Articles by Elysia Balavage
English Studies, 2025
For George Orwell, bread is the embodiment of wholesome nourishment and, in its most "virtuous" s... more For George Orwell, bread is the embodiment of wholesome nourishment and, in its most "virtuous" state, represents the antithesis of systemization. The Road to Wigan Pier (1937), Orwell's social exploration of poverty in the industrial North of England, illuminates the damaging impact of capitalism on all facets of working-class life, including the bread they consume. By using the Brookers, a particularly grimy working-class Wigan family, as a living metaphor for imposed, systemic poverty, Orwell shows the grave result of sustained class prejudices, social injustices, and deprivation that capitalism cultivates. Though he expresses disgust with all the Brookers' food and meals, Orwell appears especially repulsed by the family's dirty, nutritionally void white bread, marred with Mr. Brooker's black thumb print. The industrial squalor of the North and marginalization of the working-class thus merge in that strikingly simple, viscerally disturbing image of the defiled dietary staple: a capitalist system has transformed the "virtuous" bread into something ruined and diminished. The desecration extends beyond just the bread: it represents the debasement of an entire socioeconomic class. Thus, dirt and bread converge in The Road to Wigan Pier to personify the methodical, embedded maltreatment of the working-class by a capitalist system.
Routledge eBooks, Oct 1, 2021
Modernism/Modernity Print Plus, May 19, 2022
The Review of English Studies, 2022, 2022
This article analyses the place of nihilistic philosophy in W. B. Yeats's notoriously opaque work... more This article analyses the place of nihilistic philosophy in W. B. Yeats's notoriously opaque work A Vision. Despite often being cast as a failure, A Vision is considered fundamental to a comprehension of Yeats and his writings. While much work has been done to illuminate this obscure text, criticism has not yet adequately addressed a trio of integral philosophical influences on Yeats and their presence in A Vision. This article shows that Yeats employs the 'old' nihilistic attributes present in Baruch Spinoza's substance monism, Immanuel Kant's transcendental idealism, and Georg Hegel's Absolute Spirit to propose a foundational metaphysical system and reimagine the concept of 'deity'. Yeats enthusiastically read each of these three philosophers, counting them amongst the most significant thinkers he studied. By interrogating the deific properties of the Thirteenth Cone, this article argues that old nihilism shapes Yeats's system in A Vision and more broadly, illustrates the poet's understanding of generative nothingness, a concept that Spinoza, Kant, and Hegel considered the underpinning of epistemological reality.
Aigne, 2020
In this essay, I extend the critical discussion of Yeats’s interpretation of crisis and catastrop... more In this essay, I extend the critical discussion of Yeats’s interpretation of crisis and catastrophe. To do this, I examine Yeats’s reading of nihilism and show that he adopts a generative formulation of the philosophy, one that is represented by the works of Benedictus Spinoza, Immanuel Kant, and Georg Hegel. Together, their understanding of the idea removes the negativity of nothingness and imbues it with generative capabilities. Spinoza, Kant, and Hegel all illustrate the subject, whether the individual person or the idea of God and Nature, as using the void of nothingness for redemption after experiencing a dissolution of “everything.” I then interrogate the ways in which Yeats borrows representations of “disaster” from generative nihilism and executes this imagery in his later poetry, including Michael Robartes and the Dancer (1921), The Tower (1928), and The Winding Stair and Other Poems (1933). Considering his interest in creation that these volumes exhibit, Yeats uses the gnostic catastrophe of Spinoza, Kant’s reduction of the subject into a nonsubstantial void, and the Kantian and Hegelian sublime to diminish chaos to stillness. This allows him to extract the creative capacity from nothingness and imbue the void with creative possibility, an aim that he ultimately reaches at the conclusion of The Winding Stair.
The Journal of Modern Literature, 2021
Critics have left the influence of old nihilism on T. S. Eliot’s poetry largely unexplored, an id... more Critics have left the influence of old nihilism on T. S. Eliot’s poetry largely unexplored, an idea that necessitates further inspection because it provides a consistent pre-and-post-conversion current that accounts for his propensity to see empty spaces as fruitful. Dispensing with a framework that silos Christian conversion from philosophy, I interrogate images of empty space in Eliot’s poetry and show that he views nothingness as generative in The Hollow Men and extending to the Four Quartets, effectively spanning most of his literary career. To do this, I draw upon my archival research to reconstruct his reading of nihilism before Nietzsche—an “old” nihilism which views nothingness as generative instead of destructive—and argue that engagement with philosophy in this tradition shapes his empty spaces. This view of emptiness aligns with Eliot’s search for metaphysical answers in a broken world, a process that ultimately saw him simultaneously profess his faith passionately in front of the Pietà yet continue to exercise the values of old nihilism in his poetry.
Book Reviews by Elysia Balavage
Review of The Ministry of Truth: The Biography of George Orwell’s 1984 , 2021
Totalitarianism. Autocracy. Oppression. These words express some of the bedrock points of George ... more Totalitarianism. Autocracy. Oppression. These words express some of the bedrock points of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four, and while unquestionably substantial, such concepts are perhaps not meant to elicit responses of joy or even amusement from the novel's intended audience. However, Dorian Lynskey's The Ministry of Truth succeeds in presenting the "life" of Orwell's infamously aggrieving text in a fashion that captivates and gratifies.
Reviewed Blog Posts by Elysia Balavage
AndPhilosophy.com: The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series, 2020
For Netflix’s The Umbrella Academy, “extraordinary” encompasses more than simply possessing super... more For Netflix’s The Umbrella Academy, “extraordinary” encompasses more than simply possessing super-human skills. Being extraordinary requires transition, transformation, and a decision to face nihilism head-on. Or as Nietzsche’s Zarathustra would say, a “down-going” that will forge the Übermensch (or overman).
Syllabi by Elysia Balavage
Literature and film course focusing on human existence and what it means to "be."
Special Topics in British and American Literature
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Articles by Elysia Balavage
Book Reviews by Elysia Balavage
Reviewed Blog Posts by Elysia Balavage
Syllabi by Elysia Balavage