revert to a lost childhood or return to a forgotten
Eden. This theory, according to Lewis, is at the cen-
ter of most American literature—a constant return
to youth, with an emphasis on the experiences, rev-
elations, and trials inherent in a coming-of-age nar-
rative. Thus, in a sense, the focus on coming of age
in American literature and in the national character
can be argued as an unwillingness to acknowledge
history: All events are subject to change and to rein-
terpretation, a kind of automatic “redo” where each
generation must begin its task of the coming of age
process. Like Lewis, Ihab Hassan sees the idea of
innocence as a conscious denial of American history,
but he contends that the denial is also firmly rooted
in political ideology. The focus on a wide-eyed, naive
innocence of each generation defining itself is not
just a literary trope for Hassan; rather, it is deeply
enmeshed in an ideology that offers no roots, no
genealogies, and no sense of a permanent and static
identity. For Leslie Fiedler, this focus on coming-of-
age narratives underscores the preoccupation with
youth found in American culture. Fiedler argues
that this desire to return to a childlike, Edenic state
is predicated on the idea that the American national
character is constantly fluid and dynamic, youthful
and energetic. To allow the national character to
grow static and permanent would force American
culture to grow old, and perhaps grow up.
The coming-of-age narrative is quite simple to
define; however, the implications of that definition
are numerous and wide-ranging. What began as
a way to fictionalize how a child became an adult
became complicated throughout the centuries by
other issues. Race, class, and gender all play a piv-
otal role in how a youth is expected to grow into an
adult in various societies. Furthermore, the accep-
tance or rejection of social obligations and duties
is another factor in how teens grow into adults. All
of these factors expand a relatively benign textbook
definition into a wide-ranging, thoroughly complex
theme.
See also Anaya, Rudolfo: bLess Me, uLtiMa;
Anderson, Sherwood: winesburG, ohio; Aus-
ten, Jane: eMMa; Chopin, Kate: awakeninG,
the; Crane, Stephen: red badGe oF couraGe,
the; Kincaid, Jamaica: annie John; Knowles,
John: separate peace, a; Marshall, Paule
brown GirL, brownstone; McCarthy, Cormac:
aLL the pretty horses; McCullers, Carson:
MeMber oF the weddinG, the; Shakespeare,
William: henry iv, part i; Steinbeck, John: red
pony, the; Stevenson, Robert Louis: treasure
isLand; Tolkien, J. R. R.: hobbit, the; Updike,
John: “A & P.”
FURTHER READING
Du Plessis, Rachel Blau. Writing Beyond the Ending:
Narrative Strategies of Twentieth-Century Women
Writers. Bloomington: Indiana University Press,
1985.
Fiedler, Leslie A. An End to Innocence: Essays and Cul-
ture and Politics. Boston: Beacon Press, 1955.
Hardin, James, ed. Reflection and Action: Essays on the
Bildungsroman. Columbia: South Carolina Univer-
sity Press, 1991.
Hassan, Ihab. Radical Innocence: Studies in the Contem-
porary American Novel. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton
University Press, 1965.
Lewis, R. W. B. The American Adam: Innocence, Tragedy,
and Tradition in the Nineteenth Century. Chicago:
Chicago University Press, 1955.
Millard, Kenneth. Coming of Age in Contemporary
American Fiction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univer-
sity Press, 2007.
White, Barbara. Growing Up Female: Adolescent Girlhood
in American Fiction. Westwood, Conn.: Greenwood
Press, 1985.
Daniel G. Jonescommodification/commercialization
Commodification is a multifaceted concept, having
roots in political and economic theory as well as cul-
tural and literary studies. Broadly defined, commodi-
f ication is the transformation of immaterial, social
relationships into commercial relationships that
often utilize the language and ideological stances of
a market driven economy and capitalist society (for
example, terms and ideas surrounding “buying and
selling,” “supply and demand”). In order to under-
stand this important and complex idea, we need to
understand the etymology of the word commodif ica-
tion. At the root of the word is commodity, which in
modern language usage is defined as “a kind of thing
for use of sale, an article of commerce, an object ofcommodification/commercialization 15