FEELINGS李白的长干行.doc

Appreciation of 20th Century Britishand American Literature Jeanette ZhaoOutline of the CoursePart OneAppreciation of 20th Century British LiteraturePart TwoAppreciation of 20th Century American Literature Part OneChapter One Introduction to 20th Century English Literature I. From the End of 19thCentury to19141.Historical BackgroundThe period from the end of 19th century to that before World War I can be said to be a transitional period in many fields. The end of the Victorian Age, beginning in the 1890s, was marked by radicalchanges in old traditions, in social standards and in mens thoughts. With the death of Queen Victoria came not only the weakening of the Victorian values, but also the economic and political decline of the whole state. The accompaniment of the end of the Victorian Age was the loss of faith and the rise of pessimism, which is reflected in almost all the literature of the time. 2. Literature MovementIn the literature of this period, realism still occupied a dominant position in literary techniques, yet the co-existence in Europe of many other literary tendencies and schools such as naturalism, aestheticism and symbolism, and the rising of some new experimenting art such as impressionism and expressionism shown in paintings had a great influence on the British writersIn poetry, some poets were against Victorian tradition and followed the Romantic conventions combined with new tendencies such as aestheticism, symbolism and impressionism in their poetry-writing , such as W.B.Yeats.In novels, there was a new concern with the internal feelings or subjective sensibilities. D.H.Lawrence created his psychological realistic novels under the influence of the theories of Sigmund Freud.In drama, the first important playwright in a modern sense was Oscar Wilde, who introduced art for arts sake. And the first serious and the most influential playwright was Bernard Shaw, whose realistic plays dealing with social problems.3. Major Writers Poets:W.B.Yeats, A.E.Houseman, Rudyard Kipling, John Masefield, and Thoms HardyNovelists:D.H.Lawrence,Joseph Conrad,John Galsworthy, Henry JamesPlaywrights:Oscar Wilde, Bernard Shaw4. Literature Tendencies and Terms 1) Aestheticism: an art movement that focused on that art exists for the sake of its beauty alone. It studies beauty in nature,art and literature. The aesthetics in literature concerns the sense of the beautiful, rather than on moral, social, or practical considerations. 2) Symbolism: broadly, symbolism is the use of one object to represent or suggest another;or, in literature, the use of symbols in writing, particularly the serious and extensive use of such symbols. It sees the immediate, unique and personal emotional response as the proper subject of art and its full expression as the ultimate aim of art.3) Naturalism: the application of the principles of scientific Determinism to literature. It gains from Newtons mechanistic determinism; from Darwins Biological Determinism;from Marx a view of history as a battleground of vast economic and social forces;from Freud a view of the determinism of the inner and subconscious self. Naturalist sees human beings as the victims of destiny or fate. Human beings are portrayed as animals driven by fundamental urges-fear,hunger, and sex. 4) Imagism: it signals the beginning of modernism. The imagist poems tend to be short, composed of short lines of musical cadences rather than metrical regularity,to avoid abstraction, and to treat the image with a hard, clear precision rather than with overt symbolic intent.The movement in literature was led by Pound, he translated ancient Chinese poems and got hints, that is to describe the scene or the object and then express the feelings.李白的长干行，赠汪伦。The language is precise, clear. “In a Station of the Metro”:The apparition of these faces in the crowd;Petals on a wet, black bough.5) Impressionism: derived from painting technique, the fleeting impression emerges in the observers eyes from the proper distance. Painters concentrate on the general impression produced by the scene or the object. (Van Gogh)Painters work is to record the direct and sensuous impression when observing objects, without making modification according to your knowledge or experience. Writers hold that the personal attitudes and moods of the writer were legitimate elements in depicting characters or setting or action. 6) Expressionism: German painters tend to express emotion by distortion of form and violent color, leading to exaggeration. It is used to describe any art that raises subjective feelings above objective observations. In literature, writers attempt to exhibit the distortion of the objects of the outer world, and the violent dislocation of time sequence and spatial logic by the impressions or moods of a character. II. From 1914 to 19451. Historical Background World War I had a very shocking influence on Great Britain. Firstly, Britain became a debtor nation, because the British government borrowed 1000 million dollars from America. Secondly, the British empire began to lose its territories, the colonies of the empire gradually broke away and formed independent states.Thirdly, the worldwide Economic Depression from1929 to 1933 weakened Britain further. Finally, World War II(1939-1945) destroyed Great Britain as a great world power. The British Empire of the 19th century remained only as a symbol and metaphor for an increasingly bitter and disillusioned literature. The war and its historical and psychological impact were one of the chief topics of the literature. War, as a psychological wound, was omnipresent.2. Literature Movementn In poetry, the 1920s was the period of high Modernism. British poetry took a sharp turn with the rise of a new star T.S.Eliot, whose works revolutionized the British poetry and pioneered the modernist poetry. The 1930s saw the intellectual poems with industrial and urban imagery and political consciousness. The 1940s was the period of Neo-Romanticism. The poets of this period afforded a warmer emotional release than was available in Modernist or Metaphysical poetry. In novels, the writing technique was influenced by modernist movements. The two world wars brought tremendous hurt to people. The disillusionment and dissatisfaction with the drift of material civilization in the west drove some writers to turn to religion for their spiritual comfort and some of them joined Catholicism. In drama, the stress of war increased the demand for light entertainment and the theatre goers were limited to a small audience. The English stage saw the decline of the English drama. 3.Major Writers Poets: T.S.Elliot, W.H. Auden Novelists: James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, E.M. Forster, George Orwell Playwrights: Noel Coward4. Literary Tendencies and Terms 1) Modernism: was an international movement in literature and arts,which began in the late 19th century and flourished until 1950s. It covers Symbolism,Surrealism,Imagism, Impressionism, Stream of Consciousness, Expressionism, Futurism,Cubism, Abstractism ,etc. modernism takes the irrational philosophy and the theory of psychoanalysis as its theoretical base.The modernist writers concentrate more on the private and subjective than on the public and objective, mainly concerned with the inner being of an individual. The major themes of the modernist literature are the distorted, alienated and ill relationships between man and nature, man and society, man and man, and man and himself.2). Dadaism: a movement in art and literature founded in Zurich in 1916 and it lasted until 1922, about 1924 it developed into surrealism. In certain respect it seems to have been a forerunner of the anti-realistic novel and the theatre of the absurd. The aim of Dada was destructive, denying sense and order.3). Surrealism: a movement in art and literature which began in Paris in 1924. It aims to deprive poetry and prose writing of conscious mental control and aesthetic technique, allowing the subconscious and all irrational impulses the freedom to express other traditional principles or standards. It is often regarded as an outgrowth of Dada and influenced by Freud. The study of dreams, of hallucinations, the practice of automatic writing under the dictation of the subconscious were considered by the surrealists as the true means of knowledge.4) Stream of Consciousness: created by William James in his “Principle of Psychology” to describe the flow of thoughts of waking mind. In literature, it has been used to describe the narrative technique. The assumption is that in the mind of an individual at a given moment his or her stream of consciousness is a mixture of all the levels of awareness, an unending flow of sensations, thoughts, memories, associations, and reflectionsIf the exact content of the mind(consciousness) is to be described at any moment, then these varied, disjointed, and illogical elements must find expression in a flow of words, images, and ideas similar to the unorganized flow of the mind. The term interior monologue is also sometimes used.II. From 1945 to 1960s 1. Historical Background After the WWII, the Cold War between the two superpowers, the US and the Soviet Union appeared. Britain was in economic and political crisis and had to attach itself to the US.The impact of the Second World War on human consciousness and artistic expression was far greater than that of the First World War. The destructive force of science and the possibility of self-annihilation set people thinking about the meaning of existence and life. The most influential expression of Western philosophy over the post-war years was Existentialism.The men of letters showed the absurdity and emptiness of existence, the human anguish and despair and the inner vacancy of self on the one hand and showed a serious concern for the future and affirmed the need for a moral regeneration to the other.2. Literature Movement There was a general international spirit of new consciousness and a sense of dissatisfaction with the reality which were shown through the angry protest in Britain. The 1950s was called the period of Angry young Men. The English literary situation looked depressingly bleak after the Second World War.Writers mainly followed the 19th-century realistic tradition and focused on the post-war reality of the English society. They created a lot of anti-heroes educated out of the working class and expressed a great dissatisfaction with and revolt against the social mores. 3. Major Writers: poets Philip Larkins Novelists Kinsley Amis, William Golding Playwrights John Osborne, Samuel Beckett, Arnold Wesker4. Literature Tendencies and Terms 1) Existentialism: a school of philosophy which had a great influence on European literature since World War II. Existentialists tend to emphasize the unique and particular in human experience. They place the individual person at the center of their picture of the world. Each man is what he chooses to be or make himself.Individual is the source of all value and obliged to choose for himself what to do and what standards to adopt or reject, consciousness of such freedom is a condition of authentic existence. Thus existentialists give priority to sincerity and creativity in the moral life. 2) Post- modernism: World War II brought people into a post-period, post- war, post-ideological, post-atomic and post-modern. Its tendency is towards historical discontinuity, alienation, asocial individualism, and also existentialism. The modernists intended to construct intricate forms, to interweave symbols elaborately, and to create works of art. Traditional forms, such as the novel, have given way to denials of those forms, such as the anti-novel. The typical protagonist has become not a hero but an anti-hero. 3) Theatre of the Absurd: a term given by the critic Martin Esslin about some dramatists, whose plays hold that human existence was without meaning. The form and content of the plays express the rejection to logical construction, and the creation of meaningless speeches and silence.III. From the 1970s to the End of the Century1. Historical Background: Britain was hit hard by the economic recession. Of all the industrial nations, it suffered the highest rate of inflation. In 1979 Margaret Thatcher took office, Thatcher Revolution quickly transformed the social, political and cultural climate, and brought a well-established liberal consensus to an end. 2. Literature Movement: In the 1970s, there appeared many novels which not only dealt with the past history, but were also concerned with its process of development and its relationship with the present lives of people. With the appearance of feminism, many notably female or feminist careers flourished or developed over the1970s. The 1980s was an era of political dismay. The 1990s saw the internationalization of themes and plurality in form. In poetry, from the 1960s to 1970s, through the 1980s, even 1990s, there was an active Irish poet Seamus Heaney. Drama was declining in the age of highly commercialized culture. 3.Major Writers poets Andrew Motion, Douglas,Black Morrion Novelists Martin Amis, Margaret Drabble, Julian Barnes Playwrights Tom Stoppard 4.Literature Tendencies and Terms 1) Feminism:In literature and criticism, a general position, not necessarily confined to women, having to do with the advocacy and encouragement of equal rights and opportunities for women politically, socially, psychologically, personally and aesthetically. Feminism criticism comes in many forms, and feminist critics have a variety of goals. Some are interested in rediscovering the works of women writers overlooked by a masculine-dominated culture. Others have revisited books by male authors and reviewed them from a womans point of view to understandhow they both reflect and shape the attitudes that have held women back. Still others have been interested in more fundamental questions involving the psychological and linguistic development of women in patriarchal or masculine-dominated culture.2.) Black humor: a kind of humor or a form of drama which displays a marked disillusionment and cynicism. It shows human beings without convictions and with little hope, regulated by fate or fortune or incomprehensible powers. The term refers as much to the tone of anger and bitterness. Black humor is a substantial element in the an-ti novel and the theatre of the Absurd. Chapter Two 20th Century English poetryI. Introduction 1910s: Thomas Hardy, traditional rural poetry W.B.Yeats, Symbolism, Aestheticism 1920s: T.S.Eliot, Modernism 1930s: W.H.Auden, political concern 1940s: Dylon Thomas,Romanticism 1950s: Philip Larkins, modern and traditional 1960s: Ted Hughes, Post-modernism 1970s: Andrew Motion, narrativeII. T.S.Eliot (1888-1965)His Life He was educated between 1906 and 1910 at Harvard University, where he studied philosophy, which Eliot adopted and reflected in his poetry. He was influenced by anti-Romanticism and the Italian Renaissance, particularly in Dantes poetry. He went to France and Germany to study literature and philosophy. Then he studied at Oxford University.From 1917 to 1919 he was assistant editor of “The Egoist” , a magazine advocating the Imagist Movement. In 1921 his marriage was a failure and then he went to Switzerland to receive medical treatment. Two months later he gave Ezra Pound the manuscript of The Waste Land. In 1927 he was received into the Church of England.His main works: 1.The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock（1915）J. 阿尔弗雷德.普鲁弗洛克的情歌2.*The Waste Land (1922)荒原3.Four Quartets （1943）四个四重奏包括:1)Burnt Norton(1936) 烧毁的诺顿2)East Coker(1940) 东科克3)The Dry Salvages(1941) 干燥的萨尔维 吉斯4)The little Gidding (1942) 小吉丁4.Prufrock and Other Observations (1917)普鲁夫洛克及其他5.The Gerontion (1919)小老头6.The Sacred Wood (1920) 圣林7.Homage to John Dryden(1924) 向约翰德莱顿致敬8.The Hollow Men （1925）空心人9.For Lancelot Andrews (1928) 纪念兰斯洛特安德鲁斯10.Ash-Wednesday （1930） 圣灰星期三11.Murder in the Cathedral（1935）大教堂谋杀案12.Family Reunion (1939) 大团圆13.The Cocktail Party (1950) 鸡尾酒会The Waste Land Published in 1922 in “The Criterion” and dedicated to Ezra Pound, T.S.Eliot poem The Waste Land is 433 lines long, and includes five parts. It involves lots of borrowings from 35 different writers and 6 foreign languages, so it is obscure and hard to understand. It is broadly acknowledged as one of the most recognizable landmarks of modernism.The Waste Land The title derives from the Fisher King legend and benefits from Jessie L.Westerns From ritual to Romance（从仪式到传说） and James Frazers The Golden Bough（金枝）. Jessie L.Western tells of the Grail legend of which the story of the Fisher King is a part. The Fisher King sins against God,who then punishes him by making him sexually wounded, and this disability is reflected on his land, so that his kingdom becomes a waste land. To make the King well, the Holy Grail, the Cup which is said to have been used by Jesus at the Last Supper, must be searched for by the quester. The quester must not get the Cup, but he must come to right place and ask the right question about the nature of the Cup. Western also states that the Holy grail legend is connected with the Arthurian legend(Sir Gawain and the Green Knight). King Arthur sends his knights to look for the Grail to save his