• DOI:10.1017/S0021875805000605
• Corpus ID: 145780623

Eastenders Go West: English Sparrows, Immigrants, and the Nature of Fear

@article{Coates2005EastendersGW,
  title={Eastenders Go West: English Sparrows, Immigrants, and the Nature of Fear},
  author={Peter A. Coates},
  journal={Journal of American Studies},
  year={2005},
  volume={39},
  pages={431 - 462}
}

• P. Coates
• Published 1 December 2005
• Art
• Journal of American Studies

The Tortilla Curtain (1995), a novel by T. Coraghessan Boyle, juxtaposes the existence of southern California's affluent whites and non-white underclass by relating the stories of two couples whose lives become irrevocably entangled following a fateful automobile accident. The period flavour derives from racial tensions that culminated in the Los Angeles riots of 1992 and the passage, two years later, of Proposition 187, a package of prohibitive measures to curb the influx of “undocumented” immigrants from Mexico. Delaney Mossbacher, the book's main character, is a freelance nature writer with orthodox liberal views – a caricatured Sierra Club member. He contributes a monthly, Annie Dillard-esque nature column (“Pilgrim at Topanga Creek”) to an outdoor magazine. He lives in an upscale hilltop community designed in impeccable Spanish mission style – the product of white flight – apparently safe from the Mexican hordes that have broken through the border (the brittle “tortilla curtain” of the novel's title) and are overrunning the flatlands.