Assignment
Name: - Dave
Nimesh B
M.A. Sem: -
3
Paper No :- 9 ( The Modernist
Literature)
Assignment Topic: Discuss in detail
what is Modernism? What are the characteristics of Modernism/ Modernist
literature.
Academic
Year :- 2015-16
Submitted
To :- Department
of English ( MKBU)
Discuss in detail what is Modernism? What are the characteristics of Modernism/ Modernist literature.
Evaluate “The Waste
Land”, “Waiting for Godot”, “To The Lighthouse”, & “ The Birthday Party” as
a modernist text/ literature.
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- Introduction:-
- What is Modern? When we say 'Modern', it automatically signifies that there was something ancient or old. Then we can differentiate that things which are not ancient or old or traditional are modern.
- Dictionary gave me meaning of the word Modern:-
- Pertaining to a current or recent time and style, not ancient.
- Synonym- contemporary.
- Antonym- dated, old, pre modern, ancient.
●"The Modern
Age"(1901-1950).A.C. Ward- the
Setting
- It is very difficult to differentiate when particular movement in history began or ended. We cannot give exact dates. But then even various critics have tried to put Modern age into different periods.
- When any new thing starts in history it doesn’t became particular movement rapidly. But after a long time people realizes the traces, seeds of that movement or age/epoch, which later on recorded by historians by keeping in mind particular references. The same case happens with all the great ages or says The Modern age also.
- Categorizing is very much western idea. They see in linear way like rail bogies, whereas for Indians everything is in cyclical nature (life-death-rebirth). My point is that thus they differentiate history also in various compartments.
- Literature captures fluctuations of time/ society. Literature is affected/ influenced by society. So whatever was happening in early 20th century that time is captured in The Modernist Literature.
- Modernism:-
- Although the term
“modernism” generally refers to the collective literary trend in the early twentieth century, it
more precisely applies to a group of British and American writers—such as James
Joyce, Ezra Pound, and T. S. Eliot—who crafted carefully worded images in
colloquial language. In the broader sense of “modernism,” early-
twentieth-century writers broke up the traditional plot structure of
narratives, experimented with language, fragmented ideas, played with shifting
perspectives, and drew self-conscious attention to the very nature of language
itself. Postmodern writers playfully create allusions, contradictions,
meta-narratives, and linguistic games in order to disrupt reader expectations
of fixed, objective references.
- In Modernism Experimentation and individualism became virtues, where in the past they were often heartily discouraged In contrast to the Romantic world view, the Modernist cares rather little for Nature, Being, or the overarching structures of history. Instead of progress and growth, the Modernist intelligentsia sees decay and a growing alienation of the individual. The machinery of modern society is perceived as impersonal, capitalist, and antagonistic to the artistic impulse. War most certainly had a great deal of influence on such ways of approaching the world. Two World Wars in the span of a generation effectively shell-shocked all of Western civilization.
- It is a literary & artistic movement that provided a radical break with traditional modes of western art, thought, religion, social convention & morality. Major theme of this period include the attack on notion of hierarchy, experimentation in new forms of narrative such as stream of consciousness, doubt about the existence of knowledge, objective realty, attention to alternative viewpoints & modes of thinking, and self referentiality as a means of drawing attention to the relationship between artist and audience, and form & content.
●How this age is
important for Europeans?
- It is the age when human race moved faster forward and backward than during perhaps fifty generations in the past. It brought progress and regress both. (Scientific revolution-aero plane, other means of mass slaughter in two world wars, with nuclear power bring threat of universal destruction) (In peace time motor car & motor cycle gave almost unlimited mobility to millions).
▪Victorians V/S
Modernist
- in the study of
literature few things are most interesting than to consider periodic changes of
outlook which sway the human mind and spirit, and to observe those fluctuations
of value which cause the truths and certainties of one generation to appears as
superstitions and baseless conventions in the eyes of the generation following.
- Young men & women during 20th century looked back upon the (Victorian Age) as dully hypocritical.
- -Victorian ideals appeared mean and superficial and stupid.
- From 1901 to 1925 English Literature was directed by mental attitudes, moral ideals and spiritual values at almost the opposite extreme to the attitudes, ideals & values governing Victorian literature.
- The old certainties were certainties no longer.
- Everything was held to be open to question.
Question
Examine
Test→ watchword of
Modern Age.
- Standard of artistic craftsmanship and of aesthetic appreciation began to change fundamentally.
- What he Victorians had considered beautiful their children and grandchildren thought hideous.
- Intellectuals and artists at the turn of the 20th century believed the previous generation’s way of doing things was a cultural dead end. They could foresee worlds events were spiraling into unknown territory. The stability and quietude of Victorian civilization were rapidly becoming a thing of the past.
- The post Victorian generation disliked the furnishings of Victorian households; they were even more contemptuous of the furnishings of the Victorian minds.
- In the Victorian age there was a widespread and willing submission to the rule of expert.
- The voice of authority was accepted in religion, in politics, in literature, in family life.
Victorians
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Modernist
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- ♣ Characteristics of Modernism / literature
- High degree of complexity in structure
- Anxiety and interrogation
- reworks tradition
- Works are intensely self-reflexive, exploring the process of their own composition.
- Are often Fragmented and nonlinear, breaking up time frames and plots.
- Some critics identify a sense of apocalypse & disaster in modernism.
- City based.
- It is also located in the context of Empire and world wars, of advanced military technology.
- A great deal of experimentation with language and form.
- An interest in subjectivity and the working of the human consciousness.
- Often rejects realism & the idea that art has to capture reality.
- Modernist fiction defamiliarizes or makes strange what is common.
- MAKE IT NEW- is the Modernist slogan.
- Highly elitist because it was complex and used allusions and classical references that called for great erudition- which was available only to certain classes of people.
- FRUSTRATION
- FRAGMENTATION
- ISOLATION
- BROKENNESS
- NOTHINGNESS Characteristics of modernist Literature.
- The Waste Land by T.S.Eliot as Modernist text
- Introduction:-
- The poetry of modern age expresses the chaos and the changing scenario of life and society.
- T.S.Eliot's The Waste Land is both a demonstration and a manifesto of what the new poetry wanted to do and could do.
- T.S.Eliot (1888-1965) describes the boredom, emptiness and pessimism of modern age in bitter, ironical and satirical verse.
- His famous poem The Waste Land is considered the most important poetic documents of the age. It expresses poignantly a desperate sense of the poet, and the age's lack of positive spiritual thinking. Eliot's overwhelming need for redemption transformed him into a religious poet. His intense zeal for religious truth, which lead finally to a new hope in the Christian ideas for rebirth & renewal.
- In his pursuit of giving a realistic representation of life around him, he many times becomes critical of the spiritual degeneration of men and expresses his deep despair over utter emptiness of the contemporary civilization.
- He introduced a new poetic style. His diction is original and unique. It comprehends paradox, irony and contrast.
- Frank Kermode rightly observes that English Poetry would have had no future without the invaluable work done by T.S.ELIOT.
Positive words
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Negative words
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- The Waste Land
- The Waste Land represents our current world is a mob of faces, of fragmented images. The scene is set, history is added, and then the voices come in, expressing the feeling of war generation. the feeling of hopelessness that are still around today, in depression, unhappiness, lack of caring........perhaps despair is not European condition, as most people would have despaired at some point in their lives.
- The Waste Land is a collage of several things/Images, in which Eliot tries to attempts to tell the story of the modern person. He gives voice to the many voices, the many ideas, the many people in a diverse culture, which is also why he may include numerous languages.
- The sequence of pictures-Modern Technique of Cinematography:-
- As in cinema, there are a series of shots transcending time and place, meaningless if. Considered separately, but taken together forming a coherent whole.
- It helps in controlling time and space- gives universal and permanent significance.
- Successive clippings, after a few readings fix themselves in memory and convey a coherent whole of meaning.
- The sequence of picture is central to the poem. The interpretations of these pictures and other symbols and images may vary from person to person. Yet, what is definite is the vitality & realism of these pictures as they pass by like shorts in films.
- In its novel use of fragmentary voices, dense allusiveness, mythic structures, urban setting, coiling irony and unabashed difficulty, T.S.ELIOT'S The Waste Land epitomizes the central thematic and stylistic tendencies of Modernist Literature.
- Much of the poem brings us face to face with the Modern artist's dilemma of how to find an adequate poetic form and expression to convey his inner experience. It shows us that the modern poet is acutely aware of the conflicts and contradictions, the complexities and fragmentation of his society. So that he can no longer use traditional methods of writing poetry.
- Hence the artist today is forced to recreate his own esoteric myth & symbols, and draw upon his own vast and unique range of reading for references and allusion to adequately express his meaning or experience. This leads to the charge the Eliot's poetry, especially in The Waste Land is often abstruse and suffers from extreme ambiguity. Thus the disintegration of modern art and poetry itself into the realm of obscurity and elitism becomes a crucial issue in Eliot's poem.
- Entire The Waste Land is in the stream of consciousness of Tiresias. So whatever Tiresias sees that is the substance of the poem. Eliot rightly chooses Tiresias as a unifying link to connect past, present and future. We are in the stream of consciousness of Tiresias.
- The very first line of The Waste Land is 'April is the cruelest month', which breaks the archetype of Chaucer's 'April is the sweetest month', is itself the characteristic of modernist literature. He breaks the basic symbol.
- Eliot is showing mirror to world, which they are. Rather than praising he is criticizing rottenness of Western culture. But as a modernist writer he can’t do that in traditional way like Hardy, Dickens or another. So how to do that? He does this in awkward way. He tries to say through hazy, blurred images in a haphazard way.
April is the cruellest
month, breeding
Lilacs out of dead land,
mixing
Memory and desire,
stirring
Dull roots with spring
rain. ←
1st image.
- Snow covered mountain -2nd image.
- Marie & cousin - 3rd image.
- Landscape image
- Lovers coming, wet hair (Tristan and Isolde) – image
- London Bridge (mechanical people)-image
- Madame Sosostris-image
- A lady seating & beautifying herself-image
- Philomela & Procne-Image
- Two person seating (in coffee house) image
- Albert coming back- image
- Image of river Thames
- Tiresias-Sailor, typist, clerk image
- Phlebas the phonecian
- What the thunder said-
- Christian imagery- Christ caught after last supper.
- Mystical image
- Sterile dry thunder without water
- Falling towers image
- Ganga, Himavat image
- Datta, Dayadhvam, Damyata.
- Conclusion
Thus, The Waste Land is
remarkable piece of writing of Modernist Literature.
- To The Lighthouse
- Lighthouse To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf is remarkable work of 20th century / Modernist literature.
- This novel is famous because of its writing technique- Stream of consciousness- which is trademark of Modernist literature. Virginia Woolf breaks the traditional way of telling a story and creates something novel (new).
- The text is heavily autobiographical. By reading Woolf's biography, we come to know about her traumatic experience, her disturbed mind, illness, depression etc. So what she wants to write is not possible in traditional form of writing. So stream of consciousness is appropriate technique in To The Lighthouse.
- The novel is divided into three parts:
- The Window
- 2)Time Passes
- 3)To The Lighthouse
- Each is fragmented into stream of consciousness.
- It is very difficult technique to write as well as to understand. We are mostly in the minds of the characters. Readers also come to know that characters while doing something- thinking about something else. And writer also tells minor things like sound of waves, someone or something is passing by etc. This kind of internal thinking process finds place in stream of consciousness.
- ★ Stream of consciousness:-
- What is Stream of consciousness??
- Stream of consciousness was a phrase used by William James in his Principles of Psychology (1890) to describe the unbroken flow of perceptions, thoughts, and feelings in the waking mind.
- And then it has been adopted to describe a narrative method in modern fiction.
- Long passages of introspection, in which the narrator records in detail what passes through a character's awareness, are found in novelists from Samuel Richardson, through William James’ brother Henry James, to many novelists of the present era.
- Stream of consciousness is the name applied specifically to a mode of narration that undertakes to reproduce, without a narrator's intervention, the full spectrum and continuous flow of a character's mental process, in which sense perceptions mingle with conscious and half-conscious thoughts, memories, expectations, feelings, and random associations.
- (A Glossary of Literary Terms – M.H. Abrams)
- ★Interior Monologue in To The Lighthouse
- Interior Monologue is a term that is most often confused with stream of consciousness.
- It presents to the reader the course & rhythm of consciousness precisely as it occurs in a character's mind
- In Interior Monologue author does not intervene nor does it minimally- as a describer, guide or commentator.
- It is the exact presentation of the process of consciousness.
- 2 types:-
- 1)Direct monologue: - negligible author interference
- 2)indirect monologue: - author intervenes between character's psyche and the reader.
- # Difference:-
- -indirect monologue gives reader a sense of the author's continuous presence
- Direct monologue either completely or largely excludes it.
- In To The Lighthouse, we can observe the modernist phenomenon that - traditionally made up stories were no longer important, what matters was the impression they made on the characters that experienced them.
- Virginia Woolf, in her essay, Modern Fiction :“Let us record the atom as they fall upon the mind in the order in which they fall, let us trace the pattern, however disconnected and incoherent in appearances, which each sight or incident scores upon the consciousness.”
- Example from the text;
- Such were the extremes of emotion that Mr. Ramsay excited in his children’s breasts by his mere presence; standing, as now, lean as a knife, narrow as the blade of one, grinning sarcastically, not only with the pleasure of disillusioning his son and casting ridicule upon his wife, who was ten thousand times better in every way than he was (James thought), but also with some secret conceit at his own accuracy of judgment. What he said was true. It was always true. (Pg. 1)
- This shows the similarities between a narrator's utterance & omniscient narrator commentary
- narrator steps aside but soon comes to give the comment “What he said was true...".
- # Use of Parenthesis:=
- “Teaching and preaching is beyond human power, Lily suspected. (She was putting away her things.)”(p.32)
- Parenthesis can also be little asides, expectations, pointers to what is going on.
- [Mr. Ramsay, stumbling along a passage one dark morning, stretched his arms out, but Mrs. Ramsay having died rather suddenly the night before, his arms, though stretched out, remained empty.] (Pg 91)
- [Prue Ramsay, leaning on her father’s arm, was given in marriage. What, people said, could have been more fitting? And, they added, how beautiful she looked!] (pg 93)
- [Macalister’s boy took one of the fish and cut a square out of its side to bait his hook with. The mutilated body (it was alive still) was thrown back into the sea.]
- Thus, through Stream of consciousness, Woolf expresses the character's inner world in great coherence and unity.
- It reveals the character’s flow of thoughts and takes the reader into the consciousness of the character. It deals with conscious, subconscious and even unconscious part of her character.
- Sudden death of central character, Mrs.Ramsay, in parenthesis in the novel's highly stylized middle section, was deeply strange because this is Modernist Literature.
- ToThe Lighthouse follows & extends the tradition of Modernists, like Marcel Proust and James Joyce. It cited as a key example of stream of consciousness literary technique- most of it written as thoughts and observations.
- Waiting for Godot as a Modernist Literature
Introduction:-
- Waiting for Godot is a French play, translated into English by the author himself Samuel Beckett.
- Waiting for Godot is the most debated play, since its first premiere in very small theatre of Paris in 1953.
- This play has many characteristics of modernist literature. The play is not traditional. Protagonist of the play is two tramps.
- Making two tramps protagonist itself makes it Modernist text, because from traditional way of looking towards literature- it is believed that protagonist should be great person like king, prince, great warrior etc.
- Aristotle told that play should be of high seriousness, but if we look at Waiting for Godot, we find that nothing serious happens. Two tramps Vladimir and Estragon are just waiting on the stage for someone called Godot.
- It has no story, no plot - neither beginning nor end.
- Waiting for Godot is full of anxiety and interrogation. There are so many questions, but not a single answer- what is this all about?
- Modernist Literature is also experimentative in language & form. The language of the play is simple- but that simplicity is deceiving.
- Waiting for Godot explores the working of the human
consciousness. It also rejects realism and the idea that art has to capture
reality.
- Modernist fiction also defamiliarizes or makes strange what is common. Make it new is the modernist slogan. The play has no story or plot to speak of. Characters are almost mechanical puppets.
- If a good play must have fully explained theme, which is neatly exposed and finally solved, Waiting for Godot have neither beginning nor end.
- "Waiting for Godot does not tell a story, it explores static situation. Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it’s awful".
- Nothingness:-
- 'Nothing to be done'.
- The very first line of the play is 'Nothing to be done'. Nothingness is very remarkable characteristic of modern age. Nothing is something of the play.
- Setting:-
- A country road. A tree. Evening.
- Even in their waiting for Godot, Estragon and Vladimir are unsure of the place where they are waiting.
- V: He said by the tree. Do you see others?
- E: What is it?
- V : I don’t know.....A willow.
- In this doubt & uncertainty, there is no authenticity to the existence of Vladimir and Estragon. Therefore nothing is certain. Life is meaningless.
- Estragon and Vladimir are also coming to the opinion after long waiting that nothing can be done. So it is great satire on positive thinking.
- · Existentialism & Absurdism
- Existentialism became popular in the year following World War 2, and strongly influenced many disciplines besides philosophy including theology, drama, art, literature and Psychology.
- Existentialist recognizes that human knowledge is limited and fallible. Waiting for Godot falls under the category of Theatre of Absurd, a term coined by drama critic Martin Esslin.
- Vladimir and Estragon caught in hopeless situation forced to do repetitive or meaningless actions, dialogues are full of clichés, wordplay and nonsense, plot that is cyclical or absurdly expansive.
- Who are we?
- Why are we here?
- Existentialist themes are displayed in the Beckett's Waiting for Godot, in which two men divert themselves while they wait expectantly for someone named Godot who never arrives. They claim Godot to be an acquaintance, but in fact hardly know him if they saw him.
- Samuel Beckett, once asked who or what Godot is? replied, ' if I knew, I would have said so in the play'.
- To occupy themselves, the men eat, sleep, talk, argue, sing, play games, exercise, swap hats and contemplate suicide - anything “to hold the terrible silence at bay.
- The play "exploits several Archetypal forms and situations, all of which lend themselves to both comedy and pathos".
- The play also illustrates an attitude toward human experience on earth: the poignancy, oppression, camaraderie, hope, corruption, & bewilderment of human experience that can be reconcile only in the mind & art of the Absurdist. The play examines questions such as death, the meaning of human existence and the place of God in human existence.
- The characters of the play are strange caricatures who have difficulty in communicating the simplest concept to one another as they bide their time awaiting their arrival of Godot.
- Whereas traditional theatre attempts to create a photographic representation of life as we see it, The Theatre of Absurd aims to create a ritual like, mythological, Archetypal, allegorical vision closely related to the world of dreams.
- The focal point of this dream is often man's fundamental bewilderment & confusion, stemming from the fact that he has no answer to the basic existential questions:
- Why we are alive?
- Why there is injustice and suffering?
- All actions become senseless, absurd and useless...
- Conclusion
- Waiting for Godot a drama presents distrust of language by as a means of communication. Language is nothing but a vehicle for conventionalized, stereotyped, meaningless exchange. Thus, waiting for Godot is very remarkable work of modernist literature.
- The Birthday Party as a Modernist text
- The Birthday Party is a play by English playwright Harold Pinter, who achieved international success as one of the most complex post World War 2nd dramatist.
- Harold Pinter's plays are noted for their use of silence to increase tension, understatement & cryptic small talk.
- Equally recognizable are the 'Painteresque' themes - nameless menace, erotic fantasy, obsession & jealousy, family hatred and mental disturbance.
- The Birthday Party falls under the category of Theatre of Absurd or especially Comedy of Menace.
- PLOT
- Traditional plot structures are rarely a consideration in Theatre of Absurd. Often there is a menacing outside force that remains a mystery.
- The Birthday Party - Goldberg & McCann. Confront Stanley, torture him with Absurd question and drag him off at the end of the play but is never revealed why. The menace is no longer entering from outside but exists within the confined space.
- Language:-
- Despite its reputation of nonsense language, much of the language in this plays naturalistic. The moments when characters resort to nonsense language or clichés- when words appear to have lost their denotative function, thus creating misunderstanding among the characters- make The Birthday Party distinctive.
- Language in this play gains a certain phonetic, rhythmical almost musical quality, opening up a wide range of often comedic playfulness.
- Character:-
- The Characters in this play are lost & floating in an incomprehensible universe and they abandon rational devices and discursive thought because these approaches are inadequate.
- The more characters are in crisis because the world around them is incomprehensible. Many of Pinter's plays, for example feature characters trapped in an enclosed space menaced by some force that characters can’t understand.
- Theatre of Absurd:-
- The Birthday Party is also part of Theatre of Absurd. The play has all the characteristics of Theatre of Absurd.
- The play presents meaningless situation of human in confusing, hostile and indifferent world.
- As comedy of menace:-
- The Birthday Party- a comedy of menace is a tragedy with numbers of comic elements. It is a comedy, which also produces overwhelming tragic effect.
- Throughout the play we
are kept amused and yet throughout the play we find ourselves also on the brink
of terror.
- Some indefinable and vague fear keeps our nerves on an edge. We feel uneasy all the time even when we are laughing or smiling with amusement. This dual quality which is modern phenomenon makes the play Modernist literature- which is also breaking old tradition.
- Pinter Pause: - (Something new than traditional)
- One of the two silences when Pinter's stage direction indicate pause and silence when his characters are not speaking at all- has become a trademark of Pinter's dialogue and known as Pinter Pause.
- There are two silences:-
- (1) When no word is spoken
- (2) When perhaps a torrent of language is being employed.
- There is always continuous fear of unknown. Human beings trapped in a situation they don’t know.
- Frustration,
- Isolation,
- Brokenness &
- Disjointedness in The Birthday Party.
- Political
reading:-
- The play is very much open for various interpretations.
- -Political
interpretation of the play suggest that Nat Goldberg and Dermont McCann
represents country like U.S.A. and U.K. Lulu represents the idea/concept of
welfare state on the grounds of socialistic/ communist/ Marxist Leninist
economics.
- Characters like Meg and Petey represents society- who can do nothing. Impotency of society is presented through these characters.
- Stanley - An artist represents a true individual, free thinker (Nations).
- Play is mixture of terror and amusement; it is frightening as well as funny.
- Nothing is clear in the play. This is the characteristics of Modernist literature that larger things are signified than said directly.
- Conclusion:-
- Thus, with its distinctive characteristics The Birthday Party is a modernist text- different and distinct than traditional works of literature in many ways.
Work Cited
Bloom, Harold. "Waiting for Godot." Bloom,
Harold. Waiting for Godot. New York: Facts on File, Inc., 2010. 23-40.
Deer, Herriet Deer and
Irving. "Pinter's The Birthday Party: The film and the play." Jstror
45 (2013): 26-30.
Kumar, Satish.
"The Modern Age." AGES MOVEMENTS and LITERARY FORMS. Lakshmi
Narian Agarwal, n.d.
Nobelprize.org. Art,
truths and politics. 2005. 10 10 2015
<http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/2005/pinter-lecture-e.html>.
online
literature.com. 30 10 2015. 30 10 2015
<http://www.online-literature.com/periods/modernism.php>.
Ward, A. C. "THE
SETTING." Twentieth Century English Literature. 1. London: The
English Language book society and Mathuen, 1965. 1-24.
w http://www.slideshare.net/dilipbarad/stream-of-consciousness-in-to-the-lighthouseww.ntworld.com. 30 10 2015. 30 10 2015 <http://homepage.ntworld.com/bradsweb/pinter.html>.
