Quot;The Lost Generation" and Modernism in American literature

(1914 - 1940s)

Many historians call the 1920s the roaring 20s or the Jazz Age ("век джаза"). On the one hand American people were recovering from the tragedy & trauma of World War I. Those, who had taken part in the war, had come back home crippled either physically or morally or both. They tried to adjust themselves to the post - war mode of life, but often failed to do that as the dramatic war experience had ruined their old set of ideals & values, & made them unable to adopt themselves to the changed conditions. These people as well as the writers who described such people got the name of "the lost generation":

— Ernest (his real name was Miller) Hemingway (Эрнест (Миллер) Хемингуэй) (1899 - 1961);

— Francis Scott Fitzgerald (Фрэнсис Скотт Фицджеральд) (1896 -1940);

— John Don Passos (Джон Дон Пассос) (1896- 1970) -"Three Soldiers" (1921);

— William Harrison Faulkner (Уильям Харрисон Фолкнер) (1897 -1962) - "Soldier's Pay" ("Солдатская награда") (1926) - his first novel based on the problem of "the lost generation", it was not very successful, especially in comparison with the two titans of American "lost generation" writers - Ernest Hemingway & Francis Scott Fitzgerald.

On the other hand the 20s with their industrial boost (рост, увеличение) also saw the great upheaval of the moods of the people, their desire to compensate for the austerity (строгость) & deprivations (лишения) of the war years. Moreover World War I turned out to be quite profitable for America as it was the only country which really profited from the war. So the Americans partied, partied & parried. Besides the 20s can be summed up as the age of prosperity, entertainment (jazz music gets enormous popularity) & fashion.

In the 30s the situation changed drastically because of the Great Depression (not only in America but in the whole world). The living standards dropped very low. There was a rise of proletariat movement in America. The 30s are sometimes called the red 30 s, as society was oriented on socialist ideas. So the Depression & the natural disasters which aggravated (усугублять) the economic disaster - all this was naturally reflected in literature (especially in realistic literature).

One of the best books on the 30s was John Ernest Steinbeck's (Джон Эрнест Стейнбек) (1902- 1968) novel " T h e Grapes of Wrath" ("Гроздья гнева") (1939) - a story a family in Oklahoma which is a victim of the natural disasters & the economic crisis. They have to move to California - a sort of "promised land" ("земля обетованная"). And the author depicts their sufferings very well. The writers of that day tried to reflect the everyday life of common people, they showed people's search for the "promised land" & showed that there was no such land. Steinbeck's personages also move from place to place to find a better life.

The period between the two World Wars also saw the emergence of m о d e r n i s m, the trend which broke up with the traditional realistic manner of writing & which ignored the social aspect of literature & concentrated on the inner world of man. The vision & viewpoint became an essential aspect of the modernist novels. Novelists gave up writing a straightforward narration & began to experiment with fictional points of view, that is - representing the world as if seen from the inside of the characters. Their narration became fragmentary, incoherent.

The most prominent modernist prosaic writers were Henry James (1843 -1916) & William Faulkner (1897 - 1962), while Thomas Eliot (Томас Элиот) (1888 - 1965) & Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (Эзра Уэстон Лумис Паунд) (1885 - 1972) excelled in modernist poetry.

William Faulkner had in his works both the traces of "the lost generation" & modernism. W. Faulkner was born in the state of Mississippi, he took part in World War I (but not for long as he was wounded & came back home). As it was already mentioned his works were influenced by the war experience ("Soldier's Pay") and often dealt with the theme of "the lost

generation". Besides he also represented the Southern School of Writers. The other writers who belonged to this school were:

— Erskine Caldwell (Эрскин Колдуэлл) (1903 - 1987) - his novels "Tobacco Road" ("Табачная дорога") (1932) & "God's Little Acre" ("Богова делянка") (1933) put the author among the classics of American literature;

— Margaret Mitchell (Маргарет Митчел) (1900 - 1949) - the novel "Gone with the Wind" (1936) was her only novel;

— Thomas Clayton Wolfe (Томас Клейтон Вулф) (1900 - 1938) - his first novel at once brought fame to its author - "Look Homeward, Angel" ("Взгляни на свой дом, ангел") (1929);

— Robert Penn Warren (Роберт Пени Уоррен) (1905 - 1989)- "All the King's Men" ("Вся королевская рать") (1946) is his most famous novel;

— Tennessee Williams (Теннесси Уильяме) (1911 - 1983) - he was a playwright. One of his most popular plays are "The Glass Menagerie" ("Стеклянный зверинец") (1944), "A Street Car Named Desire" ("Трамвай желание") (1947), "Orpheus Descending" ("Орфей спускается в ад") (1957), etc.

All these writers dealt with the Southern Myth in their works, with the process of disintegration of the American South up to the Civil War. The Southern Myth meant the idealization of the prewar (the Civil War) past, of the relationships & mentality of the Southerners before the war, the superiority of the South over the pragmatic & commercial North. All that "was gone with the wind" - with the wind of the Civil War. And all that was replaced. The moral superiority of the Southerners, the elegance & refinement (утончённость) of the southern women - all was gone & replaced by the pragmatism & unscrupulousness after the war. In all such novels we feel the nostalgia for the past. The writers of the Southern School asserted the myth, on the other hand denounced (изобличать) it, showing that the roots of the postwar vices lie in the prewar reality. In all these works we see that it was a crucial thing that destroyed the lives of many characters. None of the Southern families managed to revive morally after the war.

W. Faulkner said that "once he realized that his small country, the sign of a post stamp presents enough material to write about". "Sartoris" ("Сарторис") (1929) was Faulkner's first novel which really brought him fame (though it was already his 3^rd published novel). In this book we find ourselves in the district of Yoknapatawpha (which very much resembles the state of Mississippi where Faulkner lived) with the town of Jefferson as its capital. "Yoknapatawpha" (Йокнапатофа) is an Indian phrase which means "quiet flows the river here" (it is consonant with Sholokhov's "Тихий Дон"). And in many of the writer's other novels we come across the characters from this district, so the theme of Yoknapatawpha & its people is many times repeated in Faulkner's future works. About 14 other novels of Faulkner deal with life of families from there & trace the process of disintegration of these families:

— "As I Lay Dying" ("На смертном одре") (1930);

— "Light in August" ("Свет в августе") (1932);

— "Absalom, Absalom!" ("Авессалом, Авессалом") (1936);

— the trilogy: —"The Hamlet" ("Деревушка") (1940);

— " T h e T о w n " (" Г о p о д ") (1957);

— "The Mansion" ("Особняк") (1959) - this trilogy shows a

rise of a bourgeois family.

All these novels are marked with a very deep insight into human psychology. They bring out the innermost (самые сокровенные) thoughts & feelings of the characters. Besides the writer introduces the device of multiple narration, when one & the same story is told by several people (for example, "As I Lay Dying" consists of 59 monologues of the 15 characters). Faulkner thought that the position of the narrator, standing above the characters is not applicable - many viewpoints should be shown. In the 30s Faulkner wrote under a great influence of Freud's ideas. And his so called "black novels" are full of scenes of madness, schizophrenia, insanity (such a piece of modernism is his novel "The Sound and the Fury" ("Шум и ярость") (1929)). And the trilogy shows his turn to realism. It traces two opposite processes: the downfall of the rich, aristocratic families & the rise of a capitalist family with the American Dream as their target in life - "from rags to riches". Faulkner was really a Southern writer with the feeling of a defeated mode of life of the Southerners after the Civil War. In his

works he often shows the black slaves as primitive people who need the guidance. He also touches upon the blood relationships in the works (for example, the right of the landowner to have any black woman & children from her).

Actually Americans are always likely to be quite optimistic but Faulkner was deeply influenced by Dostoevsky and he was not afraid to show the worst sides of human nature. For his literary work he was awarded the Nobel Prize.

And speaking about modernists of the time we can't but mention Henry James whose concept of "the many windowed house" (концепция "множественности точек зрения") had a great influence on the development of the novel as a genre. The concept reflected the many-sided character of the perception of the reality by different personages, as they look on the world from different viewpoints (this idea is very consonant with the ideas of Leo Tolstoy).