A 'Fourth Way' to Tell the Story - Fact and Fiction in Three Novels by Joyce Carol Oates

This study is an analysis of the novels Black Water (1992), Blonde (2000), and My Sister, My Love (2008) by Joyce Carol Oates. Based on real-life characters (Mary Jo Kopechne, Marilyn Monroe, JonBenét Ramsey), these works blend fact and fiction, historical and poetic truth, and create a new way to recount facts that allow the writer to give a new voice to people who cannot speak for themselves anymore. The present book addresses the stories behind the novels, their genre and stylistic features, but is also an exploration of several aspects of American culture and society and their issues connected to consumerism, the cult of beauty and celebrity, and how they affect American women's lives and power relations with men.

List of contents

1. Black Water: The Reconstruction of a Forgotten Character


1. The Chappaquiddick Incident




2. Blonde: A Reconstruction of the Self beyond the Myth




1. Marilyn Monroe and the Problem of Identity




3. My Sister, My Love: Memory, Forgetting and Social Criticism




1. The Ramsey Case

About the author

Barbara Miceli holds a PhD in Euro-American Studies from Roma Tre University (Italy) and she is Assistant Professor at the University of Gdañsk (Poland) where she teaches American Studies subjects. She specializes in the relationship between fact and fiction in the contemporary American novel.

Product details

• Authors: Barbara Miceli
• Assisted by: Marek Wilczynski (Editor)
• Publisher: Peter Lang
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 31.05.2022
• EAN: 9783631867921
• ISBN: 978-3-631-86792-1
• No. of pages: 168
• Dimensions: 148 mm x 16 mm x 210 mm
• Weight: 294 g
• Series: Transatlantic Studies in British and North American Culture
• Subject: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > English linguistics / literary studies