Article published In: Voicing Absences/Presences in a Damaged World
Edited by Jessica Maufort and Marc Maufort
[English Text Construction 15:2] 2022
► pp. 156–174
A more perfect dissolution
Mining nostalgia in Samuel D. Hunter’s Greater Clements
Published online: 1 June 2023
https://doi.org/10.1075/etc.00055.mic
https://doi.org/10.1075/etc.00055.mic
Abstract
Samuel D. Hunter’s 2019 play Greater Clements is named after a fictional former mining town in Northern Idaho, which straddles the space between presence and absence. The locals have decided to put an end to a dispute with the Californian second-homers that have flocked to town in recent years, by voting to unincorporate. Hunter has indicated that the play relies heavily on the “toxicity of nostalgia”, on which the present essay concentrates. This article explores nostalgia as connected to two marginalised communities in Greater Clements: the miners, now out of work due to the effects of deindustrialisation, and the town’s Japanese American residents, who are still reeling from the trauma of wartime internment.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction: Into a dissolving world
- 2.Restoring ruins
- 3.Hidden pasts, wayward futures
- 4.Conclusion: Home and the art of “seeing double”
- Notes
References
References (26)
Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. n.d. The U.S. Constitution: Preamble. United States Courts website. <[URL]> (last accessed on 4 November 2022).
Amorosi, A. D. 2019. “Greater Clements”: Theater review. Variety, 9 December. <[URL]> (last accessed on 18 February 2022).
Anon. 1954. The inland empire. TIME Magazine, 11 January, 64(18). 21–22. Academic Search Ultimate database (last accessed on accessed 4 November 2022).
Bonnett, Alastair. 2010. Left in the past: Radicalism and the politics of nostalgia. London: Continuum.
Clark, Anna. 2018. The poisoned city: Flint’s water and the American urban tragedy. New York, NY: Metropolitan Books.
Gomez-Vidal, Cristina & Anu Manchikanti Gomez. 2021. Invisible and unequal: Unincorporated community status as a structural determinant of health. Social Science and Medicine 285(114292). 1–9.
Green, Jesse. 2019. In “Greater Clements,” the tragedy of a town that closed. The New York Times, 9 December. <[URL]> (last accessed on 17 May 2021).
Hamid, Mohsin. 2017. “Mohsin Hamid on the dangers of nostalgia: We need to imagine a brighter future.” The Guardian, 25 February. <[URL]> (last accessed on 2 August 2021).
Kushner, Tony. 2020. Samuel D. Hunter: The high tragedy place. American Theatre 371 (May/June). 44–45.
Ladino, Jennifer K. 2012. Reclaiming nostalgia: Longing for nature in American literature. Charlottesville, VA: University of Virginia Press.
MacArthur Foundation. 2014. Samuel D. Hunter. MacArthur foundation website, 17 September. <[URL]> (last accessed on 18 February 2022).
Mah, Alice. 2012. Industrial ruination, community, and place: Landscapes and legacies of urban decline. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.
Marks, Peter. 2019. “Greater Clements” is the best new play of the year. The Washington Post, 9 December. <[URL]> (last accessed on 18 February 2022).
McBride, Keally D. 2005. Collective dreams: Political imagination and community. University Park, PA: Penn State University Press.
Sehgal, Parul. 2018. Toxic history, poisoned water: The story of Flint. New York Times, 3 July. <[URL]> (last accessed 4 November 2022).
Smith, David. 2016. Lynn Nottage: “Nostalgia is a disease many white Americans have”. The Guardian, 17 February. <[URL]> (last accessed on 4 August 2021).
Snow, Bradley D. 2017. Living with lead: An environmental history of Idaho’s Coeur D’Alenes, 1885–2011. Pittsburgh, PA: University of Pittsburgh Press.
Soloski, Alexis. 2019. Samuel D. Hunter’s own private Idaho. New York Times, 27 November. <[URL]> (last accessed on 17 May 2021).