Terms & Prizes
Round 2
Fin de Siècle
● "End of the century," a phrase applied mostly
  to the last ten years of the 19th century. The
  1890s were a transition in which artists were
  conciously abandoning old ideas and
  attempting to discover new techniques.
Spoonerism
● An accidental interchange of sounds, usually
  the initial consonants, in two or more words,
  such as
  ○ blushing crow for crushing blow
  ○ or well-boiled icicle for well-oiled bicycle
Geneva School
● A group of critics, including Georges Poulet,
  Marcel Raymond, Albert Béguin, and the
  early J. Hillis Miller, who see a literary work
  as a series of existential expressions of the
  author's individual consciousness. Although
  they vary in method and emphasis, the
  group is consistent in seeing litearture as the
  expression of that consciousness revealed in
  the act of reading.
Theatre of the Absurd
● A kind of drama that presents a view of the
  absurdity of the human condition by the
  abandoning of usual or rational devices and
  by the ues of nonrealistic form. It portrays a
  pattern of images presenting people as
  bewildered creatures in an incomprehensible
  universe. Examples are The Bald Soprano
  (Eugène Ionesco) and Waiting for Godot
  (Samuel Beckett). Other playwrights include
  Jean Gênet, Arthur Adamov, Edward Albee,
  Arthur Kopit, and Harold Pinter.
Roman à Clef
● A novel in which actual persons aer
  presented under the guise of fiction. Notable
  examples have been Madeleine de
  Schudéry's Clélie, Thomas Love Peacock's
  Nightmare Abbey, Hawthorne's The
  Blithedale Romance, Somerset Maugham's
  Cakes and Ale, Aldous Huxley's Point
  Counter Point, Hemingway's The Sun Also
  Rises, Capote's Answered Prayers, Carrie
  Fisher's Postcards from the Edge, and
  almost any of Jack Kerouac's novels.
Beat Generation
● A group of American poets and novelists of the 1950s
  and 1960s in romantic rebellion against what they
  concieved of as the American culture. They expressed
  their revolt with loose structure and slang diciton. They
  opposed anti-intellectual freedom. The group's idealogy
  included some measure of primitivism, orientalism,
  experimentation, eccentricity, and reliance on
  inspirartion from modern jazz (bebop) and from Blake
  and Whitman. Leading members of the movement were
   ○ poets: Allen Ginsberg
   ○ Gregory Corso
   ○ Lawrence Ferlinghetti
   ○ and novelists: Jack Kerouac
   ○ William Burroughs
Aestheticism
● 19th century literary movement that rested on the credo
   of "ART FOR ART'S SAKE." Its origins had a close
   kinship to the reverence for beauty of the Pre-
   Raphaelites. Its dominant figures were Oscar Wilde,
   who insisted on the seperation of art and morality, and
   Wilde's master, Walter Pater. The English Parnassians--
   Ernest Downson, Lionlel Johnson, Andrew Lang, and
   Edmund Gosse--were a part of the movement but were
   primarily concerned with questions of form rather than
   sharp seperations of art from moral issues.
Bon Mot
● A witty repartee or statement. A clever
  saying. Sometimes abbreviated to "mot."
Chiaroscuro
● Contrasting light and shade. Originally
  applied to painting, the term is used in the
  criticism of various literary forms involving
  the contrast of light and darkness, as in
  much of Hawthorne's and Nabokov's fiction
  and in Faulkner's Light in August. Thomas
  Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbown involves
  complex interpaly of black and white.
Muses
● Nine goddesses represented as presiding over the
   various departments of art and science. They're
   daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (memory).
   ○ Calliope (epic)
   ○ Clio (history)
   ○ Erato (lyrics and love poetry)
   ○ Euterpe (music)
   ○ Melpomene (tragedy)
   ○ Polyhymnia (sacred choric poetry)
   ○ Terpischore (choral dance and song)
   ○ Thalia (comedy)
   ○ Urania (astronomy)
Nobel Prize of 1971
for a poetry that with the action of an elemental force
brings alive a continent's destiny and dreams.



● Pablo Neruda from Chile (1904-1973)
● A poet, diplomat, politician, Pablo
Neruda's style included surrealist poems,
historical epics, overtly political manifestos,
a prose autobiography, and erotically-
charged love poems, evident in his 1924
collection Twenty Poems of Love and a Song of Despair.
● Other works include Twilight, Enthusiasm and
    Perserverance, & Residency in the Soil
●   "Someday, somewhere - anywhere, unfailingly, you'll find
    yourself, and that, and only that, can be the happiest or
    bitterest hour of your life"
Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
of 1967
● The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
● Inspired by the true story of Menahem
Mendel Beilis, an unjustly imprisoned Jew in
Tsarist Russia.
● The novel is about a a Jewish handyman or
"fixer" who gets arrested on suspicion of
murder. He is put in jail without trial. When
asked about his political views he says he is "apolitical." In jail,
he contemplates his life and forgives his wife. The "fixer", on the
way to a long-awaited trial, imagines a diolauge with a Tzar. He
blames the Tzar for running the most backward nad regressive
regime in Europe. Speaking for the Tzar, the "fixer" says that
there is no such thing as an apolitical man, especially a Jew."
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
of 1952

● Marianne Moore (1887-1972)
● For Collected Poems
● She is known for her irony,
wit, didactic tone and satire.
● She is a Modernist poet.
Pulitzer Prize for Drama
  of 1998

● Written by Paula Vogel
● The play centers around a teenage girl
who is being taught how to drive by her
uncle and is also being molested. Their
relationship reaches a climax when Uncle
Peck proposes to her, in which the girl,
now in college, rejects him. She learns that
sometimes in life, you must start the engine and floor it.
● The play tackles topics of pedophilia, incest, misogyny,
   control and manipulation.

Terms & Prizes

  • 1.
  • 2.
    Fin de Siècle ●"End of the century," a phrase applied mostly to the last ten years of the 19th century. The 1890s were a transition in which artists were conciously abandoning old ideas and attempting to discover new techniques.
  • 3.
    Spoonerism ● An accidentalinterchange of sounds, usually the initial consonants, in two or more words, such as ○ blushing crow for crushing blow ○ or well-boiled icicle for well-oiled bicycle
  • 4.
    Geneva School ● Agroup of critics, including Georges Poulet, Marcel Raymond, Albert Béguin, and the early J. Hillis Miller, who see a literary work as a series of existential expressions of the author's individual consciousness. Although they vary in method and emphasis, the group is consistent in seeing litearture as the expression of that consciousness revealed in the act of reading.
  • 5.
    Theatre of theAbsurd ● A kind of drama that presents a view of the absurdity of the human condition by the abandoning of usual or rational devices and by the ues of nonrealistic form. It portrays a pattern of images presenting people as bewildered creatures in an incomprehensible universe. Examples are The Bald Soprano (Eugène Ionesco) and Waiting for Godot (Samuel Beckett). Other playwrights include Jean Gênet, Arthur Adamov, Edward Albee, Arthur Kopit, and Harold Pinter.
  • 6.
    Roman à Clef ●A novel in which actual persons aer presented under the guise of fiction. Notable examples have been Madeleine de Schudéry's Clélie, Thomas Love Peacock's Nightmare Abbey, Hawthorne's The Blithedale Romance, Somerset Maugham's Cakes and Ale, Aldous Huxley's Point Counter Point, Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises, Capote's Answered Prayers, Carrie Fisher's Postcards from the Edge, and almost any of Jack Kerouac's novels.
  • 7.
    Beat Generation ● Agroup of American poets and novelists of the 1950s and 1960s in romantic rebellion against what they concieved of as the American culture. They expressed their revolt with loose structure and slang diciton. They opposed anti-intellectual freedom. The group's idealogy included some measure of primitivism, orientalism, experimentation, eccentricity, and reliance on inspirartion from modern jazz (bebop) and from Blake and Whitman. Leading members of the movement were ○ poets: Allen Ginsberg ○ Gregory Corso ○ Lawrence Ferlinghetti ○ and novelists: Jack Kerouac ○ William Burroughs
  • 8.
    Aestheticism ● 19th centuryliterary movement that rested on the credo of "ART FOR ART'S SAKE." Its origins had a close kinship to the reverence for beauty of the Pre- Raphaelites. Its dominant figures were Oscar Wilde, who insisted on the seperation of art and morality, and Wilde's master, Walter Pater. The English Parnassians-- Ernest Downson, Lionlel Johnson, Andrew Lang, and Edmund Gosse--were a part of the movement but were primarily concerned with questions of form rather than sharp seperations of art from moral issues.
  • 9.
    Bon Mot ● Awitty repartee or statement. A clever saying. Sometimes abbreviated to "mot."
  • 10.
    Chiaroscuro ● Contrasting lightand shade. Originally applied to painting, the term is used in the criticism of various literary forms involving the contrast of light and darkness, as in much of Hawthorne's and Nabokov's fiction and in Faulkner's Light in August. Thomas Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbown involves complex interpaly of black and white.
  • 11.
    Muses ● Nine goddessesrepresented as presiding over the various departments of art and science. They're daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne (memory). ○ Calliope (epic) ○ Clio (history) ○ Erato (lyrics and love poetry) ○ Euterpe (music) ○ Melpomene (tragedy) ○ Polyhymnia (sacred choric poetry) ○ Terpischore (choral dance and song) ○ Thalia (comedy) ○ Urania (astronomy)
  • 12.
    Nobel Prize of1971 for a poetry that with the action of an elemental force brings alive a continent's destiny and dreams. ● Pablo Neruda from Chile (1904-1973) ● A poet, diplomat, politician, Pablo Neruda's style included surrealist poems, historical epics, overtly political manifestos, a prose autobiography, and erotically- charged love poems, evident in his 1924 collection Twenty Poems of Love and a Song of Despair. ● Other works include Twilight, Enthusiasm and Perserverance, & Residency in the Soil ● "Someday, somewhere - anywhere, unfailingly, you'll find yourself, and that, and only that, can be the happiest or bitterest hour of your life"
  • 13.
    Pulitzer Prize forFiction of 1967 ● The Fixer by Bernard Malamud ● Inspired by the true story of Menahem Mendel Beilis, an unjustly imprisoned Jew in Tsarist Russia. ● The novel is about a a Jewish handyman or "fixer" who gets arrested on suspicion of murder. He is put in jail without trial. When asked about his political views he says he is "apolitical." In jail, he contemplates his life and forgives his wife. The "fixer", on the way to a long-awaited trial, imagines a diolauge with a Tzar. He blames the Tzar for running the most backward nad regressive regime in Europe. Speaking for the Tzar, the "fixer" says that there is no such thing as an apolitical man, especially a Jew."
  • 14.
    Pulitzer Prize forPoetry of 1952 ● Marianne Moore (1887-1972) ● For Collected Poems ● She is known for her irony, wit, didactic tone and satire. ● She is a Modernist poet.
  • 15.
    Pulitzer Prize forDrama of 1998 ● Written by Paula Vogel ● The play centers around a teenage girl who is being taught how to drive by her uncle and is also being molested. Their relationship reaches a climax when Uncle Peck proposes to her, in which the girl, now in college, rejects him. She learns that sometimes in life, you must start the engine and floor it. ● The play tackles topics of pedophilia, incest, misogyny, control and manipulation.