Modern Era historical, economic, social aspects

Modernism is a literary age based between the years 1914 and 1945, or roughly, 1965. It was marked by a
series of cultural shocks. The first of these great shocks was World War One from 1914 to 1918, in which
3/4 of a million British soldiers were killed and two million wounded.
Mechanisation was very dominant and it was used for destruction with machine guns, tanks, lorries. The
destructive vehicles could attack from the air and underwater with planes and submarines.
Economic situation was also bad. The victorious soldiers had to face unemployment caused by loss of
markets for British exports, by the decline of the traditional industries, and by the collapse of the American
economy in 1929. The new car industry introduced the assembly line in the factories; the popular press grew,
the advertising industry began to promote consumption.
It was also the time of scientific discoveries with Newtons world of physics and Sigmund Freud's studies of
the human psyche.

The spirit of Modernism - Modern themes, mood and style

The period was marked by sudden and unexpected breaks with traditional ways of viewing and interacting
with the world. It was a reaction against the Victorian culture and aesthetic. Experimentation and
individualism became virtues. Central preoccupation is with the inner self and consciousness.

In contrast to the Romantic world view, the Modernist cares rather little for Nature, Being, or history.
Instead of progress and growth, the Modernists see decay and a growing alienation of the individual. The
form was relatively free (frank). It was a period of striving to search some new meaning, to search within the
real nature of a man. War most certainly had a great deal of influence on such ways of approaching the
world.

Edwardian Genre Characteristics of Edwardian Literature 1901- 1910

A period of British literature, lasting from 1901 to 1910, named by the reign of Edward VII and referring to
literature published after the Victorian period and before WWI. The death of Queen Victoria in 1901 and the
accession of Edward VII seemed to confirm that a franker, less inhibited era had begun. The Edwardian
period is not characterized by a consistent style or theme or genre; the term generally refers to a historical
period rather than a literary style.

Major Writers or Works> Poetry: William Butler Yeats, Rudyard Kipling. Prose: Arnold Bennett, Ford
Madox Ford, Alfred Noyes. Novels: Thomas Hardy, Joseph Conrad, Henry James, H.G. Wells, Ford Madox
Ford, James Galsworthy. Drama: George Bernard Shaw, John M. Synge, William Butler Yeats, James
Barrie.

World War I background general characteristics

Literature in WWI is generally thought to include poems, novels and drama: diaries, letters, and memoirs are
often included in this category as well. Modernist authors felt betrayed by the war, believing the institutions

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in which they were taught to believe had led the civilized world into a bloody conflict. They no longer
considered these institutions as reliable means to access the meaning of life, and therefore turned within
themselves to discover the answers.

World War II literature (1939-1945)

The outbreak of war in 1939, brought to an end an era of great intellectual and creative abundance.
Individuals were dispersed; the rationing of paper affected the production of magazines and books; and the
poem and the short story, convenient forms for men under arms, became the favoured means of literary
expression. No important new novelists or playwrights appeared. In fact, the best fiction about wartime
Evelyn Waughs Put Out More Flags (1942), Henry Greens Caught (1943), James Hanleys No
Directions (1943), Patrick Hamiltons The Slaves of Solitude (1947), and Elizabeth Bowens The Heat of the
Day(1949)was produced by established writers. Only three new poets (all of whom died on active service)
showed promise: Alun Lewis, Sidney Keyes, and Keith Douglas, the latter the most gifted and distinctive,
whose eerily detached accounts of the battlefield revealed a poet of potential greatness. Lewiss haunting
short stories about the lives of officers and enlisted men are also works of very great accomplishment. It was
a poet of an earlier generation, T.S. Eliot, who produced in his Four Quartets the masterpiece of the war.

24. Literature after 1945 background

Increased attachment to religion was main characteristic of literature after World War II. This was
particularly perceptible in authors who had already established themselves before the war. Christian belief
overspread in the verse plays of T.S. Eliot and Christopher Fry. Less-traditional spiritual solace was found in
Eastern mysticism by Aldous Huxley and Christopher Isherwood and by Robert Graves, who maintained an
impressive output of taut, graceful lyric poetry behind which lay the creed he expressed in The White
Goddess (1948), a matriarchal mythology revering the female principle. The two most innovatory novelists
to begin their careers soon after World War II were also religious believersWilliam Golding and Muriel
Spark.

26. Contemporary literature general characteristics

Contemporary literature is literature with its setting generally after World War II.

Typical characteristics of the contemporary period include reality-based stories with strong characters and a
believable story. Settings usually keep to the current or modern era, so futuristic and science fiction novels
are rarely included in this category. Well-defined, realistic, and highly developed characters are important in
classifying a written work as contemporary, and most writing in this category features stories that are more
character driven than plot driven. Contemporary literature features a somewhat modern narrative, but it also
contains a harsher reality. Contemporary written works tend to be influenced by the prosperous lifestyle that
followed WWII, but this literary class is rooted in the devastation that war brought to the world. A new
reality blossomed in the post-war mind, and it included a personal cynicism, disillusionment, and frustration
that is common to this literary period.

29. Postmodernism
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Postmodernism is a literary movement of post-1950s, a time marked by the cold war and the excesses of
consumption. It claims that search for reality is pointless, as the "real" is conditioned by time, place, race,
class, gender, and sexuality. There is no knowledge or experience that is superior or inferior to another.
It is largely influenced by a number of events that marked this period. Genocide that occurred during the
Second World War, Soviet gulags, the Chinese Cultural Revolution, mass destruction caused by atomic
bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, insecurity of Cold War Era, post colonialism issue, new
technologies, violence, counter culture and consumer culture. While postmodernism had a little relevance to
poetry and only a limited influence on modern drama, it had a huge impact on fiction, especially to the
novel. Main characteristics:

Topics dealing with the complex absurdity of contemporary life - moral and philosophical relativism,
loss of faith in political and moral authority, alienation
Employing black humor, parody, grotesque, absurdity, and travesty

Erasing boundaries between "low" and "high" culture

Lack of a grand narrative

Avoiding traditional closure of themes or situations

Condemning commercialism, hedonism, mass production, and economic globalism

Reality represented through language