Modernism Flashcards
Which ideals change?
Writers, intellectuals and artists found it difficult to believe in anything, religion, philosophy, art..
Which scientific improvements were there?
- Albert Einstein in 1905 published his Theory of Relativity
- Oppenheimer lead an international team of scientists to the production of new war technologies, including the atomic bomb
Which philosophical improvements were there?
German philosopher Nietzsche stated that existing values (good,true..) were decadent. These theories were later linked with Fascism and Nazism.
Impact of psychoanalysis?
Sigmund Freud showed that the human mind has many layers, some of which are unknown. He began to explore new areas of sensibility, which came to be known as the unconscious.
What does Modernism mean?
Modernism indicates the 20th century literature and art which expressed the reaction against the 19th century values in new forms
Modernism characteristics?
- breakdown of traditional literary genres
- fragmentation of time and place
- collapse of traditional plot with a story that has a beginning and an end
- use of complex language
- psychological truth of the characters
- use of myth
- use of the free verse
First generation Modernists?
1922-1925: -Eliot's The Waste Land -Joyce's Ulysse -Woolf's Mrs Dalloway They all deal with the unconscious in daily life and many writers used the stream-of-consciousness, through which they reproduce the flow of human thought.
Who were them inspired by?
Modernist writers were inspired by Cubism,Futurism,Dadaism and Surrealism. They were trying to create their own interpretation of reality, making up their own myths or using ancient ones.
Second generation modernists?
From the 1920’s artists began to take sides in the philosophical and political fight, this lead many second generation modernists like Orwell to turn to the political left. Some of them even took part in the Spanish Civil War.
What’s the stream of consciousness?
It’s made up of distant or incongruous ideas presented with no rational order. This definition was coined by William James.
Who are the transitional novelists?
Transition novels appeared between 1880-1920, novelists began to experiment with new narrative structures and techniques such as flashbacks, time-shifts and a new way of portraying the human mind.
Who’s Joseph Conrad?
Joseph Conrad wrote Heart of Darkness, a short novel set in Congo, an adventure novel with an exotic setting. Conrad shows how when man cannot rely on institutions show their dark side. It’s also a criticism of European colonialism in Africa.
Who’s D.H. Lawrence?
D.H. Lawrence was the first novelist to show the impact of new sciences and psychoanalysis. He wrote Sons and Lovers, a psychological description of an oedipal complex and a realistic portrait of live in provincial northern England
What’s the modernist revolution about?
- lack of faith in traditional values, progress, science and technology
- trauma of WW1
- use of classical myths to criticise modern society
- past,present and future co-exist
- stream of consciousness
Who are the first generation modernists?
James Joyce and Virginia Woolf
Who’s James Joyce?
James Joyce wrote Dubliners, a collection of short stories about people living in Dublin. The central theme is ‘paralysis’, an inability to overcome mental frustration. He also wrote Ulysses in which he describes the events of an ordinary day in the life of an ordinary man. He criticizes the lack of heroism, ideals, love and trust in the modern world.
Who’s Virginia Woolf?
Virginia Woolf was born in London in an upper-class family. In Modern Fiction she stated that human perception depends not on measurable time(time of the clock) but on the way the mind is affected by it(time of the mind). Mrs Dalloway describes a day in the life of mrs dalloway.
Who’s E.M. Foster?
E.M. Foster didn’t accept traditional values and attacked British imperialism in A passage to India, which explores the difficult relationship between the British and the Indians. Though his style and language are far from the modernist style.
Who are the anti-utopian novel?
During the 30s and 40s writers were concerned with the growing influence of social media and the creation of new war machines. so most of them turned to the political left. The most famous anti-utopian novel is 1984 by George Orwell, which describes a future where everything is controlled by the dictator Big Borther, which controls man’s actions through cameras and microphones. This novel became symbol of modern man’s addiction to mass media.
James Joyce’s life?
James Joyce was born in Dublin in 1882 into a middle-class Catholic family. He attended Jesuit schools. Life in Ireland was too provincial for his development so he moved to Paris, Pola and Trieste. In Trieste Joyce finished Dubliners and A portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Because of WW1 he moved to Paris where he published Ulysses. His last work was Finnegans Wake. in 1941 he moved to zurich where he died.
What was Joyce’s relationship with Ireland?
Joyce rejected life in Ireland because it was provincial and seen as an obstacle for his development, though all of his works are about Ireland, reproducing early 20th century Dublin with precise details. His self-imposed exile was necessary to give him the intellectual detachment to write about Ireland.
What’s Dubliners?
Dubliners is a collection of fifteen stories about the paralysis of life in Dublin. The story had been written in 1905, though publishers refused to publish it because it was considered immoral so it was published in 1920.
What’s the paralysis?
The paralysis of will as the inability to go beyond the social context they live in. The sense of stagnation is presented in four stages: childhood, youth, maturity and public life.
Realism and symbolism in Dubliners?
On one level Joyce gives a realistic description of the characters, places, streets of Dublin whereas on a symbolic level Joyce introduces the epiphany.
