Modernism and modernity
Oliver Barnes
The popular conception of Modernism is as the defining polemical force of the Edwardian literary epoch. It is believed that the movement was born out of a desire to codify the kaleidoscopic nature of contemporary, human existence in the sinews of imaginative literature. Ezra Pound notably reduced its philosophy to a mere maxim: ‘make it new’, which in many ways neglected the movement’s predilection for the cultural and ethical values of the Neoclassical Age. While the substance of Modernist literature was inherently juxtaposed with that of its antecedent, Victorian Realism, its genesis appears to lie less in innovation than in recreation. Over the following twenty minutes, my intention is to examine the validity of Pound’s so-called war cry for modernity, in which he appears to conflate the aspirations of Modernism and the process of modernization. Not only do I wish to elaborate on the defining factors of the movement but I also wish to question whether they necessarily point to a desire on the part of Modernists to modernize or, instead as John Carey argues, to compose their literary creations in such a way that they are rendered exclusive or inaccessible, most particularly in this talk in the suprising similarity between realism and Modernism, and I’ll also touch upon how potentially they are harking even further back Modernism’s confrontation with Victorian notions of Modernity still underlies the popular conception of the movement, with most considering it fundamentally reactionary. 84 The Great War continues to beupheld as the overriding impetus for literary innovation in the first decades of the twentieth century, on account of the way in which it forced authors to remodel their artistic guise in order to rationalize ‘the [altered] civilization’ in which
they existed. 85 The conflict prompted a re- examination of Britain’s imperial and economic might, with a consensus emerging in opposition to the country’s approbation of bourgeois ethics. 86 The totalizing structures, which had been weaved into the fabric of society by the industrial revolution, soured in the eyes of Britain’s artistic classes, becoming objects of scorn from which literary figures wished to distance themselves. They believed that for too long English literature had served as the mainstay of Victorian values, with proponents such as Arnold Bennett receiving admonishment from Virginia Woolf for their perpetuation of the refined sensibilities that had defined the era. At the end of the war, with a multitude of his fictional works still due for release, he was representative of the ‘old guard’ of English literature, employing traditional techniques which seemed antipathetical to those aiming to undermine literary conventions. 87 However, such authors and poets sought not only to convey their distaste for the literature of previous generations through modernization but also through the reappropriation of such traditional methods and perspectives. Despite Realism’s contradictory desire to ‘give a comprehensive picture of modern life’ through the representation of an objective reality, both its nature and that of Modernism’s were inevitably intertwined. 88 Hence, Modernism has been characterized as
85 Jonathan Harwell, ‘Modernism, Tradition and the Great War’ ( In Parenthesis , 2000), pp. 1-45
86 William A Johnsen, ‘Madame Bovary: Romanticism, Modernism, and Bourgeois Style’ ( French Issue: Perspectives in Mimesis , Vol. 94, No.), pp. 843-850. 87 James Hepburn, Arnold Bennett (Oxford: Routledge Publishing, 1974), p.401. 88 Anthony Giddens, Introduction to Sociology (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2009), p.10.
84 Stanley Sultan, ‘Was Modernism Reactionary ? ’ ( Journal of Modern Literature , Vol. 17, No. 4, 1991), pp.447-464
42
Made with FlippingBook - Online Brochure Maker