Modernism is by no means easy to define. In fact, no one is exactly sure if the movement has even ended yet. But that’s befitting of the period, as well as the pieces of literature that serve to define Modernism. Two pieces, T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” and James Joyce’s “The Dead”, are epitomes of this modernism. In both, the main characters are paralyzed by an inability to communicate, even while speaking. Whether through Prufrock’s musings concerning love life, or Gabriel’s inability to evoke certain feelings out of his wife, both men experience this effeminization of the intellect and communication. But where does this communicative castration begin? Most likely, in the bustling metropolises and dehumanizing philosophies that precipitate the Modernist movement. The modern man witnessed the killing of fifteen million people in the first Great War – bestial in the sheer amount of murder this war created. Meanwhile, modernity defined man’s character for him: Darwinism told him that he was the offspring of lesser animals, that man was, in essence, himself an animal. Also, Freudian psychoanalysis told man that his psyche was the product of his childhood and sexual instincts. Defined by that which he had no control over, or was too young to consciously alter, the modern man’s identity was no longer his to artifice, but society’s to manufacture at the behest of environment and upbringing. Which makes sense because, when we talk about personalities, sexualities and such today, we constantly hear the phrase “nature versus nurture”. What about “self”? Does the self have no control over these very crucial aspects of identity? Modernity has told these men “no”, that they do not form their own identities but that all ...
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...seem surprising that the men of the early twentieth century were devoid of identity. In fact, it may have been necessary to become identity-less, to recede back into something less than human. Or maybe to recede back into the very epitome human living. After all, the British Empire was on top of the world during both the Romantic and Victorian eras; therefore, it would make sense that English writers were idealistic at these times. But the Modernist era was the time of post-colonialism, where the English were no longer dominators but equals with the rest of the world – where they had once ruled, they now had to fend for themselves. So, is it possible that the modern era was not really a dehumanizing era, but a humanizing time period for the British? One cannot rightfully answer. Which, as the beginning of this paper states, is befitting of Modernism: it is unclear.
During the Victorian Era, society had idealized expectations that all members of their culture were supposedly striving to accomplish. These conditions were partially a result of the development of middle class practices during the “industrial revolution… [which moved] men outside the home… [into] the harsh business and industrial world, [while] women were left in the relatively unvarying and sheltered environments of their homes” (Brannon 161). This division of genders created the ‘Doctrine of Two Spheres’ where men were active in the public Sphere of Influence, and women were limited to the domestic private Sphere of Influence. Both genders endured considerable pressure to conform to the idealized status of becoming either a masculine ‘English Gentleman’ or a feminine ‘True Woman’. The characteristics required women to be “passive, dependent, pure, refined, and delicate; [while] men were active, independent, coarse …strong [and intelligent]” (Brannon 162). Many children's novels utilized these gendere...
‘The Image of the English Gentleman in Twentieth-Century Literature: Englishness and Nostalgia’ – Christine Berberich
Modernism was the word of the era because it was the opposite of the last. People pined for new and exciting ways to make up for time lost to the war. This feeling of looking ahead through the ambiguity of the time permeated through all tiers of society from the working class to the elites. In Judith Walkowitz’s “A Jewish Night Out,” we find a dance hall catering to Jewish youth. One can rent a dance partner and learn how to dance well. It was suddenly important to be able to charm the opposite sex in talent, attitude, and appearance because sex wasn’t just for procreation anymore. Deborah Cohen’s Household Gods, she gives a look into architecture and material things. There’s a clear clash between the older and younger generations, and the younger ones enjoy modernism. “Advocates of the modern insisted that the new era required a new style. They deplored the vogue for reproductions, which, in the psychological language of the day, they analysed as evidence of an ‘inferiority complex’.” As well, stream of consciousness writing emerges from the depths of collegiate, middle class bohemia. The Bloomsburry Group were named after the London neighborhood they inhabited and were an artist collective, living life according to art and the new fragmentation of life after war. Virginia Woolf’s writing reflects the general feeling of the interwar period: confusing, ambiguous, hopeful, and moral-less. The Bohemians took the disassociation of the era and put it into new and modern art. All of these cultural ideas and forms of recreation were a result of the Great War because there was a generation of young people who were lost and needed a future meaningful to them, so they created
Modernist Poetry involves a movement away from the self and the emotions of the individual. Typically, the focus of Modernist poetry revolves around the rational notions of the self, unlike the Romantic period, which focused on the poet. Modernist poets ex...
The postwar England of the twenties and thirties was the setting of Evelyn Waugh’s first satirical novels, among which was the Vile Bodies. Waugh, an author mostly known for his highly satirical fiction, published his novel Vile Bodies in 1930 right in the middle of the time-period between the Great Wars. Because of the historical evens that occupied England at that time, much of British Literature of the late 1920’s and early 1930’s was concerned with the Modernist movement, which was occupied with the idea of individualism of the young generation. Through the use of prominent and yet highly satirical characters, Waugh strives to criticize his Modernist generation for its unsuccessful movement into Modernism, both on the individual and political/institutional level. He does so by defining his type-characters as ignorant, self-centered and hypocritical in their disastrous movement toward individualism.
British literature continues to be read and analyzed because the themes, motifs and controversies that people struggled with in the past are still being debated today. The strongest themes that were presented in this course related to changing governments, the debate about equity between blacks and whites, men and women and rich and poor, and the concern about maintaining one’s cultural identity.
In Mr. Bennet and Mrs. Brown (1924), Virginia Woolf remarked: “…on or about 1910, human character changed” (4). Going by this classic definition of modernism, we can locate E.M. Forster’s Maurice in the Modernist canon. In fact, out of his total seven novels, four were already written before 1910. Unlike the other modernist novels, Maurice does not experiment much with language, form or style. However, its modernist ethos lies in its transgressiveness – dealing with homosexual themes in the way Oscar Wilde anticipated modernism in the previous century. Michel Foucault in his essay “A Preface to Transgression” writes: “the whole of modern thought is imbued with the necessity of thinking the unthought…for modern thought, no morality is possible” (qtd. in Tambling 4). It is hereby interesting to look at Forster, a homosexual author, and his novel Maurice which raises and/o...
In the beginning of the twentieth century, literature changed and focused on breaking away from the typical and predicate patterns of normal literature. Poets at this time took full advantage and stretched the idea of the mind’s conscience on how the world, mind, and language interact and contradict. Many authors, such as Fitzgerald, Steinbeck, and Twain, used the pain and anguish in first hand experiences to create and depict a new type of literature, modernism. In this time era, literature and art became a larger part of society and impacted more American lives than ever before. During the American modernism period of literature, authors, artists, and poets strived to create pieces of literature and art that challenged American traditions and tried to reinvent it, used new ways of communication, such as the telephone and cinema, to demonstrate the new modern social norms, and express the pain and suffering of the First World War.
"The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The 20th Century: Topic 2: Overview." The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The 20th Century: Topic 2: Overview. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Jan. 2014.
Modernists did not have faith in the external reality put forth by social institutions, such as the government and religion, and they no longer considered these avenues as trustworthy means to discover the meaning of life. For this reason they turned within themselves to discover the answers. Modernist literature is centered on the psychological experience as opposed to the external realities of the world. The experience is moved inwards in an attempt to make modernist works more representative of reality by making the experience more personal. The modernist era of literature is closely associated with the works of T.S. Eliot, James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, among others. These three authors stand out because they have made use of unique literary tactics and devices which emphasize the inward turn of modernist literature.
T.S Eliot, widely considered to be one of the fathers of modern poetry, has written many great poems. Among the most well known of these are “The Waste Land, and “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”, which share similar messages, but are also quite different. In both poems, Eliot uses various poetic techniques to convey themes of repression, alienation, and a general breakdown in western society. Some of the best techniques to examine are ones such as theme, structure, imagery and language, which all figure prominently in his poetry. These techniques in particular are used by Eliot to both enhance and support the purpose of his poems.
Many may argue that the Modernist movement was a completely new and unique movement within British literature. The goal of this paper is to determine whether or not the Modernist Literary Movement was completely unique or not. The similarities found in the works of Modernist authors and poets, such as Joseph Conrad and Hilda Doolittle (H.D.), will be examined against Romanticism themes and authors such as William Wordsworth. What will be found is that Modernism is not a completely unique movement, but one that combines elements from previous literary movements.
Chapman, Raymond. The Victorian Debate: English Literature and Society, 1832-1901. New York: Basic Books, Inc., Publishers, 1968.
During Queen Victoria's reign in England, ideals and the very thought of going against the “current” was born and passed along, embellishing into our mainstream personal views on practically everything. Throughout her reign of 64 years, till her death in 1901, England saw changes that changed their own way of doing things, their own way of thinking and refining their views to the point where it represented their work and no one could disagree with them. It was during her successful reign in England that incomprehensible things took place that changed history within such fields and specialties as art, literature, music, philosophy, sciences, and modern inventions. It is because of this time period, known as the Victorian Era, we have many of the modern conveniences, ideas, philosophies, and knowledge that we enjoy, and take for granted, on a daily basis. This period bridged the gap from the dark and medieval ages to our present and productive day. Authors, playwrights, and philosophers documented the changes that society underwent during the Victorian era. Oscar Wilde’s The importance of being earnest and even Charles Dicken’s works have included these such changes in society. This would not have come about without the influence of the ideas and works of several people from Britain, living under
The 20th Century stands out not merely as an age of growth or refinement, but one of absolute transcendent recreation. This new era, presenting the world with radical new ideas and invention, ushered in shocking changes and previously unheard of notions and theory over the views of man. This new phase of humanity brought about the conception and birth of Modernism. Joseph Conrad in particular rushed forward to slam a door on the Victorian Age and end the century of optimism, reproving the human race's ideologies on virtue and purity with the more skeptical realities of the bleakness of real human nature and the power of unfortunate circumstance. Conrad's novel Lord Jim cleaved into the supporting pillars raised by previous Victorian value and set a foundation for his notions of High Modernism; his characters and their reactions to irresolute situations, and even the situations themselves, present the absence of the divine and holy to take the skeptical stance that men, imperfect as they are, face an existential existence.