Paranoia defines a culture, particularly the
American. Since WWII (1939-45), it became an
inevitable thought structure in the USA community.
Most of the postmodern American novelists’ interest in
paranoia is due to its relevance to everyday life
anxieties and horrors. Since WWII, an extraordinary
number of writers have used expressions of paranoia to
present the influence of postwar technologies, social
organisations, and communication systems on human
beings. Writers as different as Ralph Ellison, William S.
Burroughs, Joseph Heller, Margaret Atwood, Kurt
Vonnegut, Thomas Pynchon, Joan Dijon, Kathy
Acker, and Don DeLillo have depicted individuals
nervous about the ways large organisations might be
controlling their lives, influencing their actions, or even
constructing their desires. |