Md Daniyal Ansari

MA English Sem II
ID no. 201908795

Modernism as a term is widely used in identifying new and distinctive features styles of literature
and the other arts in the earlier twentieth century, especially after World War I. Literary modernism
originated in around the late 19th and early 20th centuries, mainly in Europe and North America,
and is formed with a conscious disconnection with traditional ways of writing, in both poetry and
prose. Modernists worked around and exploited with forms and expression of literature "Make it
new." It was driven by a desire to consciously overturn traditional modes of representing ideas and
express the new sensibilities of their time. The horrors of World War I made people rethink their
ideas of existence and modern writings represent advancements in technology and societal changes
moving into the twentieth century.

Modernism finds its roots running much deeper than the middle of the 19 th century. Historians
suggest that the modern period began in the 16 th century, with the Early Modern Period, and
extended up to the 18th century. During the Renaissance period, the idea of Humanism, or human
being in the centre of the Universe and not divinity, became the intellectual base of the Modern
period. Humans during the Renaissance period started to believe in shaping their own destiny, and
also realise their own potential of understanding the nature of the Universe. The belief that anything
could be submitted to reason was almost like a wave. Tradition, morals, and even art, could be
explained and curated through human reason. Also, it was believed that the ‘truth’ that came out
from the process of reasoning could then be applied to different sections of society like education
and politics, which would definitely improve the overall well-being and functioning of the society.
Through this truth, people could then break through the rut of corruption and exploitation from
institutions like the Church, which would then give man a chance to be a master of his own choices,
thus giving him a form of freedom that was never heard about before. With the discovery of truth,
man would never be at the mercy of higher authorities that were using their power for their own
selfish notions. Enlightenment enabled humanity to be self-aware, and the knowledge of truth was
actual power, that was accessible to all. In 1762, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, in his ‘Inquiry into the
Nature of the Social Contract’, proposed a new way of life on ‘an equality that is moral and
legitimate, and that men, who may be unequal in strength or intelligence, become every one equal
by convention and legal right.’ Through this social contract, individuals were finally assured of their
own preservation, which they attained through their own freedom. These tenets became the pillars
of modernism.

In the 1880s, a huge emphasis was placed upon the notion of pushing aside ‘norms’ entirely, instead
of innovating past knowledge with contemporary techniques. The year 1922 experienced the coming
of a monumental literary innovation in James Joyce’s Ulysses, T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, and
Virginia Woolf’s Jacob’s Room, and other works that were experimental in nature. War checked the
morals, coherence, and durability of Western civilisation, sprouting doubts on the adequacy of
traditional literary modes to explain the morbid reality of a post-war world. T. S. Eliot’s review of
Joyce’s Ulysses suggested that the traditional literary body could not carry ‘the immense panorama
of futility and anarchy which is contemporary history. Eliot dabbled with a new style of literary works
that represented better the disorder of the contemporary world, especially in contrast with the
former order of the world that was now lost. In The Waste Land, we can clearly notice a narration
that is fragmented in nature, and this style seems deliberate in an attempt of handing over to the
reader a power to make its own connections.

T.S. Eliot is widely known as one of the most important modernist writers. The ideas in his poem as
well as his poetic style showed elements of the literary style that was prevalent at his time. Eliot’s
works explore these differences. ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and ‘The Waste Land’, which
were two of his most famous poems, show this modern tendency. ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock’ narrates the suffering of a modern man Prufrock who talking about the sufferings in his life
in addition to the lack of spiritual wellbeing. The setting of the poem can be perceived either as a
physical place or a mental state, the sub-conscious of the human being.

It must be taken into account that Eliot had a certain affinity for the medieval form as well and he
more often than not connected it with his interest in modern life. In poetry, Eliot juggled with both,
the religious and the contemporary themes, and thus was known to integrate the medieval and
modern ideas together. In “The Waste Land”, Eliot shows his problems with modern life by
comparing it with medieval ideas. He creates a contrast between the religious medieval life and the
lack of spirituality in the modern counterpart. In fact, “The Waste Land,” is basically a modernist
poem that clearly relies on images, which is a basic characteristic of literary modernism. The poem
plays with various fragmented images that reflect the feeling of loss. Even though the reader
understands nothing of these images, the narrator promises meaning from fragmentation. This
construction of meaning from fragmentation is one of the most important features of modernism.

Sir James George Frazer was a well-acclaimed social anthropologist and folklorist in the early stages
of the modern studies of mythology and comparative religion. The Golden Bough is considered to be
his biggest work, and it documents and explains the similarities among magical, superficial and
religious beliefs around the world. Frazer argued that human belief passed through three phases:
primitive magic, replaced by religion, in turn replaced by science. Frazer was first to describe in detail
the connection between myths and customs. His perception of the yearly sacrifice of the Year-King
has not been borne out by field studies. Yet in ‘The Golden Bough’, his study of ancient cults, rites,
and myths, their contemporaries in early Christianity, continued for many years to be studied for
detailed knowledge. The symbolic cycle of life, death and rebirth which Frazer divined behind myths
of many peoples captivated a generation of artists and poets. Perhaps the most notable product of
this fascination is T. S. Eliot's poem The Waste Land. Another influential contribution is his theory of
cultural evolution in which he assigns both magic and religion. He believed that both magic and
science were similar as both can be proven only through experimentation. He even produced the
very first social scientific expression of a disenchanted narrative.

Richards, was an English educator and a literary critic. His worked on the fundamentals of the New
Criticism, a formalist movement in literary theory which emphasized the close reading of a literary
text, especially poetry, in an effort to discover how a work functions in isolation as a self-contained
and self-referential object of aesthetic appeal. I A Richards made his great contribution with three of
his famous books, ‘The Meaning of Meaning', 'The Principles of Literary Criticism' and 'Practical
Criticism'. Richardson gave his students sets of anonymous poems to test their close reading skills
which enabled him to come up with the idea of 'practical criticism'. He is known for his minute
analysis of the text that would enhance the reading skills and the articulation of theoretical
principles. These all together would give rise to the increment in the analytical powers of the
readers. He believed that there should be language that should be universally intelligible so that it
would promote international understanding.
As far as modernist criticism is concerned, the name of Edmund Wilson erupts as a result of his great
contributions to the field. He was am American literary critic who laid his interest on Marxist and
Freudian themes. In his work ' Axel's Castle: A study in the Imaginative Literature of 1870-1930’ he
surveyed symbolism and spoke about writers like James Joyce, Marcel Proust and TS Eliot. He even
studied about European socialism and about Vladimir Lenin.