Modernism is a comprehensive movement which began in the closing years of the 19th century and has had a wide influence internationally during much of the 20th century.

1. Topic:- Overview of Modernist Literature
Submitted to:
Smt. S.B. Gardi
Department of English
M.K.Bhavnagar University, Bhavnagar.

2.  Introduced of Modernism AND Modernist Literature
1914-1945
 Modernism is a comprehensive movement which began
in the closing years of the 19th century and has had a
wide influence internationally during much of the 20th
century.
 reveals breaking away from established rules, traditions
and conventions, fresh ways of looking at man’s position
and function in the universe and many experiments in
form and style.
 It is particularly concerned with language and how to use
it and with writing itself.
 style or movement in the arts that aims to break with
classical and traditional forms”
 They directly confronted the new economic, social and
political aspects of an emerging fully industrialized world.
Encouraged the re-examination of every aspect of
existence (e.g. commerce / philosophy)

3. HISTORY
 First time period of this age approximately 1890-1950.
 Some Poets started before 1890 in the post –Romantic period.
 Some poets continued writing major work after world war -2
 Focused in Europe and north America.
 The roots of Modernism emerged in the middle of the nineteenth
century; and rather locally, in France, in literature and painting.
 Many Major element are important in modernism but word war
-2 reactions is more effectively.

5. After world war-II news paper

6. Modernism as a movement
Modernism as a movement can be recognized not only
in literature but also in
• The sciences
• Philosophy
• Psychology
• Anthropology
• Painting
• Music
• Sculpture
• Architecture

8. • 1909
– First “Manifesto” of Italian
Futurism
• 1910
– Death of Edward VII
– Post-impressionist exhibition in
London
• 1913
– Russian Cubo-futurism
– English Verticism
• 1916-20
– Dada
• 1912-17
– Imagism
– Tradition and individual
Talent by TS Eliot
• 1922
– Ts. Eliot’s The Waste
Land
– J. Joyce’s Ulysses
– Death of M.Proust
A few Dates

9. Reasons
 The horror of WW I also fed the urge
for a new way to express the protest
towards the social atmosphere prevalent
at that time.
 Rapid urbanization
 Industrialization
 Immigration
 Technological Evolution
 Growth of Modern Science
 Influence of Austrian Sigmund Freud
 Influence of German Karl Marx

10. SHIFTS IN THE MODERN NATION
 from country to city
 from farm to factory
 from native born to new citizen
 introduction to “mass” culture (pop culture)
 split between science and the literary tradition
 In short Modernism is “ a style or movement in the arts
that aims to break with classical and traditional forms”
 This movement create when some writers felt that they
required a new form of writing to express their
ideologies and outlook towards.
 20th century “vision” – emphasis on how we know- on
structures of perception themselves.

11. Leading thinkers
• Physicist Einstein on Relativity (1905)
• Physicist Planck on Quantum Theory
(1900)
• Philosopher Nietzsche on the Will of
Power
• Philosopher Bergson on the Concept of
Time
• Psychologist William James on
Emotions and Inner Time
• Psychologist Freud on the Unconscious
(The Interpretation of Dreams, 1900)
• Psychologist Jung on Collective
Unconscious
• Linguist De Saussure on Language
• Anthropologist Frazer on Primitive
Cultures

12. General characteristics of the Age
i. Anxiety and Interrogation
ii. Art for Life’s Sake
iii. Growing interest in the poor and working classes
iv. Impact of Social-economic conditions on
literature
v. Psychology and literature
vi. The Impact of the two world wars
vii. International character of literature
viii.The Influence of Radio, Cinema and Television
Shorty Remember ‘AA GIP TIT’

13. Poetry
The Transitional
Poets
Alfred
Austin
W.E.
Henley
John
Davidson
William
Watson
The Georgian
Poets
Rupert
Brooke
Walter De
La Mare
Johan
Masefield
Edward
Thomas

14. Poetry Characteristics
 Perspectivism
 Inner psychology of the mind
 Changes in perception of language
 Emphasis on the experimental
 Juxtaposition
 Discontinues narrative
 Intersexuality
(1) Faulkner’s The Sound & the Fury
( Title related to shakepare's Mackbeth)
(2) Joyces’s Ulysses
(Title and work related The Odyessey)
 Classical allusions
 Borrowing from culture and
other language
 No regular rhyming scheme
 Visual images in distinct lines

15. MODERNISM INCLUDES MANY “ISMS”
Imagism
Cubism
Dadaism
Expressionism
Surrealism
Symbolism
Impressionism

16. Expressionism

17. Impressionism Existentialism

19. Difference between Realism and Modernism
Whereas
REALISM
Emphasized
absolutism and
Believed that single
reality could be
determined through
the observation of
nature
MODERNISM
Argued for
culture relativism
And believed that
people make their
own meaning in the
world

20. Famous Modernist Writers
Samuel Beckett
James Joyce
Joseph Conrad
T.S Eliot
William Faulkner
William Butler Yeats
Ezra Pound
D.H Lawrence
Gertrude Stein
George Moore
H.G.Wells
G.B.Shaw

21. W.B. Yeats(1855-1939)

22. T.S. Eliot(1888-1965)

23. Modernist novelists
J.Joyce
V. Woolf
D.H. Lawrence
J. Conrad
E.M. Forster
E. Hemingway
W. Faulkner
M. Proust
F. Kafka
R. Musil
T. Mann
I. Svevo
L. Pirandello
B. Pasternak
M. Bulgakov
K.Mansfield

24. Formal features of narrative
• Experimental nature
• Lack of traditional chronological narrative
(discontinuous narrative)
• Break of narrative frames (fragmentation)
• Moving from one level of narrative to another
• A number of different narrators (multiple narrative
points of view)
• Self-reflexive about the act of writing and the nature
of literature (meta-narrative)
• Use of interior monologue technique
• Use of the stream of consciousness technique
• Focus on a character's consciousness and
subconscious
• Unconventional use of metaphor
• Fragmentation

25. • Use of poetic line
• Flexibility of line length
• Massive use of alliteration
and assonance
• No use of traditional metre
• No regular rhyme scheme
• Use of visual images in
distinct lines
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the
sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted
streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster
shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question . . .
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?“
Let us go and make our visit.
T.S Eliot Prufrock
Free verse

26. Use of interior monologue technique

27. Stream of consciousness
Creates the impression that the reader is eavesdropping
on the flow of conscious experience in the character’s mind
Comes in a variety of stylistic forms
Narrated stream of consciousness often composed of
different sentence types including psycho-narration and free
indirect style
Inner psychology relaity ot ‘Interiority’ represented .
Strem of conscioussec –portayinig the charcter’s inner
monologue

28. Viriginia Woolf(1882-1941)

29. James Joyce (1882-1941)

30. D.H Lawrence (1995-1930)

31. G. Orwell (1903-1950)

32. My last view...
• In sum up we know that modaarnist movement or
20 th century literature history is very hugh lengh in
wolrd history.