Modernist literature in the context of "David Markson"

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⭐ Core Definition: Modernist literature

Modernist literature originated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and is characterised by a self-conscious separation from traditional ways of writing in both poetry and prose fiction writing. Modernism experimented with literary form and expression, as exemplified by Ezra Pound's maxim to "Make it new". This literary movement was driven by a conscious desire to overturn traditional modes of representation and express the new sensibilities of the time. The immense human costs of the First World War saw the prevailing assumptions about society reassessed, and much modernist writing engages with the technological advances and societal changes of modernity moving into the 20th century. In Modernist Literature, Mary Ann Gillies notes that these literary themes share the "centrality of a conscious break with the past", one that "emerges as a complex response across continents and disciplines to a changing world".

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👉 Modernist literature in the context of David Markson

David Merrill Markson (December 20, 1927 – c. June 4, 2010) was an American novelist. He was the author of several postmodern novels, including Springer's Progress, Wittgenstein's Mistress, and Reader's Block. His final book, The Last Novel, published in 2007, was called "a real tour de force" by The New York Times.

Markson's work is characterized by an unconventional and experimental approach to narrative, character development and plot. The late writer David Foster Wallace hailed Wittgenstein's Mistress as "pretty much the high point of experimental fiction in this country". While his early works draw on the modernist tradition of William Faulkner and Malcolm Lowry, his later novels are, in Markson's words, "literally crammed with literary and artistic anecdotes" and "nonlinear, discontinuous, collage-like, an assemblage."

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Modernist literature in the context of Virginia Woolf

Adeline Virginia Woolf (/wʊlf/; née Stephen; 25 January 1882 – 28 March 1941) was an English writer and one of the most influential 20th-century modernist authors. She helped to pioneer the use of stream of consciousness narration as a literary device.

Virginia Woolf was born in South Kensington, London, into an affluent and intellectual family as the seventh child of Julia Prinsep Jackson and Leslie Stephen. She grew up in a blended household of eight children, including her sister, the painter Vanessa Bell. Educated at home in English classics and Victorian literature, Woolf later attended King’s College London, where she studied classics and history and encountered early advocates for women’s rights and education.

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Modernist literature in the context of A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man is the second book and first novel of Irish writer James Joyce, published in 1916. A Künstlerroman written in a modernist style, it traces the religious and intellectual awakening of young Stephen Dedalus, Joyce's fictional alter ego, whose surname alludes to Daedalus, Greek mythology's consummate craftsman. Stephen questions and rebels against the Catholic and Irish conventions under which he has grown, culminating in his self-exile from Ireland to Europe. The work uses techniques that Joyce developed more fully in Ulysses (1922) and Finnegans Wake (1939).

A Portrait began life in 1904 as Stephen Hero—a projected 63-chapter autobiographical novel in a realistic style. After 25 chapters, Joyce abandoned Stephen Hero in 1907 and set to reworking its themes and protagonist into a condensed five-chapter novel, dispensing with strict realism and making extensive use of free indirect speech that allows the reader to peer into Stephen's developing consciousness. American modernist poet Ezra Pound had the novel serialised in the English literary magazine The Egoist in 1914 and 1915, and published as a book in 1916 by B. W. Huebsch of New York. The publication of A Portrait and the short story collection Dubliners (1914) earned Joyce a place at the forefront of literary modernism.

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Modernist literature in the context of E. E. Cummings

Edward Estlin Cummings (October 14, 1894 – September 3, 1962), commonly known as e e cummings or E. E. Cummings, was an American poet, painter, essayist, author, and playwright. During World War I, he worked as an ambulance driver and was imprisoned in an internment camp, which provided the basis for his novel The Enormous Room (1922). The following year he published his first collection of poetry, Tulips and Chimneys, which showed his early experiments with grammar and typography. He wrote four plays, the most successful of which were HIM (1927) and Santa Claus: A Morality (1946). He wrote EIMI (1933), a travelog of the Soviet Union, and delivered the Charles Eliot Norton Lectures in poetry, published as i—six nonlectures (1953). Fairy Tales (1965), a collection of short stories, was published posthumously.

Cummings wrote approximately 2,900 poems. He is often regarded as one of the most important American poets of the 20th century. He is associated with modernist free-form poetry, and much of his work uses idiosyncratic syntax and lower-case spellings for poetic expression. M. L. Rosenthal wrote:

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Modernist literature in the context of Sămănătorul

Sămănătorul or Semănătorul (pronounced [səmənəˈtorul / semənəˈtorul], Romanian for "The Sower") was a literary and political magazine published in Romania between 1901 and 1910. Founded by poets Alexandru Vlahuță and George Coșbuc, it is primarily remembered as a tribune for early 20th century traditionalism, neoromanticism and ethnic nationalism. The magazine's ideology, commonly known as Sămănătorism or Semănătorism, was articulated after 1905, when historian and literary theorist Nicolae Iorga became editor in chief. While its populism, critique of capitalism and emphasis on peasant society separated it from other conservative groups, Sămănătorul shared views with its main conservative predecessor, the Junimea society, particularly in expressing reserve toward Westernization. In parallel, its right-wing agenda made it stand in contrast to the Poporanists, a Romanian populist faction whose socialist-inspired ideology also opposed rapid urbanization, but there was a significant overlap in membership between the two groups. Sămănătorul's relationship with the dominant National Liberal Party was equally ambiguous, ranging from an alliance between Sămănătorul and National Liberal politician Spiru Haret to Iorga's explicit condemnation of 20th century Romanian liberalism.

Promoting an idealized interpretation of local history, basing its aesthetic ideals on the work of national poet and conservative essayist Mihai Eminescu, the publication advertised itself as the voice of oppressed Romanians in Transylvania and other areas controlled by Austria-Hungary prior to World War I. Its irredentism, as well as its outspoken criticism of the political and cultural establishment, made Sămănătorul a popular venue for young Romanian intellectuals from both the Kingdom of Romania and the regions surrounding it. The traditionalist literary faction coalescing around the magazine was generally opposed to modernist literature and the aesthetics of modern art, but was more tolerant of Symbolism. In time, Sămănătorul became host to a subgroup of the local Symbolist movement.

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Modernist literature in the context of Tudor Arghezi

Tudor Arghezi (Romanian pronunciation: [ˈtudor arˈɡezi]; born Ion Nae Theodorescu; 21 May 1880 – 14 July 1967) was a Romanian writer and political figure, widely considered one of his country's greatest poets (second only to Mihai Eminescu). An illegitimate, part-Hungarian, child who was purposely vague about his roots, he had a troubled youth during which he held a variety of jobs—including a stint as a hierodeacon of the Romanian Orthodox Church, from which he gathered his extreme anti-clericalism. He debuted in the 1890s as an affiliate of the Symbolist movement, being welcomed as an outstanding poet. Arghezi renounced this career to study theology in Switzerland, but never graduated, training instead as a watchmaker and typographer. From 1910, his social poetry and leftist journalism became widely read, allowing him to return as a professional writer and art columnist. He soon became highly controversial for his apparent corruption and his mordant satire, as well as for his political positions during World War I—when, as editor of Seara and Cronica, he favored the Central Powers. Arghezi stayed behind in occupied Bucharest after The Romanian Debacle of 1916, collaborating with the German Empire in a manner that was judged as treasonous. In postwar Greater Romania, he was initially punished with imprisonment at Văcărești (an experience which informed his interwar poetry and prose), but amnestied within months of the verdict.

Arghezi returned to political journalism, frequently changing sides and patrons, but remained constant in his promotion of avant-garde literature. Credited with having discovered the similarly influential Urmuz, he set up his own review, Bilete de Papagal, which helped launch careers. He only published his poetry as books when he was in his forties, becoming instantly famous. Initially well-liked for his bridging of modernist literature and thematic traditionalism, he became reviled, especially in conservative circles, for the extreme naturalism and grotesque expressionism found in his subsequent works. Arghezi had a consuming dispute with the nationalist ideologue Nicolae Iorga, but never fully rejected nationalism, and seemingly agreed with conservatism, as well as with far-right groups such as the Iron Guard, on a number of topics. By 1930, he was a virtual client of the authoritarian King, Carol II, who also intervened to silence Iorga's opposition. Largely with money obtained from Carol, Arghezi maintained his estate of Mărțișor, located outside his former prison; it is known as the setting of his other poetic cycles and his children's literature, which address the beauties of family life. For a while, he was absent from literary life due to a misdiagnosed disease, and preserved from this a hatred of the medical profession.

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Modernist literature in the context of Modernist poetry

Modernist poetry refers to poetry written between 1890 and 1950 in the tradition of modernist literature, but the dates of the term depend upon a number of factors, including the nation of origin, the particular school in quest of the critic setting the dates. The critic/poet C. H. Sisson observed in his essay Poetry and Sincerity that "Modernity has been going on for a long time. Not within living memory has there ever been a day when young writers were not coming up, in a threat of iconoclasm."

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Modernist literature in the context of 20th century in literature

Literature of the 20th century refers to world literature produced during the 20th century (1901 to 2000).

The main periods in question are often grouped by scholars as Modernist literature, Postmodern literature, flowering from roughly 1900 to 1940 and 1960 to 1990 respectively, roughly using World War II as a transition point. After 1960, the somewhat malleable term "contemporary literature" widely appears.

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Modernist literature in the context of Carl Stumpf

Carl Stumpf (German: [ʃtʊmpf]; 21 April 1848 – 25 December 1936) was a German philosopher, psychologist and musicologist. He is noted for founding the Berlin School of experimental psychology.

He studied with Franz Brentano at the University of Würzburg before receiving his doctorate at the University of Göttingen in 1868. He also tutored the modernist literature writer Robert Musil at the University of Berlin, and worked with Hermann Lotze, who is famous for his work in perception, at Göttingen. Stumpf is known for his work on the psychology of tones. He had an important influence on his students Wolfgang Köhler and Kurt Koffka who were instrumental in the founding of Gestalt psychology as well as Kurt Lewin, who was also a part of the Gestalt group and was key in the establishment of experimental social psychology in America.

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