Post-modern Fiction

1545 Words4 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Atonement and McEwan

Pre 20th century novels were mostly adopting a linear narrative, which was either chronological or according to structure of a beginning middle and end. By not conforming to the traditional method of structuring a novel they were attempting to create a mimesis of reality. At an individual and worldly level, religion viewed birth as the beginning and perhaps death as the end. On a greater scale perhaps it viewed the creation of the world as the beginning and according to the eschatological view, the ‘end of time’ or the ‘end of the world’. Post modernist believed that this view did not reflect reality and therefore attempted to adopt a similar mimesis in their works. They attempted to use fragmentation in the novels to reflect life as being more complicated. In the Bible the quote ‘in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight’ (King James Bible, Proverb 3:6) depicts life as an easy path as long as though you submit to God. Pre-modernist England saw two World Wars where between 1914-1945, 1270009 soldiers died (Hoffmann, (2001), pg.2). Although the loss of the soldiers was paramount, the psychological and economic effect was still felt by those during the postmodernist era. The fragmentation in novels heavily reflected these repercussions of war, rather than the alleged ‘straight path’ the Christians were promised by God in the Bible.

One of the most prominent changes that took place during the post modernist era was the focus on the self as opposed to a more societal and community type approach. Religion in particular has centred a great majority if the beliefs on the idea was about doing good to others, ‘This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you’ (King James Bible, ...

... middle of paper ...

...rnism to Postmodernism: Concepts and Strategies of Postmodern American Fiction: Postmodern Studies 38; Textxet Studies in Comparative Literature. Cambridge, MA
8. Hopper, K, (2009) Flann O’Brien: A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Post-Modernist. Cork University Press, Ireland,
9. Hutcheon, L. (2004) A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, Fiction. NY: Routledge
10. King James Bible
11. McCaffery, L. (1986) Postmodern Fiction: A Bio-Bibliographical Guide. Greenwood Press: London
12. McEwan, I (2002). Atonement. Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
13. McHale, B, (1987) Postmodernist Fiction. London: Routledge
14. Orr, M. (2003)Intertextuality: debates and contexts. Wiley-Blackwell, New Yorr
15. Waugh, P. (1984) Metafiction: the theory and practice of self-conscious fiction.Routledge,
16. Winterson. J, (1991). Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit. Grove/Atlantic, Inc

Show More
Related

  • Tyler Durden Fight Club Essay

    1599 Words  | 4 Pages

    Macey, David. “Postmodernity.” The Penguin Dictionary of Critical Theory. London: Penguin Books, 2001. 307-309. Print.

    Read More

  • Jacobs & Douglass: An Insight Into The Experience of The American Slave

    1006 Words  | 3 Pages

    ...n American Literature. By Henry Louis. Gates and Nellie Y. McKay. 2nd ed. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2004. 387-452. Print.

    Read More

  • A Comparison of Beowulf and Icelandic Sagas

    1925 Words  | 4 Pages

    Ward & Trent, et al. The Cambridge History of English and American Literature. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons, 1907–21; New York: Bartleby.com, 2000.

    Read More

  • Postmodern Film

    2291 Words  | 5 Pages

    The postmodern cinema emerged in the 80s and 90s as a powerfully creative force in Hollywood film-making, helping to form the historic convergence of technology, media culture and consumerism. Departing from the modernist cultural tradition grounded in the faith in historical progress, the norms of industrial society and the Enlightenment, the postmodern film is defined by its disjointed narratives, images of chaos, random violence, a dark view of the human state, death of the hero and the emphasis on technique over content. The postmodernist film accomplishes that by acquiring forms and styles from the traditional methods and mixing them together or decorating them. Thus, the postmodern film challenges the “modern” and the modernist cinema along with its inclinations. It also attempts to transform the mainstream conventions of characterization, narrative and suppresses the audience suspension of disbelief. The postmodern cinema often rejects modernist conventions by manipulating and maneuvering with conventions such as space, time and story-telling. Furthermore, it rejects the traditional “grand-narratives” and totalizing forms such as war, history, love and utopian visions of reality. Instead, it is heavily aimed to create constructed fictions and subjective idealisms.

    Read More

  • The Challenges of the “Real” and Depth in Maus

    1799 Words  | 4 Pages

    The Postmodernist movement begun after World War II in which, high and low culture are questionable in the view of society and Art. The postmodernist movement in literature creates a new set of ideals for fiction, such as the metafiction, the fable like representation in novels, the pastiche, irony, and satire. Fredric Jameson speaks about the movement and its theory in his essay “Postmodernism and Consumer Society”. He questions postmodernism in society as it creates the new societal norm of popular culture. On the other hand, Jean Baudrillard analyzes the simulacra of postmodernism in “The Precession of Simulacra”. Baudrillard speaks of the “truth” and “reality” also as a questionable representation for the reader. Yet, both critics agree that postmodernist literature is depthless. Spiegelman’s Maus series is a metafiction, which tells the story of Art Spiegelman’s journey of writing this novel through the present-day retelling of Vladek Spiegelman’s life during the Holocaust. However, as a postmodernist text, Jameson and Baudrillard calls it depthless and an “unreal” representation. Nevertheless, the representation of Maus presents the characteristics of a postmodernist text, but argues that it is not depthless because of the representation of an authoritative view, a historical continuum, and the text does not depict itself as a mode of pop culture.

    Read More

  • The Writing's of Maya Angelou

    1907 Words  | 4 Pages

    Another important characteristic of postmodern literature is the mixing of styles. Many literary styles such as “[ . . . ] tone, point of view, register, and logical sequence; apparently random unexpected intrusions and [ . . ...

    Read More

  • Dishonesty in The Great Gatsby

    1501 Words  | 4 Pages

    Rpt. in Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. Ed. Linda Pavlovski. Vol.

    Read More

  • An Analysis of Hawthorne’s My Kinsman, Major Molineux

    3940 Words  | 8 Pages

    In the early nineteenth century, America was undergoing profound changes in the political, economic, and social realms. The rise of international commerce and the development of industrialization displaced previous Republican ideologies that valued the community (Matthews 5). Instead, the market became the principal societal system. Significantly, the major agent driving this system was the individual. Thus, a new philosophy of liberal individualism was born that honored the rights and independence of the individual man. It maintained that the individual’s “drive for success” would naturally contribute to the overall good of the community (5). Indeed, “setting free the creative energy of individuals would naturally produce a prosperous order in which all would benefit” (5). These socio-economic changes coincided with radical transformations in the political sphere as well.

    Read More

  • Postmodernism

    1446 Words  | 3 Pages

    Post-modernism noun a movement in the arts that takes many features of Modernism to new and more playful extremes, rejecting Modernism's tendency towards nihilistic pessimism and replacing it with a more comfortable acceptance of the solipsistic nature of life. There is also an inclination towards mishievous self-referentiality and witty intertextualizing. postmodernist noun, adj.

    Read More

  • The Postmodern Picture Book

    2034 Words  | 5 Pages

    To define the term postmodern is very difficult, we can start off by saying it is representative of now, of today’s society. Bette Goldstone in, ‘Postmodern Experiments,’ describes it as being an example of societies ethical values, bestowing this to future generations. Goldstone recognises picture books as giving the author and reader a stage to be able to interpret the stories through the flexibility of pictures and words. Picturebooks are rapidly developing into a more, ‘Sophisticated genre,’ than has been before, (Goldstone, 2008, p.321).

    Read More

  • Ecological Imperialism and its New Face: The Impact of Technology, Capitalism and Colonialism on Postcolonial Ecologies

    2618 Words  | 6 Pages

    Literature: From Faulkner and Morrison to Walker and Silko, American Literature Readings in the 21st Century. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2008. Print.

    Read More

  • Don T Go Gentle Into That Good Night

    1426 Words  | 3 Pages

    The Edwardian, modern and postmodern times were three essential and compelling periods in British literature. Throughout these periods prolific writers arouse and were able to write and express their feelings about their eras. Amid both of these eras society was significantly changing and there was development all over, new advances in innovation were being made and the lifestyles of individuals, families, and women were drastically changing. The changing scene brought on a hullabaloo of productive authors and artists who would write about the positive and negative things affecting their general public. Some of these amazing authors that we studied this semester included Oscar Wilde, Rudyard Kipling, Joseph Conrad, W.H. Auden, Dylan Thomas, Virginia Woolf and J.K. Rowling. These writers and poets expounded on comparable topics that were influenced by their day and age.

    Read More

  • The Evolution of the Term Defamiliarization

    1963 Words  | 4 Pages

    The main issue with which literature has always been concerned is the subject of “man” and its status in the “world”. But the most critical exploration of these concepts is accomplished by emergence of postmodern fiction. This thesis first aims to explore that what changes man and the world around him have underwent and that how the developments in the realms of culture, philosophy, and aesthetics have caused these changes. In the second step, the thesis turns its focus of attention from turns and twists of the status of man in the world to study that how postmodern fiction reacts to this process and how it reveals an awareness of this process through a defamiliarization of man, world, and the relationship in between. In accordance with the topic of this thesis, for clarifying this argument that why these are the crucial concerns of postmodern fiction we pose three questions:

    Read More

  • 1984 Analysis

    1136 Words  | 3 Pages

    In the 1950s, authors tended to follow common themes, these themes were summed up in an art called postmodernism. Postmodernism took place after the Cold War, themes changed drastically, and boundaries were broken down. Postmodern authors defined themselves by “avoiding traditional closure of themes or situations” (Postmodernism). Postmodernism tends to play with the mind, and give a new meaning to things, “Postmodern art often makes it a point of demonstrating in an obvious way the instability of meaning (Clayton)”. What makes postmodernism most unique is its unpredictable nature and “think o...

    Read More

  • Literature - Postmodern Literary Criticism

    1064 Words  | 3 Pages

    Postmodern literary criticism asserts that art, author, and audience can only be approached through a series of  mediating contexts. "Novels, poems, and plays are neither timeless nor transcendent" (Jehlen 264). Even questions of canon must be considered within a such contexts. "Literature is not only a question of what we read but of who reads and who writes, and in what social circumstances...The canon itself is an historical event; it belongs to the history of the school" (Guillory 238,44).

    Read More

More about Post-modern Fiction

Open Document