Abstract
This chapter sets out from the historical account of the events of 9/11, which determined, apart from their serious consequences on a global level, the emergence of new forms of artistic expression meant to inscribe them in the cultural memory of Western civilisation. The data compiled from The 9/11 Commission Report are correlated with the media coverage of 9/11, which are seen as fictionalised and fictionalising rewritings. The section on ‘media’ features a narratological approach to the live CNN newscast of the attacks and the analysis of two articles in The Guardian, written by Ian McEwan and Martin Amis in September 2001. It provides an overview of 9/11 fiction, regarding it as an intertext of the media texts and of the political speeches and writings related to events of 9/11.
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Notes
- 1.
During the commemorative speech delivered on 11 September 2006, President Bush admitted that Iraq had nothing to do with the attacks on the World Trade Center : ‘I am often asked why we are in Iraq when Saddam Hussein was not responsible for the 9/11 attacks. The answer is that the regime of Saddam Hussein was a clear threat. My administration, the Congress, and the United Nations saw the threat—and after 9/11, Saddam’s regime posed a risk that the world could not afford to take’ ( The Guardian , 12 September 2006).
- 2.
‘Mediatisation of politics is a complex process that is closely linked to the presence of a media logic in society and in the political sphere. It is distinguished from the idea of “mediation”, a natural, preordained mission of mass media to convey meaning from communicators to their target audiences. To define politics as “mediated” is a simple truism, in that communication and mass media are necessary prerequisites to the functioning of political systems’ (Mazzoleni and Schulz 1999, 249).
- 3.
The distinction between Islam and Islamism is political and ideological. Strongly rooted in religion, Islamists support the implementation of Sharia law and the elimination of the Western influences from a unified Muslim world. Islamism is ‘political Islam’, ‘activist Islam’, ‘militant Islam’ or ‘Islamic fundamentalism’. This matter is to be elaborated in the Chap. 5.
- 4.
All references are made to the version included in the 2008 volume.
- 5.
The success of the book might have been at least partially enhanced by the excellent transposition into a feature film (2011) directed by Stephen Daldry (The Hours, The Reader), nominated for Best Motion Picture of the Year by the Academy Awards 2012.
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Gheorghiu, OC. (2018). Making History: Politics, the Media and Literature in the Twenty-First Century. In: British and American Representations of 9/11. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75250-1_2
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