A Spotl ight on the

Twentieth Century

JAMES JOYCE, THOMAS STERNE ELIOT,GEORGE ORWELL, SALMAN RUSHDIE

LANGSTON HUGHES, AMY TAN,

NADINE GORDIMER, BRUCE CHATWIN

JAMES JOYCE

He thought that the artist ought to be ‘invisible’ in his works, in the sense that he must not express his own viewpoint. He should instead try to express the thoughts and experiences of other men.

He advocated the total objectivity of the artist and

his independence from all moral, religious or

political pressures.

A Portrait of an artist

as a young man

Use of stream of consciousness technique

The claustral sense of a young intelligence swaddled in convention and constricted by poverty

The intensity of its first response to aesthetic experience and life at large

Art associated to women (mother,

prostitutes, Our Lady)

A Portrait of an artist

as a young man

Morbid atmosphere of introspection

All characters are portrayed in the Hero’s reveries and resentments

Word-painting technique

The awaking of religious doubts and sexual instincts, leading Stephen’s carnal sin at the age of 16

A symbolic association between art and sex

leading to a contrast between art and religion

A Portrait of an artist

as a young man

Nationalism, language and religion as 3 forms of subjection

Beauty is separated from Good and Evil and related to Truth

Epiphany as a a moment of sudden insight

when mind reaches revelation

DUBLINERS

Dublin as the centre of paralysis

Careful progression from childhood to maturity, broadening from private to public scope

The essential history of the soul of a people which has confused and weakened its relation to the source of spiritual life and cannot restore it

Dreams of escape

DUBLINERS

Christian background with the display of deadly sins and cardinal virtues

For example Eveline lacking the strength of faith, hope and love wavers in an effort to find a new life and failing in the cardinal virtue of fortitude, remains in Dublin

ULYSSES

Mythic method in taking Odissey as an overlapping of structures

A new picaresque dimension

Two races: Israel and Ireland facing themselves

A never-ending search for protection

Ulysses as a sort of Everyman

ULYSSES

Molly as an emblem for all women

16.06.1906

An inverted Victorianism

Stephen in search of inner freedom

Bloom represents home, Ithaca

T. S. ELIOT

Brought up with a strongly traditional English literary education, he soon rejected the ‘romantic’ conventionsEndowed with a cosmopolitan culture, he broke away from all canons and evolved a new poetic technique

T. S. ELIOT Modern man’s alienation from societyTime versus eternityThe quest for personal identityThe problem of faith in modern civilizationThe sense that the presence is inferior to the pastThe fear of livingThe moral spiritual emptiness of our time

T. S. ELIOT Objective impersonality of art against the romantic conception of poetic subjectivismUse of rhythm and musicalityObjective correlative as a set of objects capable of expressing a certain emotionDifficult and even obscure poetryHe revalued the importance of past since man was a blend of past and present experiencesHe advocated a universal poetry searching influences everywhere

T. S. ELIOT

Minimum use of wordsHe learnt to draw images from everyday life, to deflate the tragic through irony and cynicism and to juxtapose the lyrical and the commonplace, the poetic and the squalid.Two stages in his career: before conversion and after it

THE WASTE LAND

The symbolic framework of the medieval Grail legend, inspired by ancient fertility ritesThere is not plot in the poem but a sequence of images, sometimes ambiguousLarge use of quotationsThe same vision of a nightmarish world inhabited by people that are spiritually dead, since their lack of faith has turned their lives into a sterile waste land.The frequent allusions to people, traditions, or events that require a wide cultural background

THE WASTE LAND

The various levels of reading the poem suggests (realistic, symbolical, surrealistic…)The use of stream of consciousness technique and interior monologueIts peculiar time progression mingling past, present and futureReferences to specific places assuming the role of universal symbols

THE FOUR

QUARTETS

A new mood and new attitude to life, out of the desert of Doubt into the garden of spiritual faithA complex work focusing on the main theme of time and eternity, conveying a somewhat mystical view of lifeHe must learn to disregard the temporal and look beyond this life to eternity, which he can contemplate only by dispossessing himself of all earthly attributes.Each quartet is structured musically

GEORGE ORWELLAn outstanding English example of the politically committed intellectualThe danger of propagandaThe danger of the personality cultEasy manipulation of massesControl of the language as a political instrumentTurn political writing into artA warning against the vaguenessof modern English prose

 

GEORGE ORWELL

Language as a suitable means of real communicationFocus on the political mechanisms of totalitarianism: the methods by which thought is controlled, privacy invaded, and personal resistance broken downThe depth of pessimismWith the destruction of words, language will be corrupt, and man too will be corrupt, reduced to a hollow automation. 

SALMAN RUSHDIE

Anglo-Indian novelist, who uses in his works tales from various genres - fantasy, mythology, religion, oral tradition. Rushdie's narrative technique has connected his books to magic realism

Reality is a question of perspective; the further you get from the past, the more concrete and plausible it seems - but as you approach the present, it inevitably seems more and more incredible 

MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN

It won the Booker Prize and brought him international fame. Written in exuberant style, the comic allegory of Indian history revolves around the lives of the narrator Saleem Sinai and the 1 000 children born after the Declaration of Independence. All of the children are given some magical property. Saleem has a very large nose, which grants him the ability to see "into the hearts and minds of delivered at the stroke of midnight, 14 August 1947, as India gained its independence from England

MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN

His chief rival is Shiva, who has the power of war. Saleem, dying in a pickle factory near Bombay, tells his tragic story with special interest on its comical sides. The work arose much controversy in India because of its unflattering portrait of Indira Gandhi and her son Sanjay, who was involved in a controversial sterilization campaign. Midnight's Children took its title from Nehru's speech delivered at the stroke of midnight, 14 August 1947, as India gained its independence from England

MIDNIGHT'S CHILDREN

The fog of larger events is never permitted to detract from the more personal experiences of all the multi-faceted characters in the novel. This is perhaps why this form of "magical realism" is so effective in a novel that is at once the history of a sub-continent, the story of a boy's coming to age, the saga of a family and the off-key liberation-song of a people.

LAUGHTON HUGHES

A protagonist of the advent of the Harlem renaissance in the 1920'sRhythm and beat. His stanzas weave wildly smooth tunes about life as a black American. His primary poetic influences were the blues bars of Harlem and D.C.. Individual dark-skinned selves without fear or shame.

LAUGHTON HUGHES

The streets of black America contained a culture rich and vibrant and fiercely poetic. This announcement was to become his life mission,

He tried to write poems like the songs they sang on Seventh Street...(these songs) had the pulse beat of the people who keep on going."

LAUGHTON HUGHES

His work emphasized the oral tradition styl ist ically and social engagement of critical attention to his writ ing has tended to focus thematical ly, so it comes as no surprise that the preponderance was on the SOCIOLOGICAL and HISTORICAL approaches A gentle and mild-mannered soul who spent much of his l ife at the center of controversy, a gregarious spir it who was also zealously private, a writer of social conscience and sol idarity who was fundamental ly alone

LAUGHTON HUGHES

He devoted his art to the true expression of the l ives , hopes, fears , and angers of ordinary black people, without self-consciousness or sugar-coating.

This devotion has been repaid with an extraordinary and continuing popularity, as well as with a st i l l - increasing crit ical acceptance of the l iterary artistry with which it was conveyed

LAUGHTON HUGHES

His work emphasized the oral tradition styl ist ical ly and social engagement because of his l ifelong affection for and identif ication with ordinary black people , and his vivid and affectionate rendering of their l ives in their own language, he has a place in the hearts of his many readers that goes far beyond his l iterary accomplishments, considerable as they are.

AMY TAN

The difficult quest for identity A great personal loss and interpersonal conflict A foundamental asymmetry in the mothers’ and daughters’ understanding of each other’s native cultures The mothers draw on a broad experimental base for their knowledge of American pattern of thought and behaviour The daughters have only fragmentary knowledge of that universe

AMY TANDifficult understanding from both partsMany courageous people can be found throughout the book. The characterizations in this novel paint images of women with elaborate lives. Their traumatic experiences affected their outlook on life and made them courageous.  "The test of a courageous person is the ability to bear defeat without losing heart," is a quote that is true in its entirety

AMY TAN

A courageous person knows how to go on and never look back because "to despair was to wish back for something already lost” .Ironically, the same spirit of individualism that seems so liberating to the older women makes their daughters resistant to maternal advice and criticism. Born into a culture in which a multiplicity of religious beliefs flourishes and the individual is permitted, even encouraged, to challenge tradition and authority,

AMY TAN

The younger women are reluctant to accept their mothers' values without question. The daughters experience themselves socially as a recognizable ethnic minority and want to eradicate the sense of "difference" they feel among their peers. They endeavor to dissociate themselves from their mothers' broken English and Chinese mannerisms, and they reject as nonsense the fragments of traditional lore their mothers try to pass along to them.

AMY TANHowever, cut adrift from any spiritual moorings, the younger women are overwhelmed by the number of choices that their materialistic culture offers and are insecure about their ability to perform satisfactorily in multiple roles ranging from dutiful Chinese daughter to successful American career woman She uses the contrast between the mothers' and daughters' beliefs and values to show the difficulties first-generation immigrants face in transmitting their native culture to their offspring.

AMY TAN

She endorses the mothers' traditional Chinese worldview because it offers the possibility of choice and action in a world where paralysis is frequently a threat She draws on astrology in The Joy Luck Club in order to shape characters and conflicts. As with astrology, she uses the theory of the Five Elements not only for characterization but also for the development of conflict

NADINE GORDIMER

- She writes about her own country and a racially divided society- Fighting against oppression- In 'Pickup' a problematic love story- migration from poor eastern countries to newly democratic South Africa, a promised land- those who are free to move and those who are not- search for identity

NADINE GORDIMER

- focus on social and racial differences- the need for spiritual escape symbolized by the desert- the importance of religion in the life of the man's family- the theme of freedom embodied by the couple's different decisions- Ambiguity since it's not clear who picked up whom and their reasons- Sex as the only way of contact between two different worlds- independence and responsibilities

NADINE GORDIMER

- two stories in the novel- it alternates third-person passages, usually narrative or descriptive, with first-person ones for interior monologues- the dialogues are not always introduced by inverted commas- punctuation is sometimes used in such a way as to break a sentence into segments or create suspence through dots and dashes

BRUCE CHATWIN

- His main concern is man's restlessness- Why does man decide to leave?- Walkabout as his main issue- He is interested in recording what he sees rather than his own feelings and reactions.- Travel, the fascination with pre-historic cultures and exile as his main themes

BRUCE CHATWIN

- The search for freedom, to be what one chooses to be- He was interested in detailed descriptions and in anedoctes rather than in a psychological insight- A patchwork of different experiences and pictures-The contrast between the native and the civilized man- The search for identity- The relationship between man and nature