Chuck Palahniuk and the Comic Grotesque

With the success of Fight Club his novel-turned-movie, Chuck Palahniuk has become noticed for his topical works. In his fiction works, he accurately captures the exploitation of power in America in the 21st century. With his cynicism and skepticism, Palahniuk satirizes and points out the manipulative aspects of ideologies, values and beliefs pushing society's understanding of the norm. In this work, Palahniuk's writing is examined closely and his characters are analyzed as people who rebel against the systems in control. This review also applies Mikhail Bakhtin's theory to explain Palahniuk's application of the comic grotesque and the theories from Louis Althusser and Slavoj iek to further understand the aspects of ideology in Palahniuk's writing.