"There is no right life in the wrong one": The Dialectic of Drink and Abstinence in John Dos Passos's Manhattan Transfer and USA.

MANHATTAN Transfer (Book : Dos Passos); USA (Book : Dos Passos)

The pervasiveness of alcohol in John Dos Passos's major works, Manhattan Transfer and USA , has been widely noticed. Yet abstinence, the opposite, is just as conspicuous. This article explores the dialectical implications of drink vs. abstinence, which—together with considerations of the cultural history and contemporaneous political issues connected with alcohol—reveal that drink plays an intricate role in Dos Passos's socio-political critique. While drink symbolizes human life with all its complexities and contradictions, its opposite, abstinence, exemplifies the inhumaneness of a reduced world view that prioritizes the instrumental logic of capitalism and demands unquestioning subjugation to the given conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Arizona Quarterly is the property of Johns Hopkins University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)