Change of Clothes: Exploring Post-9/11 Adaptation in Claire Messud's The Emperor's Children Micah Palmer College

Claire Messud's novel, The Emperor's Children, is a tip of the hat to Hans Christian Andersen's The Emperor's New Clothes and develops the concepts of vanity and invulnerability in Andersen's story that epitomized American culture prior to the September 11, 2001 attacks. The majority of the story takes place in New York, which was the primary target of the virulent 9/11 terrorists precisely for it's geographical embodiment of stature, wealth, opulence, and vanity. The "children" in the novel are the four main characters Marina, Danielle, Julius, and Bootie. They feel subjected to assuming roles in the competitive world of the elite, but inevitably come to expose the frailties of such a communal self-importance that promises to change them, the New York Empire, and conceivably American culture itself in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. However, Messud does not seek to demonize America nor even its perceived culture of vanity; rather, she seeks to illustrate how strongly the events of 9/11 shook the core of American Exceptionalism and the untouchable nature of this country that many American's came to internalize. Though her story appears to transcend a political agenda, it is evident that Messud seeks to illuminate the nature of...