NARRATIVE IN THE NETWORKED AGE: POSTHUMAN MEMORY AND ALGORITHMIC HAUNTINGS IN JENNIFER EGAN’S A VISIT FROM THE GOON SQUAD

In this paper Pulitzer Prize-winning book A Visit from the Goon Squad (2010) by
Jennifer Egan is taken as a foundational work of new millennial narrative, contending
that its broken, polyphonic structure captures the posthuman and digitally connected
consciousness of the twenty-first century. This study goes beyond traditional
elucidations of the novel and examines how Egan’s inventive structure consisting of
interconnected stories from different ages, genres, and mediums, and creates a
“networked” narrative. The aim is to examine how individuals such as music executive
Bennie Salazar and his assistant Sasha end up as archivists and victims of their own
digital footprints, plagued by “algorithmic ghosts” of former identities, broken
relationships, and cultural artifacts. Through the lens of digital hauntology and
posthumanism, the study argues that Egan’s work formally turns the novel into a
platform in addition to representing new voices and ideas. To culminate, it offers a
moving indictment of how human identity, perception, and cohesiveness in narration
are reshaped—and frequently undermined—by the very technology that claim to
preserve them. It turns into a literary server housing an ensemble of fractured subjectivities. Giving voice to the anxieties and adaptations of a consciousness, Egan’s
work thus stands as a transformative narrative for the new millennium.
Keywords: Posthumanism, Digital Narrative, Algorithmic Haunting, Networked Form,
Memory Studies, Millennium, Narrative Innovation, Datafied Consciousness