Modernism: The Lure of Heresy by
Peter Gay
A Sweeping Survey
A celebration of subversives: the first one-volume history of
the greatest cultural movement since the Enlightenment.
Peter Gays most ambitious endeavor since Freud explores the shocking
modernist rebellion that, beginning in the 1840s, transformed art,
literature, music, and film with its assault on traditional forms. Beginning
his epic study with Baudelaire, whose lurid poetry scandalized French
stalwarts, Gay traces the revolutionary path of modernism from its
Parisian origins to its emergence as the dominant cultural movement in
world capitals such as Berlin and New York. A work unique in its breadth
and brilliance, Modernism presents a thrilling pageant of heretics that
includes (among others) Oscar Wilde, Pablo Picasso, and D. W. Griffiths;
James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, and T. S. Eliot; Walter Gropius, Arnold
Schoenberg, and (of course!) Andy Warhol. Finally, Gay examines the
hostility of totalitarian regimes to modernist freedom and the role of Pop
Art in sounding the death knell of a movement that dominated Western

culture for 120 years. Lavishly illustrated, Modernism is a superlative
achievement by one of our greatest historians.
Personal Review: Modernism: The Lure of Heresy by Peter Gay
Peter Gay has written a sweeping survey of Modernism that is lucid, highly
readable, amply illustrated, beautifully designed, and remarkably complete.
He has, essentially, written a survey of 120 years of cultural and aesthetic
history. This is not a task for the faint of heart, but Gay has never suffered
from that malady, his array of works spanning multiple centuries. His two-
volume history of the Enlightenment remains a very important study and
his work on Freud and on 19thc sensibility equally so.
The problem with Modernism is that there is so much of it, particularly if
you set out to write about poetry and fiction, music, architecture, painting,
pop culture, and the many movements and sub-movements attending
them. And of course, he is not bounded by any national borders. This is
history with a capital H. That means that he has relatively little space (4-6
pp., usually at the outside) for each major figure. Thus, the book is a
sweeping survey, an excellent introduction to the subject. Theory is kept
to a minimum. He focuses on two aspects of Modernism--its penchant for
aesthetic heresy and its stress of subjectivism.
The book is also scrupulously fair, recognizing silliness and extremism
where they are found and recognizing the important realities that work
designed to shock the middle class cannot exist without a middle class
prepared to consume it and a society sufficiently free and stable to protect
the shockers and provide them a safe place in which to work.
Personally, I would like to have seen a little more discussion of individuals
who distinguished themselves but who did not subscribe to the Modernist
agenda, writers such as Graham Greene or George Orwell and any
number of individuals who produced magnificent work within the
constraints of traditional forms. This is a book about Modernism, of
course, but that could be contextualized with sharper contrasts. Gay is a
believer, though a balanced one. Still, he sees grandeur in the
international style of architecture and tends to overlook the ugliness of
fifties' boxes with smudged glass and drip stains from flat roofs. I did not
expect him to take Tom Wolfe's stance on the Bauhaus or on abstract
expressionism, but Wolfe's (much-maligned) stance is shared by many.
The book concludes with a survey of contemporary Modernism, with
Gehry's Bilbao Guggenheim and Marquez's fiction. Gay sees the world of
fiction as relatively flat, though there are many skilled practitioners. It is
only flat, in my opinion, if you confine yourself to Modernist writing.
Pynchon, e.g., does not fit his template and is thus not considered, though
he is a towering figure. This is a small quibble in light of the book's
accomplishments, however. I highly recommend it as an introduction to
the subject and as an instructive, entertaining, well-written book.

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