Masters Thesis

From Magic Milieu to Destructive Denizens: Examining Socio-Historical Shifts within Representations of Los Angeles in YA Literature

Francesca Lia Block and Marie Lu deftly construct two vibrantly distinct depictions of Los Angeles in their novels Weetzie Bat (1989) and Legend (2011). Both natives of LA, the two authors offer markedly different views of a city that has come to symbolize a vast array of mythic ideas from stardom and renewal to corruption and deception. Written for a young adult audience, the two stories communicate the trials and tribulations of teenagers and the anxiety that comes from growing up and living in an urban setting. Weetzie Bat follows Weetzie, a quirky high schooler, as she tries to find a place of her own in a city that is magical and dark and beautiful. Weetzie befriends Dirk, a young man who shares her nontraditional lifestyle, falls in love with My Secret Agent Lover Man, and starts an alternative family with these adventurous characters. Although the novel deals with troubling topics such as sex, drugs, and the AIDS epidemic, Los Angeles is depicted as a fantastic and postmodern landscape that the characters navigate with magical ease. In stark contrast, Lu's Legend tells the apocalyptic story of June and Day. June is a fifteen-year old prodigy tasked with finding the fifteen year-old criminal Day. Set in the backdrop of a dystopic Los Angeles, the story articulates the anxiety and paranoia that comes from living in a militant state. The two novels, emerging twenty years apart from each other, mirrors a shift in its representation of Los Angeles from a magic reality to an apocalyptic dystopia. I argue that this shift reflects a change in the literary landscape of Young Adult (YA) literature.

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