The recent enthusiasm for things postmodern has often produced a caricature of Modernism as monolithic and reactionary. Peter Nicholls argues instead that the distinctive feature of Modernism is its diversity. Through a lively analysis of each of Modernism's main literary movements, he explores the connections between the new stylistic developments and the shifting politics of gender and authority.
Nicholls introduces a wealth of literary experimentation, beginning with Baudelaire and Mallarmé and moving forward to the first avant-gardes. Close readings of key texts monitor the explosive histories of Futurism, Expressionism, Cubism, Dada, and Surrealism, histories that allow Anglo-American Modernism to be seen in a strikingly different light. In revealing Modernism's broad and varied terrain, Nicholls evokes the richness of a cultural moment that continues to shape our own.
Modernisms A Literary Guide
About the Book
Reviews
"This is a very timely work that responds to a genuine need in courses and programs on modernism. Nicholls sees that modernism was not an organic phenomenon whose characteristics can be catalogued according to some ideal taxonomy, but a series of anguished questions about identity, desire, memory, culture, and the nature of modernity itself. Few efforts have been made to survey this vast field—this is undoubtedly the finest survey of its kind."—Lawrence Rainey, author of Ezra Pound and the Monument of Culture and co-editor of the journal Modernism/ModernityTable of Contents
Preface
List of Abbreviations
Acknowledgements
Introduction: Of a Certain Tone
1 Ironies of the Modern
2 Breaking the Rules: Symbolism in France
3 Decadence and the Art of Death
4 Paths to the Future
5 A Metaphysics of Modernity: Marinetti and Italian Futurism
6 Other Spaces: French Cubism and Russian Futurism
7 Cruel Structures: The Development of Expressionism
8 Modernity and the 'Men of 1914'
9 At a Tangent: Other Modernisms
10 From Fantasy to Structure: Dada and Neo-Classicism
11 Other Times: The Narratives of High Modernism
12 Death and Desire: The Surrealist Adventure
Notes
Bibliography
Index