IN-PERSON Barcelona. Section B

Abstract

Set in a near-future dystopia of kleptocracy and mass psychosis, Shane Jesse Christmass’ novella Yeezus in Furs (2018) extrapolates such horrors of the 2020s as mass shootings, wealth inequality, and technological overload into a staccato burst of apocalyptic chaos. It follows the rise to power of a genderfluid superhuman named Cult Leader as they wander through the last days of late stage capitalism and its discontents in New York City. This presentation will disentangle the myriad themes of dystopia and future shock in Christmass’ text by arguing that his use of short, terse sentences and elliptical narrative exemplifies the urban future of the post-pandemic world and its ever-increasing speed and madness. Particular theorists and writers used to divine the text’s layers will include Paul Virilio’s views on speed and technology, Francis Fukuyama’s concept of the end of history and the last man, and the similarly staccato writings of the French eroticist Pierre Guyotat. The character of Cult Leader in particular will be compared and contrasted to such contemporary archetypes of career-oriented young capitalists as the “girlboss” and the “professional managerial class,” with recourse made to the urbanity of these archetypal characters and real-life equivalents like the businesswoman Elizabeth Holmes and the politician Pete Buttigieg. Christmass’ text and protagonist will thus be established as the ironic literary embodiment of Fukuyama’s neoliberal dream of the “end of the history and the last man” following the fall of the Soviet Union, an example of the 21st century’s dessication of the neoliberal ideal in its various urban discontents.