Death, Nature and Society in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby

Abstract

[Abstract] In this BA thesis I proceed to the revision of the imagery in The Waste Land (1922) through the intertextual analysis of the modernist imagery present in T.S Eliot's poem and the novel The Great Gatsby by F.S Fitzgerald (1929), as well as its hypothetical projection in contemporary works. The main purpose and motivation that has led me to carry out this multi-textual comparative analysis lies in the will to delve into the themes common to these modernist works, and their influence on contemporary novels of post-apocalyptic culture such as The Road by Cormac McCarthy (2006): the weariness and desolation of the modern individual in the face of the world, the failure of materialistic society, the decay of nature and the pessimistic vision of the future, as well as death as a cathartic process. Through an in-depth examination of the descriptions, images, actions and reflections of the characters and voices found in the works that have been analysed, this study has allowed me to find similarities inherent in two of the most significant modernist works, also offering a possible connection to another novel published in a distant historical and literary context, although somehow intertwined with this cultural current due to various economic, politic and social factors, as has been concluded throughout the thesis. Similarly, this dissertation argues that the disillusionment and hopelessness, the dramatic and terrible vision of modern society and nature, conceived by many authors in the 1920s-30s, is replicated again in the 20th century in an even more explicit manner. The ideas developed throughout my study are the result of extensive research into the biographies of the authors, the socio-economic context in which their works were written and the repercussions they have obtained, as well as a personal interpretation of the texts after an exhaustive analysis of the images, symbols and motifs found in them. The collapse of the capitalist system, the failure of the American dream, myth and religion, life and death as a cyclical movement, or the ecological problems that have been emerging since the last century are studied in detail through their representation in The Waste Land, The Great Gatsby and The Road. This thesis, therefore, uses specific fragments of these works to justify the arguments provided, although I have also drawn on the opinions of literary critics, authors and researchers in the field to support the theories and conclusions offered in this work.