The Wire & the Mythology of the Western

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Date
2014-02-06Author
Topola, Kelsey
Type
ThesisDegree Level
MastersMetadata
Show full item recordAbstract
The HBO television series The Wire ran for five seasons from 2002 to 2008. The series,
which garnered much critical acclaim, depicts the lives and complex intersections of the police,
drug gangs, political, and educational systems in Baltimore. This project seeks to examine the
criteria and implications of re-imagining this television series as a work of narrative fiction
belonging to the Western genre. The critical framework for these tasks is provided by John G.
Cawelti’s text The Six Gun Mystique along with examples drawn from the films The Man Who
Shot Liberty Valence and The Wild Bunch as well as the series itself.
Degree
Master of Arts (M.A.)Department
EnglishProgram
EnglishSupervisor
Bartley, William M.Committee
Cooley, Ron; Hynes, Peter; Fairbairn, AllisonCopyright Date
December 2013Subject
The Wire
American literature
Westerns
Film
Television