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ENG45C - Coggle Diagram
ENG45C
The rise of Absurdism within literature
Ezra Pound,
In a Station of the Metro
, Pound pairs absurdism with urbanization, showing off the feeling of alienation that comes with life amongst myriads of people in urban cities, a stark contrast of life before industrializaiton
Herman Melville,
Bartleby, the Scrivener
, One of the character within the story seems to stop fulfilling his appointed duty given to him by the capitalist machine and instead begins to follow his own matra of only doing what he wants to do. This, in turn, makes his actions seem absurd to the rest of his compnaions and causing them to have no idea on what to do with him; he is so far removed from their estavlished model of society that he should be left alone
Edgar Allen Poe,
The Man of the Crowd
, features a man that narrates over a crowd of people in a busy thoruoughfare in London and seemgingly loses his mind and sanity looking over the vast differences between the people, and proceeds to follow an apparaition throughout the city
W. B. Yeats wrote a series of poems that commented on the absurdity of humanity through the different stages that he viewed it through.
Sailing to Byzantium
Just like the city of Byzantium, Yeats regards this as the fall of art and literature, with artists and authors losing the ability to craft beautiful pieces of culture
The Second Coming
Though Yeats starts off stating that humanity has been stagnating in terms of literature and the arts, he believes that there is a future/hope for them, and that it is up to this current generation to save humanity
Leda and the Swan
A story that starts of the Grecian mythology and one that is written in beautiful prose and detail, could be seen as the beginning of literature and art
W. B. Yeats's
Easter 1916
. While it doesnt comment so much on the inability to control your lifes path, it comments more on the absurd loss of life and selfless sacrifice that happened in Ireland during this time, with the many rebellions and skirmishes that occured against British occupation.
Hilda Doolittle,
Eurydice
. Doolittle uses the another Grecian myth to comment on the absurdity of patriarcial societal norms and how women have suffered for hundrds of years due to the incessant intrusions from men
William Carlos Williams,
To Elsie
. A social commentary on the isolation that industrialization and capatilsm brings around the death of culture and meaning to our surroundings and ourselves
The use of narration of a text as a literary device
Henry James,
The Turn of the Screw
, By stating that this story is from a biased manuscript and it was edited by the person who experienced the story, it adds a layer of doubt on the validity of the story and its facts, forcing the reader to doubt everything that happens
In Chinua Achebe's
Things Fall Apart
we see a unique blend of both of these overaching themes. We see the use of English in a uniquely African/Igbo style, using English in a way that can effectively translate and explain African proverbs. It also features the death of the idolization of African nature at the hands of White colonizers, and the neagtive effects it had on the moral and spirituality on African culture.
These short poems, mostly by Langston Hughes, use rythmn within their narration as a way to include Black culture into their literary process
Nude Young Dancer
Langston Hughes
The Weary Blues
Langston Hughes
Let America be America Again
Langston Hughes
Harlem [2]
Langston Hughes
Langston Hughes,
The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountian
. Hughes here writes on his views of racism and Black literature, and also touches on his technique of including Blues Jazz rythmns into his poetry, introducing a uniquely Black theme to his work and therefore seperating himself from other White authors of his time.
T. S. Elliot,
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
. Less of a use of narration but more of a change of narrator; while love poems/songs used to feature a confident and charismatic narrator, Elliot instead write Prufrock to be spineless and stationary, not taking his chances to find love but instead yearn for it from afar.
Imagism is a form of poetry that focuses solely on what the narrator sees, allowing for the reader to decide what that visual means. These usually have no "true" meaning from the author and force the reader to think for themselves
Williams Carlos Williams,
This Is Just to Say
Williams Carlos Williams,
The Red Wheelbarrow
The use of idleness in temporality within literature
Virginia Woolf,
Mrs. Dalloway
, The structure of the book and its characters as if time is progressing rapidly, not allowing for the reader to catch their bearings; all of the main characters seem to intersect at meaningfuls points in time on their jounries aorund town before they all converge at the party at the end of the book
William Faulkner,
The Sound and the Fury
, Faulkner creates different modes of time for each of his protagnists and their individual acts within the book; Benjy's mode of time is in constant flux due to his impairment, Quentin breaks his timepiece in an attempt to refuse the passage of time over his ideals, Dilsey accepts her broken mode of time and learns to live around it
Langston Hughes,
The Negro Speaks of Rivers
Hughes uses a shared history and time as a literary device to create a shared Black American spirituality/link
In Langston Hughes
I, Too
he doesnt view temporality as idle but instead as forthcoming; it is inevitable that Black Americans will have equality with White Americans
Samuel Beckett,
Waiting for Godot
, Beckett uses the absence of visual landmarks and time-reading instruments to create a sense of being lost in time/endlessness that allows for the conversations between Vladimir, Estragon, and all other chracters to feel as if they last forever. Beckett also use their poor memory and constant inaction as a medium to illustrate their want to not "think" about life, and uses their brief moments of luciidity to illustrate their fear of having no control over their lives
T. S. Elliot,
Tradition and the Individual Talent
. Elliot here argues that it tradtion/being born into tradtion that creates a great author, but instead the talent of the individual that studies that traditon that greatness. This could be seen as an argument against the idleness of tradition and high class knowledge and the a forward movement towards equality in literature
Ezra Pound,
A Few Dont's by an Imagiste
. Pound follows in the same vein as Elliot ass he argues against traditonal styles of writing when it comes to imagism; he writes that it should be written in simple and easy to understand words and quick and consice. Another step away from idle tradition.
The use of nature as a juxtaposition to the industrialiazation of society
Zora Neale Hurston's
Their Eyes Were Watching God
also falls under these two catagories; The arrival of the hurricane is a sign of absurdity as it shows how it doest matter the trials and tribulations you go through, life will find a way to ruin you. It also shows nature as the be all and end all; even though Janie risked and survived all of societies preasures, it was nature that ineveitabley bested her.
James Joyce,
The Dead
. Written by an Irish author, Joyce uses the unifying nature of the blanketing snow storm over Ireland as counterpart to the modernizing and alienating Gabriel Conroy, who after realising his ignorance decides to look more inward, towards himself and his home country
W. B. Yeats
The Isle of Innisfree
. Yeats illustrates through this poem the lingering connection to nature that yet remains in the human soul, and how we still feel its call even on the paved roads that we walk/drive upon now.
William Carlos Williams,
Spring and All
. Similar to Yeats's poem, Williams writes about the connection between modernization and the constant and ever-changing nature that surrounds it, almost as if he is saying it is humanity that turns a blind eye to its supposed loss of nature because it can be seen everywhere, from the shapes of its leaves to the changing of the seasons
While not exactly using nature as juxtaposition, these pieces of literature use anthroprohormism for nature/things in nature
Hilda Doolittle,
Sea Rose
Hilda Doolittle,
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