Deflecting Absence: 9/11 Fiction and the Memorialization of Change

“Deflecting Absence: 9/11 Fiction and the Memorialization of Change” is an interdisciplinary examination of the way in which post 9/11 texts have been instrumental in memorializing the event as a moment of radical historical departure. Focusing on fiction through the reading of seminal 9/11 literary texts including Falling Man, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, and Amy Waldman’s The Submission, the article deals with the internal contradictions at work both in reading and writing about works of 9/11 fiction and the way in which such texts eternally memorialize the discourse of change. Examining these literary texts alongside “Reflecting Absence,” the 9/11 memorial site, Spike Lee’s film 25th Hour, and a broader discussion of the implications of the cultural discourse offered through these texts, the article exposes the disjuncture between 9/11 texts’ desire to memorialize the event as the moment that ‘everything changed’ and the missed opportunities for radical political change which followed.