Date: Wed, 01 Jul 1998 13:19:30 -0700
From: "T. Q. Alexander" <rattler-AT-thegrid.net>
Subject: Re: PLC: Replies to T.Q Alexander


Ms. Foster,
Thanks for the reply. First I would like to say that it is great to hear from a fellow undergrad, a compatriot if you will, in the study of lit, that is, if I read your post correctly and you have yet to complete your masters? Sometimes, for me anywise, it gets a little deep around here! LOL! But this is a great list! Allot of us use to be on this other list that dealt mostly in philosophy (mainly totalitarianism, LOL!) however, here we get the best of both phil & lit combined, not to mention some of the greatest minds from off of the old list and, by Zeus, if there were tithes taken here, I would throw more than my two cents into the basket! As well, I shall have to see about getting the address for that modernist list group.

I do feel the lean towards the modernist, and as I have said to Mr. Parr's post on this thread, that what caught my attention was how a true literary movement had fostered from out of the Existentialist school. London's, "To Build A Fire;" Conrad's, "Lord Jim;" Hemmingway's, "A Clean, Well Lighted Place," and especially, "The Snows of Kilimanjaro," that it was after reading these works that I first started finding similarities of thought between writers. It was during one of those survey lit courses on American lit. So I had to go out and by as many copies of their works to read and study each more in-depth. I guess ol' Sartre', a modern Existentialist, packing down the Pall Mall's and Espresso's in some quaint paris cafe, helped to stir up all of the modern artists to this thinking; this ideology, the banner for their new movement. The wars against fascism, W.W.I, tore at the souls and minds of artist such as Hemmingway; Existentialism made it possible to express the sense of loss
in a world void of an afterlife. Cracking open William Barrett's book, "Irrational Man," I find a passage of Hemmingway's that he uses to illiterate:
    "I was always embarrassed by the words sacred, glorious, and sacrifice and the expression in vain. We had heard them, sometimes standing in the rain almost out of earshot, so that only the shouted words came through, and had read them, on proclamations that were slapped up by billposters over other proclamations, now for a long time, and I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were like the stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat except to bury it. There were many words that you could not stand to hear and finally only the names of places had dignity. Certain numbers were the same way and certain dates and these with the names of places were all you could say and have them mean anything. Abstract words such as glory, honor, courage, or hallow were obscene beside the concrete names of villages, the numbers of roads, the names of rivers, the numbers of regiments and the dates."
---- Ernest Hemmingway, "A Farewell To Arms"

But look how much Yeats bats it home:

    "Now that my ladder's gone,
I must lie down where all ladders start,
In the foul rag-and-bone shop of the heart."
                    ---W. B. Yeats

Or, as well perhaps:

"I have wrestled with death. It is the most unexciting contest you can imagine. It takes place in an impalpable greyness, with nothing underfoot, with nothing around, without spectators, without clamor, without glory, without the great desire of victory, without the great fear of defeat."
----- Joseph Conrad. His character, Marlow, in "Heart of Darkness."

I don't know where I'm going with all this, but it is just some of what drives my interest to the modernist. Personally, I take from Existentialism only a small part, perhaps a naive and basic part of this philosophy. That the meaning of existence, whether be influenced by the school of Nietzsche or Kierkegaard, that whether or not there is a God and afterlife, one must live life to the fullest, to find within one, that which defines ones own existence, and work that specialty to it's boundaries and limits that one possibly can. The artist to create, the writer to write, to flip the best damn hamburgers, ect. That is why I feel I identified with Hemmingway's, "Snows of Kilimanjaro" as well his, "A Clean And Well-Lighted Place." It was not until I started reading such modernist works as these, that I came to find the philosophy that created the movement. I could see a connection, but could not define the term. Am I correct in any of this?

Question:
What do you believe could be the next philosophical thought that could start a new literary movement in comparison to the effects that existentialism has made in the literary world?

Yes, your post was very appreciated and enlightening, thank you. Yes, I believe that all boundaries and borders are blurred, especially in the arts. Sometimes I feel that we try so hard to package things, tight and neatly like, so as better to define order in an existence full of surprises, and more so, with mystery and unknowing. That is why it is hard for me to grasp the concept of a specialized study pertaining to literature. There is just so much excitement going on all over, and leaves me like that kid in a candy store. But, then, who has the time to read it all! LOL!

I think I better go now, I'm starting to see Rod Serling, leaning against a sign post, just outside my window.

Thanks again Ms. Foster and sorry for the bable and crudeness.
Me

BTW, what are some of the woman writers you studied.
Oh, and I'm a him. LOL!

>and guide him/her to a path of discovery as interesting as the path to which I was guided >to by listers.
>Becky Foster

lpfoster-AT-netcomuk.co.uk wrote:

> I recently completed a literary studies degree course and in my dissertation I focused on Modernism. My decision was based on the fact that I had some difficulty (prior to commencing my dissertation) with Modernism ie the more I read the more I was unable to ascertain its beginnings and what it actually is ie the criteria that constitutes literature being regarded as Modernist. In despair I sought the advice of Modernist discussion list contributors and having taken heed of the replies, I felt confident enough to draw my own conclusions. I was then able to argue that the borders of Modernism are blurred and as a consequence the central argument of my dissertation was that many New Women writers of the late nineteenth were Modernist writers (pre-dating Woolf).To sucessfully back up my arguement, my largest chapter was on Modernism. Such a task a year prior to starting my dissertation would have horrified me. My ignorance was not bliss, I had to learn more about a movement which!
> !
> !
>  spawned a literature I found difficult to understand. Modernism listers helped me immensely.
> I did not like Modernism because I did not understand it. I am now such a 'fan' of this movement that I am focussing on Modernism for my masters degree. From not knowing whether to call it a 'movement' or a 'period,' and discovering it is /can  be called both (personal preference)  Modernism is gradually becoming my forte.
> I hope that the replies to T.Q Alexander are as enlightening and as helpful as the replies I received, and guide him/her to a path of discovery as interesting as the path to which I was guided to by listers.
> Becky Foster
>
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--
Thad Q. Alexander
(rattler-AT-thegrid.net)
OCC Undergraduate
Long Beach, CA.
USA
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Great Books of Western Civilization
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The good parts of a book may be only something a writer
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of his whole damn life and one is as good as the other.
    ----Ernest Hemingway




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