Mourning and melancholia in Carson McCullers's 'The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter'

This essay argues that the novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter is a self-consciously liminal work that reviews that modernist movement, critiquing its failures and signaling its end. Through its isolated characters, the novel confronts the affective crisis brought about by the forces of modernity, particularly capitalism. Through the characters' failed attempts to overcome their isolation and form productive social bonds and collective resistance to modernity, the novel critiques a modernist movement that was incapable of resisting modernity. When viewed in a psychoanalytic framework, it is evident that the character's failure is contingent on the narcissistic relationships they form. These relationships, because of their narcissistic nature, keep the characters in a prolonged state of melancholy, unable to mourn for their social losses. This entrapment in melancholy prevents these characters from forming productive social bonds that could lead to collectivity and resistance to the forces of oppression. However, through the character of Biff Brannon, the novel suggests a complicated process of mourning that involves cognitive and affective mapping. Through this mapping, one is able to identify those who share in one's losses and form productive relationships based on mutual understanding. Finally, as the novel suggests this form of mourning, it also takes part in the process, mourning for modernism and providing the possibility of new, dynamic, and possibly productive modes of expression.