Joseph Heller's Urban Writing In Something Happened

Joseph Heller's urban writing in Something Happened has presented three distinct cross-sections of urban districts: a city of dystopian scenes,a city of commercially carnivalesque communities as well as a city of spiritual wanderers.Heller's descriptions upon the dystopian setting,where wretched ecological environment,deteriorated culture atmosphere and terror from the government's omnipresent surveillance are incessantly excruciating its citizens,give birth to his worriment about the urban ambiance.His misgivings about urban commercial milieu are demonstrated by the exposure of a carnivalesque corporate management where absurd corporate conventions,ambiguous running modes and sluggish working postures are prevailing dominance.And his inquietude about the less humanity of modern dwellers' is profoundly asserted by dissecting a spiritual wasteland where alienation in interpersonal relations,discrimination against minorities and the deprivation of human affections are fraught with people's daily routines.Those three anxieties are intersected with one another,which give rise to Heller's genuine concern from the bottom of his heart.By construing Heller's urban writing and correspondence with the idea of ecological criticism that human civilization is closely linked with the physical world,influencing it and influenced by it,it is concluded that the state of human survival is shaped by the condition of urban advancement which progresses at the price of ecological degeneration in return.In Something Happened,modern prosperity has bereaved citizens' humanity,hence,Heller utilizes his urban writingnot only to represent the existing predicament of modern residents' and appeal to pursue the wholesomeness of their inner world but,most importantly,to deliver his willies on the future destiny of his nation.