Perspectives

In what follows, we will give you a few points to help you put “Cold Calling” by Chuck Palahniuk in perspective. These points are related to literary period and similar works.

Literary period

Chuck Palahniuk is a postmodernist writer. Postmodernism is a literary period that includes most work published in the last 60-70 years. Some of the characteristics of postmodernist fiction that you can find  in this short story are: setting the story in contemporary society and dealing with contemporary social issues (such as racism), minimalism (we do not know much about the characters), transgressional fiction (characters escape norms that confine them in unconventional ways, such as lying), the loose plot structure (some of traditional elements of the plot - like falling action- are missing), and the unreliable narrator.

Works with the same theme

For the theme of racial prejudice, we recommend that you also read the short stories “This is My Living Room” by Tom McAfee and “Eating Sugar” by Catheri...