The Movement Poetry in English Literature

1. Abhinav
Prasad
T.Y.B.A.
Sem 6
Roll. No.
145

2. Presentation
On
The Movement
Poetry
Guided By
DR. Yagnesh
Dhoriya

3. 1.
•OVERVIEW

4. There have been several controversies and debate regarding the existence of this movement in 1950’s.
Each decade of a century has thrown up a poetic idiom to match the time.
Throughout the twentieth century, modern British poetry progressively moved away from centre to
include a wide range from Northern Ireland, Scotland, Wales.
When war broke out in 1939, the impulse to warn which had characterised the people.

5. 2.
•The Movement

6. The Movement refers to the particular movement of the 1950s with a definite group of poets, characteristics,
specific aims and manifesto, and its identity as an important document in literature.
The Movement was a reaction against the excessive romanticism of the previous identifiable major
movement in British poetry; the New Apocalyptics.
The Movement produced two anthologies: Poets of the 1950’s by D.J.Enright (1955) and The New
Lines (1956) by Robert Conquest.
He described the connection between the poets as ——‘little more than a negative determination to avoid
bad principles’

7. The introduction to the New Lines targeted the excesses of the 1940 poets especially Dylan Thomas and
Barker.
A second New Lines anthology appeared in 1963, by which time The Movement came into existence in
the shape of The Group.
The Movement in general, seems to have played an important and significant role in leading English
poetry from Modernism to Postmodernism.
Thus it can be perceived that the Movement has staged a rebellion against the modern poetry of the 1920s,
represented by Eliot and Pound.

8. 3.
• Origin & Development of
Movement

9. The Key factors responsible for the origin and development of the Movement were the
Friendships made at Oxford and Cambridge between the different Movement poets.
Another major role was played by Journalism in the development of the
Movement.
The Movement took its first breath in Oxford and then in Cambridge in the 1940s
when the young writers came close to one another.
Their interaction with one another influenced their writing in the beginning of their
career as literary artists.

10. By 1951, the first stage of the Oxford influence on the Movement had been completed.
This was underscored by Bateson founding Essays in Criticism as a match to the
work of Scrutiny.
Essays in Criticism became the only Oxford “contact” between Movement poets as
the poets dispersed in different directions later on.
Morrison remarks ── “Without those friendships neither the group programme nor the
impressive individual works which emerged out of it would have not been possible.”

11. 9
Movement
Poets

12. Philip Larkin
(9Aug 1922-2 Dec 1985)
Kingsley Amis
(16 Oct 1922- 22 Oct 1995)
John Wain
(14 Mar 1925- 24 May 1994)
Robert Conquest
(15 July 1917- 3 Aug 2015)
John Holloway
(1947)

13. Thom Gunn
(29 Aug 1929- 25 April 2004)
D.J. Enright
(11 March 1920- 31 Dec 2002)
Donald Davie
(17 july 1922- 18 Sept 1995)
Elizabeth Jennings
(18 July 1926- 26 Oct 2001)

14. 3.
• Major Traits of the Movement
Poetry

15. 1. Simple Themes and Subject Matter:
The subject matter of the Movement poem is common human
experience.
It has little to do with the myth poetic tendency of the Modernists.
The Movement poets wrote their poems on simple subject and in Straight-
forward manner.

16. 2. Englandism and Provincialism
The Movement Poets cultivated Englandism, provincialism, regionalism
and Londonism.
Davie defended English culture and civilization as the poetic subject in
his essay England as a Poetic Subject.
Their poetries were provincial because of their concern and love for England.

17. 3.Concern with the reader:
The modernists were unattached to the readers and hence were
isolationists and did not care for the readers.
In contrast to the modernists the Movement poets feel a keen
attachment to their readers.
All most all poets preferred ‘we’ instead of ‘I’ of the Modernists and ‘they’ of
the sociological approach.

18. 4.Syntax
The significant point to be noted regarding Movement diction is its
control of strict economy in the use of metaphor.
The Movement’s use of syntax is totally opposed to the symbolist use of
it.
The strength of Movement verse lies in its compactness and closeness of
expression which are products of an appropriate handling of syntax.

19. 4.
•Dispersion

20. After the publication of the New Lines in 1954 the group affinity began to
dissolve.
Then the lines diverged. They united for a common cause.
In 1957 John Wain wrote ─ “The revolt is now over. Its work is done”.
The Movement gradually lost its recognition.