The Crops Writing and Critique of Capitalism in Jean Toomer's Cane and Balo
Borrowing the theoretical insights of new materialism and the interdisciplinary research method of literature and economics,the present paper explores the interweaving relationship between crops and human beings in Jean Toomer's hybrid novel Cane and one-act play Balo.Meanwhile,he denounces the destruction of nature caused by human agency,especially of bourgeois actants,reiterating the moral responsibility of human actants in the economic assemblage constructed with cane,cotton,wood,and other things.And by writing about the enslavement of black people by cotton and their long history of suffering violence,he discloses the logic of capitalism and power relationship behind cotton fetishism and the power of fear performed by cotton.Hence,Toomer's cotton writing makes up for the political inadequacy of new materialism.Unlike cotton,the cane portrayed by Toomer is endowed with the agency of de-anthropocentricity and de-capitalization,reversely reinforcing his critique of American agricultural capitalism.
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