S5: Modernism

Question 1

John Barth, “The Literature of Replenishment”: What are characteristics of modernist fiction? (6)

Answer 1

• the radical disruption of linear flow of narrative
• the frustration of conventional expectations
• ironic and ambiguous juxtapositions
• tone of epistemological self-mockery
• inward consciousness
• subjective distortion

Question 2

Virginia Woolf:
A) member of …….group
B) Founded ………. Together with Leonard Woolf
C) three major works:

Answer 2

A) Bloomsbury
B) Hogarth Press
C) Mrs Dalloway (1925)
To the Lighthouse (1927)
Orlando (1928)

Question 3

Whats stream of consciousness? (6)

Answer 3

• Representation of thought process = subjective point of view
• Not necessarily structured or ordered = no or little coherence
• Irregular syntax, ellipses, lack of punctuation
• No addressee
• Little or no fixed perspective = cubism
• Flashbacks, montage, rapid cuts

Question 4

Whats stream of consciousness in Mrs Dalloway?

Answer 4

Switch between several characters

Question 5

James Joyce:
A) born in ……
B) moved to continent in …..
C) lived in …..
D) 3 major works:

Answer 5

A) Dublin
B) 1904
C) Trieste, Paris and Zurich
D) Dubliners (1914): 15 short stories
Ulysses (serialised 1918; book 1922)
Finnegans Wake (1939)

Question 6

Ulysses:
A) banned in the UK and the US on charges of ……… (…….)
B) story of ………… and ………….
C) 18 sections (……….)
D) city text = ……..

Answer 6

A) Banned in the UK and the US on charges of obscenity (Nausicaa chapter)
B) Story of Leopold Bloom and Stephen Dedalus
C) 18 sections (linked to episodes of the Odyssey)
D) City text=Dublin

Question 7

Whats critique of „Ulysses“?

Answer 7

• puzzled, bored, irritating and disillusioning
• underbred book
• brackish and pretentious

Question 8

Whats the characteristics of the chapter „Aeolus“?

Answer 8

• set in newspaper office = layout
• replication of bustle/noise
• headlines are not always connected to main text = experience of disorientation
• different voices; unfinished stories
• sense of frustration
• empty rhetoric

Question 9

What are the origins of WW1?

Answer 9

• 1879: Germany and Austria-Hungary form an alliance (the Dual Alliance)
• 1892: France and the Russia form an alliance (the Dual Entente). Germany has a potential enemy in the West and the East
• 1907: Britain joined Russia and France to form the Triple Entente
• Continuing disputes between GB and France over colonies in North
Africa
• 1908: Austria-Hungary annexes Bosnia. Resistance from Serbia and Russia
• 1912-13: series of wars in the Balkans. Serbia is the main victor and appeared and a potential threat to Austria-Hungary

Question 10

Whats the outbreak of WW1?

Answer 10

• June 28, 1914: Assassination of Archduke and Austrian Crown Prince Franz Ferdinand of Austria by Bosnian Serb Gavrilo Princip
• July 28, 1914: Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia. Russia mobilizes its forces
• August 1, 1914: Germany declares war on Russia
• August 3, 1914: Germany declares war on France = Schlieffen Plan. Belgium denies permission for German forces to pass through to the French boarder
• August 4, 1914: GB declares war on Germany
• August 6, 1914: Austria-Hungary declares war on Russia
• August 11, 1914: France declares war on Austria-Hungary
• August 12, 1914: The United Kingdom declares war on Austria-Hungary

Question 11

What was the battle of the Somme?

Answer 11

• Symbol of horror of trench warfare
• 420,000 casualties in the British army (60,000 on the first day); 200,000 in the French army and 500,000 in the German ally

Question 12

WW I: Recruitment and Conscription

Answer 12

• 300,000 volunteers by August 1914; 45,000 by September 1914=Kitchener’s Army
• 1916: conscription is introduced; 2.6 Million volunteers plus 2.3 conscripted
• 80,000 female volunteers by the end of WW1 = non-combatant role (e.g. Queen Mary’s Army Auxiliary Corps)

Question 13

Who are war poets? + one poem

Answer 13

• Rupert Brooke (1887-1915) “The Soldier”
• John McCrae (1872-1918) “In Flanders Field”
• Wilfred Owen (1893-1918) “Dulce et Decorum Est”
• Isaac Rosenberg (1890-1918) “Break of Day in the Trenche”
• Siegfried Sassoon (1886-1967) “Everyone Sang”

Question 14

Who was William Butler Yeast?

Answer 14

• Poet, playwright,essayist and politician
• Anglo-Irish/Protestant Ascendancy
• Sympathies for Irish Nationalism
• Interest in “Irish” culture = Irish Revival, Abbey Theatre (1904)
• Nobel Prize of Literature (1923)

Question 15

What are 3 of William Butler Yeast‘s main works?

Answer 15

• Countess Kathleen (1892)
• Cathleen ni Houlihan (1902)
• Hawk’s Well (1916)

Question 16

Whats the Irish cultural revival?

Answer 16

• Idea of distinct Irish cultural identity beginning in the 18th century
• Often fostered by members of the Anglo-Irish ascendancy
• Interest in Irish language and folk traditions (=Romanticism)
• Regional novel (Maria Edgeworth)
• More political in 19th and 20th century
• Gaelic League (founded by Douglas Hyde in 1893)

Question 17

Whats the Irish Literary Revival?

Answer 17

Apart from William Butler Yeats also
• Lady Augusta Gregory (1852-1932):Cuchulain of Muirthemne (1902)
• John Millington Synge (1871-1909): Riders to the Sea (1904)
• Sean O’Casey (1880-1964): The Shadow of a Gunman (1923)

Question 18

What was the Easter rising?

Answer 18

• Demands for Irish home rule since 1880s
• Government of Ireland Act 1914 (Third Home Rule Bill) = postponed because of WW I
• Irish Republican Brotherhood under Patrick Pearse and James Connolly stage rebellion against British
• Declaration of Irish Republic on Easter Monday
• British Army crushes rebellion using heavy artillery and machine guns
• 485 deaths, over 2000 wounded, 16 executions, 2000 imprisoned

Question 19

5 characteristics of modernism

Answer 19

• focus on character experiences rather than plot
• use of the stream of consciousness style
• experimentation with time and linearity
• communicates feelings of disillusionment
• highlights new technologies of the era

Question 20

Impressionism

Answer 20

Impressionistic literature can basically be defined as when an author centers their story/attention on the character’s mental life such as the character’s impressions, feelings, sensations and emotions, rather than trying to interpret them.

Question 21

Expressionism

Answer 21

Expressionism in literature arose as a reaction against materialism, complacent bourgeois prosperity, rapid mechanization and urbanization, and the domination of the family within pre-World War I European society. It was the dominant literary movement in Germany during and immediately after World War I.