The image of the American province in Percival Everett’s creativity

Abstract

The African American literary tradition has always been characterized by the opposition between city and province, individual and community, which goes back to the collective consciousness of African Americans. In the work of the contemporary African-American writer Percival Everett, the American outback plays, if not a primary, then a significant role, since quite often the writer chooses small American towns and their surroundings as the setting for his novels. An example of such a work is the novel American Desert (2004). The narration starts in Los Angeles and then moves to the southern, underpopulated state New Mexico, which is famous for its desolate deserts and the absence of large cities. Addressing canonical topoi of African American literature, Everett contrasts two locations, depicting the peculiarities of the characters’ lifestyle, their customs and mores, their attitude to family values, religion, medicine, the state, etc. Life in the town is regulated by traditional standards of decency and its formal following, while the American province serves as a place for frightening and dangerous experiments. In addition, to create the image of the American province, the writer turns to popular stereotypes associated with New Mexico deserts and plays with them in a postmodern way.