English Language and Literature Commons^™

Mirroring Financial Speculation And Late Capitalism Through Speculative Fiction: Worker Gullibility And Guilt As Re-Imagination Of Human Value, Ian Koh

English (MA) Theses

Charles Yu’s short story “Standard Loneliness Package” from the speculative fiction collection Sorry Please Thank You features a worker who conforms to the cultural logic of Wall Street and late capitalism. However, the privilege of working in a tech company in an up-and-coming industry does not shield him from experiencing the oftentimes destructive logic of financial speculation and in-built structural inequalities. This paper makes a case that a tragedy could be read into this worker’s seemingly stable situation in a way that can uncover the character’s truly sorry state from his illusion of privilege and choice. But first, readers must …