Genre and Intertextuality
Bret Easton Ellis’s books are characterized by despondent protagonists who more often than not descend into delusion and pathology; existential angst and anomie regarding the hollowness of sex-, drug-, and brand-addled lives in a status-conscious and commodifying world deteriorates into psychotic delusion grasping at substantial and meaningful reality amid a plague of empty yet stylish image-oriented appearance. Glamorama (1998) confirms Ellis’s trajectory of genre experimentation. Less Than Zero (1985) and The Rules of Attraction (1987) are college coming-of-age novels; American Psycho (1991) is a serial killer novel; Lunar Park (2005) is an ersatz celebrity memoir turned haunted house ghost story; Imperial Bedrooms (2010) is not only a sequel to Less Than
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Citation: Blazer, Alex. "Glamorama". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 19 May 2011 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=21884, accessed 21 November 2024.]