Gender, Security, and Atomic Destruction in Louisa Hall’s Trinity

Abstract

Abstract Louisa Hall’s Trinity examines environmental risk and responsibility, restoring to memory the networks of power and security that shaped the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, the so-called “father of the atomic age.” Extending work in feminist theories of exposure, Indigenous critiques of nuclear colonization, and studies of environmental agency and accountability, I trace the author’s use of fictional biography as a means of investigating disavowal, detachment, and the drive for mastery. Focusing on systems of silence and security underwriting the development of the bomb, Hall addresses everyday experiences of gender, race, and sexuality as meaningful in the world of atomic science and as useful tools for grappling with the uncertainties and vulnerabilities of environmental risk in the atomic age.