The modernist revolution and the modern novel

At the beginning of the 20th century intellectuals attitudes were changing and people found it difficult to believe in anything.

First of all, an explosion of new ideas changed man’s view of himself and of the universe.

In 1905 Albert Einstein published “Theory of Relativity” in which he dealt a further blow to the belief that objective reality and science as a substitute for religion could give an explanation of the universe.

British writers were inspired by the philosophical ideas of Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche who proclaimed existing abstract values such as the “good” and the “beautiful” were decadent.

These ideas were incorrectly late linked with Nazism and Fascism.

Another important influence on British artists came from Sigmund Freud and his theories on the structure and workings of the human mind, which are known as psychoanalysis, in order to treat hysteria and neurosis.
Freud, then, explored new areas of sensibility which cae to be known as the unconscious.

20th century literature and art are indicated with the term “Modernism” because intellectuals expressed the reaction against 19th-century ideas. The Literary Modernism flourished from 1922 to 1925 and developed following new ideas:

- The breakdown of the traditional literary genres;
- The fragmentation of time and place;
- The collapse of the traditional plot with a story that has a beginning and an end and setting;
- The use of complex language which defies traditional syntax, grammar and punctuation;
- A new idea of the representative function of literature , with the emphasis on psychological truth rather than on realistic details;
- The use of myth;
- The adoption of free verse instead of traditional verse.

Some of these ideas were the development of some literary experiments in narrative structures and techniques contained in the transitional novels, which appeared from 1880 to 1920, such as flashbacks, presentation of different points of view, and subtler ways of portraying human psychology.

It is important to be clear about the transitional novels focusing on the narrative structure and techniques contained in two considered important transitional novels: “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad and “Sons and Lovers” by David Herbert Lawrence.

“Heart of Darkness” is based on the author's Congo experience and it is the best expression of Conrad’s use of exotic setting and adventure plot. The themes of the novel are the relationship between man and social institutions, and man’s dark side which appears when social values collapse.

“Sons and Lovers” is both the psychological description of an oedipal complex and a realistic portrait of life in provincial northern England.

During the late 1910s and the early 1920s James Joyce and Virginia Woolf introduced classical myths into modern narrative in order to reflect the novelists’ lack of faith in traditional values and the disillusionment with modern myth (progress, science and technology).
In “Ulysses” Joyce described the ordinary life of the main character, Leopold Bloom, a Dubliner of average intelligence and ambition comparing him with Ulysses, the main character of “Odyssey” by Omero. The author used the epic model to highlight the lack of heroism, ideals and trust in the modern world.
Then, in “Dubliners” Joyce treated “paralysis” as the shape of the inability to overcome the stiffing mental frustration that characterises the inhabitants of his hometown, Dublin.

Moreover, the first generation Modernists (J. Joyce, V, Woolf and T.S. Elliot) inserted a new way of conceiving time: it was a continuous flux in which individual consciousness could identify significant moments (stream of consciousness).
For example, Woolf analysed in “Modern Fiction” the human perception which didn’t depend on measurable time (time of clock) but on the way the mind is affected by it (time of mind). This particular Woolf’s conception of time is influenced by Henry Bergson.

So, these novelists treated the unconscious in daily life and the stream of consciousness technique in order to reproduce the continuous flow of human thought.
The stream of consciousness technique is best represented by James Joyce in his masterpiece “Ulysses”: apparently incongruous images or ideas are put together with no rational order, but rather as they would pass through the unconscious mind. Joyce adoptes a difficult prose style which does away with syntactic and grammatical connectives, in order to show the chaotic flow of thoughts in the human mind.

Another technical features adopted by author are:
- Fragmentary description of an event interrupted by side comments or thoughts which have really little to do with what is going on;
- Some images or thoughts are brought from a character’s past;
- Frequently questions in the mind;
- Musical quality of words using assonances and alliterations as a poet would.

Modernist writers were influenced by Cubism, Futurism, Dadaism and Surrealism without abandoning tradition. They were trying to create their own interpretation of reality and were investigated with an anthropological interest in their relationship not only to literature, but also to primitive society.

 

 

The novelist Edward Morgan Forster shared with Modernists the inability to believe in accepted values and the conviction that reality is elusive and many-faceted. In his work “A passage to India '' he explores the difficult political and human relations between the British and the Indians.

During the 1930s the impotence of capitalist governments in the face of Nazi expansion, together with economic depression and poor conditions for workers, led the majority of many second generation Modernists (G. Orwell and W.H.Auden) to turn to the political left.
For example, during the Spanish Civil War some intellectuals went to Spain to fight for the republican (socialist) forces against the monarchical (fascist) forces of General Franco.

During this period, writers supported negative utopians and were concerned with the growing influence of mass media and the development of sophisticated war machines.
The most important anti-utopian novelist is George Orwell.

In his masterpiece “Nineteen Eighty Four” he describes a future world in which a tyrannical power (Big Brother) controls man’s actions and thoughts through telescreens and microphones present in every place. In the novel Big Brother represents the man’s enslavement to mass media.