Unit 6: Contemporary Literature

Unit 6:

Contemporary Literature

Discussion Questions

• What is Contemporary Literature?

• Why is it difficult to define “Contemporary Literature”?

http://orion.it.luc.edu/~pjay/contlit.htm#USEFUL WEBSITES

Difficult to Define

From Paul Jay’s Graduate course:

1. All literature is contemporary when it is written, and much of it strives to be self-consciously contemporary. Dante, for

example, in the Divine Comedy, broke with tradition to write in Italian about his own political contemporaries;

Shakespeare drew on historical sources to write about his own age; Wordsworth and Coleridge strove to write poetry in the language of the "common man"; the great

19th-century novelists like Austen, Eliot, Hardy and Dickens created a body of work that sought to record and reflect on the rise of bourgeois modernity; and of course so-called "modernist" writers attempted to write fiction, poetry and drama that was technically innovative in ways they felt resonated with contemporary philosophical insights and which incorporated forms of contemporary cultural

critique. Most literature strives to be "contemporary," and

Difficult to Define (cont.)

2. More specifically, "contemporary literature" can be

loosely defined as literature written in our own time, as opposed to literature written in "other times." It is

"recent" literature. It hasn't yet been disciplined by its formal incorporation into "English." This can make its study a kind of free-for-all, since we are free, seemingly, to choose for study whatever we want. However,

educators who have been skeptical of the value and appropriateness to teaching "contemporary" literature argue, in fact, that we don't yet know who the great

writers of our own age are, and that we ought to stick with the literature of earlier periods, which has been sorted

out, categorized, codified, in a word, "judged." The study of contemporary literature can be interesting, then,

Difficult to Define (cont.)

• 3. One problem with this second definiton, of course, is that it begs the question of how we determine "our own time." It may be

commonsensical to think of "contemporary literature" as a body of work written in "our own time," but when did our own time begin, and what are its characteristics? Here we're confronted with the problem of periodization. If "contemporary" literature is literature written in a particular period, how do we date the period? One conventional approach, which I'll review in a minute, dates "contemporary" literature from WWII --- thus the familiar term "postwar" literature. This approach is fundamentally historical, since it dates the "contemporary" period from a significant event. However, it also assumes a set of political, intellectual, social, and cultural developments that shaped the literature of the period.

"Contemporary American Literature" defined in this way as

"postwar" literature has been pretty thoroughly incorporated into the discipline of English---as the course we're presently in

demonstrates, it has a place in programs and curriculums, and it has an established if loosely structured group of canonical texts and authors.

Historical Context

• World War II

– The Holocaust – Pearl Harbor

– Destruction of European cities – Atomic bombs

“Postmodernism”

• Period following Modernism

– Rejects Modernism for something new

– “project of rejecting tradition in favour of going "where no man has gone before" or better”

(http://elab.eserver.org/hfl0242.html ) – Search for uniqueness and individuality

• “Resists definition or classification”

Characteristics of Postmodernism

Literature

• Irony

• Pastiche – ““pasted” elements of previous

genres and styles of literature to create a

new narrative voice”

• Intertextuality – relation to other literature

• Metafiction – writing about writing

• Temporal distortion

Characteristics (cont.)

• Paranoia

• Magical realism – “dreams taking place during normal life, the return of previously deceased characters, extremely complicated plots, wild shifts in time, and myths and fairy tales

becoming part of the narrative”

• Participation – involvement of the reader

Resources

• Major Authors and Works:

http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/contemporar y-american-literature-authors-and-major-works.html#less on

– Quest for identity – Expressionism – Rhythm and tone – Juxtaposition

• Overview of Modernism:

http://www.uncp.edu/home/canada/work/allam/1914-/lit/

• Contemporary Literature video:

Homework – December 3, 2013

What were writers questioning?

• “Man’s inhumanity to man”

• Potential for atomic self-destruction

• Human nature

• “How civilized was a world in which such

horrors could take place?”

• Turn from realism to symbolism, fantasy,

myth, surrealism, and ironic or antic

“War Novel”

• The Naked and the Dead

by Norman

Mailer

What am I like?

What is “self-knowledge”?

• “knowledge of one's particular mental

states, including one's beliefs, desires, and

sensations”

(http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/self-knowl

edge/)

• Self-awareness

“Self-knowledge”

• Robert Penn Warren’s

All the King’s Men

– “Only if self-knowledge has been paid for in blood can one be sure one has gained it.”

• J.D. Salinger’s

A Catcher in the Rye

– “The attempt to preserve the integrity of the self in a world full of “phoniness” and

American Novels

• Ralph Ellison’s The Invisible Man

• Bernard Malamud’s The Assistant and The Fixer

– All people are victims. – All people suffer.

• Saul Bellow’s The Adventures of Augie March

and Henderson the Rain King

– Comic heroes as victims

– Escape from influence of others

American Novels (cont.)

• John Updike’s Rabbit Redux, The Coup, and Rabbit Is Rich

• Anne Tyler’s Earthly Possessions, Morgan’s Passing, and Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant

• Joyce Carol Oates’ Them, A Bloodsmoor Romance, and Mysteries of Winterthurn

• William Styron’s The Confessions of Nat Turner and Sophie’s Choice

• Alex Haley’s Roots

• Joan Didion’s Play It As It Lays and A Book of Common Prayer

• Alice Walker’s The Color Purple

• John Irving’s The Hotel New Hampshire and The World According to Garp

• Eudora Welty’s The Optimist’s Daughter

• Thomas Pynchon’s V., The Crying of Lot 49, and Gravity’s Rainbow

The Short Story

• Many novelists also wrote short stories.

– Updike, Tyler, Oates, Barthelme, etc.

• Flannery O’Connor

• Anne Beattie, Kay Boyle, Elizabeth

Hardwick, Isaac Bashevis Singer, and

Jean Stafford

• Why has this form of literature

Contemporary Drama

• Tennessee Williams’ A Streetcar Named Desire

• Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman

• Additional writers:

– Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, A Delicate Balance, and Seascape

– Jason Miller’s That Championship Season

– Miguel Pinero’s Short Eyes

– Beth Henly’s Crimes of the Heart

– Charles Fuller’s A Soldier’s Play

– Sam Shepard’s Buried Child

Poetry

• Robert Frost

– “A remarkable poet in that much of his work appealed to both the critic and the common man and woman”

– What was the “high point for the art of poetry”?

• Robert Lowell

• Robert Penn Warren • James Dickey

• Richard Wilbur – “accomplished formalistic poetry” • Elizabeth Bishop – metaphysical

• Gwendolyn Brooks

Contemporary Nonfiction

• American public’s wide range of interests

• Which types of books “tend to endure

beyond their brief appearance on the

best-seller list”?

– Biographies and social or political histories – Controversial people and events of the time

Characteristics of Contemporary

Nonfiction

• Increasing reliance on novelistic elements

• More vivid and subjective narrative style

• Greater concentration on revealing

incidents

• Deeper and more speculative exploration

of personality

Autobiography

• James Baldwin’s

Notes of a Native Son

• Maxine Hong Kingston’s

The Woman

Warrior

Travel Writing

What is its purpose?

– To learn about other places

– To describe the look and feel of other places – To “provide insights into the possibilities of

Additional Authors

• N. Scott Momaday

Homework – Wednesday,

December 4, 2013

• Read Elizabeth Bishop’s biography on

page 796.

• Read her poem “One Art” on page 797.

• On a sheet of paper complete the

following tasks:

– Understanding and Interpretation #1-4 – For Appreciation #1-2

Elizabeth Bishop

• Travelled often

• Coeditor of

Contemporary Brazilian Poetry

• North and South,

A Cold Spring

, and two

What is a villanelle?

• 19 lines divided into 6 stanzas

• 1

five stanzas have 3 lines

• Last stanza has 4 lines

• 1

and 3

lines of the first three-line stanza

alternate as the last lines of the succeeding four

three-line stanzas

Villanelle Example

Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night

Dylan Thomas

Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,

Because their words had forked no lightning they

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright

Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,

And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight

Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,

“One Art”

• Summary?

– Lose minor things lose major things

• Main idea?

– Things are meant to be lost

– People become accustomed to losing things.

• What loss really bothers the author?

“One Art”

• Allegory of the title?

– Loss as “one art” – Writing as “one art”

• Tone?

– Calm, relaxed

“One Art” – complicated villanelle!

• Poetic license

– Refrains are not verbatim! (as in a true villanelle)

• Rhyme scheme: AB (refrain)

– A: Intent, spent, meant, etc.

– B: master, fluster, faster, last or, etc.

• Meter: iambic pentameter

Discussion

Discuss the questions that you answered for

homework. Then, we will talk as a class.

What are some characteristics of

Homework – Thursday,

December 5, 2013

• Read Robert Frost biography and poems

(online) for tomorrow.

Homework – Friday,

December 6, 2013

“The Life You Save May Be Your Own”

• Summarize.

• Discuss the “For Understanding” questions.

• What symbolism is apparent?

• What role does the weather play?

The Beat Movement

• Early 1950’s

• Group of writers with a “care-free, often

reckless and unquestionably fresh

approach to literature as well as a

demonstrative social stance toward what

was sometimes referred to as "The

Establishment””

Beat Literature

• “their free-form, improvisational style of writing and their unconventional, spontaneous way of life”

• Writers: Herbert Huncke, William Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, and Jack Kerouac, Lawrence

Ferlinghetti, Gary Snyder, Michael McClure, and Gregory Corso

• Most famous novel On the Road by Jack Kerouac

– Encourage others to “seek personal fulfillment through the pursuit of an existential lifestyle”

Jack Kerouac

• Born Jean-Louis Lebris de Kerouac • Father owned a print shop

• Childhood tragedy – brother died of

rheumatic fever embraced Catholic faith more deeply

• 2 favorite pastimes – reading and sports • Highly influenced by Jazz music

• Attended Columbia University (dropped out) • Enlisted in the U.S. Marines (10 days)

• Moved around frequently

Jack Kerouac (cont.)

• On the Road (1957)

– Inspired by his trip with Neal Cassady

– He wrote the entire novel over one three-week bender of frenzied composition, on a single scroll of paper that was 120 feet long.”

– “Spontaneous prose” – improvisation of Jazz

– “Revision, he believed, was akin to lying and detracted from the ability of prose to capture the truth of a

moment.”

• Other novels: Book of Dreams (1961),Big

Kerouac’s Literary Genres

• Free verse

• Haikus

Kerouac Poetry

• http://www.openculture.com/2013/09/listen

-to-jack-kerouac-read-american-haikus.ht

ml

•

http://unexpurgatedme.wordpress.com/20

11/09/10/jack-kerouac-poems/

•

http://staff.oswego.org/ephaneuf/web/Beat

Haiku

• Japanese poem of 17 syllables

Kerouac’s Haikus

• "He's the only one in the United States who knows how to write haikus… Kerouac thinks in haikus, every time he

writes anything—talks that way and thinks that way. So it's just natural for him… He's the only master of the haiku." Interview with Allen Ginsberg, The Paris Review, 37

(Winter, 1966), 52-53.

• “"The American Haiku is not exactly the Japanese Haiku. The Japanese Haiku is strictly disciplined to seventeen

syllables but since the language structure is different I don't think American Haikus (short three-line poems intended to be completely packed with Void of Whole) should worry about syllables because American speech is something again...bursting to pop. Above all, a Haiku must be very

simple and free of all poetic trickery and make a little picture and yet be as airy and graceful as a Vivaldi Pastorella."

Examples of Kerouac’s Haiku

A balloon caught

in the tree – dusk In Central Park zoo

A big fat flake of snow

Falling all alone

After the earthquake, A child crying

In the silence

A long island in the sky

Application

• Open the document.

• Read at least 6 of Kerouac’s haiku.

• Choose a haiku.

• On a sheet of paper, complete the following

tasks:

– Write the haiku itself. – Explain what it means.

– Why did you choose this haiku? – Write your own haiku!

Unit 6 Literature

• Elizabeth Bishop

• Robert Frost

• Flannery O’Connor

• Jack Kerouac