- American Literature
1910 - 1930
Era of Modernism
• Desire to “break” with the past
• Pivotal event of the era was WWI – before
the war the attitude was one of optimism
• Many writers lived in Europe during this
time
• Writers who did not go to Europe before the war
visited during and after
• WWI was a tragic failure of old values, old
politics, and old ideas – essential to cast off ways
of the past – filled with despair and confusion
• Expatriates – disenchantment after the war
led many writers to become expatriates or exiles
– many settled in Paris where they were
influenced by Gertrude Stein – she coined the
phrase “the lost generation” to describe those
disillusioned by the war
• Modernist writers not only wanted to express the
waste and futility, but they wanted to make some
sense of the experience
Modernist Literature
• “Make it new” – cry of Ezra Pound
• Modern psychology had great impact on
literature – writers showed how we often think
by leaping from association to association in
what William James called “stream of
consciousness”
• Imagism – poetic movement that ushered in the
era- the imagists rebelled against the
sentimentality of the 19th century- they
demanded hard, clear expression, concrete
images, and the language of every day speech –
their models came from the Greek and Roman
classics, the Chinese and Japanese, and free verse
of French poets of their day
•
• Poetry discards meter and rhyme – free verse is
the tool of most
• Visual appearance of poetry is important
• Use of everyday subjects that would be unusual
in 19th
• Often fragmentary reflecting not only the “stream
of consciousness” but the Modernist perception
of 20th century as a jumble of conflicting ideas
• Modernists often insist that readers participate
and draw own conclusions – the modernist
shows rather than tells
• Imagist poetry uses an image to capture
an emotion
River Merchant’s Wife
• Ezra Pound adapts the poem from the
Chinese
• In her letter the young wife reviews their
life together - bashfulness at 14, growing
love at 15 and a deep love and longing at
16
• Worried about the dangers he faces
• Willingness to go meet him
Janet Waking
• John Crowe Ransom takes a sentimental topic
and treats it in an unsentimental way
• Uses irony & pathos
• Janet discovers her Chucky has died = killed by a
bee sting
• First experience with death
• Pleads with her parents to waken Chucky
• Waking from innocence
• The detached tone allows the events to speak for
themselves
old age sticks
• e.e. cummings –uses experimentation to present
traditional themes
• Capitalization and word placement are important
also irony
• Warnings of the elderly about the dangers of age
go unheeded by the carefree young.
• The young tear down the signs, but one day they
will be posting the signs themselves
• Elderly recognized with capital letters and
parentheses
• Use of irony in last stanza
Mending Wall
• Robert Frost writes much about nature in New
England
• Sees a relationship with humanity and nature
• Frost describes the upkeep of stone walls that
separate neighbors both literally and figuratively
–
• as the speaker he feels that “something there is
that doesn’t love a wall” but his neighbor fiercely
true to his father’s traditions counters that “good
fences make good neighbors.”
• What is the reason for the wall
• When do they rebuild
Stopping by the Woods
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Stops to watch the snow
Horse impatient to move on
Mile to go before he sleeps
Actions show he has a sense of appreciation of
nature and responsibility
• Internal conflict –torn between the desire to stay
and appreciate nature and an awareness that he
has commitments to fulfill
The Road Not Taken
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Written about his friend Edward Thomas
Both roads equally appealing
Would like to try both
Chooses path less traveled – independent spirit –
doesn’t follow the crowd
• He is committed to take the road
• Says he will come back but knows in life one
thing leads to another
• Relief or happiness – sorrow or regret
• (interpretation up to the reader)
• The road he chose has made all the difference
• Knows what his life is like from the road he has
chosen but does not know what it would have
been like if he had taken the other road