Decoding Alienation: Semiotics and Consumerist Modernity in Paul Auster’s City of Glass

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 PhD Candidate, Department of English Language and Literature, Bo.C., Islamic Azad University, Borujerd, Iran

2 Department of English Language and Literature, Bo.C., Islamic Azad University, Borujerd, Iran

3 Department of English Language and Literature, Bo.C., Islamic Azad University, Borujerd, Iran.

Abstract

Consumer culture, with its relentless emphasis on individualism and material possession, systematically erodes communal bonds, replacing authentic selfhood with identities constructed through consumption. This dynamic fosters a profound sense of alienation, a defining condition of modernity, particularly within urban landscapes where consumerist rituals dominate daily life. Paul Auster’s City of Glass first deciphers the alienating semiotics of food and drink, a critique that is then internalized and radicalized across The New York Trilogy, through the consumption of narrative in Ghosts and of another’s identity in The Locked Room, ultimately demonstrating that in late capitalism, the consuming self becomes the final, unfilled commodity. Employing Roland Barthes's semiotics to decipher the latent myths of consumer behavior, this study radicalizes its analysis through Jean Baudrillard's theory of the hyperreal, arguing that in a progressive consumer society, such mythologized signs detach from all referents to create a simulated reality where the simulacrum of satisfaction substitutes for authentic need. New York, a labyrinth of empty signs, emerges as a microcosm where consumerist promises dissolve into fragmentation. By interrogating semiotics, urban space, and late capitalism, this research implies how Auster's narrative exposes the hollowness of consumer culture, offering a critique of alienation that echoes beyond text.

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References

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History

  • Receive Date: 30 June 2025
  • Revise Date: 02 March 2026
  • Accept Date: 15 March 2026

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