, Casting Out: The Eviction of Muslims…, 125; Contrived endings in anti-jihad novels reveal a postimperial melancholia about lost white male authority — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 84; A novel can criticize explicit Islamophobia while endorsing its underlying assumptions — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 178

Broader Connections

• A novel can criticize explicit Islamophobia while endorsing its underlying assumptions #complicates (0.72) — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 178