
Education Act of 1870
made elementary
education mandatory in
England

Emergence of a large,
unsophisticated reading
public

“English” as a subject
originally only taught to
Middle Class (it was
assumed that Upper Class
people would be well-read
as a matter of course).

“English” originally taught
at “Mechanics Institutes”

Widening gulf between
“artists” and “nonintellectuals” (highbrow vs.
lowbrow).

Mass production of
“popular” literature for the
“semi-literate.”

Literate public does not = a
literary public

Reading comprehension
not explicitly taught in the
U.S. until 1930s.
“England is sick . . . And English Literature
must save it. The churches . . . Having
failed, and social remedies being slow,
English literature now has a triple
function: still, I suppose, to delight and
instruct us, but also, and above all, to
save our souls and heal the state.”
 Professor George Gordon, Oxford University
“To be modern is to find ourselves in an
environment that promises adventure,
power, joy, growth, transformation of
ourselves and the world—and at the same
time, that threatens to destroy everything
we have, everything we know, everything
we are. . . . Modernity can be said to unite
all mankind. But it is a paradoxical unity, a
unity of disunity; it pours us all into a
maelstrom of perpetual disintegration and
renewal.”
› Marshall Berman, 1982


Social and economic stabilities of
the 19th Century remain intact, but
the market shifts
(commodification,
commercialization)
Beginnings of search for unique
work that could create its own
market

The Result?
›
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But…decline in state, aristocratic,
institutional patronage: alienation
of artists and intellectuals
›


Must produce cultural products
to compete in a market
economy
Beginnings of experimentation: to
change the basis of aesthetic
judgment

Highly individual
Highly aristocratic
Disdainful of popular culture
Arrogant
Cognizant of the individual
ability to (re)shape reality
Change becomes norm:
fascination with technique,
speed/motion, machine/factory,
etc.
›
Leads to denial vs. utopian
acceptance

As with the Victorians, there was
a continuing fascination with
technology.

Rapid urbanization &
industrialization (post-1850):
Modernism is largely an urban
movement

New modes of circulation and
communication

Conspicuous consumption (due
to mass production, advertising,
etc.): “sham individualism”


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
Great technological
advancements quickly
proved to have their
limits…
Speed/Pace leaves little
time for reflection
Dehumanizing
conditions
Deskilling of labor
Crime, poverty, etc.
increase
Not to mention potential
for physical destruction…

Disappearance of common sense of experience: new
sense of instability

Disappearance of a common understanding of the
past (or denial of any sense of historical continuity)

Refocus on the experiences of the individual without
regard for public acceptance

Existing values diminished, authors expected to create
value systems for their worlds.

Increasingly technical writing. Authors must become
increasingly objective, committed, and skilled.

In The Tempest,
Shakespeare wrote,
“what’s past is prologue.”

That sentiment, usually
taken as axiomatic (even
today), is challenged by
much of so-called
“Modern” literature.

In much of Modern
literature, there exists a
fundamental sense of “the
ephemeral [and] the
fragmentary.”

Given this sense of
existence as fleeting and
unknowable, modernity
can have no real
understanding of its own
past.

As such, Modernism
represents a “ruthless break
with any or all preceding
historical conditions” and is
characterized by a
continuous process of
internal ruptures and
fragmentations.”

No longer chronological in
sequence

New notions of (sub)consciousness:
Sigmund Freud & Carl Jung

Past, present, future blend: Past is
always present at some level of
consciousness

We are our memories: we are the
sum total of our past experiences

If we dig deep enough, we can
learn the who truth about a person
without having to move through
time and testing circumstances.

If multiple levels of
consciousness exist
simultaneously and time is
constant and fluid…

Authors could now plunge
into the consciousness of a
character rather than
provide external
frameworks or narratives.

Authors attempt to render
the thoughts of a
character without the
hindrance of formal
structure (quotations, etc.)

Can be extremely difficult
to read… No set up; so
signposts along the way;
no help

The reader must put the
pieces together as s/he
goes…Assumes a skilled an
educated readership
“Ineluctable modality of the visible: at least
that if no more, thought through my eyes.
Signature of all things. I am hear to read,
seaspawn and seawrack, the nearing tide, that
rusty boot. Snotgreen, bluesilver, rust: coloured
signs. Limits of the diaphane. But he adds: in
bodies. Then he was aware of them bodies
before of them coloured. How? By knocking
his sconce against them, sure. Go easy. Bald
he was and millionaire, maestro di color che
sanno. Limit of the diaphane in. Why in?
Diaphane, adiaphane. If you can put your five
fingers through it, it is a gate, if not a door. Shut
your eyes and see.”

Due to the use of stream of
consciousness, there is an
increased emphasis on the
individual in isolation

Needs of society never match
up to the needs of the individual

If each individual is unique, then
each experiences the same
stimuli differently



What we are expected to do in
public is an external imposition
(a la J.S. Mill).

If we do try to present ourselves
as we really are, those signals
are bound to be misinterpreted
by someone else with different
experiences.

Thus, modern literature often
deals with communication of
private consciousnesses

We are constantly searching for
the “other” we can truly identify
with.

Which is ultimately pointless
As such, there is no “common”
experience.
We are all alienated and
isolated

World War I basically
began with from a
snowballing of events
beginning with the
assassination of the
Archduke Franz
Ferdinand (and less
historically important
because no one cares
about women…his wife,
Sophia).
 (“Bang, Bang shoot me
Gavrilo”…all for you,
Franz Ferdinand fans.)
 Extra Credit if you can
sing the next line.

Now, add brutal ,
mechanized violence to the
list

As the world suffered through
the first world war, many
young writers suffered a loss
of faith in everything they
understood about their
worlds.

Leads (in part) to an outright
rejection of traditional values

Attempts to control, define,
etc. what they consider to be
a new and barbaric era.

Primarily a spiritual depression
(Eliot’s, The Waste Land)



Outbreak of WWII in 1939 and
Hitler’s pact with Russia, ended
flirtation with leftist politics
Economic Depression in the early
1930’s.

English writers refocused on their
own and their countries’ existence
Rise of Nazism: renewed threat of
war

By mid-century, British Imperialism
was on the way out: lost India in
1947, Ireland in 1949, South Africa
in 1961

Impotence of Capitalist
governments to stop it

Majority of young intellectuals,
move left (politically)

Emergence of Germany, Japan
as economic giants postwar

Wanted a “clean sweep” of old
rulers & ruling class.

Growing unease with the narrative
of progress dominant since the
Enlightenment.

Significant shift in writers’ attitudes
more than style
›
Capitalism was commonly held
as the vehicle to the
achievement of a utopian
dream world

The emergence of
Socialism/Communism inserts a class
dimension into Modernist thinking

For many, perhaps due to shifting
perceptions of class (Marx), the
modern period meant exploring
notions of class expectations and
interpersonal relationships

Whose side are the cultural producers
on? Shifts over time.
›
Is the utopian ideal to be ushered in
via a small group of enlightened
individuals?
›
Or will we create a society in which
the populace will drive itself toward
perfection?
›
Is perfectability even possible give
the shattering of Enlightenment
ideals of truth, universalism, and
progress?

The Moderns became
very adept at cloaking
meaningful substructure
in the mundane.

Everyday life is
presented, but beneath
the surface lie symbols,
etc. that indicate a
greater truth

The inconsequential is
ultimately never
inconsequential

Given the loss of faith in all of the
old institutions and mythologies
that informed previous eras, much
of the interwar period is
dominated by the desire to
create a new mythology for a
new world.

Fascination with speed and power
(leads to embrace of “creative
destruction”  violent militarism)

Art becomes increasingly political
in nature (often itself commodified
for political/commercial ends)

Needed to create a new myth to
inform a “new project for human
endeavor”

“New myths” run counter to one
another running up to WWII:
Nazism is one outcome

Pound: Language should perform
with machine efficiency (see
Hemingway)

“High Modernism” (post WWII)
becomes increasingly aligned
with dominant power structures.
›
The “technological efficiency” is
the new “rational”
›
Production should lead toward
human emancipation
›
›
Corporate capitalist version of
Enlightenment notion of progress
dominates.
What once was subversive is
simply canonized
Adam D. Bishop ~ Liberty High School ~ Bakersfield, CA. ~ 2012