KronoScope: Journal for the Study of Time, 2017

This essay explores the trope of reincarnation across the works of British author David Mitchell (b. 1969) as an alternative approach to linear temporality, whose spiralling cyclicality warns of the dangers of seeing past actions as separate from future consequences, and whose focus on human interconnection demonstrates the importance of collective, intergenerational action in the face of ecological crises. Drawing on the Buddhist philosophy of samsara, or the cycle of life, death, and rebirth, this paper identifies links between the author’s interest in reincarnation and its secular manifestation in the treatment of time in his fictions. These works draw on reincarnation in their structures and characterization as part of an ethical approach to the Anthropocene, using the temporal model of “reincarnation time” as a narrative strategy to demonstrate that a greater understanding of generational interdependence is urgently needed in order to challenge the linear “end of history” narrative of global capitalism. The version uploaded here is the pre-peer-review manuscript; the final published version is available at http://booksandjournals.brillonline.com/content/journals/10.1163/15685241-12341382 Harris-Birtill, Rose. “‘Looking down time’s telescope at myself’: reincarnation and global futures in David Mitchell’s fictional worlds.” KronoScope: Journal for the Study of Time 17.2 (2017): 163-181.

1994

This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Theological Studies at Digital Commons @ Loyola Marymount University and Loyola Law School. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theological Studies Faculty Works by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons@Loyola Marymount University and Loyola Law School. For more information, please contact digitalcommons@lmu.edu. Repository Citation Fredericks, James L., "The Far Side of Nothingness: Reading Mitchell's Spirituality and Emptiness" (1994). Theological Studies Faculty Works. 29. http://digitalcommons.lmu.edu/theo_fac/29

Flushed with his impassioned gibberish, he [Tom Buchanan] saw himself standing alone on the last barrier of civilitation.

Journal of Modern Literature, 2012

This paper analyzes the rhetoric of futurity at work in a number of texts dealing with the “posthuman future of humanity.” It follows these texts in an attempt to historicize such a future in relation to human history. But it also identifies an overwhelming temporal contradiction at the heart of their discourse: that the posthuman is already with us even as it remains to come. If so, is posthuman identity to be interpreted as a mere phase in the history of human subjectivity? Does posthumanity come about in response to ethical and epistemological challenges inherited from the experience of human subjects? Or is it rather an altogether new paradigm that renders the very use of words like “subjectivity,” “history,” and “experience” anachronistic? Drawing on Hegel, Derrida, and especially Beckett, I argue that an experience of the impossible informs the moment of posthuman self-reflection; and consequently, that the challenge of theorizing a point of contact between human and posthuman being (or human and posthuman history) calls for a new, ad hoc interpretation of the concept of “impossibility.”

The Message of the Psalter: An Eschatological Programme in the Book of Psalms, 1997

What’s really going on in the Psalms? Is it just an anthology of old Israelite songs? Or is there more to it than anyone ever guessed? This evergreen classic proposed, in 1997, a messianic metanarrative in the Psalms. Someone arranged the Psalms to outline a programme of future events, like in Zechariah 9-14. A bridegroom-Messiah gathers exiled Israel. He sets up a kingdom, but dies a violent death. Israel are scattered in the wilderness of the nations. Then they are gathered again in troublous times. Finally, they are rescued by a king from the heavens. He sets his throne on Zion and receives the tribute of the nations. Read all about it!

Hypatia, 2009

Stellenbosch Theological Journal , 2022

Tentatively emerging from a global pandemic, we are confronted with a horizon of immanent adversities: (1) the closing window for altering the trajectory of our climate crisis, (2) the political antagonisms that exacerbate greater polarization, and (3) the effects of late-stage capitalism that service these first two interconnected configurations. Far from indulging a doomsday pessimism or comfortable misanthropy, this article pursues two continental philosophers, situating them within the tradition of "negative political theology" to think through a future of nothingness. Developing and then distinguishing between what is called the "plastic apocalypticism" of the philosopher Catherine Malabou, which thinks the end of the world as such, and an "insistent messianic" of the radical theologian, John D. Caputo, which takes the end of the world as the condition for saving it, an argument is made in favour of a mutual compatibility-recognizing the passing away of this world, its absolute contingency, but also the "event" of God's insistence. This messianic insistence and plastic revelation both resist divine intervention and instead look toward the formation of a new future, just as such a future (of nothingness) is the condition for the persistent interrogative of all concrete political arrangements.

David Mitchell: Contemporary Critical Perspectives , 2019

This chapter examines David Mitchell's concern with eco-crisis and civilizational collapse across several works from his oeuvre, paying close attention to his speculative and global treatment of contemporary narratives of scarcity. This includes Ghostwritten's (1999) depiction of simultaneous planetary crises, and the wave of infestations and infections that brings about Cloud Atlas's (2004) future dystopian narrative. This chapter also examines Mitchell's short-story 'The Siphoners' (2011), and its account of a roving band of paraffin stealers in the post-energy dystopia of 2033, and Mitchell's novel, The Bone Clocks (2014), which portrays the brutal aftermath of global civilizational collapse in 2043 due to over-consumption. Yet thinking 'ecologically' means imagining progressive change beyond eco-apocalypse. I conclude by examining how storytelling is the essential kindling for post-apocalyptic civilizations, and how depictions of other social groups gesture towards sustainable social and ecological relations. This is a pre-publication draft of a chapter that will come out imminently in an anthology on David Mitchell. Citation details as follows: De Loughry, Treasa. “David Mitchell’s representations of environmental crisis and ecological apocalypse”, in David Mitchell: Contemporary Critical Perspectives eds. Wendy Knepper & Courtney Hopf. Bloomsbury: London, 2019. 133–148.

Like "Leaves of Grass," this book of poems is an organic compilation of 30+ years of writing, with more being added as my life churns on.