Cognitive Dissonance in Robert A. Heinlein’s Starship Troopers

Abstract

This dissertation studies cognitive dissonance in Robert A. Heinlein’s Starship Troopers. The chosen novel is often labeled as a ‘Fascist Utopia’; an oxymoron that sums up the essence of its tone. The aim is to detect and analyze the scope of dissonance within Heinlein’s narrative and to extrapolate it to his readership. For this purpose, I propose a multidisciplinary approach with two major orientations: close reading (a context- dependent psychonarratological angle) and distant reading (context-free sentiment analysis of his readership’s responses). The close reading section comprises a review of the writer’s biography: his life, works, and political commitment. This part is combined with a socio-historical study of the writer’s anchorage. Thus, Heinlein is revealed as a complex writer with an undeniable craft in sending mixed signals to his readership. On the other hand, the distant reading section purports to place the readers at the center of the thesis’ concern. Hence, cognitive dissonance is envisaged as a transmissible condition – from author to reader. At the level of the theoretical scaffolding, I set a wide range of theory running the gamut from new historicism to cognitive psychology- passing by reception theories, readers’ response theory, and psychonarratology. The works of Darko Suvin, Frederic Jameson, Leon Festinger, Dixon & Bertolussi and Franco Moretti are used to elaborate a ground base theoretical and methodological proposition