lignou

THE PEOPLE'S
UNIVERSITY

Indira Gandhi National British Literature: Early Twentieth Century

Open University BEGC-112
School of Humanities

Block

1
Modernism
INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE 03

BLOCK INTRODUCTION 04

UNIT 1
MODERNISM 05

UNIT 2
MODERNISM IN POETRY 18

UNIT 3
MODERNISM IN THE NOVEL 28

UNIT 4
MODERNISM IN DRAMA 38

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EXPERT COMMITTEE

Prof. Ameena K. Ansari Prof. Malati Mathur

Department of English Director
Jamia Millia Islamia. School of Humanities, IGNOU

Dr. Anand Prakash

Associate Professor (Retd.)
Hans Raj College
University of Delhi IGNOU FACULTY (ENGLISH)

Dr. Hema Raghavan Prof. Neera Singh

Principal (Retd), Gargi College Prof. Nandini Sahu
University of Delhi Prof. Parmod Kumar
Dr. Pema Eden Samdup
Dr. Vijay Sharma Ms. Mridula Rashmi Kindo
Principal (Retd.), RLA College Dr. Malathy A
University of Delhi

COURSE COORDINATION & COURSE EDITING

Dr. Malathy A, Assistant Professor (Selection Grade), School of Humanities
IGNOU, New Delhi

COURSE PREPARATION

Units 1 & 2: Dr. Hema Raghavan, Principal (Retd), Gargi College University of Delhi
Unit 3: Dr. Anand Prakash, Associate Professor (Retd.) Hans Raj College University of Delhi
Unit 4: Dr. Hema Raghavan , Principal (Retd), Gargi College University of Delhi
Units 5, 6, 7 & 8: Dr. Malathy A., Assistant Professor, School of Humanities, IGNOU, New Delhi
Units 9, 10, 11 &12: Dr. Anand Prakash, Associate Professor (Retd.) Hans Raj College University of Delhi
Units 13,14,15 & 16: Dr. Hema Raghavan , Principal (Retd), Gargi College University of Delhi
SECRETARIAL ASSISTANCE
Ms. Monika Syal, AE (DP), SOH, IGNOU

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INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE
Welcome to the course ‘British Literature: Early Twentieth Century’!

This is a core course of the fifth semester of BA English (Honours), that focuses on studying
early twentieth century British literary texts, placing them in their social, cultural and
intellectual contexts. In earlier courses you have been introduced to British literature of the
14th to the 17th centuries. This course brings us to the early twentieth century, which as might
be expected at the beginning of a new century, was a period of transition and change.
In literature, the period saw the emergence of ‘modernism’ which represented an attempt to
reject and break away from all that had been valued by the preceding Victorian age. It was a
period marked by extraordinary artistic and literary creativity – some of the twentieth
century’s finest writers like W. B. Yeats, T. S. Eliot, D. H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf and
James Joyce were writing at this time. In this course, we introduce you to their writing, with
the hope that you will be encouraged to read more of their work. The texts prescribed for
study represent the transition from late Victorian to Modernist sensibilities, and convey a
sense of the innovation and experimentation in form and technique that was typical of this
age. The texts also reflect the major concerns of the period, such as its preoccupations with
psychoanalytic approaches to human behaviour, the women’s movement and the general
sense of anxiety and despair created by the first World War.

We begin the course with an introduction to this fascinating phase of British literary history
in Block 1 ‘Modernism’ which provides an overview of Modernism. Block 2 ‘Novel (1)’is
devoted to a detailed study of the novel Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence, one of the
outstanding British novelists of the twentieth century. Block 3 ‘Novel (2)’ discusses new
methods of narration such as the ‘stream of consciousness’ and studies the writing of the
modernist novelist Virginia Woolf, focusing on her novel Mrs. Dalloway. Block 4 ‘Poetry’
discusses representative poems by four of the greatest poets of the early twentieth century –
W. B. Yeats, T. S. Eliot, W. H. Auden and Stephen Spender, so that you, the learner will get
an idea about the new directions that British poetry was taking during this period.

We hope that by studying this course, you will gain a strong understanding of the literary
achievement of this particular period in British literary history.

The course contents are given below:

Block 1: Modernism
Unit 1: Introduction to Modernism
Unit 2: Modernism in Poetry
Unit 3: Modernism in the Novel
Unit 4: Modernism in Drama

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Block 2: Novel (1)
Unit 1: The Early Twentieth Century British Novel: Social and Cultural Contexts
Unit 2: D. H. Lawrence and the British Novel
Unit 3: Sons and Lovers: Analysis and Interpretations
Unit 4: Sons and Lovers: Themes and Concerns
Block 3: Novel (2)
Unit 1: “Stream of Consciousness”: an Introduction
Unit 2: Virginia Woolf as Novelist
Unit 3: Mrs. Dalloway – Analysis and Interpretations
Unit 4: Mrs. Dalloway - Themes and Concerns
Block 4: Poetry
Unit 1: W.B. Yeats: “The Second Coming”
Unit 2: T.S. Eliot: “Journey of the Magi”
Unit 3: W. H. Auden: “The Unknown Citizen”
Unit 4: Stephen Spender: “I think continually of those who were truly great.”

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BLOCK INTRODUCTION
Block 1: Modernism provides an overview of Modernism as a major literary movement of
the twentieth century. The block discusses the rise of Modernism in different art forms and in
literature. The expressions of Modernism in Poetry, Novel and Drama are also discussed in
detail.
Unit 1: Introduction to Modernism: Modernism is a complex movement, and in this block,
the terms ‘Modernism’, ‘Postmodernism’ and ‘Post-postmodernism’ are explained in simple
language.
Unit 2: Modernism in Poetry: This unit discusses aspects of modernism with reference to
modern poetry, citing various passages from modernist poetry as examples.
Unit 3: Modernism in the Novel: This unit discusses the modernist novel and its ideological
and aesthetic dimensions.
Unit 4: Modernism in Drama: The various phases in the development of modern British
drama, such as the ‘problem plays’ of George Bernard Shaw, the ‘verse drama’ of T. S. Eliot
and the ‘theatre of the absurd’ are discussed in detail in this unit.

Acknowledgement

The material and images we have used are used purely for educational purposes. Every effort
has been made to trace the copyright holders of material used in this book. Should any
infringement have occurred, the publishers and editors apologise, and will be pleased to make
the necessary corrections in future editions of this book.

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UNIT 1 MODERNISM
Structure

1.0 Aims and Objectives

1.1 Introduction to Modernism
1.2 What is Modernism?
1. 3 The Rise of Modernism and Postmodernism
1.4 Characteristics of Modernism
1.5 Postmodern Criticism
1.6 Post-postmodernism in Art and Literature
1.7 Summing up
1.8 Questions and Answers
1.9 Glossary
1.10 References

1.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

In this unit, you will learn about:

• Developments in twentieth century literature

• The genres of modernism
• What is modernism
• The rise of modernism
• The characteristics of the three forms - modernism, postmodernism and
post-postmodernism

1.1 INTRODUCTION TO MODERNISM

During this programme of study, you have been introduced to writers belonging to different
periods of English Literature. You have sampled their distinctive styles or genres of writing in
keeping with the characteristics of the age they belonged to. You have read Homer who wrote
in 800 BC, nearly thirty centuries back. You followed it up with a study of English literature
from the Elizabethan period (16th - 17thcenturies) till the end of the Victorian period that came
to a close at the turn of the 20th century. The different genres of writing associated with these
different periods have been variously labelled as Classicism, Romanticism, Neo Classicism,
and Victorian (which was predominantly Realism). Approximately, the writing of the first
thirty years of the 20th century, has come under the rubric of ‘Modernism’. The literature of the
second half starting at the end of World War II and extending well into the nineties is generally
covered by the term, ‘Postmodernism’ and the literature of the last thirty years leading to our
present times is referred to as Post-postmodernism or Meta Modernism. The literary trends we
associate with these different “isms” make the last one hundred and odd years distinctive from
earlier literary ages.

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1.2 WHAT IS MODERNISM?
‘Modern’ as a term relates to the present or recent times as opposed to the remote past. In
literature, visual arts, architecture, dance, and music, the style that is known as
Modernism represented a break with the traditional past and a simultaneous search for new
forms of expression. Modernism in the 20th century, indicates a period of experimentation in
all forms of artistic and aesthetic expression - in literature, arts, architecture and sculpture, as
well as in the performing arts like music, dance, and drama. Modernism in literature is notably
seen in the writings of the years following World War I (1914-18), though it should be stressed
that the end of the Victorian age (1900) marked the beginning of a new style in all forms of
art and literature.

Activity 1: From your study of Literature, give definitions for the terms Classicism,
Romanticism, Neo Classicism, and Realism with one example for each style of writing.

The Victorian Age in England, especially the second half of the 19th century, saw rapid growth
of industrialization and remarkable advances in the sciences and the social sciences. Industrial
progress resulted in a huge exodus from the rural areas to the cities that brought about distinct
social changes. In social sciences such as psychology, Freud’s theories explained human
behaviour and introduced psychoanalysis for treatment of mental illness. New philosophical
inquiries and political theories needed alternative modes of expression.

Modernists felt a growing alienation from Victorian prudery rooted in Victorian morality and
in a society based on hierarchical principles of gender and class, its optimism, and conventions.
New ideas in psychology, philosophy and political theory, kindled a search for new modes of
expression. All these caused a radical shift both in form and content in 20th century art and
literature.

Modernism introduced new literature and new forms of art that were innovative and
experimental. The first three decades of the 20th century (approximately 1900-1930) is called
the modern period. The postmodern period started around the time World War II ended,
approximately after 1945. It spanned the second half of the 20th Century almost for three
decades and gained ascendancy over modernism from the 1960s. However, we have to
remember that artistic and literary movements cannot be pinned down to an identifiable
calendar year, and we cannot say that modernism started exactly in 1900 at the turn of the
millennium, and postmodernism at the end of World War II in 1945.

Broadly speaking, the 20th century saw the rise of a new movement in creative arts, both
visual and performing arts. It had a strong impact on literature, theatre, painting, sculpture,
music, dance and architecture. It was also a philosophical movement as it effected a change in
the Western society towards a new way of thinking, living, expressing and engaging in cultural
and artistic pursuits. Modernism as a movement gave men and women the means to tackle a
new world that was increasingly getting impatient with traditional mores and beliefs. The term
Modernism has come to signify a new trend in the early decades of the 20th century, a
divergence from the earlier tradition of arts and literature that brought in
various innovative movements and styles as a replacement.

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1.3 THE RISE OF MODERNISM AND POST MODERNISM
Among the many factors that gave rise to the new movements – modernism and post
modernism - two are significant: (1) the rise of the new modern industrial societies that
contributed to the rapid growth of cities and (2) the two horrific World Wars which resulted
in great destruction and extensive loss of life, in particular, the racist genocide on a vast scale
in the name of ethnic cleansing. The kind of inhumanity evidenced in the two World Wars
was not a new phenomenon. Violence and cruelty between man and man, united by common
ancestry, but divided by race, religion and society, have always been a part of our existence,
from the days of the Mahabharata War.

But what was new in the 20th century was the severe jolt it gave to the traditional belief that
‘God is in Heaven/All is right with the world’ which led to scepticism about the presence and
existence of God. The question – ‘if God is in Heaven, why all is not right with the world’-
led to the sceptical questioning of God’s existence and of the comforting validity of faith in
the justness of the divine. Man’s relationship with God changed from faith to non-faith to
agnosticism. The dependence on God and on His merciful intervention to set things right
declined. But on a positive note, this gave rise to a utopian vision of human life and society, a
belief in human progress and a moving forward without waiting for divine grace. It almost
echoed the prophetic utterance of Nietzsche’s Zarathustra in the last quarter of the 19th
century, “Away with such a God! Better to have no God, better to set up destiny on one’s
own account, better to be a fool, better to be God oneself”. This was Nietzche’s exhortation
to man to become a Superman as the natural next step in the progress of the evolutionary
order.

Check your progress 1

1. Explain in your own words, your understanding of the terms ‘modernism’,

‘postmodernism’ and ‘post-postmodernism’.

2. Briefly discuss the factors that gave rise to modernism in the early twentieth century.

1.4 CHARACTERISTICS OF MODERNISM

In the beginning, modernism began as an anti-tradition movement against existing forms of
art, literature, philosophy, culture and society, and impacted other activities of daily life such
as architecture, fashion, modes of transport, and connectivity. Modernism, true to its name
represented a clash between the old and the new. It rejected all traditional forms as irrelevant
and outdated to fit in with the new economic, social, and political environment of a modern
competitive, industrialized world. The poet Ezra Pound’s injunction to ‘Make it new!’ inspired
artists and writers to re-examine established cultural, aesthetic, and religious traditions and
bring a change in all aspects of life.

The 20th century saw the beginnings of an aesthetic modernism in literary and visual arts. In
painting between 1890 and 1910, came different art movements such as Dadaism, Surrealism,
Cubism, Constructivism, Minimalism, Vorticism, Futurism, and Fauvism distinct from the
earlier forms of Classicism, Gothic art, Baroque, Naturalism, Realism, and Romanticism to
name a few. In short, realistic painting or representation of reality in painting was abandoned.
Similarly in music, melody and harmony were given up in favour of atonalism and

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indeterminacy whereby a musical piece can be performed not in any one fixed way, but in
substantially different ways. It marked the break-down of all traditional aesthetic conventions,
and introduced complete freedom in all aesthetic dimensions, including melody, rhythm,
harmony and tone. In architecture the new trend was for geometrical forms instead of the earlier
ornamental styles. It included open spaces, use of new and innovative technologies of
construction, particularly the use of glass, steel, and reinforced concrete; the emphasis was on
functionalism and minimalism and a rejection of ornament. In literature, traditional realism,
closed endings, chronological plots and consecutive narratives were set aside in favour of
experimental forms that included open endings, symbolism, individualism, formalism and
absurdity. Modernism thus ushered in changes in culture, society, literature and arts.

Even as modernism started on a rebellious note against tradition, it harboured nostalgia and
deep regret for all those lost fragments from the earlier age. In the poem ‘The Wasteland’
(1922), by T. S. Eliot, the poet explicitly says ‘These fragments I have shored against my ruin’.
This single line sums up a despairing nostalgia for what has been lost. The loss of all certainties
that had earlier sustained society in the past had caused a vacuum in the absence of a sustainable
replacement. ‘The Waste Land’ appeared four years after World War I ended in 1918. Eliot
was affected by the emotional and spiritual sterility that was both the cause and consequence
of the war. Human beings had lost faith in God and religion, and in the absence of any strong
anchor to hold on to, were rudderless and lost even the passion for life. They led a life-in-death
existence, a life without hope of salvation, a life of disillusionment and despair with no
possibility of moral and spiritual regeneration. All that remained were the broken cultural
fragments from a vanished past that remained to be salvaged, holding out the vestige of hope
as a distinct possibility.

Eliot’s ‘The Wasteland’ mirrored the mental, emotional and spiritual aridity of the time. The
triple repetition of ‘Om Shanti’ at the end of the poem sounds more like wishful thinking.
Eliot’s poem mirrored the paralysis of the mind and sterility of emotions, where the brain
seemed paralyzed, emotions sterile and the spirit violated. As one of the holocaust survivors
said, ‘we have not died; we are dead. They've managed to kill in us not only our right to life in
the present and for many of us, to be sure, the right to a future life . . . but what is most tragic
is that they have succeeded, with their sadistic and depraved methods, in killing in us all sense
of a human life in our past, all feeling of normal human beings endowed with a normal past,
up to even the very consciousness of having existed at one time as human beings worthy of this
name”.

Modernist literature is innovative and experimental in form and content. These experimental
writings were at their height during the first three decades and slowly declined over the next
two decades. The intervening World War (1939-45) started the downslide of modernism and
less than two decades thereafter, postmodernism became the dominant theory. Modernism
peaked between 1910 and 1930 with some of the best works produced in England and Europe by great
English poets, artists and novelists like T. S. Eliot, W. B. Yeats, Ezra Pound, Wyndham Lewis, Virginia
Woolf, Wallace Stevens and Gertrude Stein and French and German writers like Marcel Proust,
Stephane Mallarme, Andre Gide, Franz Kafka and Rainer Maria Rilke. Their writings were
characterized by:

1. Focus on impressionism and subjectivity (how we see rather than what we see as
evident in the stream of consciousness technique).
2. Rejecting objectivity in novels, such as an omniscient external narration, well defined
moral positions and fixed narrative points of view

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 3. Blurring of genres whereby novels are poetic and lyrical and poems more like prose
documentaries.
4. Fragmented form, discontinuous narrative and mounting of collages of disparate
materials and
5. A tendency towards reflexivity whereby the writings such as novels or poems raise
issues about their status and their nature.

Postmodernism

Modernism began to decline in the 1930s; the 1960s saw the beginnings of Postmodernism.
Postmodernism, like modernism is also characterized by its eclectic approach - i.e. the use
of fragmented forms (recall Eliot in The Wasteland: “These fragments, I have shored
against my ruins”), by its preference for aleatory writing and the absence of the omniscient
narrator. But the difference arises in the mood, attitude and outlook of the two genres
towards these three features.

Modernism is characterized by regrets for having lost those fragments from the earlier age.
Eliot’s line quoted above is a despairing nostalgia for what has been lost. But the post
modernist celebrates the fragmentation as it liberates him/ her from fixed systems of belief.
The second difference relates to the attitude or tone of the work. Modern art, literature and
architecture were critical of the over-elaborate art forms of the 19th century. Fierce
asceticism was one of the features of modernism. Modernist architects ignored decoration,
pointing out that the house is a machine to live in. The remarkable thing about this high
idealism was that even when it was ascetic in nature and shunned all aesthetic
ornamentation, it had the power to move.

In postmodern literature written in the 1950s, soon after the end of World War II, this is
reflected in minimalism and by shrinking poems to two-word lines. Samuel Beckett brought
a new theatre of minimalist plays – plays that have a stage time of 13 minutes, plays that
have just one speaker, plays where the setting is bare and the costumes reduced to the barest
minimum of faded and torn jeans and shirts, but encapsulating within them profound
observations on the meaninglessness of life and on the futility and absurdity of existence.

Check your progress 2

1. Discuss the major characteristics of modernism.

2. Name five British modernist writers and write a short essay on their literary
achievements.
3. Explain how the characteristics of postmodernism are different from those of
modernism.

1.5 POSTMODERN CRITICISM

1. Postmodern themes like the absurdity and meaninglessness of existence, the loss of
hope of restoring meaning and order to life, are explored in the literary works of the
20th century.

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 2. Postmodern identities are not seen in a single genre representing a literary work, but in
a mixing of genres such as thrillers, myths, psychological novels and detective stories
in a work of fiction. This is also seen in the notion of language. Beckett and other absurd
dramatists use language to show its emptiness and its vacuity and which therefore
cannot be used to capture any transcendental reality.

3. The past is not destroyed as in modernism, but the postmodernist revisits the past with
irony. The word Godot in Samuel Beckett’s play is a pun on God. The two tramps at
the centre of the play wait for Godot - a nostalgia for the lost wholeness of the past and
a pale imitation of waiting for a non-existent Godot. Lucky’s garbled speech is also an
example of the mind seeking to recall the past religious beliefs and ending with a
deranged outpouring of words that parody the certainty of language and faith of the
past.

The meaninglessness of waiting - an activity that we carry out throughout our lives - is
again an attempt to seek a non-existent external savior or force to alleviate our misery
and suffering. Waiting is seen in Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters where they wait for
twenty-three hours in a train for an external force to enter and transform their provincial,
mundane life. Their optimism for the future is seen in their creation of an image of
Moscow, full of glitter and glamour, a mix of memory and desire as a kind of hyper-
reality or simulacrum.

1.6 Post- Postmodernism in Literature and Art

We have seen that the 20th century was dominated by modernism and postmodernism.
In the last decades of the century, there came a shift to post-post modernism or
metamodernism that was both a reaction against and a perpetuation of modernist
aesthetics. The later postmodernism of the 1980s rejected modernist asceticism as elitist
and insisted on mixing bits and pieces from the past ages - such as colourful imagery,
viewpoints and vocabulary in a bizarre and jumbled way. One such example is that of
Craig Raine, who along with Christopher Reid invented what is known as ‘Martian
poetry’. In his poem “A Martian sends a Postcard Home”, the poet expresses his
impressions of humanity in terms that seem strange and puzzling at first and need a
little working out before one realizes what the poet is referring to. It is in working out
the puzzles that the reader derives a lot of fun from this poem.

A Martian sends a Postcard Home (1979)

Caxtons are mechanical birds with many wings

and some are treasured for their markings –
they cause the eyes to melt
or the body to shriek without pain.
I have never seen one fly, but
sometimes they perch on the hand.
Mist is when the sky is tired of flight
and rests its soft machine on ground:
then the world is dim and bookish
like engravings under tissue paper.
Rain is when the earth is television.

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 It has the property of making colours darker.

Model T is a room with the lock inside –

a key is turned to free the world
for movement, so quick there is a film
to watch for anything missed.
But time is tied to the wrist
or kept in a box, ticking with impatience.
In homes, a haunted apparatus sleeps,
that snores when you pick it up.
If the ghost cries, they carry it
to their lips and soothe it to sleep
with sounds. And yet, they wake it up
deliberately, by tickling with a finger.
Only the young are allowed to suffer
openly. Adults go to a punishment room
with water but nothing to eat.
They lock the door and suffer the noises
alone. No one is exempt
and everyone’s pain has a different smell.
At night, when all the colours die,
they hide in pairs
and read about themselves –
in colour, with their eyelids shut.

The poem is in 34 lines and in unrhymed couplets. It presents human culture as seen by a
Martian. Look at the pun on ‘Caxtons’ which here refers to big birds and at the same time takes
us to the 14th century, when Caxton invented the printing press. The pages of the book are seen
as the wings of the birds. The act of holding a book when reading is seen as one of mechanical
birds perching on a hand. Mist is beautifully described while rain is linked to television. Just
as a TV screen can be adjusted to different degrees of brightness, rain has the property of
making colours darker and the sky dim and grey. Just as books are referred to as Caxtons, a car
is referred to as model ‘T’. The car is described as ‘a room with the lock inside’. Turn the key
to move into the world. As the car moves, the world flits by like a film and by looking at the
rear mirror one can re-watch the film ‘for anything missed’.

The puzzling references to wrist watch and phone mark the poem as one about perception. In
this light, the familiar is strange because it is being seen in a very unfamiliar way. The use of
the Martian is therefore a narrative device for ‘seeing ourselves as others see us’ and pointing
to the strangeness of some of the actions of humans if removed from their context. The reader
can laugh at the Martian but must also bear in mind that anyone, when thrown into a completely
new environment that need not be all that far from home can make similar mistakes.

The poem highlights the frequently asked question whether what we perceive as reality is
nothing but illusion. The classical Greek philosopher Plato in his “Allegory of the Cave” speaks
about the world we perceive as a world of appearances, an imperfect copy of the real. All that
we see and experience are framed by the cultural and social milieu in which we are brought up.
The human world is a shadow world of the pure forms that exist in the realm of ideas. Our
interpretation of the universe varies accordingly. As a result, we see how our perceptions are
caught up in our desires and how what we consider to be real is tied to our own conventions of

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language and naming. This poem is in the postmodern style, which differs from that of
modernism.

In 1980, German theorist Jurgen Habermas looked at modernism as a continuation of the age
of Enlightenment with its focus on reason, its break with blind faith in tradition and slavish
obedience to religious precepts and its proscriptions as a means to reform society. He felt that
the French Structuralists like Michael Foucault and Jacques Derrida repudiated Enlightenment
and attacked the ideals of reason, clarity, truth and progress.

Jean Francois Lyotard in his essay ‘What is Modernism’ in 1982 obliquely questioned
Habermas’s attack on Modernist attempts at artistic experimentation and at ending ‘the
heritage of avant-gardes’(the ‘advance’ group of artists, writers, musicians, whose works are
unorthodox and experimental.) He said that the Enlightenment had been authoritative,
prescriptive and overarching in legislating our life. Such meta-narratives seeking to explain
reason and order did not accommodate plurality and differences. Lyotard defined post
modernism as ‘incredulity towards meta-narratives’. Lyotard analyzed the notion of knowledge
in postmodern society as the end of 'grand narratives' or meta-narratives, which he considered
a quintessential feature of modernity. Lyotard introduced the term 'postmodernism'. Those
grand rules that purported towards establishing progress and human perfectibility are no longer
tenable. Hence the change was for mini-narratives that provide a basis for different groups
placed in different circumstances. Postmodernism is in a way the deconstruction of
Enlightenment.

Another French writer Jean Baudrillard’s book Simulations was translated into English in 1983.
The book deals with the concept ‘of the loss of the real’, which happens as a result of images
from films, TV and advertisements making it difficult to distinguish between the real and the
imagined, reality and illusion, surface and depth. The superficial reality hides the hidden reality
and has brought in a new culture of hyper-reality. He explains it in this way: in the past a sign
was an outward representation of an inner depth of reality such as blessing as an outward sign
of an inner grace. But according to Baudrillard, sign is not necessarily an index of inner reality,
but that of other signs. Then the whole system becomes one of simulacrum (a slight, unreal, or
superficial likeness or semblance). Representation is substituted by simulation. How does this
happen?

1. A sign in the earlier times represented the basic reality. An industrial city of the 20th
century is shown by painting crowds of lean thin figures in a street, the horizon showing
the factory like buildings, grey and in muted colours, to stress the monotony and
mechanical quality of life there. This is a representation of basic reality.

2. Misrepresentation or distortion of reality: The 19th century Victorian artist shows the
city at night, glamourising it by showing wet pavements reflecting the bright light from
the shops , the moon rising from the clouds and ships’ masts silhouetted against the
sky. This is a wonderful painting, but far distant from the reality of grime and soot that
typify an industrial city. Here the sign is a distortion of reality.

3. A sign is a representation of representation: Surrealistic painting that portrays,

expresses, or interprets the workings of the subconscious mind is a good example. Let
us consider an example of a painting by Rene Magritte - a painting that shows an
easel with a canvas on it along with a window. On the canvas is painted the exterior
scene as seen through the window. This exterior scene is not what one sees outside of

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 a window, but it is an imaginative representation of reality in a painting within a
painting. This sign has no reality and it disguises the fact that there is no
corresponding reality underneath.

4. The sign bears no relation to reality . This is seen in abstract painting which is not
representational at all.

The painter who created this painting, Marcel Duchamp said: “My aim was a static
representation of movement, a static composition of indications of various positions taken by
a form in movement—with no attempt to give cinema effects through painting. The reduction
of a head in movement to a bare line seemed to me defensible”.

The four signs signify four different ways in which the paintings signify or represent things.
So also within literature the distinction between what is real and what is simulated collapses.
‘Everything is a model or an image, all is surface without depth and this is the hyper real’
(Baudrillard).

What had been seen as a solid real world is nothing but a tissue of dreamlike images. So the
postmodern condition is the loss of the real. This causes a problem for positing any literary
theory, because all literary theories like Marxism, Feminism, and Stucturalism depend upon
the differentiation between what is seen in the text and its underlying meaning. Here in post

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modernism what we see is all we get and nothing more. The loss of the real is equated with the
collapse of reality.

The third sign that conceals an absence – the idea that there is nothing beyond the canvas,
nothing beyond the surface painting is the crucial concept of postmodernism. The image tends
to become the reality. Let us take a look at our advertisements. The perfect man or woman or
family shown in the advertisements are not real but shown as real.
.

1.7 SUMMING UP
After a detailed study of the unit, you would have gained a comprehensive understanding of

*the three constituent movements – modernism, postmodernism and post- postmodernism

*the differences between modernism and postmodernism, and between postmodernism and
post- Postmodernism or metamodernism

1.8 UNIT END QUESTIONS

1. Define Modernism. Explain with examples how it is different from the earlier literary
and artistic styles of presentation.
2. Distinguish between postmodernism and post-postmodernism.
3. Describe the four ways in which signs represent reality

1.9 GLOSSARY
Classicism: the following of ancient Greek or Roman principles and style in art and literature,
generally associated with harmony, restraint, and adherence to recognized standards of form
and craftsmanship.

Romanticism: a movement in the arts and literature that originated in the late 18th century,
with emphasis on inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual.

Neo Classicism: a Western cultural movement in the decorative and visual arts, literature,
theatre, music, and architecture that drew inspiration from the art and culture of classical
antiquity.

Realism: Realism began as a literary movement in response to and as a departure from the
idealism of the Romantic period. Realism emerged in literature in the second half of the
nineteenth century,

Rubric: a title or heading under which something operates or is studied.

Aesthetic: a set of principles underlying the work of a particular artist or artistic movement

Exodus: A mass departure of people

15
Psychoanalysis: Psychoanalysis is defined as a set of psychological theories and therapeutic
methods which have their origin in the work and theories of Sigmund Freud. The primary
assumption of psychoanalysis is the belief that all people possess unconscious thoughts,
feelings, desires, and memories.

Alienation: a withdrawing or separation of a person or a person's affections from an object or

position of former attachment or estrangement from the values of one's society

Prudery: excessive propriety or modesty in speech, conduct, etc

Genocide: the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic
group with the aim of destroying that nation or group.

Ethnic cleansing: the mass expulsion or killing of members of one ethnic or religious group
in an area by those of another. (Ethnic: relating to a population subgroup (within a larger or
dominant national or cultural group) with a common national or cultural tradition.)

Agnosticism: refers to the impossibility of knowledge with regard to god or the supernatural.

Utopian: modelled on or aiming for a state in which everything is perfect; idealistic

Dadaism: an art movement of the early 20th century in Europe, characterized by mockery and
humour and the aim to destroy traditional values in art and replace them by a new art.

Surrealism: a movement which takes off from Dadaism - it is one way of reuniting conscious
and unconscious realms of experience so completely that the world
of dream and fantasy would be joined to the everyday rational world in “an absolute reality, a
surreality.”

Cubism: a new approach to representing reality by bringing different views of subjects (usually
objects or figures) together in the same picture, resulting in paintings that appear fragmented
and abstracted.

Constructivism: a style or movement in which assorted mechanical objects are combined into
abstract mobile structural forms. The movement originated in Russia in the 1920s and has
influenced many aspects of modern architecture and design.

Vorticism: a style or movement in which assorted mechanical objects are combined into
abstract mobile structural forms. The movement originated in Russia in the 1920s and has
influenced many aspects of modern architecture and design.

Futurism: an artistic movement begun in Italy in 1909, which strongly rejected traditional
forms and embraced the energy and dynamism of modern technology.

Fauvism: an art movement characterized by a radical use of unnatural colors that

separated color from its usual representational and realistic role, giving new, emotional
meaning to the colors.

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Gothic: the style of architecture prevalent in western Europe in the 12th to 16th centuries (and
revived in the mid 18th to early 20th centuries), characterized by pointed arches, rib vaults, and
flying buttresses, together with large windows and elaborate tracery.

Baroque: Relating to or denoting a style of European architecture, music, and art of the 17th
and 18th centuries that is characterized by ornate detail

Naturalism: a style and theory of representation based on the accurate depiction of detail.

Open and Closed endings: open endings allow the reader to imagine the eventual denouement
of the lead character (and allow spin-offs, of course!), while closed endings bring closure to
the reader as well, particularly if the read is interesting.

Symbolism: the practice or art of using an object or a word to represent an abstract idea.

Individualism: the belief that the needs of each person are more important than the needs of the
whole society or group; the actions or attitudes of a person who does things without being
concerned about what other people will think.

Formalism: an emphasis on form over content or meaning in the arts, literature, or philosophy.

Absurdity: in literature usually focuses on characters or situations who can find no

meaningful purpose in life

Aridity: extreme form of dryness

Impressionism: Instead of painting a reflection of real life, painting an 'impression' of what

the person, light, atmosphere, object or landscape looked like to them.

Stream of consciousness: a literary style in which a character's thoughts, feelings, and

reactions are depicted in a continuous flow uninterrupted by objective description or
conventional dialogue. James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, and Marcel Proust are among its
notable early exponents.

Omniscient: knowing everything

Collage: a piece of art made by sticking various different materials such as photographs and
pieces of paper or fabric on to a backing; a collection or combination of various things.

Eclectic: deriving ideas, style, or taste from a broad and diverse range of sources.
Aleatory: forms chosen at random like making a poem out of sentences randomly selected
from newspapers

Asceticism: severe self-discipline and avoiding of all forms of indulgence, typically for
religious reasons

Simulacrum: something that replaces reality with its representation, the generation of the
hyperreal

Avant-garde: new and experimental ideas and methods in art, music, or literature.

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Meta narrative: a narrative account that experiments with or explores the idea of storytelling,
often by drawing attention to its own artificiality.

Mini narratives: stories that explain small practices, local events, rather than large scale
universal or global concepts. Mini-narratives are always situational, provisional, contingent,
temporary and make no claim to universality, truth, reason or stability.

Simulation: A way of seeing a thing happen without it actually taking place in the same way.

Suggested Reading:

Sarup, Madan: An Introductory Guide to Post Structuralism and Post Modernism

Patricia Waugh: Post Modernism, A Reader
Roger Fowler: A Dictionary of Modern Critical Terms
M.H. Abrams: A Glossary of Critical Terms.

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UNIT 2 MODERNISM IN POETRY
Structure
2.0 Aims and Objectives
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Modernism in Art and Literature
2.3 Characteristics of Modernism with reference to Modernist Poetry
2.4 Distinction between Paleo-Modernism and Neo-Modernism
2.5 Relationship between Modernism and Tradition
2.6 What is Modernist Poetry?
2.7 An example of Modernist Poetry
2.8 Summing Up
2.9 Unit end Questions
2.10 Glossary
2.11 References

2.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

At the end of your study of this unit, you would have learnt about:

*the meaning of the term “modernist’ with special reference to art and literature
*the terms ‘paleo-modernism’ and ‘neo-modernism’ and the difference between the two
*characteristics of modernism with emphasis on modernist poetry
*relationship between tradition and modernism and
*characteristics of modernist poetry

2.1 INTRODUCTION
The term ‘modernist’ associated with the 20th century, is misunderstood as a chronological
development starting with the beginning of the 20th century, and spanning the full century.

It is not as though all those who wrote from 1900 are labelled ‘modernist’ writers. The term
‘modernist’ as it is applied to arts and literature, music and dance, sculpture and architecture,
designates a distinctive kind of imagination which to begin with seems obscure and therefore
difficult to apprehend at the elemental level. It also demands some degree of acquaintance
with ancient and classical texts from different parts of the world. Thus obscurity is the first
defining characteristic of modernist literature. Hence this Unit will introduce you to
modernist poetry which is different from poetry written prior to this period and thereby make
you appreciate why it is difficult to understand.

2.2 MODERNISM IN ART AND LITERATURE

Modernism started in the last years of the 19th century and has subsequently impacted the
character of most 20th century art and literature. The movement reached its peak between
1910 and 1930, though it had begun in the last few years of the 19th century. These twenty
years were a period of great turbulence and suffering as a result of World War I (1914-18)

19
and yet culturally they turned out to be a very creative period. Some of the outstanding
British writers of this time were T. S. Eliot, W. B. Yeats, Ezra Pound, James Joyce, Virginia
Woolf, and D.H. Lawrence, while Europe had Rainer Maria Rilke, Guillaume Apollinaire,
Marcel Proust, Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann, and Boris Pasternak to name a few.

We also have the War poets belonging to the first World War period whose central theme
was an ‘anti-war’ position. War poetry captured themes that carried across generations. It
also sought to create a new language, which later generations used as a framework for
understanding war history. Notable among them were W. H. Auden, Wilfred Owen, Isaac
Rosenberg, Siegfried Sassoon, Herbert Read, and Robert Graves to name a few. But the
impact of Eliot and Yeats who started writing before the War, and continued to write well
after the War ended, left a strong influence on English poetry. The War poets mentioned
above had their own stature among English poets, but they did not influence many
successors: “In general, they had admirers more than imitators”.1

Activity:

1. Take any Anthology of Modern English Poetry and read at least one poem of Eliot or
Yeats and try to see where the obscurity and difficulty of understanding arises.

2. Read a few poems of the War poets mentioned above to get a feel of War poetry.

We are familiar with terms like ‘realism’ and ‘naturalism’ which represent a style in arts and
literature that seeks to represent the familiar or typical in real life as opposed to the abstract
or the ideal. Sometimes works of realism are known as works presenting what is known as
“slice-of –life” representation. But in modernist literature and in particular in modernist art,
realism is replaced by many other-isms such as Impressionism, Expressionism, Cubism,
Dadaism and Surrealism, Fauvism, Constructivism, Futurism etc (Refer Unit 1- Modernism).

Though most of the –isms relate to art, we have some of them reflecting the literary style of
the Modern period. For example, literary impressionism reveals the authors' preoccupations
and experiences at the moment of literary creation. Similarly expressionism in literature
conveys emotion rather than meaning - a revolt against realism and naturalism, seeking to
achieve a psychological or spiritual reality rather than record external events in logical
sequence. Constructivism in literature enables the readers to better understand themselves,
their culture and society. Constructivist theory postulates that personal experience cannot be
separated from knowledge. In analyzing the literature of the day, the author found
that constructivism can be viewed at the cognitive (individual) and social (community) levels.

In the novel, the term is closely allied to the writing of Franz Kafka and James Joyce and new
styles of writing such as the stream of consciousness mode. These new –isms found
expression not only in poems, novels and drama but it also brought in new literary theories
and aesthetic manifestoes. The 20th century can be best described as the age of literary theory.

Thus what comes to mind when speaking of modernist literature is that it is something new
and broadly imaginative that impacts intellectual and creative thought. This is its second
characteristic. Before we discuss modern poetry with particular reference to early 20th century
English poetry, let us once again define ‘modernism’.

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Check your progress 1

1. Why do we regard the years between 1910 and 1930 as a peak period in poetic creativity?
2. How have –isms in Modern Art impacted Modern Literature. Give examples
3. Why is the 20th century known as the age of literary theory?

2.3 CHARACTERISTICS OF MODERNISM WITH

REFERENCE TO MODERN POETRY
What makes for modernism in art and literature? Even in our daily parlance, when we say,
someone is modern it means that s/he does not wholly subscribe to traditional beliefs and
traditional culture. It also means the person is daring and desires to be different from the
accepted practices and norms of the day. Modernism or the modern movement was built on
the catchy slogan “Make it New”. It changed the character of all creative art and literature.
The phrase “Make it New’’ was coined by Ezra Pound, the American poet and critic (1885-
1972) though he did not advocate jettisoning the past, but argued in favour of gathering the
odds and ends of the past tradition and repurpose them for modern times.

T. S. Eliot’s Wasteland is a good example where Eliot uses the legend of the Holy Grail and
the Fisher King and many literary and cultural allusions from the Western canon alongside
quotations from Buddhism and the Hindu Upanishads which he says are the fragments he has
shored against the ruins of time - suggesting it will be possible to continue despite the failed
redemption.

Modernism did not stop with the 1930s, but continued through the 20th century. There has been
a continuity of modernism in its original sense of being anti-tradition and anti-realism though
it has in the post War II period, taken a distinct direction both in style and content. Frank
Kermode speaks of the two phases of modernism- paleo-modernism and neo-modernism, also
known as postmodernism. Those who wrote till the 1930s were the Paleo-modernists like T. S.
Eliot, James Joyce, Marcel Proust, Ezra Pound, D. H. Lawrence, the later Yeats and those who
wrote after the 1940s were the Neo-Modernists such as Gertrude Stein, William Carlos
Williams, Marianne Moore, Wallace Stevens, and Virginia Woolf.

2.4 DISTINCTION BETWEEN PALAEO MODERNISM AND

NEO MODERNISM
Paleo-modernism Neo-modernism
Sought quality and perfection Criticized quality and perfection as elitist and
un-democratic. All values should be valued
equally
Paleo-modernists wrote enormous poems Wrote short poems. They thought Greek and
and books sprinkled with Greek & Latin Latin quotes were bad by definition because
quotes, with footnotes or explanatory texts they were elitist.
without which they could not be read.
They were likely to be Christian (Eliot) or Philosophically committed to individual and
fascist,where the fascists valorized the cultural relativism (the theory that beliefs,
customs, and morality exist in relation to the

21
 Nation-state and rejected the autonomy andparticular culture from which they originate
human dignity of the individual and are not absolute.
Words are to be understood in the contextsWords are used in the realistic sense and
where they are used presented in sentence fragments without the
context by stripping off all unwieldy
associations.
Closer to Structuralism (what things mean Closer to deconstructionism(meaning cannot
and how they mean) be decided) i.e. try to understand the
relationship between text and meaning, to
conduct readings of texts, looking for things
that run counter to its intended meaning or
structural unity.

Modernism is thus anti traditional, anti-naturalism and anti-representationalism. The best way
to define modernism is to signify its constant attempt at experimentation in art and literature.
Blank verse, atonalism in music, anti-representationalism in art, fragmentation, and stream of
consciousness in novel were the outcome of modernism. Another characteristic of modernism
is that it establishes a new relationship between the reader and the writer. For example, in the
19th century Victorian novel the writer writes about reality that he shares with his reader, where
the experience of life is common to both the reader and the writer. Similarly in poetry as in
novel, the focus was on morals or ethical values that could be easily understood by the reader.

But there came a reaction to the idea of a writer being a moral spokesman as it imposed
restrictions on him/ her such as a taboo on writing about sexual relationships. With modernism,
such moral earnestness was challenged as it spoke about beautiful but untrue things. The
aesthetic revolution of the 1890s challenged Victorian orthodoxies. The end of the 19th century
saw the breakdown of all assumptions - ethical, moral, social and artistic. One other distinctive
feature of Modernism is the intertwining of literary criticism and poetic creation as is evident
in the poetic works and critical works of Ezra Pound, Robert Lowell (of the early 20th century)
and Philip Larkin in the postmodern period.

Complexity is yet another aspect of modernism. Accepting obedience, loyalty to authority, and
even ideals like patriotism, doing one’s duty, adherence to Christianity etc which were
valorised by earlier centuries became questionable ideals. Hence modernism is characterized
by various experiments of form. Chronological narrative was replaced by “spatial form” –
where narrative is organized in order of space or location and not in order of chronological
time We see this in Eliot’s The Wasteland, Pound’s Cantos, and Joyce’s Ulysses. What is
provided is a pattern, not a story. The Wasteland is full of references and one has to discern
the meaning by an understanding of the pattern of references that reflect the poet’s experience.
Eliot spoke about Joyce: “Instead of the narrative method, we can now use the mythical
method. It is, I believe, a step towards making the modern world possible for art.” This method,
the use of myth (not in a rootless fantasy but in an intelligent way). is relevant to Eliot’s poetry
as well as to Joyce’s novel. Eliot uses the myths of death and regeneration, the cycle of nature,
the order of the seasons etc.

ACTIVITY
Read a few poems of the modernist poets and analyze the myths associated with them.

Check your progress

1. Distinguish between paleo-modernism and neo-modernism.

22
2. What are the myths associated with modernist poets like Eliot and Yeats?

2.5 RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN MODERNISM AND

TRADITION
If we closely follow the characteristics of modernism it will be evident that there is a
paradoxical relationship between modernism and tradition. On the one hand, modernism seeks
to liberate itself from inherited tradition of values, ideals and cultural forms. There is a
resistance to inherited culture, a complete break with the past. At the same time, as shown
above there is a return to ancient myths from various cultures and religions with a deep sense
of alienation, loss and despair.“ These are the two phases, positive and negative, of the modern
as anti- traditional; freedom and deprivation, a living present and a dead past.”2 Modern
imagination is both liberated and alienated. Thus modern writers in search of originality have
gone back to ancient myths and traditions.

2.6 WHAT IS MODERNIST POETRY?

1. It is poetry that has broken away from the traditions of the past.

2. It is aggressively and consciously different from the poetry of the past.

3. All of modern poetry does not hang as one united movement, but it is characterized by

a bewildering diversity.

4. A change of attitude towards poetic syntax (the ways in which we order specific words
to create logical, meaningful sentences.) Syntax in modern poetry is wholly different
from syntax as prescribed by grammarians. This is because modern poetry comes close
to symbolist poetry.

5. What is symbolist poetry?

Symbolists believed that art should represent absolute truths that could only be described
indirectly. Thus, they wrote in a very metaphorical and suggestive manner, endowing
particular images or objects with symbolic meaning. Symbolism was hostile to "plain
meanings, declamations, false sentimentality and matter-of-fact description", and its goal
instead was to "clothe the Ideal in a perceptible form" whose" goal was not in itself, but
whose sole purpose was to express the Ideal." For example an emotion is not described but
a symbolic action or description of a place that stands as an equivalent is employed to
express that emotion. Landscape often presents the experience through the choice use of
words and syntax. Even though “The Solitary Reaper” was written in the early 19th
century, it is a good example of using landscape to express the feelings of the solitary
reaper. T.S. Eliot calls it ‘the Objective Correlative”: expressing emotion through a set of
objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula of that 'particular'
emotion. Free verse, symbolic imagery and synaesthesia, (where poets sought to identify
and confound the separate senses of scent, sound, and colour) were the techniques used.

23
 Feeling is to be derived from the images and the poem itself rather than overtly describing
the feeling.

2.7 AN EXAMPLE OF MODERNIST POETRY

Modernist poetry is difficult poetry. Since logical meaning has been replaced by images, there
is a tendency on the part of the poets in the modern era to focus on intensity rather than on
meaning to satisfy the reader. An example of modernist poetry is Eliot’s The Wasteland. It is
one of the most significant poems of the 20th century, and a central work of modernist poetry.

Eliot’s poem has provoked two responses that contradict one another. It is seen to harbour
defeatism, reflecting the state of personal depression in the guise of a full, impersonal picture
of society. F.R. Leavis said that the poem’s “rich disorganization” is an index of the modern
plight, the state of society in modern times - “the irrevocable loss of that sense of
absoluteness that seems necessary to a robust culture. Life in the modern wasteland is sterile,
breeding not life, but disgust, acedia and unanswerable questions.”

But if one looks at the technique, it is seen how the poem moves from one experience to
another. In Section II, “A Game of Chess” the shifting style throws light on different women
protagonists. Starting with Cleopatra’s ornate lifestyle, the poem moves to Belinda, the heroine
of the Rape of the Lock, living in an idle, expensive world of make-up, dress and conspicuous
consumption, then to the unpleasant reality of modern times.

My nerves are bad tonight. Yes, bad. Stay with me

Speak to me. Why do you never speak. Speak

What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?

I never know what you are thinking. Think.

Similarly in the mid section, “The Fire Sermon”, one sees the change of class - from the wealthy
class to the lowly class and the way the women of different classes talk show the transitions of
time and transitions of the coarse talk by the pub women followed by the typist who reveals
his own superiority. Eliot’s use of older literature reveals his admiration for better quality of
life, though he does not make it so explicit. If the reader like the critic, F.R. Leavis is
pessimistic, he will not share that rich life of the past. So is the comparison between The
Thames river today with empty bottles and sandwich papers as a contrast to the Thames of
Spenser’s time - of the Elizabethan times. The poem’s meaning is clear: “modern civilization
does nothing but spoil what was once gracious, lovely, ceremonial and natural”3(David Craig);

The poem contrasts Elizabethan magnificence with modern sordidness. But even in that past
period, love for love’s sake in an ideal fancy world of Spenser is shown as empty and sterile as
in the modern world. Elizabeth and the typist are alike as well as different. Is Eliot warped in
the past and full of revulsion for the present? If one is pessimistic, one sees the filth, poverty,
low class life in contrast to the magnificence of the past. On the contrary Eliot seems to be
manipulating history and reality to express his own prejudices and almost writing about his
personal experience. Eliot’s conscious use of literariness, his use of different styles for different
people are meant to hold at arm’s length his personal dislike of the unfeeling grossness of

24
experience between the typist and the young man endeavouring to engage her in caresses. His
description of modern apartment:

On the divan are piled (at night her bed

Stocking, slippers, camisoles and stays (women’s undergarments and corset

which shows the lack of sociableness is an attack on modern civilization. This is the irony/
smart sarcasm in the contrast between old grandeur and modern squalor by the use of literary
allusions - not so facile to grasp but which is so intelligently manipulated. One notices Eliot’s
snobbery in the presentation of the young man- “a small house agent’s clerk and what right has
he to look assured? And the passage ends with Goldsmith’s line “When lovely woman stoops
to folly, she smoothes her hair with automatic hand/and puts a record on the gramophone.”

It is not a presentation of moral decline – it is not an attack as some critics say on the uprooting
of life in the machine age. While The Wasteland has generated opinions that are negative
about modern life, Eliot’s last section “What the Thunder said” is inspired by Hindu faith. In a
dramatic moment, thunder cracks over the scene, and its noise seems to say three words in
Sanskrit: Datta, Dayadhvam, and Damyata, which command you to "Give," "Sympathize," and
"Control." This is followed by a repetition of the word Shanthi, which means "the peace that
passeth all understanding." After all the slogging, T. S. Eliot possibly gives us a little hope with
this final word.

Let us just look at Line 431: These fragments I have shored against my ruins, which might
actually be the most important line in the entire poem, because it basically sums up
everything Eliot is trying to do by writing The Waste Land. What do we mean by that? Well,
he has taken broken fragments from a culture that was once whole, and is just piecing them
together in order to "shore up" his ruins. In other words, he sees himself standing in the
middle of a waste land that's littered with pieces from a glorious, cultured past, and in writing
this poem, he has collected these broken pieces and piled them together in a sort of testimony,
which he feels is the most he can do now that Western culture is shattered. For such a
depressing poem, The Waste Land actually ends on a slight note of hope, pointing us toward
non-Western religions as a way to restore our faith and to start acting like decent, unselfish
human beings again.

Datta. Dayadhvam. Damyata.

ShantihShanithShantih

Well, at least that's something. Maybe we're not so doomed after all. Maybe. Maybe not.

2.8 SUMMING UP
After a close study of this Unit on Modern Poetry, you would have learnt
* the definition of modernism as a literary term with specific reference to art and literature
* the two distinct terms of paleo-modernism and Neo-modernism and the difference between
them
* characteristics of modernism with specific reference to modernist poetry
* relationship between tradition and modernism
* what constitutes modernist poetry and
* why modernist poetry is difficult poetry.
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2.9 UNIT END QUESTIONS
1. What are the Characteristics of Modernism with reference to Modern Poetry?
2. What is Modernist Poetry? Why is Modernist Poetry difficult poetry? Illustrate your
answer with one example.
3. Discus the relationship between tradition and Modernism.
4. What is Free Verse, Symbolist Poetry and Objective Correlative? Explain each citing an
example.

2.10 GLOSSARY
1. Obscure: not clearly expressed or easily understood.
2. Apprehend: understand or perceive.
3. Slice-of-life: a realistic representation of everyday experience in a film, play, or book
4. Cognitive: concerned with the act or process of knowing, perceiving,
5. stream of consciousness: a literary style in which a character's thoughts, feelings, and
reactions are depicted in a continuous flow uninterrupted by objective description or
convention.
6. parlance: a particular way of speaking or using words, especially a way common to
those with a particular job or interest.
7. Jettison: discard
8. Redemption: the action of saving or being saved from sin, error, or evil.
9. Represenaionalism: Representationalism (also known as indirect realism) is the view
that representations are the main way we access external reality. According to this
version of the theory, the mental representations were images (often called "ideas") of
the objects or states of affairs represented.
10. Atonalism: music that lacks a tonal center, or key.
11. Aesthetic: concerned with beauty or the appreciation of beauty.
12. Orthodoxies: authorized or generally accepted theory, doctrine, or practice.
13. Intertwining: connecting or linking closely
14. Paradoxical: Seemingly absurd or self contradictory
15. Metaphorical: involving, invoking, or intended to be taken as a metaphor, something
used symbolically to represent something else, suggesting a comparison or
resemblance.
16. Free Verse:poetry that does not rhyme or have a regular rhythm.
17. Symbolist Poetry: attempts to evoke, rather than primarily to describe; symbolic
imagery was used to signify the state of the poet's soul.
18. Objective Correlative: the artistic and literary technique of representing or evoking a
particular emotion by means of symbols which become indicative of that emotion and
are associated with it; something (such as a situation or chain of events) that
symbolizes or objectifies a particular emotion and that may be used in creative writing
to evoke a desired emotional response in the reader.
19. Synaesthesia: a subjective sensation or image of a sense (as of color) other than the one
(as of sound) being stimulated.
20. Overtly: without concealment or secrecy; openly.
21. Defeatism: demonstrating expectation or acceptance of failure.
22. Acedia :apathy and inactivity in the practice of virtue.

26
 23. Neurotic: describes mental, emotional, or physical reactions that are drastic and
irrational. At its root, a neurotic behavior is an automatic, unconscious effort to manage
deep anxiety.
24. Sordidness: wretched, shabby, base.
25. Warped: abnormal or strange; distorted.
26. Literariness: to distort or cause to distort from the truth, fact, true meaning, etc.; bias;
falsify- for example, prejudice warps the mind.
27. Grossness: outrageousness; the quality or state of being flagrant: atrociousness
28. Caresses: touch or stroke gently or lovingly
29. Camisoles: a woman's loose-fitting undergarment for the upper body, typically held up
by shoulder straps.
30. Sociableness: the relative tendency or disposition to be sociable or associate with one's
fellows. synonyms: sociability.

2.11 REFERENCES
1. Jon Silkin, Out of Battle; The Poetry of the Great War, Palgrave/Macmillan, 1998.
2. Ellmann and Feidelson, The Modern Tradition.
3. Patricia Coughlan, & Alec Davis, eds. Modernism and Ireland: The Poetry of the 1930s.
4. Hugh Kenner, The Pound Era.
5. Perkins, David, A History of Modern Poetry: Modernism and After Harvard Press, New
Haven 1987.
6.Schmidt, Michael, (ed) The Great Modern Poets, Quercus Poetry 2012

27
UNIT 3 MODERNISM AND THE NOVEL
Structure

3.1. Objectives
3.2. Introduction
3.2 (a) The Reviewing Effort at Core
3.2. (b) Active Mind Gaining Primacy
3.3 Taking Cognizance of the term ‘Modern’
3.3 (a) Social Deadlock Caused by Capitalism
3. 3(b) Rise of the Modern Condition
3.4. Modernism: The Philosophical Dimension
3.4 (a) Modernisation as Inherent in Modernism
3.4 (b) Individual as the Decisive Factor

3.5. Modernism: The Ideological Dimension

3.5 (a) Reflection of Conflicts and Contradictions
3.5 (b) Modernism as the Ideology of Rejection
3.6. Modernism: The Aesthetic Dimension
3.6 (a) Irony in the Modernist Venture
3.6 (b) Precursor of Literary Theory in the 20th Century
3.7 Let us sum up

3.1 OBJECTIVES
The objective of this unit is to make known to you a literary trend termed ‘modernism.’ As
you would be aware, the trend arose in the early years of the twentieth century that was
distinct from the previous period in many ways. Its parameters were different from the ways
in which writers and artists of the nineteenth century perceived their surroundings. From
knowledge of the trend, the unit will take you into the general background of modernism and
explain the constraints under which it worked. This unit will explain what modernism stood
for and how it approached the many cultural challenges of the day. That will then be followed
by the social thought working behind modernism, the class interests that the trend served and
the shape it gave to the writing of the period. Finally, you will be made aware of the
relevance and significance of modernism to the British novel in terms of the aesthetics, the
literariness given by modernism to the fiction in question. Modernism dictated the way in
which the fiction in the twentieth century would shape particularly the experiences and
viewpoints of the time.

3.2 INTRODUCTION
There is something new and unique about modernism. It reflects the mental states that the
closing decades of the nineteenth century in England generated. There were new social
groups, new individuals, new economic activities, new explanations of the existing
phenomena, and new answers to old questions. The changed responses of the writing carried
specific traces of the existing thought but tended to review them in the light of difficulties
that raised head in the new situation. The newness we talk of brought to the fore doubts and
apprehensions about the unfolding scenario at the time.

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3.2 (A) THE REVIEWING EFFORT AT CORE

The reviewing effort resulted in not just a rejection of the prevailing approaches but put
modernism in opposition to what the writers had done in the preceding years. One example
will suffice. The nineteenth century had begun with the role of a romantic assertion of ideals.
These ideals were utopian in nature, and activated the faculty of dreaming in the human
beings. What lay in front was thought to be undesirable. Romanticism replaced that with a
new construct that appeared capable of solving inequalities and miseries in the surrounding
world. Later, the romantic ideals ceased to be appealing. That led to the recognition of
scientific thought as a viable alternative. Combined with the vigour and vitality of the
common people, scientific thought became a strong critique of the ideology and politics of
the time. Meanwhile, within scientific thought, the variant of psychology emerged to offer a
parallel map of human initiative. Under its influence, the mental dimension of human practice
gained primacy.

3.2. (B) ACTIVE MIND GAINING PRIMACY

An active mind roaming in the land of imagination and entering human history from the side
of myths, legends and folklore may have appeared difficult to handle, but it finally proved a
path worth examining. The endeavour was intellectual and creative, and the two offered
simultaneously a tough challenge to the great realists of the existing period. Leon Edel has
said about Henry James the following:

He had begun as a realist who describes minutely his crowded stage. He ended by
leaving his stage comparatively bare, and showing a small group of characters in a
tense situation, with a retrospective working out, through multiple angles of vision, of
their drama. In addition to these technical devices, he resorted to an increasingly
allusive prose style, which became dense and charged with symbolic imagery.

Here, we note the period of transition crystallizing later into a new kind of prose fiction.
Mark the emphasis on tension, retrospection and multiplicity that might flower in due course
to assume a view far away from what the nineteenth century realists had attempted.

3.3 TAKING COGNIZANCE OF THE TERM ‘MODERN’

Modernism is a descriptive term taking note of a specific phase in British fiction. The period
it refers to is the close of the nineteenth century that stood at a crossroads. As you have been
briefly told above, the time was marked by many new questions and doubts. It did not know
what to contend with and which direction to move in. Writers and artists of this period found
it imperative to break free from the stresses as well as progression and onward movement of
social life. As things stood, wonder and enthusiasm ruled the roost, even as visionaries scaled
new heights of knowledge. The opening years of the twentieth century on the other hand felt
too weak to express their aspirations. Perhaps no aspirations worth pursuing existed. The
problems and challenges were different. It was left to fiction, poetry and drama to evolve a
position in the existing scenario of turbulence and uncertainty.

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3.3 (A) SOCIAL DEADLOCK CAUSED BY CAPITALISM

The social deadlock of the period suggested an era of violence. Turbulence could not be
handled with ease since it related to economic relations in Europe. Trade and commerce at
the time faced stasis and capital-entered production did not see a clear path of gaining
stability and ensured profit. That affected the social health of the different economies coming
to terms with unemployment, poverty and the resulting misery. Literary fiction in the related
period took note of the malaise caused by growing inequalities. Gone was the mood of social
ascendency of the mid-Victorian period that had witnessed an era of relative peace in the
eighteen sixties and seventies. George Eliot's novels such as Middlemarch had captured
glimpses of dynamism and initiative in England. The writing had philosophical dimensions to
explore as also to engage with dilemmas of choice. There had been intellectual fervour in the
air with studies of evolution and psychological processes adding depth to literary depiction.
All this became a thing of the past as clouds of despair hovered over Europe that would soon
find the ways of progress blocked.

3.3 (B) RISE OF THE MODERN CONDITION

Could that be called the modern condition? The question cropped up before novelists such as
Joseph Conrad, James Joyce and Virginia Woolf, the children of the late nineteenth century.
The answers did not come out clearly but were yet addressed. The modern condition offered
challenges of inertia as well as a reversal of the social dynamic. The times saw no future
ahead. In the context, the following observation of J.A. Cuddon might help:

As far as literature is concerned, modernism reveals a breaking away from established

rules, traditions and conventions, fresh ways of looking at man’s position and
functions in the universe and many (in some cases remarkable) experiments in form
and style. It is particularly concerned with language and how to use it
(representationally and otherwise) and with writing itself. Thus, structuralism was
(and is) from the outset closely connected with modernist tendencies, though the
theories of structuralism did not gain a strong foothold until the 1960s, by which post-
modernism was well established as a new movement. (Emphasis in the original, 551)

Mark the qualifiers in the above quote. Cuddon is tentative, not clear where the clue to the
issue lies. However, the direction is indicated which is the act of writing, the language being
at the centre of its expression. Equally uncertain are the thought categories. The expression
“Man’s positions and functions in the universe” is too broad a hint to carry conviction in the
background of discoveries by Darwin in the preceding century. Also, the ideas regarding man
and language remain unconnected since the concrete social life is not a part of the frame.
Cuddon is right though, stressing the break away from established rules. For that reason,
modernism is presented as a foray into the unknown, a phenomenon requiring new ways and
means to make sense of the existing scenario.

3.4. MODERNISM: THE PHILOSOPHICAL DIMENSION

The view ingrained in modernism does not recognise the role of history in social life. It
remains uninfluenced by the popularly accepted notion that there has been a past of the
society in which the human individual is placed. Contrarily, modernism gives credence to the
view and reveals itself as rooted in the early twentieth century alone. The word used for the
prevailing time is ‘contemporary,’ bearing implications of that which is palpably present, that
30
which can be seen and felt. For it, all else is false and illusory or at best a burden that we
erroneously bear on our backs. According to modernism, the past is best forgotten and
considered as dead and gone, since of no consequence. For it, only the present is real. It has a
sense and rhythm its own.

The second philosophical implication of modernism is that life in the existing moment is
without hope or ideals. Instead, it is a necessity, suggesting that individuality alone is the
crux. It lets us know that we as the supposed population are thrown together as single entities,
there being no connection of one with others. It tells us that we are islands in the sea, each
having an area of living with resources our own. It is a case of utmost isolation from all that
surrounds each island which has to look for sustenance within itself. Further, the isolation is
characterized by the individual having a self that got built by extraneous influences and the
influences leaving their mark on it.

3.4 (A) MODERNISATION AS INHERENT IN MODERNISM

As is rightly believed, the modern individual is critically aware of the surroundings operating
in the manner of problematic obstructions. The catchword in the context is critical awareness
requisite for freedom and fulfilment. In context, D.H. Lawrence, T.S. Eliot, James Joyce and
Virginia Woolf come to mind. They share the overall perspective of history and society as
problematic categories for the critically aware and freedom-seeking individuals. D. Kolb has
explained the view in the following manner:

The proponents of modernisation promise that it will liberate us from brute forces of
nature, oppressive social powers and the alien within our psyches, bringing us self-
reliance through reason and dispelling illusion and superstition in a self-authorising
and self-transparent manner. So, it seems to be the final and culminating stance
towards the world, society and ourselves. It is not just another particular traditional
mode of living, with its own individualistic values. It is what we get when we remove
all traditional modes of living, a degree zero of bare humanity. So, modernisation
seems to be a universal process, a development beyond any fixed set of values, rather
than the imposition of a particular set of Western values. (Protevi 404-405)

We might use “modernisation” here in the sense of modernism. In it, reason is highlighted in
preference to what are termed illusion and superstition. Further, the trend is supposed to be in
the mode of a “universal process.” That precisely is the issue to be kept in mind. One might
believe the development to be a fundamental departure from the socio-historical viewpoint.
There is no wonder that from thereon, other isms such as structuralism and postmodernism
will take over and be proceeded with.

3.4 (B) INDIVIDUAL AS THE DECISIVE FACTOR

Indeed, in the philosophical sense, modernism remains stuck to the impression the
surroundings leave on the individual. Even as the impression has a blemish, an impurity that
the surroundings had received from practices in society, it draws boundaries for the
individual to observe and becomes a protective wall for the individual to ensure his safety
from ideas and opinions of the time. If the wall did not exist, the individual would be open to
attacks from the outside endangering his selfhood. See that for the individual in the period of
modernity, isolation is a value keeping him away from the logic of circumstance where life’s

31
distortions rule the roost. In the process, as the self stands alienated, it gets a chance to work
out the strategy to finally free himself from the boundaries received in the form of the initial
impression. T.S. Eliot's Murder in the Cathedral presents the point of Becket's final escape
from worldly selfhood as a fulfilment of the modernist aim. Through it, Becket has earned the
release from worldly bonds of ambition.

Mark that the early years of the twentieth century were particularly reactive to the march of
historical progression as well as dialectical time and the doctrine was the mode to counter
effectively the change-oriented realism of the preceding time.

3.5 MODERNISM: THE IDEOLOGICAL DIMENSION

Modernism attained a firm ideological base in the years around the First World War. The
rationale of the phenomenon likely to offer an alternative to the nineteenth century emphases
of social change along egalitarian lines had appealed to a whole section of the deprived and
underprivileged. Understandably, it became a desperate situation for the European bourgeois
class. True to say, in a class-divided society with the haves and have-nots, the crucial aspect
is of property. Everything else comes after it. The last decades of the nineteenth century in
England were witness to the prospect of fierce opposition to capitalist exploitation. In view of
this, the people with economic and political might had of necessity to forge an ideology
countering politics of justice and humanism, not an easy task but necessary nonetheless.

5 (A) REFLECTION OF CONFLICTS AND CONTRADICTIONS

That was one side. The other side was of social tensions and contradictions that had left the
scene of mixed possibilities, unique in the sense that the materialist historical answer of
socialist orientation, if concretised, would be entirely novel and unprecedented in human
history. As such, ideology was a decisive issue, all the more so as the period saw the
spectrum of a nascent upheaval at the grassroots. In this part of the discussion, we have to
bring in literary fiction specifically since it deals with the common people who are worst
affected by an economic crisis. The background of the crisis compelled artists, writers,
thinkers, and the enlightened middle classes to take cognizance of the complex situation with
serious engagement. The consequence could be seen in the impatience, concern and
intellectual churning in socio-ideological sphere.

5 (B) MODERNISM AS THE IDEOLOGY OF REJECTION

Modernist ideology was of rejection of all that was established and accepted. It consisted of
new ways to explore and experiment as well as to challenge popular notions. Literary forms,
too, came under attack since they followed established patterns of composition. In many a
case in the opening decades of the twentieth century, the respected and sacrosanct came
under the lens for scrutiny. Institutions of family, marriage, education, religion, and
morality—were earmarked for questioning as denying freedom to the individual. The
modernist denial was uncritical and based solely on the argument of solitariness.

In one specific sense, ideology of modernism was clear in its aim—it was to campaign
against the goals of equality and justice taken up by the nineteenth century writers and
thinkers. As had been asserted at the time, adherence to social change and to a free society
from the shackles of capitalism sent shock waves to the privileged and mighty in Europe. It

32
became the case of now or never for them. The upper crust of European societies took
measures for crushing the rising ideological challenge to their supremacy. The atmosphere
made it difficult for the visionaries of the day to pursue their cause as supporters of orthodoxy
and faith regrouped. If the discourse of realism, social progress, and scientific thought did not
find favour with the voices of modernism, one knew where to look for reasons behind such a
choice. The answer lay in a changed preference for the paradigm.

Making a point about “the image of man” in modernism, Georg Lukacs has observed that
man for the modernist writers “is by nature solitary, asocial, unable to enter into relationships
with other human beings.” Lukacs quotes Thomas Wolfe who stated his position on the issue
thus: “My view of the world is based on the firm conviction that solitariness is by no means a
rare condition, something peculiar to myself or to a few special solitary human beings, but
the inescapable, central fact of human existence.”1 The view of man as projected by
modernism extends to the whole humanity that carries the influence of separating every
individual from the other. In this sense, the modern-day human existence is characterised by
loneliness that puts initiative at the mercy of circumstance. This condition leaves no scope for
the individual to make any contribution to the life surrounding him. It also snatches from the
individual the capability to produce, experiment or align with a general endeavour since no
endeavour indeed exists in reality. Taking Heidegger’s authentic historicity as a historicity in
effect, Lukacs explains his point as follows:

This negation of history takes two different forms in modernist literature. First, the
hero is strictly confined within the limits of his own experience. There is not for
him—and apparently not for his creator—any pre-existent reality beyond his own self,
acting upon him or being acted upon by him. Secondly, the hero himself is without
personal history. He is ‘thrown-into-the-world’: meaninglessly, unfathomably. He
does not develop through contact with the world; he neither forms nor is formed by it.
The only ‘development’ in this literature is the gradual revelation of the human
condition. Man is now what he has always been and always will be. The narrator, the
examining subject, is in motion; the examined reality is static. (Lukacs 20-21)

This can be specifically applied to the stream-of-consciousness British fiction that came up in
the early decades of the twentieth century. The roaming protagonists and narrators in it talked
unto themselves about what they witnessed in the surrounding world. In the observations and
responses of the protagonists got reflected a given set of structures, social, ideological and to
some extent political. Indeed, the structures were a given, not those that had evolved or were
evolving in a context. After they found a place in the consciousness of the narrators or
protagonists, they stood as unchanging rocks, be they family, love relationship, chance
alliances on the road, or the buying and selling agency of the market.

Check your progress 1

1. What is meant by the ideological dimension in modernism? Does it indicate the view
of man at the time the trend of modernism struck roots in English writing? Explain
and discuss.

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3.6 MODERNISM: THE AESTHETIC DIMENSION
In Modernist writing, illusion and fantasy come in for active use. Generally, illusion is the
antonym, the opposite of the real, and thus might take one into a land of dreams with no basis
in the material world, the world of norms, principles and structures. Through illusion, one
goes anywhere and experience a pattern never thought of before since it is in fact non-
existent. Yet, one likes illusion for its flexibility, freedom and possibility of quick turns and
twists. Illusion shows that person one wants to be with, to talk or listen to and believe in.
With the help of illusion, one can do or be what one wishes and desires. Come to think of it,
only humans have this capacity to cross over from a surrounding of hard facts and ideas to a
sphere where one is free from obstructions and is a master, a mentor, a guide.

At this point in discussion, we move to a different area, connected with the faculty of mind
but one equipped with producing a reality working as an alternative to the existing one. It is
fantasy that has traits of its own. Fantasy is many notches higher than illusion, based itself on
illusion and taking flights into the unknown or unfamiliar. In fantasy one's mind is immensely
active, forming patterns after one's heart and sustaining or demolishing them at will. Since it
is a conscious act, the artist and the writer see to it that a new, somewhat shocking path is
visualised and shaped. Fantasy puts demand on the viewer and the reader to exert an extra bit
for knowing and grasping the creative intent. One thing is clear though. Rejection and
experiment are the key factors of modernist art. Since the environment is tangled, raising
doubts and questions than affirming the available literary expression, modernism emerges in
the twentieth century as a bridge between the viewer/reader, an affirmation of the difficulties
involved.

3.6 (A) IRONY IN THE MODERNIST VENTURE

We might also read an irony in the modernist venture. The writers of the new phase were
enabled by studies conducted in the nineteenth century. In the context, they showed the
required approach unblocked by structures of morality, faith, ritualism and convention. The
process had been set in motion by doubting the entrenched view of creation, morality and
social power. Romanticism invoked flights of imagination, took attention into the mysteries
of the mind, whereas realism showed the exploitative path for what was. Alongside this, the
evolutionary thought revealed struggles of the species crystallizing into conscious living.
That was the overall background of modernist queries and uncertainties. This expressed itself
effectively not in the utmost negativity of modernist thought but in its aesthetics.

Here lay the seed of modernist activism and daring to exhibit a complex scenario. Take away
the knowledge of science, of the working of the mind and the dialectic of history from the
spectrum and see that modernism would cease to mean much.

There are other approaches that are at variance with what has been stated above. In aesthetic
terms, there is discernible the use of allegory in fiction. The subject matter under allegory is
given an aesthetic complex shape—the account works not just at the level of direct statement,
howsoever intense and sharp, but also at the level of abstract message. Allegory points
towards an older norm embedded in a tale. A popular pattern is evoked to run parallel to the
narrative. The aesthetic of allegory widens the scope of meaning even as it works as a counter
to the immediate context in a novel.2Then, there is the question of abstract particularity and
concrete particularity. The former is a departure from the sensuous reference and takes the
expression away from life’s reality. The latter joins the expression to the immediate reference
34
and at the same time raises the detail to the level of a felt idea. That is how Kafka could be
critiqued as a modernist who leaves an impact with his intensity but does not connect with
life’s dynamism, its concrete issues.3

3.6 (B) PRECURSOR OF LITERARY THEORY IN XX CENTURY

In another sense, modernism became an important precursor to the increased activity of

theory in the academic domain later in the twentieth century. Modernism was a trend setter
that necessitated exploration in the specific direction of language, the fluctuating aspect of the
perspective and thematic widening of the literary text. Terry Eagleton has stressed the point
in the following manner:

It is in fact the literary movement of modernism which brought structuralist and post-
structuralist criticism to birth in the first place. Some of the later works of Barthes and
Derrida are modernist literary texts in themselves, experimental, enigmatic and richly
ambiguous. There is no clear division for post-structuralism between ‘criticism’ and
‘creation’: both modes are subsumed into ‘writing’ as such. Structuralism began to
happen when language began an obsessive preoccupation of intellectuals; and this
happened in turn because in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries, language in
Western Europe was felt to be in the throes of deep crisis. How was one to write, in an
industrial society where discourse had become degraded to a mere instrument of
science, commerce, advertising and bureaucracy? (121)

In this quote, Eagleton sees creation and criticism merging in the text that enables the writer
to see himself involved in putting to paper what he wishes to portray aesthetically. That
makes the writer self-reflexive in which act he ceases to be the maker or author of the text
and becomes instead a site of the conflicts of the existing world. This began happening, for
instance, in Joyce, Virginia Woolf and Samuel Beckett, who broke the sanctity of the
narrative in fiction. Instead of being centred on a theme, the text became a replication of the
mental act of composition in which the struggle to express takes the front seat and invites the
reader to become a helpful participant in choosing words and phrases, and rejecting them if
they block the flow of writing in the natural course. The plan of writing becomes a subject of
questioning since the language used in it might revolt against the turn the writer imposes on
the broader track of creative movement. These were inherent in the depiction that was in the
process of forming itself during the act of writing.

Can we say that modernism propped up issues of reconsideration, possible falsification of the
intended subject and questioning of a fixed meaning in the word and phrase selected for the
authorial use? The modernist writer felt the need to examine other related areas of writing
that were consistently pushed under the carpet by the author for projecting a specific
viewpoint in preference to others. There were indeed difficulties the writer faced at the
conscious level, not being able to justly and authentically present the tensions of the chosen
time-segment. That was because thought and rationality put restraints upon the literary form,
the novel, poem or drama, and taking the writer’s attention to the invisible factors of
dreaming and imagining.

The ball had been set rolling in the writings of Joseph Conrad who brought in discussion time
and again in the course of a narrative sequence. He deliberately created hurdles with the help
of questions and counter-questions and stopped the movement of the narrative midway. All
this indeed happened within the limits of the form, the writer not coming out clearly for

35
putting forth philosophical or ideological questions. Yet, shadows started hovering over the
literary forms that disallowed words and phrases from going their own independent ways.
The whys and wherefores lurking behind modernist experimentation, doubts and
uncertainties drew attention of the scholars of the twentieth century and soon a platform for
theorizing got created. Thus, the credit for a whole process of examination, self-reflexivity,
expansion of debate should go to modernism showing to the thinker and reader the
boundaries shackling the human experience. In this sense, modernism may not be a theory by
itself, but it necessitates a serious consideration of the supposed autonomy of the form in
literature, thought and ideology—structuralism, post-structuralism and postmodernism being
the offshoots of the venture.

Check your progress 2

1. Would you say that literary theory as a discipline closely followed the modernist trend
in the latter half of the twentieth century? Give reasons in support of your answer.

3.7 LET US SUM UP

In this unit, we had a close look at the phenomenon of Modernism in the twentieth century
literary domain. The point of reference in the discussion has been British fiction. The use of
the term itself raises important questions concerning modern as the existing. The net of
modernism was so wide in the early twentieth century that it required a separate discussion of
the three clearly identifiable facets of the trend—philosophical, ideological, and aesthetic. In
the unit, these have been analysed in some detail for capturing a comprehensive view of the
subject. It is also suggested finally that the manner of theory taking over the literary
landscape in its entirety points towards what Modernism came to project in the first half of
the twentieth century.

Notes and References:

1
qtd in Lukacs 20.
2
See Lukacs 40.

(https://www.britannica.com>Henry)

Cuddon, J.A. Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. Hardmondsworth: Penguin,
1991.

Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory: An Introduction. Delhi: Doaba, rpt. 2000.

Lukacs, Georg. The Meaning of Contemporary Realism. London: Merlin Press, 1972.

Protevi, John. Ed., The Edinburgh Dictionary of Continental Philosophy. Wilts: Edinburgh
University Press, 2005.

36
Glossary:

social thought working behind modernism: the ideas that caused modernism to happen
directly or indirectly. In many a case, the said ideas work as a pressure on the writer,
compelling him/ her to think in one way and not the other.

the unfolding scenario at the time: this has reference to the First World War that emerged
initially as a probability, in the form of fear or apprehension. Soon, it became a threatening
presence and symbolised large-scale destruction. One could visualise it in terms of the
changing scenes in a larger episode.

period of transition: in it, the process of change is suggested. Transition may not necessarily
be for the better. Transition is a phase of uncertainty and wonder. The factors working in the
phase would be at cross purposes with one another. At the same time though, a few of them
assume a decisive role and take things towards a strong and palpable trend.

Unit end Questions:

A. Write a critical note on modernism as a trend in the early twentieth century British
fiction.
B. Modernism may offer a critique of life, but does not offer a realistic portrayal.
Comment.

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UNIT 4. MODERNISM IN DRAMA
Structure

4.0 Aims and Objectives

4.1 Introduction to Modern Drama
4.2 Modern European Theatre (Early Twentieth Century)
4.3 Verse Drama
4.4 Drama after the 1950s: The Theatre of the Absurd
4.5 Summing up
4.6 Unit end questions
4.7 Glossary
4.8 Further Reading

4.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

This unit is intended to give you

*an overview of Modern British Drama

*Characteristics of Pre-War Modern Drama (1900-1950)
*Element of Propaganda in Problem Plays of the pre-War period
* Characteristics of Post-War Modern Drama (after 1945)
*Absurd Drama (from 1950 onwards)

4.1 INTRODUCTION TO MODERN DRAMA

If you turn to Unit 1, you will recall how modernism had three different phases that spanned
the whole of the 20th century. After Shakespeare – after the 17th century, there were hardly
any notable playwrights in England for nearly three centuries. The 18th century saw the rise
of the Comedy of Manners and Sentimental Comedy. Both have now become period pieces.
The 19th century theatre was known as “boulevard theatre,” introduced melodrama, a form
that was to dominate theatre in the 19th century. Melodrama, in turn, by popularizing
departures from Neoclassicism and capturing the interest of large audiences, paved the way
for Romantic drama.

The renaissance of British theatre began in the early 20th century. Modern British drama
consists of two major phases - early 20th century drama (pre-War drama ) and later 20th
century drama (post-War drama). A minor phase can be seen in plays written soon after
World War II ended in 1945. One of the distinguishing features of Modern Drama is that it is
a drama of ideas rather than action. The dramatists are focussed on making theatre an
expression of political, social and metaphysical ideas that makes a theatre experience both
entertaining and instructive. It will be no exaggeration to say that after the paucity of plays
for nearly three centuries, the 20th century revved up British theatre. It is more of an
intellectual drama than it ever was in the history of drama before the present age.

38
4.2 MODERN EUROPEAN THEATRE: EARLY
TWENTIETH CENTURY
The early 20th century, with its slogan ‘Make it New’ was mainly marked by rejection of the
realism of the 19th century. The idea of introducing innovations in theatre prevailed in all
European theatres. These innovations in the theatre were similar to innovations in the visual
arts such as painting, architecture, and sculpture - all of which had a singular focus of
rebelling against realistic representation. The theatrical experimentations especially in Europe
gave fresh impetus to the development of theatre after they set the tone and widened the
theatrical vocabulary for all the innovations that followed.

1. Instead of cluttering the stage with authentic realistic details, the focus shifted to
simplicity and austerity, with ‘a heightened expressiveness that could convey the true
spirit of a play rather than provide merely superficial dressing.’
2. The actor was to be given centre stage and all other detailed setting should not rob
the actor of this focus. It has to be just a suggestion of reality. For example, the
German director Max Reinhardt rejecting the idea of “one style,” demanded for
modern plays a style that was realistic in feeling but that avoided the drab exactness
of realism.
3. The many –isms you read about in Unit 1 (Introduction to Modernism) in painting,
like Symbolism, Impressionism, and Expressionism were also attempted in European
theatre.

Let us turn to Modern Drama in Britain and Ireland where the emphasis was marginally
different from the rest of European theatre.

Modern British drama spans the period from the end of the nineteenth century through the
present. The term "modernist" is generally applied to a group of early twentieth-century
writers who rejected realism and traditional forms. But British drama of the early 20th century
(approximately 1900 -1950), turns away from the anti-realistic focus of the European
experimental theatre, and presents realistic social drama. Modern British drama comprises
comedies and poetic dramas during the first half of the century and a new theatre known as
the Theatre of the Absurd after 1950.

The early influence on British drama came from Ireland. When we speak about twentieth
century British theatre we can trace its origin to the Irish Literary Theatre founded by the
three most famous Irish dramatists, William B. Yeats, Lady Gregory, and J.M. Synge. Their
purpose was to provide a specifically Celtic and Irish theatre to stage ‘the deeper emotions of
Ireland’ to the Irish people. The playwrights of the Irish Literary Theatre that later came to be
known the Abbey Theatre, was one of the key influences on British theatre revival. The
major Irish playwrights were Sean O’Casey, J.M. Synge, W.B. Yeats, Lady Gregory and
Edward Martyn, to name a few.

In England the “well-made play” of the earlier era was replaced by a new theatre with its
appeal chiefly to the young audience who were politically and socially conscious. The
dramatic characters in their plays were primarily based on this young audience, reflecting
their ideas, views, culture, aspirations and attitudes. The noteworthy dramatists were George
Bernard Shaw, Harley Granville Barker, W. Somerset Maugham, and John Galsworthy.

39
When we talk of Modern British Drama of the early 20th century, the first dramatist in this list
is George Bernard Shaw, Irish by birth, but domiciled in Britain. He used theatre as a lively
platform for the discussion of social and philosophical issues, and wrote plays that were
relevant to his age. Shaw is known for his wit and his plays can be best described as serious
comedies. Some of Shaw’s plays come under the rubric “Problem Plays” - also known as
Comedy of Ideas, and as ‘Thesis Plays’. These are meant to bring to life some contemporary
controversy or social ills such as women's rights, unemployment, penal reform, class
privilege etc., to stimulate thought and action in the audience. Problem plays usually take up
an issue - social or political, present the inherent problem in the issue and ends on an open
note, leaving it to the audience to find their own solution.

The first playwright to present Problem Plays was from Europe - the Norwegian dramatist
Henrik Ibsen with his innovative epochal play A Doll’s House. It is a dramatic representation
of serious familial and social conflicts and raises the issue of women’s rights. For the first
time, patriarchal dominance was under scrutiny and gender conflict was brought onto the
open stage. Shaw's Mrs Warren's Profession examines the attitudes towards prostitution. In
another of Shaw’s plays, Candida, the dramatist raises the problem of marital bliss in the
form of the protagonist wanting to re-marry a younger person after a contented life of about
ten years. Pygmalion, which was later filmed as “My Fair Lady” has an open ending. A
flower girl educated and trained by an upper-class gentleman is seen at the end wondering
what would be her status as she can neither return as a flower girl or move into the
aristocratic society that refuses to accept her, as she hails from a working class milieu. It is
left to the audience to recognize the problem and arrive at its own conclusion. Man and
Superman and Back to Methuselah deal with the metaphysical concept of “Life Force”.
This “Life Force” concept of Bernard Shaw contains the central idea that Life is a vital force
(elan vital) or impulse that strives to attain greater power of contemplation and self-
realization in the process. Unlike drama having action as its mainstay, Man and Superman
does not have action but a long debate to discuss the problematic issue.

Shaw’s mercurial strength is his awesome power of debate and wit. ‘He was a brilliant
debater and public speaker and most of the dialogues in his plays—both for and against the
issue in hand—are witty and often very absorbing, but they do not constitute real dramatic
action. The noted British critic, Ifor Evans observes: ‘The brilliance of his dialogue
sometimes leads him beyond the bounds of dramatic propriety so that the stage becomes a
hustings.’ In the plays of a lesser artist like Galsworthy this defect is all the more serious
because his debates and lengthy dialogues are without any sparkle or engaging vitality.
Galsworthy's Justice exposes the cruelties of solitary confinement and the legal system.

These plays were not written for the sake of theatricality or to create a beautiful dramatic
piece but to direct public attention to social evils and misconceptions. “And, what is more, a
problem play is not something merely diagnostic but also something therapeutic; in other
words, it not only spells out the ills but also prescribes possible solutions that the audience
will have to chose from… Shaw scoffed at the slogan “art for art’s sake.” He said that for the
sake of art he would not undertake the labour of writing even one sentence, not to speak of a
whole play”.

Thus the new theatre of the first three decades took up social and political issues and the tone
of the plays was both satirical and rebellious. Apart from political and social themes as stated
above, Shaw’s plays were also philosophical, trying to discuss the who and why of human
life and existence. Industrialization also had an impact on twentieth century drama, resulting

40
in plays lamenting the alienation of humans in an increasingly mechanical world. During the
1930s, new genres in place of straightforward naturalism came up. Noel Coward’s Private
Lives (1930) is a return to the Comedy of Manners; J.B. Priestley explored the cyclic concept
of time in Time and the Conways (1937).

Check your progress 1

1. What are the characteristics of Modern Drama of the early twentieth century?
2. Discuss the Nature of Problem plays.

4.3 VERSE DRAMA

T.S. Eliot introduced verse drama and five of his plays found a modern idiom for the poetic
drama. In his verse play Murder in the Cathedral (1935), originally performed in Canterbury
Cathedral, Eliot makes a special case for Poetic/Verse drama. Eliot claimed that "the greatest
drama is poetic drama, because poetry is language raised to its highest power and drama is
that form of representation which allows greatest concentration of effect, and when one fuses
the two, it accounts for the greatest drama”. Verse drama is drama written in verse form to be
spoken by the actor. The insistence of Eliot that ‘if our verse is to have so wide a range that it
can say anything that has to be said, it follows that it will not be 'poetry' all the time. It will
only be 'poetry' when the dramatic situation has reached such a point of intensity that poetry
becomes the natural utterance, because then it is the only language in which the emotions can
be expressed at all’ is one of the most important insistence about the unity of poetry and
drama. According to this view of poetic drama, poetry exists as latent and sleeping existence
in drama. In his essay, "A Dialogue on Dramatic Poetry" Eliot says that prose drama
emphasises the ephemeral and superficial while verse drama expresses the permanent and
universal. T. S. Eliot's belief in the value of poetic drama is based on the ground that poetic
drama is the fine resource which can express the permanent struggles and conflicts of human
beings and can transcend the ephemeral and the superficial.

After Eliot and Christopher Fry, verse drama fell out of fashion in the latter half of the 20th
century, and British Drama returned to the well made play about the middle class which
appealed to the middle class. The conventional looking plays of Terence Rattigan heads the
list of the well made plays. His plays exposed the emotional forlornness behind the polish and
genteel appearance of middle class society. In 1956 John Osborne’s Look Back in
Anger forcefully signalled the start of a very different dramatic tradition known as the
‘kitchen sink’ school of drama with the working class taking centre stage with its rawness,
sexual openness and anger and bitterness against the well heeled members of the society.
Shelagh Delaney’s A Taste of Honey (1958) and Arnold Wesker’s trilogy, Chicken Soup with
Barley (1958), Roots (1959), and I’m Talking About Jerusalem (1960) gave further impetus
to this movement. Osborne’s later play The Entertainer (1957), attacked the tasteless
flashiness and brazenness of post-War Britain. Arden wrote historical plays such as Serjeant
Musgrave’s Dance (1959), and Armstrong’s Last Goodnight (1964) to advance radical social
and political views and making a powerful influence on left-wing dramatists.

Check your progress 2

Discuss T. S. Eliot’s views on the use of verse in drama.

41
4.4 DRAMA AFTER THE 1950s – “THE THEATRE OF THE
ABSURD”
We will briefly touch upon the ‘theatre of the absurd’ even though it belongs to a period later
than that covered by this course, since it is an important development in modern drama. At
the end of the two major World Wars (1914-18 and 1939-45) that accounted for the deaths of
millions in England and Europe, an alarming trend of anxiety, hopelessness and religious
scepticism spread among Europeans. Faith in God along with the traditional belief in sin and
punishment came under question leading to an existential crisis and increased scepticism in
the existence of a just and benevolent God. The post- War world was caught between the old
world that was dead, and the new yet to be born. In the context of the two World Wars that
included atomic holocaust and Nazi acts of genocide, divinely authenticated values became
suspect. How is it that God or the Divine Power, could not prevent the horror, cruelty and
inhumanity unleashed on innocent men, women and children? In the absence of any
meaningful and logical explanation to the nightmarish tragedy all around, life seemed
absolutely meaningless except to serve as a link between birth and death. But again, life to
what purpose? This was a baffling irresolvable question. Several European, British and
American writers gave expression to the concept of the meaninglessness of life and their
writings came under the rubric “Literature of the Absurd”.

The word ‘absurd’ in common parlance denotes something utterly senseless, something that
defies logic and reason and is therefore, laughably ridiculous. Hence the term ‘Absurd’
perfectly fitted the post-war state where life seemed bereft of all meaning and purpose. The
concept of the Absurd was initiated by Albert Camus in The Myth of Sisyphus though the
term was coined on a much later date in 1961 by Martin Esslin to describe the works
primarily of a number of European playwrights who wrote in the 1950s and 1960s and
focussed largely on the meaninglessness and purposelessness of existence. These plays also
highlighted the vacuity of words and actions in a universe that functioned on its own where
human interference was irrelevant and inconsequential.

Thus after the two world Wars, human beings found themselves in a world with no religion to
believe in, no faith to comfort them, and faced the biggest existential crisis - how to exist in a
world where there is no certainty or predictability about the shape life would take in the
future. “Literature of the Absurd” and in particular the “Theatre of the Absurd” gave
expression to this feeling of loss, lack of purpose in life and absence of logic and reason in
happenings over which one has no control.

Albert Camus from France, Eugene Ionesco from Romania, Arthur Adamov from Russia,
Samuel Beckett - Irish by birth who wrote initially from France before settling in England,
and Harold Pinter from England were the early contributors to the “Theatre of the Absurd”.
The surprising thing is that none of them knew each other but they wrote individually and
their work collectively dealt with the absurdity of existence. Camus’s perception of absurdity
gave him an awareness of ‘a burning and frigid, transparent and limited universe in which
nothing is possible but everything is given, and beyond which all is collapse and
nothingness’.

The plays under the rubric “Theatre of the Absurd” and in particular, those of Samuel
Beckett deal with the predicament of men and women in the universe, saddled with an
existence that is out of harmony with their longing for logic and order. Beckett’s famous

42
sentence sums up the modern writer’s predicament: "the expression that there is nothing to
express, nothing with which to express, nothing from which to express, no power to express,
no desire to express, together with the obligation to express”.

Nearly four centuries back, Shakespeare had similarly written about the smallness of human
beings against the vastness of the universe where the gods reign supreme: ‘As flies to wanton
boys are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport’. It is clear that Beckett’s statement is an
extension of Shakespeare’s understanding of Man’s smallness vis-à-vis the great power of the
universe that is presided by an invisible Super Power- call it God or Fate or Destiny or simply
Godot as Beckett terms it. This power is unknown and incomprehensible as the human mind
is limited in scope to understand the complexity of life that seems wired to a remote Power.
Hence the major theme of the Absurd drama revolves round nothingness- we know nothing,
our words and actions mean nothing as the shape of things to come is hidden from us. Life
moves on perennially through the birth- death cycle with neither a beginning nor an end in
sight. The cycle goes on unceasingly without any predictable pattern except that of a cyclical
movement through birth and death. One of the characters in Beckett’s most famous play,
Waiting for Godot, says: ‘Nothing happens, no one comes, no one goes, this is awful’.

The Theatre of the Absurd has for its content man as ‘nothing’ in eternal confrontation with
Nothing. In short, it is about nothing circumscribed by Nothing. The problem for the
playwright arose as to how to present ‘Nothing’ on stage! For any artist to draw a picture
imaginatively featuring ‘nothing’ becomes a creative falsehood because the moment he /she
titles a picture ‘Nothing’, the picture gets a reference and becomes something. Hence
Beckett’s statement that there is ‘nothing’ to write(content), ‘nothing rom which to
write’(means of writing such as language, as words cannot communicate nothingness),
‘no power to write’ (as he is limited by his rational, empirical, logical power), ‘no desire to
express’ (as he is aware of the futility and impossibility of attempting to express that which is
Not) and finally the ‘obligation to write’(as a writer cannot remain silent and is forever
attempting to communicate even if the means, substance and desire he / she possesses do
not have the power to express).

This is the new theatre that discarded the well made plays which followed the dramatic
structure with a beginning, middle and an end, where the delineation of characters was done
through action and words, and the structure consisted of plot, dialogue, action, climax and
denouement. The Theatre of the Absurd had no use for such a structure, as the story line was
not linear and there was neither a beginning nor an end. The new plays were circular with the
plays ending at the point where they began. It will not be far off the mark to say that these
plays present not a story but a situation, a daily occurrence of life.

One other innovative aspect of the Theatre of the Absurd is the usage of words/dialogues
despite their lack of potential to communicate nothingness. These plays resort to minimal
dialogues that are repetitive and employ non sequiturs and complement them with
purposeless actions and vacuous gestures to convey the futility of all put together. The play’s
‘action’ is something that does not move the play forward. Since the play does not have a
storyline, no action can take it further. All action is limited to ‘here’ and ‘now’.
Beckett employs the art of the grotesque that was prominent in ancient Italian comedies like
the Commedia dell’ arte, Vaudeville, Music Hall, and Cross talk. He uses the grotesque to
present the theme of a hostile force- a hostile mechanism reducing life to nothing and at the
same time to give us the awesome perception of a ceaseless continuity of life through the

43
birth-death cycle. Life is like Chakravyuh, a labyrinth in which when one gets trapped, one
cannot escape; one simply keeps spinning through the maze.

The grotesque is both funny and frightening. Beckett tries to heal the gaping wound of the
absurdity of life through a healing release of laughter. We become aware of the humour of
cruelty and the cruelty of humour in his plays. The grotesqueness assaults our aesthetic
sensibility as it is disturbingly at odds with the way we are accustomed to view our situation.
The disorderliness of life is conveyed through a new form of formlessness - where there is no
story, no plot, no characterization - and is presented with the help of farce and clownery. This
new form of play that belongs to the Theatre of the Absurd reflects the paradoxical
relationship between the intolerable condition of human existence and the possible
achievement of art.

4.5 SUMMING UP
* Modern Drama is categorized into two major kinds that corresponds with Pre War Drama
(1900-1950) and Post War Drama (1950-80)
* The first phase consists of comedies and problem plays. They deal with social and political
issues, raise questions but provide no solution, leaving it to the audience to arrive at their own
conclusion. Yet another development was that of Verse Drama meant to express the deepest
emotions through verse. There was a short interregnum of drama after 1945 that has come to
be known as ‘kitchen sink’ school of drama
* The second phase is the Theatre of the Absurd, where the plays are circular (and not linear),
with no story but a common situation that we daily go through, where there is more action
and minimal –all to convey the meaninglessness of existence, where the costumes and stage
settings are reduced to a minimum in keeping with the focus on presenting life as nothing
surrounded by Nothing.

4.6 UNIT END QUESTIONS

1. Enumerate the characteristics of the Theatre of the Absurd

4.7 GLOSSARY

Comedy of Manners: witty, cerebral form of dramatic comedy that depicts and often
satirizes the manners and affectations of contemporary society.
Sentimental comedy: a dramatic genre of the 18th century, denoting plays in which middle-
class protagonists triumphantly overcome a series of moral trials.
Period piece: A period piece is a play, book, or film that is set at a particular time in history
and describes life at that time
Boulevard theatre: Commercial theatre, consisting mainly of comedies. Boulevard theatre is a
theatrical aesthetic that emerged from the boulevards of Paris's old city.

Melodrama: a sensational dramatic piece with exaggerated characters and exciting events
intended to appeal to the emotions

44
Celtic: generally refers to the languages and respective cultures of Ireland, Scotland, Wales,
Cornwall, and the Isle of Man, also known as the Celtic nations.
Perennial: long lasting
Holocaust: destruction or slaughter on a mass scale,
Genocide: the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic
group with the aim of destroying that nation or group
Vicissitudes: a change of circumstances or fortune, typically one that is unwelcome or
unpleasant.
Cognitive: conscious mental and intellectual activity.
Delineation: the action of describing or portraying something precisely.
Denouement: the final part of a play, film, or narrative in which the strands of the plot are
drawn together and matters are explained or resolved.
Laybrinth: a complicated irregular network of passages or paths in which it is difficult to find
one's way; a maze
Open ending: allowing the formulation of any answer, rather than a selection from a possible
set of answers.
Metaphysical: concerning existence and the relations among things that exist.
Commedia dell’ arte: where performances were unscripted and employed few props and
costumes,
Vaudeville: a light often comic theatrical piece frequently combining pantomime, dialogue,
dancing, song and acrobatic acts
Music Hall: a mixture of popular songs, comedy, acrobatics including clownery, and
variety entertainment
Cross talk: a common term for a particular kind of two-person routine by Vaudeville
performers.

4.10 REFERENCES
Modern Dramatists A Casebook of Major British, Irish, and American Playwrights. 1st
Edition. New York: Routledge.

Luc Gilleman, John Osborne, Vituperative Artist. Routledge.

David Krasner. A History of Modern Drama, Volume I. Wiley and Blackwell.

J. L. Styan.Modern Drama in Theory and Practice. Volume 3. Expressionism and

Epic Theatre.
Richard Gilman. The Making of Modern Drama:A Study of Büchner, Ibsen, Strindberg,
Chekhov, Pirandello, Brecht, Beckett, Handke. Yale Univ. Press

Kirsten Shepherd-Barr. Modern Drama: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press.

Martin Esslin. The Theatre of the Absurd. Penguin Random House

Michael Y. Bennett. The Cambridge Introduction to the Literature and Theatre of the
Absurd. Cambridge University Press.

45
 ignou
lTHE PEOPLE'S
UNIVERSITY

Indira Gandhi National British Literature: Early Twentieth Century

Open University BEGC-112
School of Humanities

Block

2
Novel (1)
BLOCK INTRODUCTION 02

UNIT 5
The Early Twentieth Century British Novel: Social and Cultural
Contexts 03

UNIT 6
D. H. Lawrence and the British Novel 14

UNIT 7
Sons and Lovers: Analysis and Interpretations 25

UNIT 8
Sons and Lovers: Themes and Concerns 33

1
BLOCK INTRODUCTION

In the previous block of this course, we introduced you to modernism and its expression in
various genres. In this block, we will be discussing the early twentieth century British novel,
focusing on the novel Sons and Lovers by D. H. Lawrence.

Unit 1: The Early Twentieth Century British Novel: Social and Cultural Contexts briefly
discusses political and social developments in Britain during this period, as well as the work of
intellectuals like Freud and Nietzsche, an understanding of which is important for a deeper
engagement with the texts chosen for study.

Unit 2: D. H. Lawrence and the British Novel introduces the writings of Lawrence and
discusses in some detail, those aspects of his life which are relevant for an understanding of Sons
and Lovers.

Unit 3: Sons and Lovers: Analysis and Interpretations contextualises this novel in the corpus
of Lawrence’s fiction and discusses its structure.

Unit 4: Sons and Lovers: Themes and Concerns touches upon the autobiographical aspects of
the novel, its engagement with the region of the English East Midlands, as well as some of the
major theoretical readings of the novel.

Acknowledgement

The material and images we have used are used purely for educational purposes. Every effort has
been made to trace the copyright holders of material used in this book. Should any infringement
have occurred, the publishers and editors apologise, and will be pleased to make the necessary
corrections in future editions of this book.

2
Unit 5: The Early Twentieth Century British Novel: Social
and Cultural Contexts
Structure

5.0 Aims and objectives

5.1 Introduction
5.2 Britain in the early twentieth century
5.2.1 Political conditions in early twentieth century Britain
5.2.1.1The Edwardian period
5.2.1.2 The beginnings of the Labour Party
5.2.1.3 Irish Home rule
5.2.1.4 World War 1
5.2.3 The social and cultural contexts
5.2.3.1 Economic changes
5. 2.3.2Women’s rights
5.3 Intellectual contexts
5.4 British novelists of the early twentieth century
5.5 Let us sum up

5.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

After studying this Unit, you should be able to critically analyse:
• the political, social and cultural conditions in early twentieth century Britain.
• the social, cultural and intellectual contexts of the early twentieth century British novel
• the achievement of early twentieth century British novelists
and the broad concerns of their writing

5.1 INTRODUCTION
In the previous block of this course, we discussed Modernism and its representations in various
literary genres. As you have already learnt, the Modernists emphasised the importance of
breaking away from the past and its cultural values – a fact noted by almost all scholars studying
the cultural history of this period. Virginia Woolf’s essay ‘How it Strikes a Contemporary’,
makes a clear statement of what it meant to be ‘modern’ in the early twentieth century:

“No age can have been more rich than ours in writers determined to give expression to the
differences which separate them from the past and not to the resemblances which connect them
with it. … the most casual reader dipping into the poetry, into fiction, into biography, can hardly
fail to be impressed by the courage, the sincerity, in a word, by the widespread originality of our
time” (Woolf, The Common Reader).

Chris Baldick in his Introduction to the Oxford English Literary History Volume 10, points out
how Woolf is emphasising here, a fact of central significance for her and her contemporaries, of

3
living and writing in a world radically different from the Victorian world of the previous
generation. Thus, the tendency to break away from tradition and established literary practices,
were very important to the modernist project.

However, even while celebrating the incredible originality of the modernist writers, it is also
important to have an “awareness of the mainstream from which they diverged” (Baldick 3).
Here, Baldick reminds us that there were several continuities from the previous period into the
early twentieth century, which cannot be ignored. Such continuities can be traced from the social
and cultural life of late Victorian England, into the Edwardian period and even later.

To truly appreciate early twentieth century British literature and the modernist achievement, we
need to understand both the continuities as well as the originality of this literature. In this Unit,
we therefore attempt to contextualise the work of early twentieth century British novelists in the
complex social and cultural contexts in which they were written. This discussion will be helpful
in understanding not only the novels in our course of study, but also early twentieth century
British writing in other genres as well.

5.2 BRITAIN IN THE EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURY

On the whole, the early decades of the century, was, for Britain, a period of great changes and
transformations – this was especially true in the case of scientific knowledge and technology.
These changes may be summed up thus:
“Taking us from the steam age to the nuclear age, the first forty years of the twentieth century,
saw both the consolidation of a century-and-a half’s industrial growth and development, and a
decisive transition towards the now familiar modernity of our own technologically advanced,
mass-democratic, and mass consumerist society” (Poplawski 470).

The above assessment shows how these years marked the beginnings of the twentieth century
world as we know it, characterized by technological advancement, mass democracy and
consumerism.

Activity

Before we proceed to take a look at the political, social and cultural contexts in which
early twentieth century British literary texts were written, take a moment to consider what
in your opinion, are the factors that mark out and distinguish the early twentieth century
world from that of the previous century, and write them down.

5.2.1 Political Conditions in early twentieth century Britain:

Scholars like Michael Levenson point out that ‘crisis’ is the central term to describe this
turbulent cultural period. It was obvious quite early in the century, that the twentieth century
would be “the epoch of crises, real and manufactured, physical and metaphysical, material and

4
symbolic. The catastrophe of the First World War, and before that the labour struggles, the
emergence of feminism, the race for empire, these inescapable forces of turbulent social
modernisation were not simply looming on the outside as the destabilising context of cultural
Modernism; they penetrated the interior of artistic invention” (Levenson, Cambridge Companion
to Modernism, 4).

Thus quite early in the century, it was clear that it would be a century marked by crises of all
sorts. The various labour strikes and struggles, the World War, the competition for colonial
supremacy etc. in the early decades of the century, brought about a sense of conflict and crisis,
which, as pointed out above, influenced artistic creativity of the time.

5.2.1.1 The Edwardian Period

Queen Victoria died in 1901, bringing the grand Victorian age - a period marked by political
stability, imperial glory, and industrial and scientific achievements for Britain - to a close, and
was succeeded by her son Edward VII. The dawn of the twentieth century, thus coincided neatly
with the beginning of a new period, the Edwardian period, in British history. When Edward VII
died in 1910, George V came to the British throne, and reigned till his death in 1936. Though
Edward VII ruled only till 1910, the period from 1901 up to 1914, is generally referred to as the
Edwardian period. Ian Cawood remarks that though it is often spoken of as ‘a golden age of
peace and harmony’, before the disruption created by World War I from 1914 onwards, it was
actually a period of great turmoil (Cawood 14).

Paul Poplawski in his study of the contexts of English literature, notes the “general continuities”
between the late Victorian and early Edwardian periods (479). In the political arena, says
Poplawski, there was an obvious continuity from the nineteenth century, since the Conservative
government continued in power in Britain, from 1895 to 1905. The main political issues and
debates of early twentieth century Britain, were the same as those of the late nineteenth century:
Irish Home Rule, female suffrage, unemployment, trade unionism, distribution of wealth and
income, and education. The continuous migration of people from villages into towns and cities,
created pressure on politicians to address problems related to urban planning, housing and health.
The agitations led by socialists, trade unionists and suffragettes, made labour rights and equality,
important items in the political agenda (Poplawski 480).

5.2.1.2 The beginnings of the Labour Party

In 1905, there was a change in the political temper of the British government, when the Liberal
party came to power, bringing a decade of Conservative rule to an end. The liberal Government
introduced several social reforms during the ten years that it remained in power (1905-1915),
which included, as the historian Ian Cawood points out, free school meals, free medical
treatment in schools, old age pensions and National Insurance, which were “the first crucial steps
towards establishing minimum standards of wealth and health in Britain” (Cawood 33).

Another important change was effected in the political equations in early twentieth century
Britain with the formation of the Labour party, which has been a major player in twentieth
century British party politics. “The Labour Party was born at the turn of the 20th century out of

5
the frustration of working-class people at their inability to field parliamentary candidates through
the Liberal Party, which at that time was the dominant social-reform party in Britain”
(Encyclopedia Britannica).

5.2.1.3 Irish Home rule

Tensions over the political freedom of Ireland had been continuing for several years between
England and Ireland, leading to much bitterness and animosity between the two nations, and also
formed a major topic of political debates and discussions of the period. You will find references
to this issue coming up in your study of the poetry of W. B. Yeats, later in this course.

Paul Poplawski explains how the British government presented a Home Rule Bill in Parliament
in April 1912, which was opposed, like earlier bills, by the Protestants of Ulster who resisted
attempts to include Ulster within the ‘home’ rule of the rest of Catholic Ireland. “The Irish
Nationalists under pressure from Sinn Fein … refused to support a government amendment
leaving Ulster out of the agreement…. At Easter 1916, Sinn Fein attempted a rebellion in Dublin.
This was suppressed after five days of fighting and the British then executed fifteen of the
leaders. This brutal act turned Irish opinion decisively in Sinn Fein’s favour – as the poet W.B.
Yeats suggested, all had now ‘utterly changed’, ‘A terrible beauty is born’(“Easter 1916”)”. In
1920 Ireland was partitioned into Ulster and the South, and finally in 1921, the Irish Free State
became a self governing dominion (486).

Activity

Read W. B. Yeats’s poem “Easter 1916” and write a critical

note on Yeats’s poetic response to the events of Easter 1916.

5.2.1.4 World War I

The first World War (1914 -1918) was the most cataclysmic event of the first three decades of
the twentieth century, in European history. It led to the death of millions of young soldiers,
destroyed entire towns and cities, and left permanent scars on the twentieth century psyche.
Numerous tensions and power struggles for supremacy among European nations, led up to the
war, which proved to be a painful experience for the entire world. World War 1 was such a
traumatic experience, that every art form, every literary genre responded to it, and reflected its
horrors.

The most agonising fallout was of course, the number of casualties. “The casualties suffered by
the participants in World War I dwarfed those of previous wars: some 8,500,000 soldiers died as
a result of wounds and/or disease. …War was increasingly mechanized from 1914 and produced
casualties even when nothing important was happening” (Encyclopedia Britannica). In addition
to the appalling loss of life, the War caused other hardships – Poplawski points out how many

6
families lost their breadwinners to the war, while food rationing, shortages and hardships, and
massive expansion in arms industries became common (Poplawski 488-9).

The psychological effects of the war were equally horrendous. Though the early months of the
war witnessed outpourings of nationalistic sentiments, patriotic fervour and idealism, soon these
gave way to a general sense of weariness, disillusion and disenchantment, and serious
misgivings about the whole purpose of ‘scientific advancement’ and ‘progress’. “Dark shadows
of horror, loneliness and sorrow, hovered over many of the survivors. It was hard to be as
optimistic about the future and the perfectibility of human nature in 1919 as it had been in 1913.
The writer George Orwell reflected, “Progress had finally ended in the biggest massacre in
history” (270).” (Ellis Wasson, History of Modern Britain)

World War 1 in a way effectively brought an end to the sense of optimism that was often pointed
out as characteristic of the Victorian outlook. “The First World War in particular represented a
shattering end to the nineteenth century’s optimistic faith in human progress, and there was a
permeating consciousness of the war as a defining reality for modern civilisation. As D. H.
Lawrence suggested in 1924, everywhere, it seemed, ‘the dead hand of the war lay like a corpse
decomposing’(St. Mawr, p 90). Although Lawrence was a non-combatant, his works are
symptomatic of that permeating consciousness, especially as it grappled with the moral and
spiritual implications of the underlying tendencies which had led to and supported the war and its
mass mechanised destruction (Poplawski 507-8).

Poplawski goes on to explain how modernist art represented the war through its fragmented
forms and its symbolism, pointing out T.S. Eliot’s The Waste Land (1922), as the classic
example of this (Poplawski 508-9). Almost all major writers of the period engaged with the
theme of war, some directly, others in more oblique ways. In the next unit, we will see how D.H.
Lawrence brings in the deadening effects of the War on the inner lives of people, in novels such
as Women in Love.

While the Modernist writers expressed the sense of disillusion and the general angst regarding
the dehumanising effects of war through the use of fragmentary language, images and symbols,
other writers, such as the group of ‘War Poets’ also registered their responses to the traumatic
experience: “Rupert Brooke caught the idealism of the opening months of the war (and died in
service); Siegfried Sassoon and Ivor Gurney caught the mounting anger and sense of waste as the
war continued; and Isaac Rosenberg (perhaps the most original of the war poets), Wilfred Owen,
and Edmund Blunden not only caught the comradely compassion of the trenches but also
addressed themselves to the larger moral perplexities raised by the war.” (Encyclopedia
Britannica)

Check Your Progress 1

1. Write a short note on the political conditions in early twentieth century Britain.
2. Discuss how World War 1 has been represented in early twentieth century British
literature.

7
5. 2. 2 The Social and Cultural Contexts

5. 2. 2.1 Economic changes

During most of the nineteenth century, Britain was an industrial powerhouse, and a rich and
powerful nation with control over the resources of a large empire. Historians of the period agree
that at the beginning of the twentieth century, Britain was at the peak of its imperial power and
economic might. According to Ellis Wasson, at the beginning of the twentieth century, Britain
“continued to prosper”. Access to abundant energy sources, expanding sources of raw materials
and markets in colonies, ensured growth. Industry became more productive and efficient, and a
commercial culture of entrepreneurship developed. (220) (History of Modern Britain: Ellis
Wasson). Ian Cawood, while noting that “Britain in 1900, was still the richest and most powerful
country in the world. Much of her wealth was based on the British empire, which made up
roughly a quarter of the earth’s surface” (Cawood 2), also adds that, this was also a period of
“unprecedented industrial unrest”, and witnessed several strikes by shipbuiders, dockers, railway
workers, and miners (Cawood 40).

5.2.2.2 Women’s rights

The early years of the twentieth century were significant for the movements for women’s rights,
especially for voting rights. The figure of the ‘New Woman’ who defied socially accepted
constructs of gender roles, and had gained much prominence during the later years of the
nineteenth century. The 1870 Education Act had made elementary education accessible to large
sections of society.

Ian notes how both middle class and upper class women benefitted from expansion in
educational provision; working class girls usually learnt cooking, needlework etc. which would
prepare them for domestic service, while some middle class girls studied subjects like
Mathematics and Science, and went on to university. Working class girls usually found low paid
unskilled work, such as domestic service, while nursing, teaching etc. were opening up new
opportunities for middle class women. Women had some voting rights in local elections, but
were still demanding the right to vote in the national elections, at the beginning of the century
(Cawood 8).

Though women taxpayers won the right to vote in municipal elections during the later
nineteenth century, and later to sit on county and city councils, they were still denied the right to
vote in national parliamentary elections . Millicent Garrett Fawcett and Emmeline Pankhurst
were the prominent leaders of the movement for women’s suffrage. According to the
Encyclopedia Britannica, “Many suffragists became involved in increasingly violent actions as
time went on. These women militants, or suffragettes, as they were known, were sent to prison
and continued their protests there by engaging in hunger strikes….When World War I began, the
shifted their energies to aiding the war effort, and their effectiveness did much to win the public
wholeheartedly to the cause of woman suffrage. The need for the enfranchisement of women was
finally recognized by most members of Parliament from all three major parties, and the
resulting Representation of the People Act was passed by the House of Commons in June 1917

8
and by the House of Lords in February, 1918. Under this act, all women age 30 or over received
the complete franchise” (Encyclopedia Britannica).

Perhaps one of the most enduring statements of resistance to patriarchal cultural values during
the early twentieth century, was Virginia Woolf’s essay “A Room of one’s Own” (1929). The
character of the ‘New woman’ was a common one in early twentieth century literature. In D. H.
Lawrence’s novel Sons and Lovers, the character Clara is a suffragette, and there are some
references in the novel to the women’s movement. Ursula Brangwen in Lawrence’s novel The
Rainbow, is a ‘New Woman’ who seeks to be independent and enters the world of work as a
school teacher.

Check your progress 2

Discuss how early twentieth century British literature has engaged with the issue of women’s
rights and the women’s movement.

5.3 INTELLECTUAL CONTEXTS:

As Fiona Becket observes, “Many radical positions within modernism are derived from
revolutionary thinkers, chief among them, Friedrich Nietzsche, Karl Marx and Sigmund Freud,
iconoclasts and innovators whose work encouraged a revaluation of social, political and personal
‘certainties’” (14). In an article on ‘Intellectual Currents’ in the Routledge Encyclopedia of
Modernism (https://www.rem.routledge.com), Vincent Pecora, notes the iconoclastic character
of the intellectual culture of the early twentieth century. Pecora also identifies a certain violent
quality in the intellectual character of the period.
Colonial atrocities, political revolution, a massive war, economic disasters — “all contributed to
a sense, registered by some major works of modernist art, that (in W.B. Yeats’s famous words)
“the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.” Even if many did not share
T.S. Eliot’s subsequent verdict that culture in the twentieth century had become a Waste Land,
…his sense that the period represented wholesale decay, could not be ignored even by the
optimists.”

Having identified violence and anarchy as major elements marking the life of this period,
Pecora goes on to identify its positive achievements: the significant achievements included the
discovery of the germ theory of disease, ‘perhaps the single most significant public health event
in history’; discoveries in astronomy and physics that ‘radically altered the perception of space,
time, motion, matter, and the universe itself’; and studies in the origins of civilization which
demonstrated the similarities between that so-called primitive, myth-oriented societies and
modern, scientific societies. Again, Freud’s theories of the human psyche and his elaboration of
the unconscious mind led to a new understanding of emotions. Karl Marx’s predictions and
Nietzsche’s radical ideas “turned the entire Western moral tradition upside down” (Pecora,
Vincent, “Intellectual Currents” Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism). Thus many scholars
have identified Freud, Nietzsche and Marx as some of the key intellectual influences of the time.

9
Sigmund Freud
Source of image:www.flicker.com

One figure who dominated intellectual discourse of the early twentieth century was Sigmund
Freud, “the great theorist of the enigmas of the human mind and founder of psychoanalysis”(13,
Elliot, Anthony, Psychoanalytic Theory: an Introduction). Through his writings such as Studies
in Hysteria (1895) The Interpretation of Dreams (1900)The Ego and the Id (1923) Beyond the
Pleasure Principle (1923), and his lectures, he expressed ideas that would radically alter the
understanding of the workings of the human mind and deeply influence twentieth century
theories of social and cultural behaviour. Freud’s pathbreaking ideas included his study of the
‘unconscious’, of ‘repression’, and his interpretations of dreams. The Oxford Companion to
English Literature notes how many of his concepts have become universally familiar in a
simplified form, eg. the Oedipus complex, the death wish, the family romance, and the
formulation of the division between the ‘Id, the Ego and the Superego’(369).

Freud’s ideas had a profound impact on literary studies as well as social and critical theory. “The
result of Freud’s work on dreams, … was to heighten awareness among modernist authors of the
importance of unconscious over conscious mental processes … Many of the new techniques
developed by later modernist writers were attempts to articulate the power, both creative and
disruptive, of the unconscious. Lawrence’s development as a major writer is inseparably bound
up with his attempt to integrate what he had gathered of psychoanalysis with wider traditions of
romantic creativity. The new prose of The Rainbow (1915), and Women in Love (1920), like the
stream of consciousness techniques of Joyce and Woolfe, and the symbolist methods of Eliot and
Pound, were attempts to utter an unconscious which had been defined in part by Freud”
(Poplawski, Encycl of Literary Modernism 335)

Early twentieth century intellectual discourse was profoundly influenced by another European
thinker, the German philosopher Nietzsche (1844 -1900). Nietzsche’s first book The Birth of
Tragedy (1872), focused on the tragic tradition in Greek classical culture, and in his work Thus
Spake Zarathushtra, Nietzsche made his famous pronouncement that “God is dead.” According
to Vincent Pecora, “Nietzsche turned the entire Western moral tradition upside down. … Like
Marx’s, Nietzsche’s ideas percolate throughout the era” (Routledge Encyclopedia of
Modernism). The Oxford Companion to English Literature also notes that through his ideas
such as the affirmation of the ‘Superman’, the rejection of Christian morality, the doctrine of

10
power, and the ‘revision of all values’, Nietzsche. challenged the accepted tradition of classical
scholarship (699).

Another major influence on the intellectual life of the early twentieth century was James Frazer
(1854 -1941) regarded as one of the founders of modern anthropology, author of The Golden
Bough (1890) and Totemism and Exogamy (1910). The Golden Bough was “a vast and
enterprising comparative study of the beliefs and institutions of mankind, offering the thesis that
man progresses from magical to religious to scientific thought. Its discussion of fertility rites, the
sacrificial killing of kings, the dying god, the scapegoat etc., and its analysis of the primitive
mind, caught the literary imagination, and its influence may perhaps be seen more lastingly in
the works of D. H. Lawrence, T. S. Eliot, Pound and others” (Oxford Companion to English
literature).

Check Your Progress 3

Discuss the radical influence of the writings of Freud and Nietzsche on the intellectual life of
early twentieth century Britain.

5.4 THE BRITISH NOVEL IN THE EARLY TWENTIETH

CENTURY

Statue of James Joyce in Dublin

Source: commons.wikimedia.org

The early twentieth century is generally associated with the modernist writings of James Joyce,
D. H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf. However, realistic fiction which could trace its roots to the
great nineteenth century realists, was flourishing simultaneously, though criticism has focused

11
more on the brilliant innovations of the modernists. The “great Victorian tradition of realistic
fiction, devoted to the study of ordinary lives, within carefully specified social environments,
survived vigorously into this period. Modernist fictional experiment has commanded more
critical attention, but the mainstream of the English novel still lay here, inheriting from George
Eliot and Thomas Hardy, conventions of realism and its emphases on local community and
social change” (Ox. Eng. Lit. history Vol 10,171). Arnold Bennett, Hugh Walpole, Mary Webb,
Eden Phillpotts, J. B. Priestley and John Galsworthy, are instances pointed out here. Modernist
novelists such as Dorothy Richardson, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and William Faulkner
introduced new forms of writing that radically altered the contours of the English novel in the
early twentieth century.

H. G. Wells, one of the most popular British novelists of the early twentieth century, remarked in
his novel Tono-Bungay (1909), that the ‘present colour and abundance’ of Britain was only
‘October foliage before the frosts nip down the leaves’. He was reminding his readers that
though everything looked colourful and bright at the moment, decay would soon set in. The early
twentieth century novel in general reflected such a sense of disillusion and disenchantment.
“On all sides though, the optimism and faith in progress that had characterised the Victorian
period had given way to something approaching a crisis of confidence – and it was a crisis that
through various forms of disillusioned critique, was given acute expression in much of the
literature of the period. Even as early as 1902, for example, the symbolic title and narrative of
Joseph Conrad’s modernist masterpiece, Heart of Darkness registered a growing sense of
malaise over Britain’s and Europe’s imperial adventures (Poplawski 483).

Check your progress 4

What were the major characteristics of British fiction written in the early twentieth century?
Write short notes on the works of any four British novelists of this period.

5.5 LET US SUM UP

In this unit, we have discussed the political, social and cultural conditions in Britain in the early
twentieth century. This discussion will help us to contextualise the writing of all the authors
whose work we will be studying in this course. In the next unit, we will discuss the writing of D.
H. Lawrence, one of the major writers of early twentieth century Britain.

5.6 GLOSSARY
1. suffragette: member of a womens’ organisation of the early twentieth century that fought
for women’s right to vote in public elections.
2. ‘The New Woman’: A phrase coined in the 1890s, to describe a new generation of
women who believed in women’s rights, educational opportunities for women etc.
3. Angst: a feeling of anguish, anxiety and dread.
4. Cataclysmic: a violent upheaval
5. Non-combatant: not actively involved in fighting the enemy

12
6. Malaise: sickness
7. Iconoclastic: attacking or breaking long-held beliefs and traditions
8. Constructs: ideas or conceptions
9. Oblique: indirect

References

Baldick, Chris. Oxford English Literary History Volume 10 (1910 -1940). OUP, 2004.
Becket, Fiona. D. H. Lawrence. Taylor and Francis, 2002.

Cawood, Ian. Britain in the Twentieth Century. Taylor and Francis, 2003.

Elliot, Anthony, Psychoanalytic Theory:an Introduction. Duke UP, 2002.

Encyclopedia Britannica. www.britannica.com

Levenson, M. Cambridge Companion to Modernism. CUP, 1999.

Oxford Companion to English literature. Margaret Drabble Ed. OUP, 1985.

Pecora, Vincent. ‘Intellectual Currents’ .Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism

(https://www.rem.routledge.com).

Poplawski, Paul. Ed. English Literature in Context. CUP, 2017.

Ellis Wasson, History of Modern Britain. John Wiley and Sons, 2016.

Woolf, Virginia. The Common Reader.

13
Unit 6 D. H. Lawrence and the British Novel
6.0 Objectives
6.1 Introduction
6.2 D. H. Lawrence: a Brief Biographical Sketch
6.3 Early Novels
6.4 Later Novels
6.5 Other Writings (Poetry, Stories, Plays, Travel Books and Essays)
6.6 Lawrence and environmentalism
6.7 Criticism of Lawrence
6.8 Let us sum up
6.9 References
6.10 Glossary

6.0 OBJECTIVES:
After studying this Unit, you should be able to:

1. Critically analyse D. H. Lawrence’s achievement as a novelist

2. Contextualise the writing of D. H. Lawrence in early twentieth century British literature
3. Contextualise Sons and Lovers within the corpus of Lawrence’s fiction

6.1 INTRODUCTION
In Block 1 of this course, we discussed various aspects of the Modernist movement. In the
previous unit, (Unit 5, which is the first Unit of Block 2) we looked at the political, social and
cultural contexts of early twentieth century British literature. In Unit 6, we introduce you to the
writing of D. H. Lawrence, one of the most powerful British novelists of the early twentieth
century. Lawrence wrote novels, short stories, plays, essays and poems – all of which have
attracted critical acclaim; however, in this unit, we will be focusing on his work as a novelist, so
that we are equipped to read and analyse the novel Sons and Lovers in the next two units.

D. H. Lawrence, says Fiona Becket, was “one of the most prolific of the English writers to
dominate the high period of literary modernism even whilst he appeared to inhabit its margins,
an intellectual who was deeply suspicious of the mental life, and an important critic of his
culture. His legacy is a vast corpus of work in practically every major literary genre, he also
painted. Lawrence was one of England’s most controversial figures” (Becket,1). This assessment
by Fiona Becket touches upon the various aspects of Lawrence’s creative endeavours and his
unusual mastery of an entire range of literary genres; we learn that Lawrence was a major figure
of the modernist movement and that he produced a huge body of writing in various genres. We
also learn that many of his writings created controversies when first published.

Lawrence was one of the earliest British novelists to write convincingly about working class life.
His novels capture the transitions in contemporary British society – the tensions between classes,

14
the movement for women’s rights, the upheaval caused by industrialisation, which is why F. R.
Leavis remarks that “as social historian, Lawrence, among novelists, is unsurpassed” (D. H.
Lawrence: Novelist,173,). At the same time, Lawrence’s writing is deeply involved with the
inner lives of people, and plumbs the depths of the workings of the conscious and unconscious
mind. Lawrence was a champion of the instinctual life, and as Fiona Becket says in the passage
quoted above, suspicious of the life of the intellect. His writings also reveal a strong sense of the
ecological interconnectedness of human life and culture with the natural world, and is now
celebrated for its ecological vision.

6.2 D. H. LAWRENCE: A BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

David Herbert Lawrence was born on 11th September, 1885, in Eastwood, a mining village near
Nottingham, as the son of Arthur Lawrence, a miner at the local Brinsley Colliery, and Lydia
Lawrence. We will go into some of the details of his early life, since they will be of interest
while studying Sons and Lovers. This novel, like much of his early writing, draws upon his own
early life in the East Midlands, growing up as a miner’s son in a colliery village that was being
transformed completely by industrialization. Arthur Lawrence and his wife had very different
educational levels and social aspirations and Lawrence grew up in a family where the relations
between the parents were strained. Andrew Harrison in The Life of D. H. Lawrence, notes how
Lydia Lawrence never felt herself to be part of the colliers’ community, and tried to stay aloof
from it. “Lydia’s sense of identity was invested in a determined resistance to the outlook and
values of her working-class neighbours” and “with her interest in religious and intellectual
matters, insisted on looking above and beyond Eastwood for her fulfilment, fully intending to lift
her children out of their present circumstances. Lawrence grew up then in a family riven by
profound divisions … speaking received pronunciation inside the house and the less respectable
dialect outside it”(Harrison, 2016: 4-6).

15
D.H. Lawrence’s birthplace at Victoria Street, Eastwood. (Source of image:
commons.wikimedia.org)

After attending Beauvale Board School as a child, Lawrence won a prestigious Nottinghamshire
County Council scholarship to Nottingham High School in 1898 – “an extraordinary
achievement for the son of an Eastwood miner” (Harrison, 2016:7). Lydia Lawrence was
continuously goading her children to ‘get on’ and move into more ‘respectable’ stations in life.
The family’s move from a small terraced house with a large shop window in Victoria Street,
Eastwood, to a larger house in ‘The Breach’ with a garden, to a house in Walker street with a
view of the valley below, and finally to Lynn Croft on the hill top, represented the improvement
in the family’s fortunes.

Lawrence’s religious and moral education was received from “the large Congregationalist
community of Eastwood which by all means reproduced and re-inforced his mother’s values of
education, self-improvement and self-discipline” (Becket, 10). The Chapel at Eastwood was in
fact “one of the central influences on the development of Lawrence’s early intellectual life”
(Harrison, 2016, 8). The Mechanics’ Institute Library in Eastwood provided books and other
reading material for the young Lawrence. “The boy Lawrence was, by all accounts, hungry for
knowledge and his predilection for reading and nature study, combined with his formal
schooling, gave him a sound foundation. His youth seems to have been characterised by
bookishness and an intense interest in the arts” (Becket, 10).

His childhood friend Jessie Chambers (on whom the character of Miriam in Sons and Lovers is
based) shared his passion for books and imaginative literature. Together, they read novels by
Walter Scott, Fennimoore Cooper, R. L. Stevenson, George Eliot, and Dickens, and discussed
the poetry of Blake, Longfellow, Tennyson and Swinburne. Historical romance and adventure

16
feature strongly in Lawrence’s reading at this time and this was probably responsible for the
“powerful, often overlooked romance elements in his early poetry and prose fiction” (Harrison,
2016, 11 -12).

Lawrence began work as a pupil-teacher at the British School in Eastwood in 1902. Later, in
1906, he joined University College, Nottingham, to study for a Teacher’s Certificate. In 1908,
Lawrence took up a job as a teacher in Croydon, near London. However, the strain of a full-time
teaching job, combined with the stress of his literary pursuits, had serious effects on his health
and he was forced to give up teaching. From that time, his main source of income came from
writing: “He supported himself thereafter by writing… From his earliest years till his last days,
Lawrence wrote” (Becket 5).Lawrence met Frieda Weekley in 1912. Frieda was married at the
time to Ernest Weekley, Professor at Nottingham University, and had three young children. She
left her husband and children to live with Lawrence. They left England together and went to
Europe - “for Lawrence it was in many ways, a leap into the unknown” (Harrison, 2016, 76).
Lawrence and Frieda travelled to and lived in different parts of Europe, Australia, and America,
until Lawrence’s death in 1930 at Vence, in France on 2nd March, 1930.

(Sources for the section ‘D. H. Lawrence: a brief biographical sketch’:

John Worthen: “Biography of D. H. Lawrence” (1997) (www.nottingham.ac.uk):
Andrew Harrison: The Life of D.H. Lawrence (2016) and Fiona Becket: D .H. Lawrence (2002))

Brinsley colliery near Eastwood, where Arthur Lawrence worked as a miner

17
Check your progress 1
After reading Sons and Lovers, discuss the autobiographical elements in that novel with
reference to the details about Lawrence’s life given in the above section.

6.3 EARLY NOVELS

Lawrence’s earliest writings were poems. John Worthen in his short biography of the writer,
points out that Lawrence wrote his earliest poetry in 1905; “he began writing with a strong sense
of the oddity of his ambition. "What will the others say? That I'm a fool. A collier's son a poet!"
he remarked, scathingly, to Jessie Chambers” (Worthen,1997). Lawrence was aware that in the
class-conscious society of early twentieth century Britain, the literary efforts of a writer from a
working class background, were likely to be ignored.

His friend Jessie Chambers who greatly admired his work sent some of his poems to Ford Madox
Hueffer, an influential editor. Hueffer was impressed with Lawrence’s writing and published it
in The English Review, and this brought Lawrence in touch with the London intellectual circles.
He soon began his first novel Laetitia, the novel which was later published as The White
Peacock. It was Hueffer who encouraged Lawrence to write about his own region and the mining
community with which he was familiar. Lawrence’s plays A Collier's Friday Night, The
Widowing of Mrs. Holroyd and the short story "Odour of Chrysanthemums" were written at this
time.

The East Midlands landscape that inspired most of Lawrence’s early writing

18
Lawrence’s first novel was The White Peacock published in 1911. Like much of his early
writing, it is set in the East Midlands region. Fiona Becket points out how this early novel - the
only Lawrence novel with a first person narrator, (Cyril Beardsall), shares the preoccupations of
the more critically acclaimed later novels, and set the standard for later fiction, with its
preoccupation with relationships. “It is his particular treatment of these themes developed in
considerable detail in The White Peacock, which establishes Lawrence’s differences from his
literary predecessors, and his modernity” (35-41). Lawrence’s next novel The Saga of Siegmund,
later given the title The Trespasser, was completed in 1910 and published in 1912. As Becket
points out, though Lawrence himself later saw this novel as juvenile, it has ideas relevant to his
later work. The novel, which draws heavily on the life of his friend Helen Corke, writes a
romance, while critiquing romantic love (Becket 42) Lawrence published Sons and Lovers, his
third novel, and the one which firmly established his literary reputation, in 1913. We will be
discussing this novel in detail in the next two Units.

In 1913, Lawrence started writing The Sisters, which later became two separate novels, The
Rainbow and Women in Love; the former novel was completed before World War I and the
latter, during the War. Many of Lawrence’s novels were controversial when first published,
perhaps the case of his last novel Lady Chatterley’s Lover is the best known. The Rainbow was
suppressed soon after publication following allegations of ‘obscenity’ and its publisher
‘Methuen’ was prosecuted.

The Rainbow (1915), like most of the earlier writings, including Sons and Lovers, engages with
the East Midlands, though on very different terms. The novel is placed or located mostly within
the East Midlands, with brief shifts to other places in England and the continent. The first
paragraph locates the first cycle of the novel ‘in the meadows where ‘the Erewash twisted
sluggishly through alder trees, separating Derbyshire from Nottinghamshire’ (The Rainbow: 9).
The novel follows the lives of different generations of the Brangwen family, who had
traditionally farmed the marshy land between Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire. The Rainbow
deals with some of the central developments in the intellectual, social and economic history of
the nineteenth century. F. R. Leavis took note of what he called the ‘historical depth’ of The
Rainbow, and expressed the view that as social historian, Lawrence is unsurpassed (Leavis 173).

One of the most notable aspects of the novel is the introduction of the character of Ursula
Brangwen, the ‘new woman’. Fiona Becket considers The Rainbow to be Lawrence’s “first
properly modernist novel”, and praises it for employing a “radically new language”,” and for the
ways in which Lawrence represented characters. The novel also shows Lawrence’s developing
interest in the ‘unconscious’(Becket 49-56).

19
Cossall church near Eastwood, which figures as Cossethay church in The Rainbow

Women in Love (1920) was also a revised version of a part of The Sisters. Lawrence wrote in the
foreword that this novel “took its final shape in the midst of the period of war, though it did not
concern the war itself.” Women in Love carries forward the story of Ursula Brangwen from The
Rainbow. Ursula, who has a relationship with Rupert Birkin, and her sister Gudrun, who is
involved in a relationship with Gerald Crich, are the “women in love”.

The novel shifts from the Midlands landscape to London and the Continent, “to depict many
facets of a dying culture… Against a background of actual and symbolic landscapes, he
establishes the complex personal lives of his characters and the psychodramas which play out
between them… Women in Love is a novel underpinned by violence” (Becket, 57). The novel
depicts, says Becket, “the end of culture… and the psychical and spiritual breakdown in
individuals which accompanies it” and “is a powerful document of British modernism”(65).

Paul Poplawski also considers Women in Love to be Lawrence’s “outstanding modernist novel”,
which clearly reflects the pressures created by war on individuals and society. The novel conveys
this through its ‘fractured, episodic structure, its sudden outbursts of violence’, and its ‘language
of emotional and sexual conflict’. The novel does not contain any explicit reference to the war,
since Lawrence’s aim in this novel, was not to record the external circumstances of war, but
rather to analyse its ‘internal’ consequences for the individual and society( Poplawski 508-
9).This is therefore a novel that clearly depicts the psychological damage inflicted by the World
War on contemporary society.

20
Source: commons.wikimedia.org

6.4 LATER NOVELS

Among Lawrence’s later novels, The Lost Girl (1920) again returns to the East Midlands
landscape and tells the story of Alvina Houghton, her life in Woodhouse (a fictional village
based on Eastwood), and her journey to Italy. Lawrence’s next novel Mr. Noon, which was
unfinished, also begins in a Midlands setting. As pointed out by Fiona Becket, Aaron’s Rod,
which Lawrence completed in 1921, challenges the focus on relationships between men and
women in earlier novels such as The Rainbow and Women in Love, and shifts the focus to the
solitary male and ‘singleness’. Aaron’s Rod is his first attempt at a political novel, and through
the character Aaron Sisson, this novel expresses Lawrence’s rejection of marriage (66-67).
Aarons Rod (1922), Kangaroo (1923) and The Plumed Serpent (1926), form a group of novels
focused on the leadership theme.

Lawrence wrote Kangaroo and The Boy in the Bush after his visit to Australia in 1922. Through
the character of Benjamin Cooley (nicknamed ‘Kangaroo’), the leader of a right-wing group
called the ‘Diggers’, the novel Kangaroo explores ideas of political power, democratic ideals and
manliness. In a Chapter of Kangaroo entitled ‘The Nightmare’, Lawrence writes: ‘It was in
1915, the old world ended. In the winter of 1915-16, the spirit of the old London collapsed, the
city in some way perished, perished from being a heart of the world, and became a vortex of
broken passions, lusts, hopes, fears and horrors”. According to Poplawski, this passage reflects
Lawrence’s view that the World War brought about ‘a fundamental debasement of humanity’
and represents ‘how human relationships had internalised the conditions of war-torn modernity’
(Poplawski 507-8). Thus, this novel not only interrogates the leadership theme, but also
expresses Lawrence’s reflections on the effects of the World War on the inner lives of people.

The Boy in the Bush (1924), is a revision of an earlier novel The House of Ellis by the Western
Australian writer Mollie Skinner. Skinner wrote The House of Ellis partly based on the life of her
brother Jack Skinner (who becomes the protagonist Jack Grant in the novel). The novel is set in
the 1880s, which was a late period in the settlement history of Western Australia. In his revision
of Mollie Skinner’s novel, Lawrence focused on the psychological development of Jack Grant.
The psychological possibilities offered by Skinner’s Jack Grant are worked out, against the
character’s journey into the Australian bush.

21
The Plumed Serpent (1926) reflects Lawrence’s interest in primitivism; the novel focuses on an
Irishwoman Kate Leslie and her involvement in the revival of a Meso-American Quetzalcoatl
cult. Fiona Becket sees this novel as part of Lawrence’s search for “an alternative, a more
impersonal, unconscious mode of being in his evocation of a pre-Columbian culture.” (75).
Commenting on the novels of the early 1920s, Neil Roberts says that this was a period in which
Lawrence was constantly travelling, and that all the work that he produced then, “is profoundly
marked … by the narrative motif of the journey”. In novels like Women in Love, Aaron’s Rod,
Kangaroo and The Plumed Serpent, the influence of the travelling protagonist is vital, as
compared to novels like Sons and Lovers and The Rainbow, which are more or less confined to a
region (130-131). Lawrence’s last novel, and perhaps his most controversial, Lady Chatterley’s
Lover (1928), based on the relationships between Lady Constance Chatterley and the
gamekeeper Mellors, once again goes back to the English East Midlands. The novel was banned
in England and America, and the full text published in England, only thirty years after his death
(in 1960) after a long trial.

Check your progress 2

Write a note on Lawrence’s later novels, discussing how they differ from the early novels.

6.5 OTHER WRITINGS (POETRY, STORIES, PLAYS,

TRAVEL BOOKS AND ESSAYS)
Lawrence’s poetry collections include Look! We have come through! (1917), New Poems (1918),
Tortoises (1921), Birds, Beasts and Flowers (1923), Pansies (1929), and Last Poems (1932)
published posthumously. Helen Sword remarks that “although he is remembered and celebrated
today primarily as a novelist and a short story writer, Lawrence first saw publication as a poet,
wrote poetry throughout most of his life, and granted a privileged status to poetic language and
vision” (Sword, 119).

Lawrence’s novellas include The Captain’s Doll (1923), The Fox (1923), The Ladybird (1923)
St.Mawr (1925), The Princess (1925) and The Man who Died (1929). Lawrence wrote several
short stories, collected in volumes such as The Prussian Officer and other Stories (1914);
England, my England (1922), and The Woman who Rode Away (1925). Coroneus and Tate
observe that “Lawrence wrote more than sixty tales…The remarkable achievement of this body
of writing is often overshadowed by Lawrence’s novels” (Coroneus and Tate, 103).

Lawrence wrote several essays collected in volumes such as Study of Thomas Hardy (written in
1914), Reflections on the Death of a Porcupine and Other Essays (1925); Psychoanalysis and
the Unconscious (1921); Fantasia of the Unconscious (1922); and Studies in Classic American
literature. Lawrence is also acknowledged to be one of the outstanding travel writers of the
twentieth century. His travel writings are collected in volumes such as Twilight in Italy (1916);
Sea and Sardinia (1921) Mornings in Mexico (1927) and Sketches of Etruscan Places (1932).
Lawrence’s plays include A Collier’s Friday Night, The Widowing of Mrs. Holroyd, The
Daughter-in-law; The Fight for Barbara, and The Married Man.

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6.6 LAWRENCE AND ENVIRONMENTALISM
Lawrence is acknowledged to have had a deep and intuitive sense of ‘place’, which is evident in
almost all his writing. John Worthen points out how the places where people work and live are
significant in the reading of Lawrence’s work. Lawrence is the first writer to use the phrase
‘spirit of place’, suggests Worthen, and considers how his usage differs from the use of the term
‘genius loci’ by his predecessors (1997: 28 -32). According to eco-critics, Lawrence’s sense of
place and of the natural environment, reveal his awareness of the ecological interconnectedness
of human beings with non-human life. Del Ivan Janik remarks that Lawrence ‘saw man as part of
an organic universe… In this sense he stands at the beginning of the modern post-humanist
tradition and of the literature of environmental consciousness’ (Janik, quoted in Garrard 89-90).

6.7 CRITICISM OF D. H. LAWRENCE:

Some of the earliest criticism of Lawrence’s novels appeared immediately after his death. These
included Son of Woman (1931) by John Middleton Murry; Savage Pilgrimage (1932) by
Catherine Carswell (1932); and D. H. Lawrence: a Personal Record (1935) by Jessie Chambers.
Lawrence is a writer whose literary reputation has fluctuated over the years, often going from
one extreme to another. In the 1930s, he was attacked by T. S. Eliot, the most influential critic of
the time. In his study After Strange Gods (1934), Eliot stated that “Lawrence started life wholly
free from any restriction of tradition or institution … and suffered from a lack of intellectual and
social training.”

Eliot’s arguments were countered by the legendary Cambridge critic F. R. Leavis. Leavis says,
“as social historian, Lawrence, among novelists, is unsurpassed. Actually, he is in the strict
sense, incomparable”, and argues that the two novels Women in Love and The Rainbow, would
by themselves have been enough to place Lawrence among the greatest English writers (D. H.
Lawrence: Novelist,173). Leavis also argued that Lawrence continued the ‘Great Tradition’ of
the English novel, in which he had originally included Jane Austen, George Eliot, and Joseph
Conrad.

Another important study in the 1950s was Mark Spilka’s The Love Ethic of D.H. Lawrence
(1955). As Peter Widdowson points out, much of the critical writing on Lawrence up to the
early seventies, is celebratory, either following Leavis’s view of Lawrence as the modern
continuator of the English ‘great tradition’ or viewing him “as a radical mystic or visionary”,
rebelliously challenging the conventions of bourgeois society (Widdowson 4). We will be
touching upon some of the theoretical critical readings of Lawrence’s novel Sons and Lovers in
Unit 8.

Check your progress 3

1. How did F.R. Leavis critically assess D. H. Lawrence as a novelist?

2. Write an essay on D. H. Lawrence as a modernist novelist.

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6.8 SUMMING UP
In this unit, we have discussed the most important details regarding the life and work of D. H.
Lawrence. We also got an idea about his work in different genres and some of the critical
writings about his work. In the next two units, we will discuss his novel Sons and Lovers in
detail.

6.9 REFERENCES
Becket, Fiona. D. H. Lawrence. Taylor and Francis, 2002.

Con Coroneus and Trudy Tate. “Lawrence’s Tales”. Cambridge Companion to D. H. Lawrence.
2001

Eliot, T. S. After Strange Gods, Faber and Faber,1934.

Garrard, Greg. Ecocriticism. London: Routledge, 2007

Harrison, Andrew. The Life of D.H. Lawrence. Blackwell, 2016

Leavis, F.R. D.H. Lawrence: Novelist. Penguin, 1994.

Poplawski, Paul. Ed. English Literature in Context. CUP, 2017.

Roberts, Neil. “The Novelist as Travel Writer: The Plumed Serpent”, DHLR 25. 1993-94.
Sword, Helen. “Lawrence’s Poetry”. Cambridge Companion to D. H. Lawrence. 2001.

Widdowson, Peter. D. H. Lawrence. Longman, 1992.

Worthen, John. “Extended Biography of D. H. Lawrence”. (www.nottingham.ac.uk)

Worthen, John. 1997. “The Spirit of Place: a Redefinition.” Bratislava, Narodne literarne
centrum, 1997

6.10 GLOSSARY
Oddity: being different from the usual or expected
Juvenile: immature
Vortex: something that resembles a whirlpool
bourgeois: middle class, conservative, supporting established values.

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UNIT 7 SONS AND LOVERS: AN INTRODUCTION
7.0: Objectives
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Sons and Lovers: the major concerns
7.3 From Paul Morel to Sons and Lovers: the development of the novel
7.4 Sons and Lovers: the structure of the novel
7.5 Let us sum up
7.6 Glossary
7.7 References

7.0 OBJECTIVES
After studying this Unit, you should be able to

Write a critical summary of the novel Sons and Lovers

Critically analyse the major themes and concerns of the novel

Before proceeding to study this unit, you should read the entire novel.

7.1 INTRODUCTION
Sons and Lovers was Lawrence’s ’s first major achievement as a novelist. He himself considered
it his “first great book”. While critics often praise his later novels The Rainbow and Women in
Love as being his finest work, Sons and Lovers is probably the most popular of his novels. It is,
as Michael Black points out, “one of the most widely read of all English novels. It is usually the
first book by Lawrence that anyone reads; often the only one” (1). Other critics have expressed
similar views. Terry Eagleton, says, “Lawrence wrote novels much more original and ambitious
than Sons and Lovers, but he never achieved anything so superbly authentic, so magnificently
free of false notes” (The English Novel, 269). In this Unit, we will be taking a look at the
structure of the novel and some of its major concerns.

7.2 SONS AND LOVERS: THE MAJOR CONCERNS

Let us first consider the reasons behind the enduring popularity of the novel. During the century
following its publication, several generations of readers have found this novel interesting due to
its thematic and formal features. Sons and Lovers has a strong autobiographical element. Since
it is clearly set in the English East Midlands, it also falls into the category of the ‘regional
novel’. It is also one of the earliest English novels to focus on working class life, and it is
written by an author who was born into a working class family. The novel also spoke frankly and
openly about sexuality. Though Sons and Lovers falls within the great tradition of realist English
fiction, parts of the novel are also written in highly metaphorical language.

25
Thus we may say that the enduring popularity of Sons and Lovers may be attributed to factors
such as:“ its clear connections with Lawrence’s own early experiences; its success in writing the
East Midlands into the structure of the novel; its focus on the life of the working classes (a focus
that extended the frontiers of English fiction which had till then touched on working class
experience, only tentatively, if at all); its honest and frank attitude towards sexuality; its turn-of -
the -century character reflected in its participation in nineteenth and twentieth century traditions
of the novel; its critique of industrial capitalism, which acts as a powerful sub-text; and the
exploration of marriage across class barriers and the tensions within family relationships”
(Anandavalli, M. 88).

Check your progress 1

In your opinion, what are the reasons for the enduring popularity of Sons and Lovers?

7.3 FROM PAUL MOREL TO SONS AND LOVERS: THE

STORY OF THE NOVEL’S DEVELOPMENT
Sons and Lovers, published in 1913, was Lawrence’s third novel; the earlier ones were The
White Peacock (1911) and The Trespasser (1912). The writer Ford Madox Hueffer, who helped
to get his earliest work published, suggested that Lawrence should write realist fiction.
Accordingly, he began to work on a novel titled Paul Morel. Andrew Harrison points out how
Hueffer encouraged the young Lawrence, “to draw directly on his working class background in
his fiction, and particularly on Eastwood, and his knowledge of miners and the routines of a
mining community”. This novel which was based “on events in Lawrence’s own early life, and
on the lives of his friends and extended family”, was a “kind of provincial working-class fiction”
(Harrison, 2016, 40-51). His earlier two novels had been fairly romantic in style, but Lawrence
planned to adopt a more realist style in Paul Morel. Harrison notes how Lawrence wrote to his
friend, that unlike the earlier two novels, which were “consciously literary novels”, Paul Morel,
would be based on his actual background, and would be “a novel, not a florid prose poem”
(Harrison, 2007,7). Thus, in Sons and Lovers, Lawrence departed from his earlier romantic style
of fiction towards a realist style of writing – in fact, from 1909 onwards, Lawrence had been
writing plays and short stories in this style.

Lawrence took around two years writing and revising the novel. There were four drafts and in
the final draft, Lawrence changed the title to Sons and Lovers. This change of title was
significant; it meant that Lawrence wanted to bring a new focus to the novel. According to
Andrew Harrison, Lawrence changed the title to move “the emphasis away from his central
character and towards the timeless psychological dilemma his situation may be seen to embody”
(2007:10). We will be discussing this “psychological dilemma” in detail later, in the next unit.

When Lawrence submitted the manuscript to Duckworth publishers for publication, the editor
Edward Garnett, cut out several passages, and censored some of the references. These passages
were restored only in 1992, in the Cambridge University Press edition of the novel. (Harrison,
2007, 11). While many scholars criticize Garnett for reshaping an original creative work by one
of the greatest English novelists, we have to realise that Garnett was simply making the novel
acceptable for publication. Considering the literary tastes of the reading public, and the market

26
for fiction in the early twentieth century, credit should be given to Garnett’s decision; otherwise
the novel may not have been published at all.

7.4 SONS AND LOVERS: THE STRUCTURE OF THE NOVEL

The novel is written in two parts: Part 1has six chapters which describe the early married life of
the Morels, the birth and childhood of Paul Morel, the relationships and tensions within their
family, and the death of the eldest son William. Part 2 (nine chapters) focuses more on Paul’s
relationships with Miriam and Clara and the death of Mrs. Morel, which leaves Paul “derelict”.
Chapter 1 (“The Early Married Life of the Morels”), begins with the famous description of the
mining village of Bestwood (the fictional locality based on Lawrence’s own village of
Eastwood): “‘The Bottoms’ succeeded to ‘Hell Row’. Hell Row was a block of thatched, bulging
cottages that stood by the brook-side on Greenhill Lane. There lived the colliers who worked in
the little gin-pits two fields away” (Sons and Lovers 9)

The passage goes on to describe the “sudden change” that happened ‘some sixty years’ before
the action of the novel begins. Helen and Carl Baron in their Introduction to Sons and Lovers
point out that, in time and place, the novel spans the transition in the English Midlands from a
predominantly agricultural economy to an industrial one. They note that there is a combination
of a geographical survey and a historicist perspective in the opening pages of the novel (SL:
xvii). The tone of transition is implied in the very first sentence: ‘The Bottoms succeeded to
Hell Row’ (Sons and Lovers: 9) – which clearly suggests the transition of the cultural landscape
from rural-agricultural interspersed with small-scale industry to an industrial capitalist one.

This also leads to changes in the spatial lay-out of the town when the ‘thatched bulging cottages’
are replaced by ‘great quadrangles of dwellings’ (Sons and Lovers: 10). The geographical
survey and historical perspective that the Barons mention, are effected in this part of the novel by
the way it records changes in the cultural landscape of the region, and in the change of the place
through time. Throughout the opening paragraphs the sense of change in the cultural landscape
is constantly built up. (Anandavalli 90). The transition that so radically altered the cultural
landscape of Bestwood is built up through a series of contrasts. Hell Row with its thatched
bulging cottages clearly contrasts with the Bottoms and its great quadrangles of dwellings; the
little gin-pits are contrasted with the new mines; the gin-pits were worked with donkeys, while
the new mines depend on a fairly extensive system of railways. There is the implication that
mining on a small scale had been a traditional economic activity in the area for years without
interfering in the local ecosystem (hence the reference to the brook scarcely soiled by the little
gin-pits) and generally blending into the rural landscape, merely forming ‘queer mounds’ and
‘little black places’ (Sons and Lovers: 9). The “sudden change” has led to the little gin-pits
being elbowed aside by the large mines, completely altering the landscape which had known
hardly any change for years. The railway runs across the wooded countryside and the
cornfields, sharply emphasising the contrast between the old and the new. If the miners who
earlier worked the little gin-pits lived in little blocks of cottages scattered here and there in the
village, the regiments of miners who work in the new mines are housed in the huge blocks of
standardised company housing. Throughout this section, the contrast between the ‘little gin-
pits’ and the ‘large mines’ is suggested, along with the difference it means to the landscape and
the lives of the people.

27
The new cultural landscape, it is suggested, is entirely the creation of the commercial mining
company. The changing landscape reflects changing ideologies of economic production and
social organisation. The landscape that Lawrence writes about, is one that has been largely
created by the company, a landscape that has been altered to suit the projects of the most
powerful social groups. Lawrence, in a sense, rewrites the landscape by focusing on those
aspects that are significant in making the region what it was in the mid-nineteenth century. By
foregrounding the changes in the cultural landscape, Lawrence implies how this change is crucial
to the novel’s concerns. (Anandavalli, 91-95). Thus Sons and Lovers begins by focusing on the
place in which the novel is set (the mining village of Bestwood in Nottinghamshire) and the time
in which the action takes place (the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries). “The purpose
of the first Chapter is to establish the rich social context of life for the Morel family in the
mining village of Bestwood, Nottinghamshire.” (Harrison, 2007:18).

Lawrence’s family lived in this house in “The Breach” in Eastwood, for several years.
Often called “the Sons and Lovers house”, many details of this house are recreated in the
novel.

28
Very soon, the reader is introduced to the dynamics of the Morel family, which consists at the
beginning of the novel, of Walter Morel, an uneducated miner, his wife Gertrude Morel, who is
educated and had been brought up in a higher social class, and their two young children Annie
and William. Mrs. Morel’s dissatisfaction with her life in a colliery village as the life of an
ordinary miner, her alienation from the neighbourhood, and the uneasy relationships between her
and Walter Morel, become evident: “the novel reveals the causes of Mrs. Morel’s dissatisfaction
very gradually”, focusing on her interactions with her family, going back to her family
background and her first meeting and marriage with Walter (Harrison, 2007: 19).

The strained relationship between Walter Morel and his wife are built up through various scenes
of conflict: in one of these we see Walter cutting off the beautiful hair of their little son William,
which infuriates his wife and leads to a quarrel between them. In another well known scene of
the novel, Walter comes home drunk one night, and following a furious argument with his
pregnant wife, locks her out of the house. “Mrs. Morel, seared with passion, shivered to find
herself out there in a great, white light, that fell cold on her, and gave a shock to her inflamed
soul.… she went over the last scene, then over it again, certain phrases, certain moments, coming
each time, like a brand, red hot, down on her soul” (Sons and Lovers 33-34). The suffering of
Mrs. Morel and her unborn child, is relieved somewhat, by the moonlit garden and the scent of
the large white lilies in it.

The conflicts in the family are built up in the following chapters. Chapter 2 (“The Birth of Paul,
and Another Battle”), shows us the daily routine in the miner’s life, the daily drudgery in the
lives of the colliers’ wives, as well as the support they extended to each other in times of need.
Paul Morel, the third child is born. Already, Mrs. Morel dreams of what her children would
achieve, with her support and encouragement, since she herself “had no life of her own”.
Mrs. Morel prefers to socialise with the more educated clergyman Heaton, than with the colliers’
families. (48-49).

The conflicts within the family are built up further in this chapter. Morel gets close to a group of
miner friends, who “discussed the various degrees of subjection in which their wives were held.
Morel found his wife not sufficiently subdued” (Sons and Lovers 49). Morel’s attempts to
‘subdue’ his wife worsen his family relationships further: “And, by giving her as little money as
possible, by drinking much and going out with men who brutalised him and his idea of women,
he paid her back”(Sons and Lovers 49).Various incidents, such as the scene where Morel hurts
his wife by throwing a drawer at her, and the one in which he steals money from her, further
trouble the family environment. Morel takes recourse to drink whenever he is disturbed:
“Although his actions do greater damage to himself than to anyone else, still Morel refuses to
think clearly about his situation, preferring instead to escape to the public house with his
friends.” (Harrison, 2007:23). Already, in the early chapters of the novel, his older children
William and Annie are shown as having a deep sense of hatred towards their father.

29
The kitchen in the house at ‘The Breach’ where Lawrence spent his childhood. Many
details of the interior of this house are recreated in Sons and Lovers.

In Chapter 3 (“The Casting off of Morel, the Taking on of William”), Mrs. Morel is seen to
finally lose whatever little love she had left for her husband and turn her affections to her eldest
son, William. The Morels’ youngest child Arthur is born, who unlike the other children adores
their father at first, though in later Chapters he is also seen to despise Morel. William, handsome,
clever and athletic, is his mother’s pride. As soon as William is thirteen, his mother finds him a
clerical job; Walter wants William to go the mining pit with him, but Mrs. Morel refuses flatly.
Her energy is focused on getting her children to escape the mining life, find “respectable” jobs
and “move on”. With their mother’s constant encouragement, all the children do “move on” in
life: Annie studies to be a teacher, Paul takes lessons in French and German, and Arthur tries for
a scholarship. William eventually finds a well-paid position in London and leaves for the city.
Mrs. Morel is proud of him, but also apprehensive about some of his social engagements.

In the next Chapter “The Young Life of Paul”, with William gone to London, the focus of the
narrative shifts to Paul. As a young child he was close to his sister Annie; he also has a close
bond with his mother: “His soul seemed always attentive to her” (Sons and Lovers 82). Almost
unconsciously, he shares her dislike of Morel: “All the children, but particularly Paul, were
peculiarly against their father. Morel continued to bully and to drink” (Sons and Lovers 83).

30
Since their financial situation has improved a bit, the family moves to a better house on the brow
of a hill, with a beautiful view of the valley below. The life at home continues to have its
frequent disturbances and quarrels. In front of the house was a huge old ash tree, and the
shrieking sound of the tree reflects the discord in the family: “To Paul, it became almost a
demoniacal noise”( Sons and Lovers 84). The children are forever anxious about the trouble that
they feared might brew in the household. Mrs. Morel and the children avoid Morel most of the
time; except on rare occasions, when Morel was in a happy mood, and told his children stories
about life in the pit, “he was shut out from all family affairs. Nobody told him anything… He
was an outsider” (Sons and Lovers 87-88).

In the Chapter “Paul Launches into Life”, we see Paul as a fairly accomplished artist, who would
like to continue with his painting. He realises that would be impossible, since he has to start
earning, and painting is not likely to help him do that. Paul finds a job as clerk in a factory in
Nottingham, and his mother is extremely proud of him. The job itself is dull and dreary, and the
long work hours start to take their toll on Paul.

The Chapter “Death in the Family”, introduces Willey Farm, which Paul grows to love dearly,
and the Leivers family, to whom Paul becomes deeply attached. When Paul and his mother walk
to Willey Farm for the first time, to meet the Leivers family, Paul finds the change in the
landscape quite exhilarating, and contrasting with the dreary and ugly landscape of industrial
Bestwood. It is so different that it seems almost foreign: “Just like Canada” (Sons and Lovers
153). The contrast between the two landscapes – one wild, pristine and rural, and the other,
industrial and man-made - is clearly emphasised. At Willey farm, he meets Miriam Leivers, with
whom he develops a very close relationship later.

William brings home his fiancée Lyly to meet his family. She is a frivolous girl and Mrs. Morel
disapproves of her. This Chapter ends with the death of William, in London, which leaves the
entire family devastated. The Chapter brings part 1 of the novel to a close. Throughout part 1, the
theme of social mobility is developed: the family’s move from one house to a better one as their,
as their finances improve, represents their move upwards in the social hierarchy. We also learn
about Mrs. Morel’s determined efforts to give her children a good education and her resolution
that her sons will not become miners, but will move into a more respectable class. The growing
rift between Mrs. Morel and her husband, the children’s increasing hatred of their father, the
exclusion of Walter from the family affairs, Mrs. Morel’s close bond with William, and later
Paul, are all drawn in clear lines in this part of the novel.

“While part 1 dealt with the relationships between Mrs. Morel and her sons William and Paul,
part 2 concentrates on Paul’s relationships with Miriam Leivers and Clara Dawes.” (Harrison,
2007:30). In the Chapter “Lad and Girl Love”, the reader learns about Paul’s illness and that he
takes time off work to convalesce. Paul develops a strong bond with the Leivers’ family and with
the farm, joining occasionally in farming activities: “At mid-summer, he worked all through hay
harvest with them and then he loved them” (Sons and Lovers 181). Paul and Miriam share a love
of books and reading, and their discussions of fiction, poetry and authors, brings them closer.
Mrs. Morel fears that this relationship may harm Paul’s personal development and deeply resents
Paul’s love for Miriam.

31
In the Chapter “Strife in Love”, Paul’s relationship with Miriam is shown to be increasingly
troubled. Miriam, who is intensely religious begins to find Paul’s unorthodox religious views
difficult to accept. Paul begins to achieve more recognition for his artistic work.
In the Chapter “The Defeat of Miriam”, Paul suggests to Miriam that they should not continue
their relationship anymore. Miriam sees this as the consequence of the influence of his mother.
After drifting away from Miriam, Paul becomes friendly with Clara Dawes, a young woman who
has been separated from her husband. In the Chapter “Clara”, Paul becomes closely involved
with Clara and learns more about her unhappy marriage with Baxter Dawes. He comes to know
about Clara’s difficult circumstances and how she and her mother work for the lace industry,
earning very little for their labour. When Paul visits Clara in her squalid home in a Nottingham
suburb that is hardly better than a slum, he finds the little rooms of the home smothered in white
lace and cotton, and Paul realises that Clara lives a life of drudgery and poverty.

Later, he goes back to Miriam, only to eventually break off with her for good. This break with
Miriam, pleases his mother. Paul becomes more successful as an artist, and the financial
condition of the entire family improves. They can now afford a servant and an occasional
holiday. The Chapter “Passion”, focuses on Paul’s involvement with Clara and their passionate
relationship. The flooded river Trent becomes a powerful metaphor for their passion in this
Chapter. However, Paul is unable to continue a fulfilling relationship with either Miriam or
Clara, and expresses his despair to his mother: “You know mother, I think there must be
something the matter with me, that I can’t love….I feel sometimes as if I wronged my women,
mother.” (Sons and Lovers 395).

Baxter Dawes, Clara’s estranged husband attacks Paul and leaves him hurt. Paul is emotionally
troubled and does not wish to see either Clara or Miriam. Later, he comes to know that his
mother is seriously ill, and is devastated. Clara goes back to Baxter, since she feels she belongs
to him, and that Baxter genuinely needs her. With his mother’s death after a period of pain and
intense suffering, Paul faces an emotional void. He seems to have lost everything that he has
valued in his life, he is truly ‘derelict’, as denoted by the title of the final Chapter: “Everything
seemed to have gone smash for the young man. He could not paint. The picture he finished on
the day of his mother’s death – one that satisfied him – was the last thing he did. At work there
was no Clara. When he came home, he could not take up his brushes again. There was nothing
left” (Sons and Lovers 454).

At the end of the novel, Paul is lost and faced with a sense of great despondence, but with a great
effort tries to avoid the “darkness” of despair. The novel concludes with the famous lines: “But
no, he would not give in. Turning sharply, he walked towards the city’s gold phosphorescence.
… He would not take that direction, to the darkness, to follow her. He walked towards the faintly
humming, glowing town, quickly” (Sons and Lovers 464). Andrew Harrison remarks: “The
ending to the novel in which he walks determinedly towards the bright lights of Nottingham, is
an act of assertion in a phase of Paul’s life, when the strongest pull is towards death. These final
pages of the novel contain some of Lawrence’s most ambitious writing. … he is attempting to
describe a disturbed state of being in which the mind feels alienated from the world around it”
(2007,45).

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7.5 LET US SUM UP
In this unit, we have discussed the structure of Sons and Lovers and the story of the novel’s
development and publication. The reasons for the novel’s continued popularity, such as its close
connections with Lawrence’s own life and its focus on working class life have also been
discussed. We also briefly touched upon the major concerns of the novel, which we will be
discussing in detail in the next unit.

Check your progress 2

Write a critical summary of Sons and Lovers, bringing out its major themes and concerns.

7.6 GLOSSARY
Turn-of-the -century: at the end of one century and beginning of another
Florid: highly decorated
Derelict: an outcast; someone who is not well cared for and is therefore in a bad state.
Gin pit: a shallow mine that is not very deep
Collier: miner
Phosphorescence: a dim light

7.7 REFERENCES
Black, Michael. D.H. Lawrence: Sons and Lovers. CUP, 1992.

Eagleton, Terry. The English Novel: an Introduction. John Wiley and Sons, 2004.

Harrison, Andrew. D. H. Lawrence: Sons and Lovers. Humanities E-books LLP, 2007.

Harrison, Andrew. The Life of D. H. Lawrence. Blackwell, 2016.

Lawrence, D. H. Sons and Lovers. Penguin, 1994.

Anandavalli, Malathy. “Mapping the East Midlands: Indian Critical concepts as an Approach to
the Fiction of D. H. Lawrence.” Thesis submitted to the University of Nottingham, 2004.

33
UNIT 8 READING THE NOVEL SONS AND LOVERS
8.0 Objectives
8.1 Introduction
8.2 Sons and Lovers: autobiographical elements
8.3 Sons and Lovers as a regional novel
8.4 Psychoanalytic reading of Sons and Lovers
8.5 Sons and Lovers: class and social mobility
8.6 Sons and Lovers: Issues of gender
8.7 Let us sum up
8.8 References
8.9 Glossary

8.0 OBJECTIVES
In this Unit, we will be discussing the various perspectives from which critics have approached
Sons and Lovers. This will give us an idea about the various concerns and preoccupations of the
novel. After studying this unit, you should be able to critically analyse the novel from various
perspectives.

8.1 INTRODUCTION
In the previous unit, we discussed how Sons and Lovers came to be written, the major concerns
of the novel and its structure. In this unit, we will take a look at the ways in which critics have
approached and read this novel. Sons and Lovers has enjoyed “a canonical status in twentieth
century English literature unchallenged by any of his other novels” (Harrison, 2007, 47), and has
therefore been studied and researched extensively. As Helen and Carl Baron point out in the
introduction to the novel, “Sons and Lovers has received a great deal of critical attention, but it
resists being pinned down to any single diagnostic account. It has been described in a variety of
ways: as a record of working class life, … an illustration of one or other psychoanalytical theory,
a critique of industrial capitalism (xv, Sons and Lovers). This variety in critical approaches helps
us to realise the multiple layers of meanings within the novel.

8.2 SONS AND LOVERS: AUTOBIOGRAPHICAL ELEMENTS

It is very easy for a reader to notice that the novel clearly uses material and experiences from
Lawrence’s own life as a young man growing up in a mining village in the East Midlands. The
character Paul Morel draws upon the young Lawrence, that of Walter Morel, on his father,
Miriam Leivers on Lawrence’s childhood friend Jessie Chambers, and so on. The setting of the
novel is also clearly based on the village where Lawrence was born and grew up; the novel
therefore has very clear connections with Lawrence’s early life.

34
The novel draws upon many personal experiences in Lawrence’s life as a young man. For instance,
in Sons and Lovers Paul loves to visit Willey Farm, a beautiful rural spot which is contrasted with
the ugliness of the mining village of Bestwood. Willey Farm is based on the actual Haggs Farm,
the home of Lawrence’s friend Jessie Chambers and her family. Lawrence loved to visit the
Chambers’s home, which was different in all respects from his own home. Andrew Harrison notes,
“The visit to Haggs farm would mark a watershed in Lawrence’s early life; he loved to escape
from the ugliness of Eastwood, and the tensions of home, to the startling beauty of the surrounding
countryside and the attentions of a family who grew to love him and to appreciate his
accomplishments. In Sons and Lovers, he would describe Paul Morel walking over the fields to
‘Willey Farm’ and experiencing the landscape as being ‘Just like Canada’ (Sons and Lovers153);
the phrase captures the young Lawrence’s own sense of having discovered a new world, just two
miles from industrial Eastwood.” (Harrison, 2016,10).

The beautiful countryside around Eastwood that Lawrence loved and celebrated in his
early writing

In fact, considering these connections to Lawrence’s own life, many critics have seen this as an
‘autobiographical novel’. Helen and Carl Baron point out: “It has been widely thought of as a
simply and directly autobiographical novel by an author who invariably included in his fiction
his own experiences and portraits of people he knew. Many commentators have assumed that
Paul Morel is a direct self- portrait… The many differences have been ignored (xvi Sons and
Lovers). Sons and Lovers is a complex novel, which draws upon autobiographical elements;

35
however, it is not a straightforwardly autobiographical novel. As Andrew Harrison points out,
there is a “deliberate transformation of autobiographical materials. … Lawrence very
deliberately inserts multiple perspectives into the narration, transforming autobiographical
elements into a complex work of fiction” (2007: 47- 48). Lawrence makes this very clear, and
has stated that he intended the novel to represent ‘the tragedy of thousands of young men”, and
not just a personal experience. Helen and Carl Baron explain that Lawrence never intended to
write an autobiography, and that by the time he had rewritten the novel and produced its final
draft, “he had generalized his material to such a degree that he could call it “a great tragedy, ….
The tragedy of thousands of young men in England.” (xvi).

Sons and Lovers also has characteristics of the ‘Bildungsroman’. “Sons and Lovers clearly uses
a number of conventions of its period. The first of these is the Bildungsroman, or novel of
personal development, which had been a leading nineteenth century form, used for example, by
Dickens in David Copperfield and George Eliot in The Mill on the Floss. … One particular
version of this form was the Kunstler roman, a novel about the growth of an artist. In the novel
he writes of Paul’s situation as a representative one… and he changed the title from ‘Paul Morel’
to the more generalizing Sons and Lovers”(Rylance, 2-3). Andrew Harrison calls Sons and
Lovers a ‘modernist bildungsroman’; “its psychological emphasis and its focus on the artist and
his status as a perpetual outsider suggests comparisons with James Joyce’s A Portrait of the
Artist as a Young Man (1916)”(2007,47).

Check your progress 1

Write a note on Sons and Lovers as a ‘modernist bildungsroman’.

8.3 SONS AND LOVERS AS A REGIONAL NOVEL

John Worthen (D. H. Lawrence: a Literary Life 1989) points out that it could have been advice
from Hueffer that made Lawrence write his first pieces of fiction about the coal-mining region.
Worthen finds it striking that Lawrence did not write anything similar before being encouraged
to meet the great demand in the early twentieth century for authentic projections of the type of
life that had never been voiced till then (Worthen 1989: 11-12). Lawrence’s plays, A Collier’s
Friday Night and The Widowing of Mrs. Holroyd, as well as the stories “Odour of
Chrysanthemums” and “Goose Fair” were written in response to this advice. Lawrence realised
“the dramatic potential of using Eastwood speech and dialect in order to draw out the subtle
emotional undercurrents of family interactions” (Harrison, 2016, 41).

Sons and Lovers qualifies as a ‘regional novel’ since it is ‘set’ in the mining districts of the
English East Midlands and fictionalises the experience of growing up in this region. Bridget
Pugh identifies a group of Midland writers – ‘four authors thoroughly of the Midland area’
(1989: 141) – Arnold Bennett, George Eliot, William Hale White and D. H. Lawrence, who
share a common involvement with the region. Pugh sees them primarily as realist writers and
reads their fidelity to their landscapes in terms of their realism. The real world for them, says
Pugh, was the world in which they had grown up (1989: 143-44).

36
Sons and Lovers is linked in this respect not only to such fictional writings of the Midlands, but
also to many of Lawrence’s own early writings and some of the later work as well. Like his first
novel The White Peacock (1911), Sons and Lovers is set in the Nottinghamshire-Derbyshire
borderland, though in the former, as Michael Black points out, the emphasis is on the natural
beauty of the countryside rather than the man-made landscape of the mining areas (1992: 1).
Many of his early stories like ‘Odour of Chrysanthemums’(1911), ‘A Modern Lover’ (1934) and
‘The Shades of Spring’(1914) and plays like A Collier’s Friday Night (1934) and The Widowing
of Mrs. Holroyd (1914)are set in the same region of the Midlands, focusing often on the mining
community. It is this deep involvement with the area in most of the early writing that gave
Lawrence the reputation of being a ‘regional’ writer of provincial English life, quite early in his
career.
Sons and Lovers appears to be a novel in the realist tradition, because of the careful delineation
of the physical setting, as well as the social and communal spaces of the English East Midlands
in the late nineteenth century. The novel clearly maps the spatial layout, the occupational
structure, significant local institutions, landmarks, places with high imageability, places of work
and leisure, provision for culture, socialising spaces and the built environment of the region. The
natural environment and the physical features of the East Midlands are also mapped carefully.
For instance, the flowers that appear so frequently in the pages of the novel such as lilies,
bluebells and crocuses, are those that are commonly found in the actual physical space of the
East Midlands, and together with trees such as the alders, beeches, elms, oaks, sycamores, firs,
pines, and the ash trees of the region, are important in re-creating the natural environment and
physical setting in the novel. The river Trent is a major physical feature of the East Midlands
region that is mapped by the novel. Lawrence’s mapping of the river emphasises its quiet power
and its strong currents. ‘The Trent was very full. It swept silent and insidious under the bridge,
travelling in a soft body…. The river slid by in a body, utterly silent, and swift, inter-twining
among itself like some subtle, complex creature’ (Sons and Lovers: 351).

The focus on the cultural landscape, as altered by the operations of the mining company in the
early sections of the novel, foregrounds the significance of mining in making Bestwood what it
was at a particular point of time in the history of the region. Another local occupation which
figures in the novel is the hosiery trade. The women in the Bottoms are shown waiting for ‘Hose’
the hosiery agent. Hose distributes machine knitted pieces of stockings among the local women
who stitch the pieces together and return them to him. It is work that demands time and skill and
is not well paid, but several women of the Bottoms are shown turning up with their work,
apparently glad to make the extra money and to augment the income of their miner husbands.
The exploitative nature of the process is hinted at throughout the passage. Mrs Morel, unlike her
neighbours, refuses to do such badly paid work and makes her disgust with the work and the
hosiery agent quite clear. Arthur Coleman explains how framework knitting at one time equalled
and surpassed agriculture as the basic form of employment in Eastwood, but started to decline
from around 1800 due to the newly developed coal mines which offered more lucrative and more
secure work (52-55). By the time we come to the historic period framed in the novel, framework
knitting had ceased to be primarily a cottage industry. The industry had been mechanised and
only a minor job was to be done by hand, and it is this part which is performed by the women
outworkers.

37
In Part II of the novel a picture emerges of the drudgery involved in the lace industry, for which
the area had been famous in the nineteenth century. When Paul visits Clara in her squalid home
in a Nottingham suburb that is hardly better than a slum, he finds the little rooms of the home
smothered in white lace and cotton. The initial impression of poverty and squalor that the
dwelling conveys is followed by indications of the economic activity that goes on there. The
tools of the trade are all over the place: ‘Threads of curly cotton, pulled out from beneath the
lengths of lace, strewed over the fender and the fireplace. …On the table was a jenny for carding
the lace. There was a pack of brown cardboard squares, a pack of cards of lace, a little box of
pins’ (SL: 301). The farming world of the area is re-created in Willey Farm and Strelley Mill
Farm, both of which are significant in the social context, since they represent important aspects
of farming activity.
The trip to Lincoln, the various visits to seaside resorts like Skegness and Mablethorpe – all
indicate the significance that these places had for a working-class family from Bestwood. The
sense of Nottingham as a regional capital is built up throughout the novel. The experience of the
city of Nottingham is recreated in several ways: by mapping the city’s suburbs and localities like
Clifton Grove, Colwick, Sneinton and the Park; by drawing the physical landscape like the
environs of the Trent; by references to actual Nottingham landmarks like the Castle, the
Arboretum, the market place, the Theatre Royal or the church of St. Mary’s (described in the
novel as ‘a great lantern suspended’ (Sons and Lovers: 458); and by visually presenting the
perspective from certain vantage points like the Castle grounds. The Hemlock Stone, Lincoln
Cathedral, Crich Stand, Nottingham Castle, Wingfield Manor – these are all landmarks in the
East Midlands that have imageability and high visibility and are therefore very effective
indicators of the sense of the region (Anandavalli, M., 119).

Check your progress 2

In your opinion, does Sons and Lovers qualify as a “regional novel”?

8.4 PSYCHOANALYTIC READING OF SONS AND LOVERS

Several critics have pointed out the ‘Oedipal’ theme of Sons and Lovers. According to the
Oxford Companion to English Literature, Sons and Lovers may be considered to be a classic
example of a novel about the Oedipus complex, though Lawrence himself claimed not to have
read Freud (369). According to Terry Eagleton, “Sons and Lovers, without appearing to be at all
aware of it, is a profoundly Oedipal novel” (62). Freud’s theory of the “Oedipus complex”,
where he focuses on the relationships between children and parents, which he explained first in a
letter of 1897, is one of his most celebrated psychological theories. According to Rick Rylance,
such psychological theories were explored by several other writers also: “the dynamics of what
Freud labelled the ‘Oedipus Complex’ (after the tragic Greek who unwittingly killed his father
and married his mother) became a consistent theme in English writing in the early decades of the
century. Plots exploring ‘Oedipal’ situations not unlike that in Sons and Lovers feature in works
by several of Lawrence’s contemporaries” (Rylance 3).

Many critics have noted common elements between the theme of Sons and Lovers and Freud’s
writings of the same period. “It is easy to see the connection between Paul Morel’s situation and
the conditions Freud describes as ‘universally prevalent in civilized countries” (Rylance 5).

38
Andrew Harrison points out that Alfred Kuttner was “the first critic to see in the novel a
psychological dynamic between son, mother and father, akin to what Freud had described as the
Oedipus complex. He praised the psychological acuity of the novel.” Lawrence disapproved of
the way Kuttner “reduced the complexity of fiction to the schematic simplicity of theory”. The
classic Oedipal approach sees the novel reflecting the ideas current then in Freud’s writing,
which explains Paul’s constant resentment of his father (Harrison, 2007: 46-48).

In an interesting critical study that employs the psychoanalytic approach, Terry Eagleton draws
upon the work of the French psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan and the Marxist theorist Lois
Althusser “to examine the ways in which Paul’s identity is created in particular social
conditions”. Eagleton’s method is different from the classical psychoanalytic approach that sees
the novel as a Freudian case. Eagleton argues that attention should be given to the what the text
avoids, not just what the text says. The novel has a dimension similar to the unconscious which
contains aspects that have been repressed or denied. (1992, 7-8). “In reading Sons and Lovers
with an eye to these aspects of the novel, we are constructing what may be called a ‘sub-text’ of
the work…. All literary works contain one or more such sub-texts, and there is a sense in which
they may be spoken of as the ‘unconscious’ of the work itself. The work’s insights, as with all
writing, are deeply related to its blindnesses: … what seems absent, marginal or ambivalent
about it may provide a central clue to its meanings” (Eagleton:1992, 66). Eagleton thus employs
psychoanalytic methods to arrive at the meanings of the text which are not stated clearly, but
form its ‘unconscious’ aspect, and which have to be arrived at through careful reading; in the
case of Sons and Lovers, such a reading presents Morel in a more sympathetic light.

Check your progress 3

Attempt a psychoanalytic reading of Sons and Lovers.

8.5 SONS AND LOVERS: CLASS AND SOCIAL MOBILITY

Sons and Lovers is, as we have already discussed, one of the earliest novels about working class
life; as it was written by a novelist who was born and brought up in a working-class
environment, it had a peculiar sense of reality and authenticity. Eagleton says: “Here, almost for
the first time in English fiction, are working class characters portrayed as living subjects rather
than observed objects. They are fashioned unself-consciously from the inside, rather than
patronizingly indulged or exhibited as sociological specimens. Lawrence was an extraordinarily
path-breaking author, a courageous avant-gardist in an age of sedate English naturalism”
(Eagleton, The English Novel, 256). In several parts of the novel, Lawrence uses the local dialect
with remarkable ease, and here again we see his ability to convey the realities of working class
life. “His prose here manages to be at once imaginative and workaday, vivid and precise without
being self-consciously crafted, he can wonderfully capture in this novel the dry sardonic repartee
of the English working class”( Eagleton: The English Novel, 269).

Social mobility is a key theme in the novel. During the late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries, “continued expansion in educational provision and the gradual re- structuring of
Britain’s industrial base brought about ever greater social mobility and a further increase in the
importance and influence of the lower middle classes and sections of the skilled and educated

39
working classes.” (Poplawski, 480). Thus, unlike earlier decades, there were opportunities for the
working classes to acquire education and skills and improve their social standing. Sons and
Lovers is not just a novel about the working class , but also a novel about social aspiration and
the desire to move to a higher social class. Mrs Morel and her children have a keen interest in
avoiding the mining occupation – partly because of her bourgeois preoccupation with the idea of
“getting on”, and partly because the occupation is dangerous and insecure. Though a fairly clear
picture of the occupational map of the region emerges through the novel, the narrative point of
view clearly prioritises the world of business. Mrs Morel encourages her two sons towards
clerical and office work, since such occupations are the paths to bourgeois security, the way to
get on.

Sons and Lovers ends up being a novel about the mining community that avoids mining as an
occupation and focuses instead on the kind of middle-class work that interests its central
characters – this contributes one of the underlying tensions of the novel.
Graham Holderness points out how, “social mobility through education and moral
improvement’’ operated very powerfully on Lawrence as a young man. In Sons and Lovers, the
mother, “in an effort to realise her vision of moral improvement, tries to push her sons into the
middle class. In fact, however, she pushes them into isolation, separateness, individuality.”
(Holderness, in Rylance, 143-144). Holderness argues that in the novel, this ideology of social
aspiration and the efforts to move ahead into more ‘respectable’ social positions, is shown as
“producing not social freedom, but a generation of displaced, alienated and deeply troubled
social climbers” (Harrison, 2007:51).

Check your progress 4

Discuss the themes of class and social mobility with reference to Sons and Lovers.

8.6 SONS AND LOVERS: ISSUES OF GENDER

The novel reflects the operation of issues regarding gender and women’s rights in early
twentieth century British society. Early in the novel Morel is shown as trying to ‘subdue’ his
wife into submission (Sons and Lovers: 49). Miriam resents the fact that because she is a woman
she is denied a chance of knowing, learning, or doing anything (Sons and Lovers: 185). In the
course of a spirited discussion at Willey Farm, Clara has a heated argument with Paul on the
issue of equal pay for men and women. The recurrence of gender-related issues shows how alive
such issues were in the collective thinking of the time.

When Paul visits Clara in her humble home in Nottingham, he finds Clara and her mother busy
with their ‘jennying’ work, which is done for the local lace industry. It is tough work and
obviously involves the hard labour of women who are not as well paid as men. The drudgery and
mechanical nature of the work and the poor returns that it brings are suggested by the
environment in Clara’s house. The gender implications of this exploitative system of economic
activity are suggested throughout and strongly voiced by Clara. When Paul asks Clara if she likes
jennying, she replies in a manner that belies her desperate acceptance of her occupation:

“What can a woman do!” she replied bitterly.

40
“Is it sweated?”
“More or less. Isn’t all women’s work?That’s another trick the men have played, since we force
ourselves into the labour market”” (Sons and Lovers: 303). Clara’s disillusion with her present
work is expressed in her embittered attitude and her sense of humiliation that shows through her
defiance. Clara is aware of the exploitation of which she is a victim; she is closely involved with
the suffragette movement and attends their meetings regularly.

Though Lawrence brings in the theme of women’s emancipation and the suffragette movement
in Sons and Lovers, he has been criticised by feminist critics as being anti-feminist in this novel.
Simone de Beauvoir in The Second Sex accused Lawrence of seeing women in a role subordinate
to men. Andrew Harrison points out how Lawrence’s portrayal in Sons and Lovers of the
struggle for female emancipation “angered the feminists and Lawrence was attacked by Kate
Millett in her book Sexual Politics” (Harrison, 2007: 51). “Though Millett admires Lawrence’s
refreshingly original depiction of working-class life, and the undoubted passion and energy of his
writings, she deplores the way Sons and Lovers is centred on Paul’s needs, around which the
female characters gather as satellites with no social or psychological existence of their own. Mrs.
Morel, for example, ‘is utterly deprived of any avenue of achievement’ and lives only through
her male children…. Millett interprets Sons and Lovers not as realism, but as a ‘heroic male
romance’” (Rylance 9-10).

Another point raised by feminist critics against the novel is the way Lawrence shows Clara as
returning to her husband Baxter Dawes, who had clearly abused her earlier.
Let us take a look at how Millett presents this situation: “Clara, meek as a sheep, is delivered
over to the man she hated and left years before. The text makes it clear that Dawes had beat and
deceived his wife. Yet, with a consummate emotional manipulation, Paul manages to impose his
own version of her marriage on Clara, finally bringing her to say that its failure was her fault”
(Millett, Sexual Politics, quoted in Rylance 122). Millett points out several such instances in the
novel. As Hillary Simpson observes, “Clara’s return to her husband at the end of the novel, is
singled out by Kate Millett as a particularly glaring example of Sons and Lovers’ ant-feminism”
(Simpson, 122).

Check your progress 5

How does Sons and Lovers engage with issues of gender in early twentieth century Britain?

8.7 LET US SUM UP

In this unit, we have looked at the autobiographical aspects of Sons and Lovers, and considered
the novel as a ‘regional novel’. We have also touched upon psychoanalytic approaches to this
novel and also considered issues related to class and social mobility and gender, in Sons and
Lovers.

8.8 REFERENCES
Black, Michael. D.H. Lawrence: Sons and Lovers. CUP, 1992.

41
Coleman. Arthur. Eastwood Through Bygone Ages: A Brief History of the Parish of Eastwood.
Eastwood: Eastwood Historical Society.
Eagleton, Terry. “Psychoanalysis”. In Widdowson ed. D. H. Lawrence. Peter Lang, 1992.
Eagleton, Terry. The English Novel: an Introduction. John Wiley and Sons, 2004.
Harrison, Andrew. D. H. Lawrence: Sons and Lovers. Humanities E-books LLP, 2007.
Harrison, Andrew. The Life of D. H. Lawrence. Blackwell, 2016.
Holderness, Graham. “Language and Social context in Sons and Lovers”. Rylance Ed. New
Casebooks: Sons and Lovers. London: Macmillan,1996.
Lawrence, D. H. Sons and Lovers. Penguin, 1994.
Poplawski, Paul. Ed. English Literature in Context. CUP, 2017.

Pugh, Bridget. “The Midlands Imagination.” Preston and Hoare Ed. D. H. Lawrence in the
Modern World. London: Macmillan, 1989.

Rylance, Rick. Ed. New Casebooks: Sons and Lovers. London: Macmillan, 1996.

Simpson, Hillary. “Lawrence and Feminism in Sons and Lovers”. Rick Rylance Ed. New
Casebooks: Sons and Lovers. London: Macmillan, 1996.

Worthen, John. D. H. Lawrence: a Literary Life. London: Macmillan, 1989

Anandavalli, Malathy. “Mapping the East Midlands: Indian Critical concepts as an Approach to
the Fiction of D. H. Lawrence.” Thesis submitted to the University of Nottingham, 2004.

8.9 GLOSSARY:
Bildungsroman: “class of novel that depicts and explores the manner in which
the protagonist develops morally and psychologically. The German word Bildungsroman means
“novel of education” or “novel of formation.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
Kunstler roman: “ (German: “artist’s novel”), class of Bildungsroman, or apprenticeship novel,
that deals with the youth and development of an individual who becomes—or is on
the threshold of becoming—a painter, musician, or poet. The classic example is James
Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916).” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
Imageability: ability to create a clear mental image
avant-gardist: one who introduces radical changes and innovations
naturalism: “in literature and the visual arts, late 19th- and early 20th-century movement that
was inspired by adaptation of the principles and methods of natural science, especially the
Darwinian view of nature, to literature and art. In literature it extended the tradition of realism,
aiming at an even more faithful, unselective representation of reality, a veritable “slice of life,”
presented without moral judgment.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
sardonic: mocking, humorous

42
 ignou
lTHE PEOPLE'S
UNIVERSITY

Indira Gandhi National British Literature: Early Twentieth Century

Open University BEGC-112
School of Humanities

Block

3
Novel (2)
BLOCK INTRODUCTION 02

UNIT 9
“Stream of Consciousness”: an Introduction 03

UNIT 10
Virginia Woolf as Novelist 15

UNIT 11
Mrs. Dalloway – Analysis and Interpretations 34

UNIT 12
Mrs. Dalloway - Themes and Concerns 38

1
BLOCK INTRODUCTION
This Block ‘Novel 2’ continues the discussion on the early twentieth century novel, initiated in
the previous block. Focusing on Virginia Woolf’s novel Mrs. Dalloway, this block looks at the
ways in which the modernist novel approaches the conventional elements of fiction, such as
‘character’, ‘plot’ and ‘narration’.

Unit 9 “Stream of Consciousness”: an Introduction discusses on the connections between the

‘stream of consciousness’ narrative techniques adopted in modernist novels and the
developments in Psychology in the early twentieth century.

Unit 10 Virginia Woolf as Novelist focuses on Woolf as a major modernist writer, while
touching upon her work as a feminist and leading intellectual of the early twentieth century.

Unit 11 Mrs. Dalloway – Analysis and Interpretations considers the ‘stream of consciousness’
technique as employed in Mrs. Dalloway to understand the mental processes of the characters in
the novel.

Unit 12 Mrs. Dalloway - Themes and Concerns discusses the themes of the novel, such as its
critique of contemporary society, and the trauma and horror caused by the first World War.

Acknowledgement

The material and images we have used is purely for educational purposes. Every effort has been
made to trace the copyright holders of material used in this book. Should any infringement have
occurred, the publishers and editors apologise, and will be pleased to make the necessary
corrections in future editions of this book.

2
UNIT 9 ‘STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS’: AN
INTRODUCTION
9.0 Objectives
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Psychology as the Background of Literary Production
9.3 The Stream of Consciousness vis a vis Characters
9.4 Memory as an Important Factor
9.5 Observation as Basis of the Stream of Consciousness
9.6 Aesthetic of the Stream of Consciousness
9.7 History as a Component of Stream of Consciousness
9.8 Varied dimensions of Stream of Consciousness
9.9 Conclusion
9.10 Glossary
9.11 Unit end Questions
9.12 Works Cited

9.0 OBJECTIVES
In this unit we shall discuss the stream of consciousness technique that became a crucial marker
of English fiction in the beginning of the twentieth century. The term established itself as a new
way of exploring human psychology that was reflected in the practices of modern men and
women. Since the author to be discussed in this block is a woman, Virginia Woolf, the stream of
consciousness approach would indeed be more appropriate to make sense of her novel in the
course. Here, you will have a chance to follow the motivation in the case of a woman given to
expressing herself creatively. We shall also discuss in this unit the efficacy of this particular
approach in understanding the novel as a literary form.

9.1 INTRODUCTION

As is clear from the term “stream of consciousness”, the faculty of human thinking never remains
fixed. It always goes back and forth in time, from the past to the present and from the present to
the past. The same happens at the level of the place, too — in one moment, consciousness is present
at the actual place where you live, and in another moment, you shift attention from that place to
the one you visited later. The word “stream” signifies this specifically. The focus upon the stream
of consciousness will make us aware about the internal processes of an individual’s mind. It should
be clear to us that being socially repressed, women in earlier centuries, generally were confined to
the world of dreams, fears, and expectations. The family or the larger society seldom allowed them
to take important decisions in life. This was done by the menfolk in the territory of the home. And
indeed, the outside world was entirely under the control of men. As such, Virginia Woolf can be
comprehended as a writer through the imaginings in her novels.

3
 (Virginia Woolf. Picture Source: commons.wikimedia.org)

At the back of fiction writing, in the opening years of the twentieth century, stood the scientific
research conducted in the nineteenth century. The approach was based on what scientists observed
in the physical world. For them, the region of the senses was open to enquiry and could be
investigated objectively. It involved experiment that would help them know the phenomena for
what it was in reality. There was no scope in it for accepting any mysterious source for reference.
That became the yardstick of scientists interested in motivation, for them the human mind was at
centre of all the happenings witnessed in life.

9.2 PSYCHOLOGY AS THE BACKGROUND OF LITERARY

PRODUCTION
Psychology investigates the functioning of the human brain in relation to the existing physical
world. In the production of literature also, mind is actively involved in giving words to feelings
and emotions. We may keep in view the fact that most branches of knowledge address the physical
world, be they economic, social, natural or health-related. That determines the working of the
human brain most of the time. We may also remember that our waking time is spent worrying
about livelihood, bonding with family members and the people in the neighbourhood. But when
we sit back and visit the softer areas of feeling, we forget about the external world and look
inwards. We go into the wrongs we committed and failures we suffered. The pain caused by loss
and happiness brought to us through a win tell us what may be done in life and what might be
avoided. This may be called the internal process which is a subject of psychology.

4
The functioning of the brain produced ideas as well as other determining factors. That gave rise to
a new way of interpreting individuality, choice, morality and relationships. In this regard, Sigmund
Freud (1856-1939) comes to mind as a pioneer in the field. A neurologist from Austria, Freud
devised new methods of psychoanalysis. He used the technique of holding a dialogue with the
patient to good effect. His studies were epoch-making. Of particular interest for him was the field
of human consciousness. He was one of the finest intellectuals of his time and saw that the human
being characterized as an economic, a religious, or a political man was not the whole story. To it
could be added the term ‘the psychological man’ a term initially coined by the American
sociologist Philip Rieff, a fact mentioned in the records of Britannica.

(Sigmund Freud. Source: commons.wikimedia.org)

For Freud, consciousness worked at many levels. In some cases, it was perceived by the individual,
whereas in others, only a shade of it was noted. The latter earned for it the epithet ‘subconscious’.
At a deeper level, consciousness had a link with an unknown, unobserved entity called the
unconscious. These aspects of internal human mechanism presented a scenario for the researcher
to grasp and stress upon. By 1899 when Freud’s book The Interpretation of Dreams was published,
his fame had spread in Europe. James Strachey has observed:

The unconscious contents of the mind were found to consist wholly in the activity of
conative trends—desires or wishes—which derive their energy directly from the primary
physical instincts. They function quite regardless of any consideration other than that of
obtaining immediate satisfaction, and are thus liable to be out of step with those more
conscious elements in the mind which are concerned with adaptation to reality and the
avoidance of external dangers. Since, moreover, these primitive trends are to a great extent
of a sexual or of a destructive nature, they are bound to come in conflict with the more
social and civilized mental forces. Investigations along this path were what led Freud to
his discoveries of the long-disguised secrets of the sexual life of children and of the
Oedipus complex. (14)

In a significant sense, literary writing of nineteenth century Europe also struggled to know the
causes of impulse, desire, control, and the working of social pressures. They were integral to

5
literary depictions in the period dominated by the Bronte sisters, Dickens, George Eliot, and Hardy.
The presentation of characters made it necessary that their thoughts were recognized as seminal to
the trends witnessed in society. Still more importantly, the progress of secular perceptions
embedded in the reality of the period inspired the writers to find connections between emotions
and social interests. The clash between the two might have given rise to the use of fantasy in
fictional writing. There is no wonder that as the nineteenth century came to a close, a whole new
paradigm had taken shape at the hands of writers and thinkers. That may offer to us a perspective
on the stream of consciousness as a determining principle of knowing the structures affecting the
human being.

9.3 THE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS VIS-A-VIS

CHARACTERS
As we see the stream of consciousness at work in the modernist writing of the time, it pushes
specific fictional characters from the centre to the margins. For the writer, there is no interest in
the growth of a character from one stage to another. The childhood and youth may be important
for a fictional work, but they are no longer with reference to the path the characters pursue—
economic earning, success in society, or competition to outdo others in the game of life. The
career-graph of individuals is not given importance in the new fiction. Even as the spatial
surroundings are described in detail, they do not form a link with an individual as their centre.

The stream of consciousness remains away from the firm ground of social activity and forms a
wall around the characters inhabiting the social space. The space gets created between the writer
and the reader, too, the former telling anyone who cares to listen that such and such an idea visited
a person at some point in one’s life. Connectives such as "He thought," "he was reminded of," "he
might have said," "she was afraid that" merely share with the reader an ordinary reference. On
them is hung an account of the character, or of an event, such as the First World War in Mrs.
Dalloway. The style is of making a person observe and associate life's details, which when given
a sequence would assume a fictional shape. In such a work, we could see a peculiar drama taking
place at the level of characters' imaginings, a drama in which opinions and outlooks might be in
harmony with each other while the reader struggles to make sense of the description. Yet, the
character exists in the background. Significantly, men in flesh and blood do not exist in the fiction
characterized by the stream of consciousness. The characters have no concrete emotions defining
their mental state. The potential to intervene, to agree with some and disagree with others is
conspicuous by its absence in the genre under discussion.

As such, the stream of consciousness novel has no palpable plot with a dynamic of ups and downs
and a moral principle. The very convention of sequence is discarded. This is fundamentally caused
by the absence of characters as we see them striving in the action plan of a traditional narrative.
Here, the author relies on impressions that a situation left on him / her or the characters hinted at.
The characters do have names but identity is missing in their case since they are not portrayed. We
might as well call them walking thoughts.

Such an aspect of the stream of consciousness fiction reduces characters to fluid mental states
changing by the minute and getting away from or merging with others arbitrarily, with no
validation from the circumstance in which they are placed. We might ask—has this writing
6
expelled the active men and women from the realm of depiction? Where are those people who
become angry or happy in view of the questions they face? What has happened to the tragic
consequences or comic resolutions that engaged the attention of imaginative writing from the
beginning? We may admit in the context that characterization indeed has suffered. The stream,
flow or fluidity does not allow the reader to be in contact with groups, sections and classes. The
metaphor of the river caught from a given point to another arbitrarily in this fiction leaves no scope
for the individual to make a place for self so one could test the waters and change course to realize
one’s potentialities. In fact, potentiality as an additional dimension of what a person does is
sacrificed on the altar of merely observing or wondering.

Check your progress 1

What is the concept of “characterization” in “stream of consciousness” novels?

9.4 MEMORY AS AN IMPORTANT FACTOR

The central logic of the stream of consciousness novel is memory-related. It is believed that a
person actively involves himself / herself in life at the level of memory, not action seen around the
social space. Since action is of limited significance, the human being sticks to memory as a support.
We live by memory, a cluster of events that left traces in the individual’s mind. For the writer of
this genre, the said traces have a life of their own that can be activated and enlarged to engage the
person concerned. So far as this human trait is concerned, one is always with oneself and one’s
company is in the mode of memory. To reiterate, all that one has gone through in life is stored in
one’s mind and that keeps coming to the consciousness as a matter of habit or when one faces a
specific situation. In that sense, traces cease to be traces and become markers. For the individual,
memory serves as a storehouse of information about those markers.

Additionally, there is no specific pattern in things that consciousness engages with. The things in
question seek guidance from the individual, his/ her moods and choices in a particular moment.
Soon, the pattern starts forming itself with help from incidents and situations one gets mentally
involved with. In the complex interplay of this sort, living items inhabiting the brain take over and
write their own script. They contain values, ideas, vague responses of the early phase in one’s life
and at times become a guide to the person concerned. This is a clear departure from the
conventional novel in which creativity invents those points that fit in with the aim of the writer. In
the case of the stream of consciousness novel, the writer lets himself/ herself loose in the middle
of his / her own mental state and lives the life of a dreamer, not one prosecuting plans to fulfil
himself / herself.

Under the technique of the stream of consciousness, the memory offers a parallel world to the one
the person lives in. Note that the matter of habit in the case of a participant in life is intertwined
with the situation s/he faces. The habit is without contours, it can be visual or auditory. Other
senses too take part in this act of fixed priorities. The habit makes it sure that one remains awake
and mentally alert till late evening, as is the case with Clarissa in Mrs. Dalloway. Under the stream
we talk of, the memory as form is resorted to for showing the general health of the individual.
Mark that the chosen situation lets in a part of the external reality since it is connected with a
previous episode. Do we give it the name of associative memory that provides us with the image

7
of something that happened in the past? The fiction writer of our time puts the two, the thing stored
in memory and the episode that came from association into the account. The two as such are
integrated.

Association also gives the writer a chance to recreate an older episode with imaginative effort. At
the back of re-creating consciously and usefully a previous happening is in fact a creative act. It is
essentially literary. The act also places the writer in the position of an interpreter. Let us bear in
mind that interpretation changes with time, something interpreted when one is young is entirely
different from that which is interpreted in old age. Does a change in interpretation not suggest that
time in a person’s life is crucial? That is really the case. The dimension of time lends the required
complexity coming from the stream of consciousness as a paradigm. Willy-nilly, it takes the life
of an individual into the historical bind where different segments of time raise head for
comparative view and make us wonder whether other choices were available to the people
inhabiting the fictional world in question. This question will be taken up further in another unit of
this block.

In the above, we have gradually shifted ground from remembering an event per se to the one we
describe with effort and that suiting a character’s mental state. Clearly, remembering and
describing are two different things. Remembering is more internal, whereas describing impels us
to express in words belonging to human action in the outer world. Our discussion here is based on
what the writer using the stream of consciousness method wished to create and the other he / she
kept out of purview consciously. Thus, we spread our net wide to do justice to the subject in hand.
The range of memory includes working of the human mind to tell oneself what is observed in the
flow of thought, the act leading to movement back and forth in time and capturing of the flow with
the help of writing.

Check your progress 2:

What is the role of memory in a “stream of consciousness” novel? Discuss.

9.5 OBSERVATION AS BASIS OF THE STREAM OF

CONSCIOUSNESS
So far, we have talked about the significance of memory in the stream of consciousness. Relatively
speaking, memory keeps itself away from life in the raw. It exists with reference to the past.

With that in mind, let us consider the working of consciousness, its nature and role. With it, an
individual is visualized as wandering around the places she or he lived in. There is also the
implication that each individual has a world of one's own. In the modern period, the efforts made
by an individual end in futility, and the time span of happenings leaves a sense of pain. That is
usually the case. Even as repetitive in nature, the feelings of pain or loss integrate of their own into
a narrative and offer insights into the existing life-conditions. It is a complex process. This is one
observation linked with mundaneness.

8
The second is concerning the metaphor of the stream which is an important part of literary
depiction. In the stream of modern life, breaks do not happen normally, but are sometimes
necessitated by thematic unity. Thus, the writer/narrator pauses and changes course to make a
point. Shall we term such breaks as thoughts that emerge in the flow and catch attention? Later, in
a long sequence of thoughts that resemble a chain, one or two human figures might appear and
register their specific existence. The reader might note it and begin thinking about them, their
errors and lapses. That may be considered the emergence of an individuality. As such, the stream
of consciousness writer gets stuck to that individuality and suggests its growth or decline. As a
consequence of it, we might recognize that the stream of consciousness puts a single person at
the centre of attention and accords to him /her the value of a social type, not as concretely as it
might but tells us about its presence nonetheless. We view the society that produced him / her and
gave him / her distinctive traits through the prism of the consciousness. In turn, the consciousness
projects through one’s impressions a general idea of the existing world. We say then that a linearity
forms itself through the observations of a single person.

At the same time though, the mentioned linearity can be presented with suggestions of larger
connections with life, nature, and poetic projection. On one side is the individual surrounded by
varied perceptions, and on the other the images he / she uses fall into the pattern of vacuity, humour
and self-doubt. Eventually, they become a comment on the existing scenario. Soon enough, we
have as individual readers a confrontation with the tangled environment in front. Such an
arithmetic of the individuals coming together in the flow of consciousness is the stuff of the subject
we are engaged with.

We reach a minor conclusion from this in the form of an individual human being giving identity
to the paradigm of the stream of consciousness. Further, the paradigm is psychological,
something internal to the individual we are talking of — it has little connection with people in
flesh and blood who interact with one another in a physical domain. Yet, the impressions of the
individual picked up for depiction are only impressions, not verifiable in an objective manner. We
as readers are told to take what we receive from an observer alone. To a large extent, this circularity
defines the stream of consciousness.

9.6 AESTHETIC OF THE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Aesthetics is generally the aspect of form under which a human-social experience gets shaped. For
this reason, we shall discuss the form of the stream of consciousness as playing a distinct role in
fictional representation. The stream of consciousness turned the direction of twentieth century
English fiction towards the internal world of characters, the world of their mind and
imagination. We note that fiction in the early twentieth century had only a limited interest in ideas
and perspectives, and was distrustful of conveying a message through it. The writer hitherto
focused attention on the contemporary world as a material reality where ideas, attitudes and
relations clashed. That was the objective aspect of life.

On the other hand, the stream of consciousness stressed the subjective field, the personal dilemmas
and uncertainties of individual human beings. This had something to do with the choices the writers
had for dealing with their world. Our guess is that the first quarter of the twentieth century was
heavily weighted against the majority of the people, the power being entirely in the hands of

9
finance and privilege. In this scenario, consciousness came to the rescue of the writer who could
forge a whole pattern of situations in his/ her own mind where he / she would float free from all
restrictions. The gap not only remained but also sustained the newly emerged fictional form with
the writer active inside it. The freedom to shape an experience inside one’s mind enabled the writer
to assume a specific persona to live, feel, think and dream.

Subjectivity was deeply ingrained in the stream of consciousness fiction. The writer’s subjectivity
became more active than before and the existing aesthetic principles of comedy and tragedy meant
little to him / her. Nor was the writer moved by philosophical issues of the kind George Eliot had
grappled with in the latter half of the previous century. The years around the First World War
offered a blocked scenario. The only door opened for literary writing was to deal with
psychological curiosities. The required trend had an intense power and appeal. The vigour it
possessed remained unmatched and the sweep was difficult to visualize under a single category or
approach. Mark Andrew Sanders’ comment about James Joyce’s Ulysses:

Reading Ulysses is a process of refamiliarization with a variety of adapted styles, modes,

and techniques. … Whereas Stephen is preoccupied both with guilt over his failure to pray
at his mother’s death-bed and with intellectual speculation, Bloom’s far less organized
mind regularly throws up snippets of phrases and memories from a private past and from
an observed world. (Sanders 549)

There is no reference in this quote to the method and order that the previous century adapted for
representation. One particularly notes the absence of religion, philosophy and morality in such a
literary engagement. The important words in the quote are “adapted styles,” “intellectual
speculation,” and “unsystematically.” We find in them a seriously accepted anarchy that goes
hammer and tongs at the entrenched thought-structures. An area in which all this is possible is
consciousness. Does a combination of these not present an aesthetic, a form that might hold a
mirror up to the dominant power-centres of the day? For us, James Joyce creates a rush of
observations and brings in a memory crowded with impressions and images. We confront in it a
kind of comic suffusion that overwhelms us. The mind is in focus, but it is “far less organised.” In
it there is a past but not the objectively verifiable one, instead it is a private happening on its own
terms.

9.7 HISTORY AS A COMPONENT OF STREAM OF

CONSCIOUSNESS
You have gone through a number of ideas presented in this unit. By now, it would have been clear
that the stream of consciousness takes in its fold a whole variety of literary and ideological aspects
without taking recourse to a conventional pattern. Particularly, the convention of the plot or the
narrative is anathema, and the aesthetic is of the supposedly unreal kind. What about the existence
of history in it? Ponder over the issue and you may find that the states of mind depicted in this
fiction have a concreteness about them. The said mental states relate to specific individuals
imagined by the fiction writer. Also, imagination is common to the writer and the characters found
in the fictional work. It might be said convincingly that the stream of consciousness fiction is
rooted firmly in a given moment of history. The fictional genre we talk of enjoys an association

10
with all that has gone on in the past—myths, legends, literary works, cultural trends and
geographical-linguistic spaces.

In stream of consciousness fiction, ideas and points of logic connect us with society at the level of
mutual give and take as well as the policies pursued by a collective. That is history in the palpable
sense. Developments in psychology in the latter part of the nineteenth century brought into view
responses in an associative sense, derived as they were from what the human senses perceived in
the surroundings. Psychologists such as William James drew attention to that which was not
limited to rational thoughts. There were impressions of the physical and subliminal varieties
putting constant pressure on human consciousness. For the psychologist, these could not be
separated from the rational field. In a true sense, the rational and impressionistic as well as the
associative made living immensely rich and fruitful. That would take the literary endeavour quite
near the fluent mind and consciousness.

We are told, for example, that “narrative technique in nondramatic fiction intended to render the
flow of myriad impressions—visual, auditory, physical, associative, and subliminal—that impinge
on the consciousness of an individual and form part of his awareness along with the trend of his
rational thoughts. The term was first used by the psychologist William James in The Principles of
Psychology (1890). As the psychological novel developed in the 20th century, some writers
attempted to capture the total flow of their characters’ consciousness, rather than limit themselves
to rational thoughts. To represent the full richness, speed, and subtlety of the mind at work, the
writer incorporates snatches of incoherent thought, ungrammatical constructions, and free
association of ideas, images, and words at the pre-speech level” (‘The stream of consciousness’,
Encyclopedia Britannica.

Because of pressures from history, writers of the stream of consciousness came back again and
again to the social questions, be they of the individual kind, showing bafflements and mixed
priorities in the family, education and market. The psychological aspect had the sense of history
overshadowing it; it revealed isolation of the people from institutions which had hitherto sustained
them.

Check your progress 3

Does the stream of consciousness free the novel from its historical context? Give reasons in support
of your answer.

9.8 VARIED DIMENSIONS OF STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Let us take a look at a still more distinctive consciousness exhibited by James Joyce in his novels
written around the same time as the fiction of Virginia Woolf. Joyce’s stream of consciousness is
more exploratory, experimental, and creative than perhaps witnessed in Woolf. The variety
exhibited by Joyce takes us to the inner workings of the mind on an altogether different plane. It
probes the mythical memory that may connect an individual with unknown features of dreaming
and imagining. What does an individual consciousness engage with? It might be the powerfully
affecting worries drowning the psyche with burdens accumulated in the past. Does an individual
not carry the values of his / her own father as also the religion shaping his/her identity? Joyce used

11
persona more than the person carrying hurts and traumas. In such a fiction, the flow of mind would
stop for a while to hold dialogue with another mind from a new perspective. The interplay of the
two personas left the author fumbling for answers that in fact did not exist. The inner tumult is
more the case of the Joyce representation, more poetic, lyrical and daunting.

Consider language as freed from the domain of experience. Joyce’s heroes wallowed in that
experience. When one touched upon human thought processes, one confronted the issue of word
use, of a search to express the inexpressible. That became more akin to life’s literary aspects.
Further, the thought process was an area where consciousness faced the issue of formulating than
expressing an experience. The question became: where to find the verbal equivalent of an
unformulated idea? Joyce worked to lay bare the crux of language contending with sound patterns
in the vacuum and to take the reader into an unformed reality, that which was caught in the process
of forming itself. That raised the issue of the interior monologue accepting an existing situation
whereas the goal to be pursued was of a situation in the middle of forming itself. Examples of such
a literary endeavour were Joyce’s Ulysses and Finnegans Wake. Arnold Kettle has observed:

[The final chapter of Ulysses] pushes to the furthest extent the 'stream of consciousness'
method -- the attempt to find a verbal equivalent for the inner thought-processes of a
character. ... Joyce's purpose in developing this method is primarily to enrich his objective
invocation of a total situation by adding a new dimension, another side to the many-
sidedness of complex life. This attempt, though it has often been associated historically
with the development of psychology as science, is no more 'scientific' than any other
literary attempt to give the impression of reality. You cannot in the nature of things find a
precise verbal equivalent for unformulated thoughts; the interior monologue may give
the impression of an actual thought-track, but it cannot do more than that. (Ford, 308)

Kettle joins here the two exploratory ventures of psychology and literature, and extends the
argument saying that Joyce was an artist rooted in the reality of his time than driven by any
scientific or sociological mission. To quote,

Joyce knew plenty about contemporary developments in psychiatric research. He knew

what it was to be jung and easily freudened. He did not live in Zurich for nothing. But
while he used the material of modern psychology for his purposes (just as he used among
much else a considerable knowledge of anthropology and scholastic philosophy and a life-
long passion for vocal music), his aim was not that of the analyst, the scientist. And he was
bound to run up against an outstanding difficulty: you cannot isolate the individual’s
consciousness from what is happening around and to him. Hence, throughout most of
Ulysses, ‘stream of consciousness’ is mingled continuously and sometimes uneasily with
objective narrative and the description of outside fact.

The point of the objective narrative raised by Kettle is the crux. It underlines the importance of
linking imagination with the facts of life that have built into them the relationships of individuals
and sections. The stream of consciousness is integral to human existence and the defining trait of
social life.

12
9.9 LET US SUM UP
In this unit, we gained knowledge of stream of consciousness as an important characteristic of
modern fiction in English. It was a new addition to literary writing for redefining representation in
view of changes in the early twentieth century. The stream of consciousness influenced
characterization under which individuals assumed the stance of alert observers. We also came to
know that memory can be a mode by itself and might portray the individual as well as circumstance
in a unique manner. The fiction of this variety used interior monologue to reveal the creative self
of the modern man and establish beyond doubt the human capability of seeing life through the
prism of psychology.

9.10 GLOSSARY
Determining principle: an idea that strongly influences the decision-making of an individual or a
section of society.
Metaphor: a literary device to expand the scope of meaning in poetry.
Paradigm: a theoretical model to bind and present ideas.
Persona: an independent voice in fiction or drama. It is used by the author to distance himself from
an opinion expressed in his work.
Subjectivity: In fiction, a character’s individuality, his personal opinion and standpoint.
Ulysses and Finnegans Wake: titles of novels written by James Joyce.

9.11 UNIT END QUESTION

1. Explain the technique of the stream of consciousness put to use in modern fiction.

9.12 WORKS CITED

“Philip Rieff: American Psychologist” <https://www.britannica.com/biography/Philip-Rieff>

Sanders, Andrew. The Short Oxford History of English Literature. New Delhi: Oxford, 2011.

Strachey, James. Int., Sigmund Freud: Historical and Expository Works on Psychoanalysis. New
Delhi: Shrijee’s Book International, 2003.

“Stream of Consciousness: Literature”<https://www.britannica.com/art/stream-of-

consciousness>

13
UNIT 10 VIRGINIA WOOLF AS A NOVELIST
10.1 Objective
10.2 Introduction
10.3 Virginia Woolf in the Role of a Writer
10.4 Virginia Woolf’s Ideological-Literary Traits
10.5 Modern, Modernity, and Modernism
10.6 Modernist Writing and the Social Context
10.7 Woolf: A Novelist of Assertion
10.8 Virginia Woolf as a Thinker
10.9 Woolf as a Leading Light of the Bloomsbury Group
10.10 Let us sum up
10.11 References
10.12 Glossary
10.13 Questions

10.1 OBJECTIVE
In the first unit of this block, we had a closer view of “stream of consciousness” as a technique
used in modern fiction. In the present unit, we shall explore Virginia Woolf as a writer who had
adopted the novel form to express herself. We shall begin with Modernism that emerged as a strong
trend in the closing years of the nineteenth century and flowered further, so to say, in the twentieth
century. We shall relate Modernism with the First World War influencing life on a big scale. In
the topsy-turvy world that unfolded following the First World War, feminism drew attention
crucially. We shall see the implications of feminism entering the world of fiction. This and a few
other related aspects of the issue would be taken up in this unit.

10.2 INTRODUCTION

Adeline Virginia Stephen was born in Lewes, United Kingdom in 1882. Her father was the famous
English thinker and writer Leslie Stephen. In 1912 at the age of thirty, Virginia Woolf married

14
Leonard Woolf, a thinker and writer of repute at the time. The marriage was marked by mutual
understanding and affection. Apart from writing fiction, Virginia took up the cause of women’s
freedom and assertion and was a thinker in her own right. Her major works include Jacob’s Room
(1922), Mrs. Dalloway (1925), To the Lighthouse (1927) Orlando (1928), and The Waves (1932).
In books such as The Common Reader (1925) and A Room of One’s Own (1939), she comments
on social and literary issues. She died in 1941.

Virginia Woolf’s life had many ups and downs. The process started with childhood. She belonged
to a family of stepbrothers and stepsisters as well as brothers and sisters. She was born to her father
Leslie Stephen in his second marriage. The age gap between parents, and siblings left her without
appropriate company. Her first mental breakdown occurred when she was thirteen. In that year,
she was molested by her stepbrother. This incident left a mark on her psyche never to be sorted
out in life. Even as the great Leslie Stephen treated her with fondness and love and gave her all
access to his rich library, a distance remained between the two. The teenage trauma revisited her
in many diverse forms throughout her life. She would have one bout of insanity after another. A
relative steadiness came to her when at the age of thirty she got married.

Her knowledge of human beings, their nature, temperament and psychological make up came from
the close company of the family members, neighbourhood and later, the literary world. All along,
she felt a sense of a gap between males and females. It gave her the feeling that social power as
well the supposed intellectual superiority of the menfolk was a reality never to be overlooked or
forgotten. The struggles and tensions she saw in her actual world are captured graphically in her
writing. Social life for her was a limited territory and may have compelled her to further go into
the psychology of human beings than their external social behaviour. With time, her unease and
volatility may have increased giving rise to unstable behaviour. In that regard, her writing played
a therapeutic role, giving her a chance to express herself and lessening her emotional pressures. In
the latter part of life, Leonard Woolf and Virginia founded the publishing house called Hogarth
Press in the small town of Hogarth, England. Yet, as time passed, Virginia Woolf became more
and more vulnerable to stress. Finally, she committed suicide by drowning.

10.3 VIRGINIA WOOLF IN THE ROLE OF A WRITER

The literary atmosphere influenced Woolf greatly. In English fiction, she is considered along with
James Joyce (1882-1941), a pioneer of the stream of consciousness trend. This made her literary
approach nonlinear, fragmentary, and impressionistic. It was historical but in a new sense.
History for Woolf is the sense of the present in its variations and dynamic living. For that reason,
her narrative has become exploratory than descriptive. The conventional episodic structure is
conspicuous by its absence in her novels. Her fiction instead follows a pattern-less depiction,
taking unexpected twists and turns, while investigating the grey areas of experience. Likewise,
dialogues and statements are mixed with other forms of expression such as monologue,
daydreaming and fantasy. They lack cogency and appear anarchic. Sharply critical of logic and
rational projection, Virginia Woolf experiments with images, pauses and sudden breaks. This is
the preferred stance of modernist writing, rejecting viewpoints rooted in history.

In Modernist writing, negation of ideas was vehemently stressed and the integrated human being,
was made the target of attack. Woolf combined creative expression with the prevailing ideas.

15
While talking about her, we should keep in mind the nineteen twenties that shaped her as an
extremely active person in the world of thought. It may even be said that she ran a campaign
against simplification in literature. This shows that in practice, she was not an individualist
occupying a corner away from the happenings of life. Even though a Modernist in vision, she gave
much credence to the common taste and thinking of the ordinary reader. The essays in her book
The Common Reader stand testimony to this fact. She ruffled many a feather in the literary world
by referring boldly to Shakespeare. As she projected the women’s state of her time into the past,
she made the interesting statement that Shakespeare became famous simply because he was a
man—if a woman wrote those plays, none would care about them. In this way, the gender prejudice
was highlighted. This viewpoint put her at the forefront of literary debates in England. She proved
to be a champion of the women’s cause. From that angle, she could convincingly assert that at
home, in the patriarchal family, a woman with talent and ideas should have a separate room to
herself. In her opinion, this secured for the woman the right to privacy, and freed her from the
intrusive male gaze. The point was made in her celebrated book A Room of One’s Own. To quote:

A woman must have money and a room of her own if she is to write fiction; and that …
leaves the great problem of the true nature of woman and the true nature of fiction unsolved.
… women and fiction remain, so far as I am concerned, unsolved problems. … Perhaps if
I lay bare the ideas, the prejudices, that lie behind this statement you will find that they
have some bearing upon women and some upon fiction. … When a subject is highly
controversial—and any question about sex is that—one cannot hope to tell the truth. One
can only show how one came to hold whatever opinion one does hold. One can only give
one’s audience the chance of drawing their own conclusions as they observe the limitations,
the prejudices, the idiosyncrasies of the speaker. Fiction is here likely to contain more truth
than fact. (5)

Apparently, one cannot make head or tail of the subject Woolf takes up in the above quote. Indeed,
the problem of the true nature of woman and the true nature of fiction are difficult to grasp in our
world. The psychology of the woman is beyond our reach for that reason. The concerns of the
male-dominated society have all along been to maintain the prevailing structures and to continue
with whatever gives success. The feeling was more acute in Woolf’s time. Also, “the true nature
of fiction” is a problem. How do we relate the one with the other? Mark the repetition of the word
“true.” Finally, we reach the word “truth.” In the way of what is called “truth”, come such obstacles
as the questions about sex, the prejudices that a society nurtures and the idiosyncrasies met with
in the behaviour of individuals. These questions are raised in the quote, even as Woolf remains
non-committal about their resolution. In an obvious sense, drawing one’s “own conclusions” does
not lead us anywhere. What then? Woolf stresses the gap between “truth” and “fact.” These are
some of the difficulties the contemporary writer faces. We might assume that Woolf is conscious
about them in the course of composing her fiction, as a woman as well as a citizen in the modern
world.

Yet, Woolf grappled with the issue of selfhood seriously. It became for her an important concern
regarding dilemmas and uncertainties. Making her stand clear in the situation, she observed in The
Common Reader:

16
 … the accent falls differently from of old; the moments of importance came not here but
there … Let us not take it for granted that life exists more fully in what is commonly
thought big than in what is commonly thought small. (Qtd. Ford)

Woolf’s comment is clearly on the side of the ordinary and the commonplace than on the side of
what she calls big. She is equally conscious about the factor of importance. Even as the tone is
urbane, Woolf shows the upper class its place and its distance from the issues of the day. For her,
the women’s existence had remained marginal all along.

10.4 VIRGINIA WOOLF’S IDEOLOGICAL-LITERARY TRAITS

Virginia Woolf is associated closely with three things—Modernism, Stream of Consciousness, and
Feminism. These are broader themes denoting the literary trend, method of representation, and
theoretical standpoint. They also point towards the important link between literary writing and
society. Woolf’s approach was a decisive factor. She wrote to criticise and intervene and stood for
freedom to express an opinion and to take a position on social issues. In her opinion, the writer is
a participant in the practices of one’s times. This has something to do with the very form of fiction
that writers like Woolf adopted. She was a conscious writer, conscious of class and gender
divisions. This will have a bearing on the discussion in this unit.

There is a distinct version of the Stream of Consciousness deployed by Virginia Woolf in her
fiction. We witness in it a flow of thoughts in conjunction with an individual's mental state. A link
exists between the character's biography, and the larger happenings moulding his/her
consciousness in specific circumstances. In the flow, a sequence gets asserted. Even as the
individual mind is not stuck to a linear trajectory from the past to the present or from present to
the past, one notices a sequence. It tells the story of a society caught in its evolution. Woolf
maintains the posture of detachment. She observes the existing phenomenon, not directly but
through the lens of an independent perceiver. This lets it be known that Woolf is not sure about
the supposed truth emerging in the circumstance at the moment. Her mistrust of a position on the
unfolding scene is a comment by itself, letting the reader know that decisive positions do not matter
since the flow of events in life is relentless. Note the important point Woolf makes by maintaining
the posture of neutrality. It might be a statement of breaking free from the prevailing logic of life.
We identify that there is a sense of freedom in the narrative moving back and forth under a loose
guidance from the character or from the writer-narrator who apparently lets things happen on their
own. In case of the Stream of Consciousness narrative in the hands of Virginia Woolf, the plot line
is arbitrarily followed. There are necessities of the character's temperament, her/his decisions and
clear or vague movements in the frame of the chosen fictional space.

Check your progress 1

Discuss Virginia Woolf’s writing with reference to its ideological and literary traits.

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10.5 MODERN, MODERNITY, AND MODERNISM
What is Modernism and how does it help us understand Virginia Woolf as a novelist? For this
question, we may briefly trace a bit of history to serve as a background. Modernism is meant to
recognize the presence of new ideas taking us effectively into our own time and enabling us to
grapple with the newly-emerged issues. In that regard, in England’s cultural history, we have the
clear markings of Feudalism to separate the old and the medieval from that which is modern. It is
clearly established in English literary thought that Chaucer is a modern poet. He is followed much
later in the sixteenth century by Spenser, Marlowe and Shakespeare. They are considered rightly
the modern voices. To this category, belong poets such as Donne, Marvell and Milton. All of them
belong to the modern stream of writing.

Likewise, modernity was the binding thread between Chaucer on one side and Shakespeare or
Milton on the other. Modernity laid out the character of secularism stressing the reality of the given
world. Open to change, this world was tangible and took intervention from human beings as a
source of strength. People’s endeavour was a positive factor in history since it questioned the
religious or moral structures blocking their ways and disallowed any dynamic step human beings
might take to improve their fate. On the other hand, privilege was central to social life and it
received authentication from divinity. In a significant sense, modernity contested it and enabled
specifically the section of merchants and traders to take things in their hands. The regime of the
privileged and powerful could not take the merchant class for granted any longer. With help from
modernity, the new social classes earned greater initiative than before and moved closer to the
levers of power. This helped them make a dent in the stranglehold of orthodoxy. In the process,
the behaviour of money and trade drew influence from secular politics and scientific thought
bringing about momentous change in the country’s body politic. The change unleashed by the
forces of modernity made possible the rise of a new ethos of optimism and positive outlook.
Finally, the sway from Feudalism to Capitalism was complete in the following centuries. By the
mid-nineteenth century, modernity had gained unquestioned acceptance as the governing idea, its
forms being democracy and egalitarianism. Thus, we observe that modern and modernity are
inextricably linked, the modern assuming a theoretical frame of modernity.

Contrarily though, with the onset of the twentieth century we note a crucial alteration in the
parameters forging a different view of the unfolding scenario. We talk no longer about the non-
medieval or anti-medieval values to connect with the period of science and rationality. Instead,
Modernism assumes a distinct twentieth century connotation with no link with the previous
decades. It is counter to the view that writers such as Chaucer and Shakespeare stood for.
Modernism is not understood in relation to modernity of the kind associated with the great writing
of the previous centuries. To reiterate, modernity and Modernism have no connection with each
other. The latter is confined specifically to the decades leading to the First World War and the
writers emerging in its wake. Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound are
Modernist writers since they talk of a dilemma arising in the era of uncertainty and stasis in the
twentieth century. Modernism assumes a universalist connotation under which the modern man
becomes a prototype of mankind itself. One wonders whether the study of psychology in the
nineteenth century did this by putting at the centre the individual human being. Whatever the case,
modernism of the twentieth century gave rise to a form of writing that could be set apart from all
literary forms in the past.

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Check your progress 2

Explain the terms ‘modernity’ and ‘modernism’. Are the terms connected in any way?

10.6 Modernist Writing and the Social Context

The age of modernist flowering was conflict-ridden with no tangible contours. It was recognised
as a fact of modern-day life and appeared to be the circumstance going out of control. That was
contrary to the perceptions of Woolf’s predecessors. Gone was the time when human beings by
themselves decided on a path to pursue, when a tangible aim worked out with effort at the larger
cultural level and was the determining principle of their behaviour. That was in the nineteenth
century when Charles Darwin and Karl Marx had redefined the humanist-historical view of man
as a conscious agent of the phenomenon of change. Truly emphasised in Modernism, however,
was a view that was dark and pessimist at its core. In the new century, power and initiative were
snatched away from the citizen, from the human individual who would perceive, think about and
analyse the existing social trends, when he would exercise conscious choice to realise himself.
The same held true about social sections evolving a consensus, and on that basis working for a
change in conditions. The spread of Capitalism in the new situation reduced the citizen to the level
of a helpless person meant to follow the established conventions and dictates of a state. This
environment produced persons alienated from their surroundings. In brief, the Modernist trend was
bereft of all links with the preceding epochs in history and lacked cohesion. Such a Modernist
paradigm emerged in the fiction of Virginia Woolf.

There is a justification in saying that the peculiar manifestation of Modernism was the Stream of
Consciousness emerging in a new form of fiction. It gave literary writing a peculiar character
adhering to the logic of spontaneity in thought. That indeed turned the table on how thought had
been considered so far. At the turn of the century, a belittling of thought occurred. The presence
of logic was rejected in representation. That undermined the nature of thought steadying the boat
of life, so to say, and leaving the mental process to the exigencies of moods and emotions. The
sense of certainty in the human mind was done away with. Thus, Modernism and the Stream of
Consciousness worked hand in hand to establish the superiority of human being’s mental processes
in a raw form. The paradigm appeared in the form of thoughts of the characters in works of fiction
without a specific pattern. Literally, it was a flow. We are made to realise that consciously chosen
endeavours of a character relate, directly or indirectly, with his/her self, thus going over
innumerable matters floating in memory as thinking and memory work in tandem. In the Stream
of Consciousness fiction, a character was shown as waking up in the morning and soon beginning
to sort out his or her dilemmas with a dreamy pressure of the previous day.

10.7 VIRGINIA WOOLF: A NOVELIST OF ASSERTION

Think of the socio-ideological haze covering the fates of twentieth century men and women and
letting no escape route to emerge. It recognised the working of the human mind parallel to the
plans the individual pursued. As was the case in reality, a person lived invariably at two levels, the
level of the job he /she was assigned to determine his / her life, and the other level where in mind

19
he / she continuously engaged in a parallel thought irrespective of whether it related directly or
indirectly to the assigned job. According to the Stream of Consciousness, a person was never
alone—someone/something always remained active in his/her mind. Indeed, someone always
talked to him/her. It amounted to a drama enacted inside one’s mind. Further, and yet more
meaningfully the act of imagination was integral to the person concerned.

The next thing to be considered is the state of women around the First World War. It was a domain
shaped entirely by the male. Trade and commerce as well as social and political management were
in the grip of the dominant male even as women were pushed to the periphery of running the
household. They were to merely assist the contemporary leadership and bureaucracy in the larger
world. As an individual, Virginia Woolf stood at the point of relative advantage. Coming from the
upper sections in English society, Woolf had witnessed the lack of freedom and initiative in
women’s role. Things were changing though, but at a slow pace. The family and marriage observed
the dictates of the husband. Woolf had woken up to the presence of powerful women writers in the
latter part of the nineteenth century. George Eliot and Elizabeth Barret Browning were examples.
But the scope of women’s participation in social life was limited and narrow. Acutely aware of
this aspect, Woolf chose to follow her own independent path of expression for drawing attention
to the secondary position of the womenfolk.

10.8 VIRGINIA WOOLF AS A THINKER

Virginia Woolf was primarily a fiction writer engaging with contemporary literary criticism,
theory and the subordinate position of women in society. That takes us to the third point mentioned
above concerning the characteristic emphases in her writing. She chose to reflect upon women-
related issues, with that she could offer resistance to the prevailing hierarchy based on gender. Her
essays on social biases against women left a distinct mark on the English literary thought. Activists
in the Feminist trend in the sixties and the seventies constantly referred to her insights into the
culturally flawed social phenomenon. Virginia Woolf is remembered for her essays in A Room of
One’s Own that highlight privacy as being crucial to a woman’s identity. The essays discuss
anonymity that had been forced upon women of her time and which was indeed an extension of a
long tradition of neglect. Also, the element of neglect that was subtly present won acceptance of
the population of women. In the context, we may keep in mind her portrayals of women characters
in her fiction. Her works such as Orlando, Mrs Dalloway and To the Lighthouse come to mind.
We note in a significant sense the thoughtful and extremely creative nature of the women she picks
up for representation. This is borne out by the following:

[S]he was increasingly angered by masculine condescension to female talent. In A Room

of One’s Own (1929), Woolf blamed women’s absence from history not on their lack of
brains and talent but on their poverty. For her 1931 talk “Professions for Women,” Woolf
studied the history of women’s education and employment and argued that unequal
opportunities for women negatively affect all of society. She urged women to destroy the
“angel in the house,” a reference to Coventry Patmore’s poem of that title, the
quintessential Victorian paean to women who sacrifice themselves to men. …

… Virginia had kept a diary, off and on, since 1897. In 1919 she envisioned “the shadow
of some kind of form which a diary might attain to,” organized not by a mechanical

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 recording of events but by the interplay between the objective and the subjective. Her diary,
as she wrote in 1924, would reveal people as “splinters & mosaics; not, as they used to
hold, immaculate, monolithic, consistent wholes.” Such terms later inspired critical
distinctions, based on anatomy and culture, between the feminine and the masculine, the
feminine being a varied but all-embracing way of experiencing the world and the masculine
a monolithic or linear way. Critics using these distinctions have credited Woolf with
evolving a distinctly feminine diary form, one that explores, with perception, honesty, and
humour, her own ever-changing, mosaic self.*

Here, the mention of interplay between the objective and the subjective makes Woolf’s
engagement authentic. She saw a given phenomenon, grasped it under her perspective and
reproduced it on the page as per her choice of formulation. Mark in it, use of the apparently
mundane along with ideas of an evolved mind.

10.9 WOOLF AS A LEADING LIGHT OF THE BLOOMSBURY

GROUP
For understanding Woolf’s thought and role, it would be useful to refer to the Bloomsbury Group
that had shown its potential face in friendships of a few English writers and thinkers in the latter
part of the nineteenth century. Intellectualism was at its core and a deep distrust of convention and
orthodoxy was its main strength. It was dominated by males at the time who were well-informed
and sensitive as well as inspired by art. Their faith in art was derivative, not based on the experience
of the time first-hand. In the nineteen twenties though, the Bloomsbury Group made a place for
itself in the English cultural life, with discussion, dialogue, and a free exchange of views being its
defining features. Most of the ideas and opinions expressed by its members revolved around
literature. Even as rational discourse prevailed to a large extent, it steered clear of the expressly
political standpoint. Can it be said the members of the Bloomsbury Group found the political
projection of issues beneath them and for which they would not spare sustained consideration?
They would instead bring in the aspects of art and high culture as well as a tolerant brand of
humanism. This was to enrich the new atmosphere they wished to create in the post-First World
War period of mixed-up perceptions.

The Bloomsbury group trusted their sophisticated minds for filling up gaps between their self and
the concrete purpose, and yet remained stuck to a mild sense of peace. Incidentally, around 1920,
sisters Virginia and Vanessa (children of Leslie Stephen) with husbands Leonard Woolf and Clive
Bell respectively had joined the group and took part in its running with interest. The group was
modelled around the ideals of Leslie Stephen, a passionate seeker of truth and one contributing his
might to the cause of thoughtful participation in intellectual life. The company then became the
'Memoir Club,' literally making it a get-together of past memories in human form. Some of the
friends of the foursome were Desmond and Dolly McCarthy, E.M. Forster, and John Maynard
Keynes. The spirit of the group lurks behind Virginia Woolf's fiction of the nineteen twenties,
particularly Mrs. Dalloway and To the Lighthouse. The social life of the time would appear to the
writers of this breed as a series of perceptions of what they saw and observed. It was a mix of the
concrete spectacle existing at a safe distance. This spectacle ensured safety and equanimity of the
perceiver, sanitising her/her sensitivity covered under layers of poetic similes and soft mental

21
projections. For Clarissa Dalloway, air in the early hours of the day would be, for instance, "like a
flap of a wave; the kiss of a wave; chill and sharp."

The Bloomsbury spirit, so to say, aimed at breaking free from the conventional wisdom of the
Victorian period. The second half of the nineteenth century England was marked by a shallow
complacency and smugness. For people in the period, those settled in positions of power had easy
questions to deal with and the answers were likewise banal. It all stood on the wealth coming to
the metropolitan centre called England from the colonies spread over the entire globe. The clash
of interests created an impasse. One might guess in such a case that the Modernism we have talked
of in the earlier sections of this unit was an apt response to the Victorianism that ruled the roost.
In the new response lay the effort of problematising answers and recognising that humans were to
keep pace with the overall growth of social resources. It took to experimenting with an expression
that recognised subtlety. For it, the existing human experience had a mercurial nature easily
slipping through words and phrases and compelling the author to give it an open and uncertain
shape. If in the hands of an artist, the human-social experience assumed a temper of ever innovating
with words that would prove true to the nature of an ever-evolving meaning. It made the outlook
of the Bloomsbury group elitist and appealed only to the chosen ones among readers.

The Bloomsbury Group became a symbol of writing marked by an exclusive emphasis on the
literary art as a field beyond definition. It would not only be different from the fiction written in
the nineteenth century but also from the writing that the post-First World War writers produced.
Any literary convention of plot, characterisation, detailing of situations, use of dialogue, or
dramatizing events was to be shunned since that would take away from the feelings, moods, and
situations present behind human conduct. Finding an apt word or phrase and doing justice to a
state of mind was the issue. Complexity was the watchword. In one go, literary writing went out
of the purview of a common literary practitioner even as, ironically, the common reader and her/his
needs and requirements were uppermost in the minds of Bloomsbury thinkers and theorists. Was
it the case that it had fallen upon the writer of an evolved sensitivity to improve and enrich the
understanding of the common reader, educating her/him in the niceties of the literary enterprise?

Check your progress 3

What is the significance of the ‘Bloomsbury group’ in the intellectual history of early twentieth
century Britain?

10.10 LET US SUM UP

In this unit, we have dealt with the question of Virginia Woolf’s personality as a writer. Her
interests lay in expressing herself as a sensitive being in the surroundings of crisis. Her role
involved interpreting the twentieth century situation as a woman who was equipped with the
knowledge of the mental processes. Modernism of a new kind got forged in her hands. She
established in fiction a style that relied on observation, feeling and exploration. She did not
remain confined to a distant and detached view but exercised assertion against forces of money
and market culture. Her participation as a member of the Bloomsbury group helped her remain
unaffected by predetermined goals of easy access. Her ideology was hidden but was ever active

22
and alert. This is clear in her fictional depictions and critical statements carrying a sharp
comment on the conditions of the day.

10.11 REFERENCES
Woolf, Virginia. A Room of One’s Own and Three Guineas. Ed. Morag Shiach. New York: Oxford,
2008.

Ford, Boris. Pelican Guide: The Modern Age. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1963.

Entry on Virginia Woolf in Britannica. <https://www.britannica.com/biography/Virginia-Woolf.>

10.12 GLOSSARY
Nonlinear: In Virginia Woolf’s context, the word hints at the mixed and complex in life as well as
feelings specifically.

Fragmentary: It goes in congruence with the nonlinear, and denotes parts that have an identity of
their own. Thus, fragmentary is meaningful.

Impressionistic: It refers to the momentary and the fleeting state of mind. We might also extend it
to mean that which is unformed.

Dreamy pressure of the previous day: The expression fits in well with the writing of the Stream of
Consciousness. In the context, the new is not entirely new but carries the imprint of the previous
day in a shadowy form.

10.13 UNIT END QUESTIONS

1 In what way can Virginia Woolf be called a writer of assertion? Explain.

2. Write a critical note on Virginia Woolf’s Modernism.

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UNIT 11 MRS DALLOWAY: ANALYSIS AND
INTERPRETATIONS
11.1 Objectives
11.2 Introduction
11.3 The Main Point of Significance in Mrs. Dalloway
11.4 A View of the Social Fabric in England
11.5 The Perspective of Vacuity and Stasis
11.6 Experimentative Plot
11.7 Poetic Approach than the Fictional One
11.8 Let us sum up
11.9 References
11.10 Glossary
11.11 Questions

11.1 OBJECTIVE
In the previous two units, you have read about the stream of consciousness trend in English fiction,
and Virginia Woolf as a novelist in the modernist mode. In this unit, we shall focus on Virginia
Woolf’s novel Mrs. Dalloway as a text focusing upon the states of mind in twentieth century
English life. This unit discusses the central character Clarissa Dalloway, an upper-class woman
who wonders what is significant and what is ephemeral in her world. With Clarissa as our guide,
we shall gain a deeper understanding of the conflicts of her time. It will be our job to ascertain
those areas of human experience that engaged sensitive minds of that period. As we confront
dilemmas facing a variety of characters in addition to Clarissa, our understanding of the times will
be enriched. In this unit, we shall also consider the poetic versus the fictional aspect in Mrs.
Dalloway. We will note that Woolf relies a great deal on experiment and innovation.

11.2 INTRODUCTION

(picture source: Wikimedia Commons)

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As is said in the previous units of this block, a new kind of fiction took shape in the early years of
the twentieth century. The reason for novelty lay in the European surroundings marked by issues
of loneliness, isolation, doubt and uncertainty. Though a divided society existed, the clash of
interests and concerns were muted. Communication between people got badly hit and words did
not enjoy the kind of appeal they did in the preceding decades. Were there stories and episodes in
life to engage people? Clouds of the First World War could be seen on the horizon. No one knew
about the issues behind this problematic phenomenon. The same was reflected in the writing of
the time; it went into regions of psychology where answers to the current malaise could be
identified. Doubt was key factor in life, and the novel of the period was forced to grapple with the
anarchic motivations of human behaviour.

As a novel, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway concentrated on what was called the inner landscape
of people’s minds. It overlooked the broader macrocosmic reality and wondered about the
mysteries of human imagination. The said mysteries pointed towards Romantic writing of the
nineteenth century. Yet, the difference lay in the conceptualization of the phenomenon. The
Romantic thought of hope and dream was replaced by the modernist emphasis on hollowness and
apathy. The question to be considered here is whether Mrs. Dalloway was a part of that scene. As
we shall see in the following discussion, modernist fiction presented characters not as flesh and
blood individuals but as shadows moving around in the contemporary scenario like lost souls. We
confront those figures in the form of characters such as Clarissa, Peter Walsh, Septimus Warren
Smith, and Lucrezia. They aspire for meaning in life but fail to attain anything tangible in the
course of living.

Source www.flickr.com

25
11.3 THE MAIN POINT OF SIGNIFICANCE IN MRS.
DALLOWAY
Mrs. Dalloway does not offer statements or descriptions. The author does not seem to be interested
in telling a story. It may even be said that there is no story to tell in the novel, indeed the novel can
do without it. Only in the background does Mrs. Dalloway have a narrative—a sequence of
happenings in which characters participate. The individual circumstance and the social situation
are suggested through the dialogue that the central character holds with herself. That too, happens
in her memory. This method of representation is consciously used by the writer. We note that the
writer’s choice is to focus on the circumstance of an individual who is driven by the logic of her
world. We might contrast this with the traditional fiction form that, among other things, worked
at the level of dialogue. In the traditional novel, people talk, discuss, disagree, use satire, or create
a climate of happy exchange. All these are conspicuous by their absence in Mrs. Dalloway. The
novel presents an account of a mental state, the one in which Clarissa finds herself involved. We
may wonder whether such a novel would be able to engage the reader. On the other hand, Woolf
would insist that her job is to explore and examine a phenomenon she confronts in life. She would
take the existing circumstance as a challenge. The assumption is that the alert citizen would need
to know the surroundings from an angle of interest and serious concern. If there are spots in society
that present a problem, the citizen would pause and think about them. In that process, he would
mentally participate to see the dynamic link between one thing and another. That is the point Mrs.
Dalloway raises.

In Mrs. Dalloway, there are many characters facing grave issues. The string of their thoughts is
held by an omniscient narrator. The thread connecting those characters with Clarissa, is time. They
coexist with Clarissa in the London of the nineteen twenties. Also, Clarissa is aware that the world
she inhabits is a complex one, ridden with cross purposes. She would come across many people
on the road she does not know. But they do exist. This fact might explain the fact that her life,
family and neighbourhood also reflect those of others outside her personal circle. The example of
Septimus Warren Smith and his wife Lucrezia comes to mind. Septimus is an Englishman and his
wife is an Italian. Outside the history of his love affair and marriage there is a sequence of
happenings he was a part of. He is a soldier who fought in the First World War. There, he had a
friend called Evans. The two fought together on the war front till one day, Evans got killed by a
gunshot before Septimus’s eyes. Septimus has carried all along the guilt of Evans’ death. This
gives him a split personality. He hallucinates many a time in the novel seeing the ghost of Evans
and he enters imaginatively into the scene of the war far back in time. This gets him in conflict
with the sweet and harmonious life with Lucrezia. Because of Septimus’s hallucinations, Lucrezia
remains concerned all the time about the safe upkeep of her husband and follows to protect him
like a shadow. The point made is that Clarissa and Septimus will never meet, yet they constitute
an important part of the novel since they coexist in that world. What would it say about the novel
except that the narrative in modern fiction is non-linear and integrated on the strength of distant
associations?

26
11.4 A VIEW OF THE SOCIAL FABRIC IN ENGLAND
In this regard, let us begin with a comment on Peter Walsh in the novel. He can be called as one
of the centres of cognition. His stand in the novel is unique. It is both critical and mildly, accepting.
He is not happy with the way things shaped up before his eyes. At the same time though, he is
incapable of moulding the course of events to his liking. But without him, the novel would lose its
peculiar colouring. He makes a running commentary on other characters as well as events that pass
him by. He is particularly focused on Clarissa’s choices and plans. It is interesting to watch the
movement of the society of his time in the direction of decline. The social fabric of English society
emerging in his imagination has no life or dynamic. That constitutes the positive part of his role.
The negative part is that he has little impact to make on the goings-on. Precisely, this is where a
realistic picture of the times gets reflected in the novel.

Peter Walsh is seldom happy or calm. He carries in his mind a running turmoil about winning
peace or stability. He is stricken with idealism that gives him tough moments while sorting out
life's issues. Many of his ideas might appeal to the reader but he is not able to put them into practice.
A lover of Clarissa Dalloway, Peter proves himself to be too attractive for comfort. He draws her
close but also confuses her. She cannot cope with his passion or intelligence and settles down in
life with "a fool" instead. At least, the foolish Richard Dalloway would afford to Clarissa a lighter
uneventful life that she would successfully fill up with small talk and smoothly organised get-
togethers—the many inanities the upper-class urban life has to offer. Mark that England is passing
through a critical phase of its making, or unmaking at the time.

The party organized by Clarissa becomes an image of the social forces at the helm. It attracts the
upper class to Clarissa’s place. Everyone attending the party remains confined to ritualism. There
are people in it who want to tread the path of philanthropy, of settling down as refugees in another
country, Canada in this case. We also note that a section on the rise in the existing scenario is the
middle class of professionals. We have in mind the two doctors, Holmes and Bradshaw, who study
the phenomenon from the angle of sustaining the health of the country, literally and
metaphorically. They have an answer for everything and they wield great power in managing
abnormalities and distortions. The third section is of politicians and the military bureaucracy.
Significantly however, these groups do not include the controllers of the trade and the market. It
appears that England has lost initiative to control the colonies it captured in the previous century.
Mrs. Dalloway offers a window on the country’s lean phase. Thus it is only natural that the novel
ends on a note of death—a case of suicide by a war veteran.

As suggested in the previous section, Mrs Dalloway would hardly fit in with the established nature
of the novel form that relies on suspense, anecdotes and verbal exchanges. Instead, Woolf’s novel
explores the psychological state of specific individuals than offering a view of society through
episodes and incidents. What we cull in the manner of locating a declining social fabric, is left to
ineffectual interpreters such as Peter Walsh and the political leaders. Yet, we notice the invisible
presence of a tension-ridden scenario, which implies the vacuity of a metropolitan city teeming
with high government dignitaries as well as Lords and Dukes. The account of these runs parallel
to those who suffered in the war and came back to a supposedly normal life as tormented beings.

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Check your progress 1

Does Mrs Dalloway engage with the social conditions in early twentieth century Britain?

11.5 THE PERSPECTIVE OF VACUITY AND STASIS

The main line of thought in this novel is highlighted through the get-togethers of the elite in the
city of London. Their ritual of meeting in the evenings and sorting out issues, at some level
indicates the act of becoming a community. Clarissa’s part symbolizes the pattern of life in the
city. We see preparations of such a party as the main body of the novel. The event culminates in
the ritualistic exchanges at night among the powerful. Virginia Woolf successfully presents the
undercurrents of apprehension in the nightmarish experiences of various characters. The sweep of
the novel becomes wider as the novel proceeds. It has in its fold the distant colonies of the Western
powers, the hierarchy of the ruling sections, the middle classes vying for success and favours, the
philanthropic contests of money power, hypocritical behaviour of social climbers, to name a few.
These do not exist on surface but could be felt at every nook and corner in London and in the
surrounding world. The party suggests it subtly.

Mrs. Dalloway is a serious attempt at exploring the entanglements of modern existence in an

atmosphere of instability. All this is deftly woven within the reigning pattern of modernist
aimlessness. The one major factor for noting it is the sustained interest in answers that have to be
found or invented if sanity is to be restored. Yet, the answers are not given. Perhaps, no answers
exist at the moment, as members of the ruling class struggle in vain to gain truth of the
phenomenon. To repeat, searching would not bear fruit since those involved in the search are not
up to the task of finding a common goal. Weirdly, the dilemma is seen better by Septimus’ wife
Lucrezia. She is able to define the parameters of failure and fruitlessness, unlike others. Yet, she
would not give up. The involved nature of the issue is captured not in the scene of the party, but
away from it. In her case, a leap is discerned. In the middle of the satirical tone of the narrator, we
notice in Lucrezia, a mention of hope. The image is not long lasting, but it leaves a mark. To quote:

Shuffling the edges straight, she did up the papers, and tied the parcel almost without
looking, sitting beside him, he thought, as if all her petals were about her. She was a
flowering tree; and through her branches looked out the face of a lawgiver, who had
reached a sanctuary where she feared no one; not Holmes; not Bradshaw; a miracle, a
triumph, the last and greatest. Staggering he saw her mount the appalling staircase, laden
with Holmes and Bradshaw; men who never weighted less than eleven stone six, who sent
their wives to Court, men who made ten thousand a year and talked of proportion; who
different in their verdicts (for Holmes said one thing, Bradshaw another), yet judges they
were; who mixed the vision and the sideboard; saw nothing clear, yet ruled, yet inflicted.
“Must” they said. Over them she triumphed. (129)

In Lucrezia’s context, realization of the said vacuity has the angle of a fight. At the moment, she,
“a flowering tree,” fears “no one,” and for that reason snatches a realistic view of the stalemate in
front. The power wielded by the two doctors, Holmes and Bradshaw, means nothing to her, nor to
the larger society in which they prosper. The two are medical professionals and have been given
sanction by the administering system. See that they get legitimacy from the institution of medical

28
knowledge in the country. However, they run their own logic of “propriety” and general health. It
goes to the credit of Woolf that the two doctors are held to ridicule. Ordinary people feel crushed
by their presence. Because of them, a line gets drawn between them and the country’s population
without means and resources. In the novel, this is a clear case of social criticism pointing at the
stasis as well as absurdity of the goings-on at the time.

We realize that Mrs. Dalloway has no actual situations in which characters are caught, even as
they struggle to understand their innate nature. The characters navigate their course through the
mental activity that keeps them in touch with that they see in front and the effect thereof on their
own views. The reader is given to understand that the interaction between the outer world and the
individuals' outlook is part of a bigger construct covering a substantial chunk of the existing
society. We note, therefore, that all along the novel, there is a spread of the net which is left behind
by past circumstances in a character's life. Who is at the centre of it all, calling the shots and
strengthening one's own comprehension? The answer is not clearly given.

For Woolf, the crux of social experience is the active participation of an individual self in it. With
this is linked the yet more significant dimension of the many individuals, carriers of the many
sensitivities and outlooks, who throng the scene. They appear as having originated from a common
segment in society but enjoy specificities of their own role and function in that society. Together,
the captured individualities become a concrete formation of a living spectacle that they are a part
of. This helps Woolf in widening her appeal in the world of the time. The social face of such a
culture educates the reader no end, giving him an alert view of the determining structures that are
restrictive and dictating.

The different sequences relate with one another on the basis of shared concerns emerging in the
said stream. As a consequence, a wider plan comes into view and lets the reader engage with
it. After every four, five pages, the scene in the novel changes, as if in a natural course and other
sets of character appear. The writer only notes their age, clothes they wear and the manner they
adopt to be in the existing flow of life that goes on uninterrupted. The major point of interest in
the novel is the person Septimus and his young Italian wife. They are used by the writer as a
mythical couple in modern surroundings. There is an air of mystery about them. Septimus has
decided to kill himself in public and the wife helplessly watches his odd stance of sticking to his
avowed aim.

11.6 THE EXPERIMENTAL PLOT

There is no conventionality in the plot of Mrs. Dalloway. It does not exist in the fictional form that
the writer is supposed to have inherited from the nineteenth century novel. The novel in the
preceding century had firmly established the method of fictional representation. We beheld a story
growing under a logic of happenings, and the scene was inhabited by characters that would be in
conflict or agreement with one another. In that phase of literary representation, the sequence of
happenings began at a specific point with statements and observations serving as the background.
The authorial comment and dialogue constituted an important part of the narrative. The element
of suspense and surprise added zest to the novel that was meant to entertain and educate readers.
In turn, writing necessitated successes and failures of the main characters in order to take the story
forward. The curiosity about ‘What next’ moved in a certain direction and the reader became a

29
willing participant in the imaginatively created scenario. Such an action plan or the plot engaged
the reader in the ramifications of the novel’s main subject. All this is defied by Virginia Woolf in
this novel. If such a defiance were to be key to the novel in the present case, shall we say that Mrs.
Dalloway does not have a plot in it? Our answer to this question would be largely affirmative.

As if under a scheme, Woolf adheres to the idea of non-plot. She has named the novel after a
woman character with a name and a mission—the name being Clarissa Dalloway, and the mission
being organizing parties for those who matter, who are placed at the top of the ladder. The mission
in the hands of Clarissa is projected through events that occur in a day, from morning till late at
night. Clarissa is depicted referentially, not formally or directly. She comes and goes at the
convenience of the author who holds the reins of the description in her firm hands. As the novel
proceeds, we get to know Clarissa’s age on the day she organizes the party, the one we as readers
are witness to in the pages of the novel. The word “referential” is important, it brings in the flow
of events, if they can be called so, arbitrarily. See how the novel opens:

Mrs. Dalloway said she would buy the flowers herself.

For Lucy had her work cut out for her. The doors would be taken off their hinges;
Rumpelmayer’s men were coming. And then, thought Clarissa Dalloway, what a
morning—fresh as if issued to children on a beach. (5)

What we said in the beginning of this point occurs to us again as we notice this opening. The novel
shows a complete departure from the convention of a novel with a plot. Indeed, the novel could
have begun at any other moment in life of Clarissa Dalloway. But who is Mrs. Dalloway in the
particular sense? We are kept wondering about the character after whom the novel has been named.
As such, the reader’s expectations do not matter the least, s/he is prepared to take whatever is
offered without batting an eyelid. Still, the question remains, “Does the novel have a plot in it?”
On a second thought, we might as well say yes, because the buying of flowers, Lucy, the removal
of doors for an occasion, and the mention of a morning give the reader something to grapple with.
A story and a plot-line do get suggested.

We might be aware that in the course of reading, the reader is kept at a distance from the novel
and is to struggle for reaching the meaning built into the narrative. It is particularly so for the
reader in India since the life of the nineteen twenties in London is removed many times over for
us. The period of the novel is when we were under the yoke of the British. What helps us is that it
is written by a woman who is mindful of the subject race (of the Britishers), so to say, and its
infirmities. Imagine that in this novel, one of the major characters, Peter, has lived in India for a
while and has plans to go back to it in connection with a second marriage. He is an outsider to
India and his affair with one or the second woman is limited to the white community. Plot-wise,
these complicate matters for the reader. The reason behind the difficulty to make sense of the novel
is that the conceived pattern of happenings remains undefined for all, inside the novel as well as
the readers.

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Check your progress 2

Virginia Woolf has adhered to the idea of the non-plot. Do you agree? Give a reasoned answer.

11.7 POETIC APPROACH THAN THE FICTIONAL

ONE
Woolf's approach to human experience lies in a poetic response to how an individual feels in a
situation and what s/he perceives at the level of imagination. For any character in this novel, a
detail does not denote an idea, but only a sensation on which another sensation of the same kind
may be hung. The character is led from there to form an impression. Is this act psychological? The
answer in the case of Woolf would be nearer the poetic than the psychological. The poetic and the
psychological are clearly differentiated and may require an explanation. Melba Cuddy-Keane has
observed:

Woolf valued the plasticity and fluidity of language, seeing its effect on the unconscious
as both fertilizing and liberating, in stark contrast to the increasingly analytic and
monolithic tendencies of the new professional discipline of English studies. … Woolf was
not attempting to theorize the unconscious. Instead, she focused on the evocative
possibilities of unconscious response, and to do so, she wrote in metaphoric, imagistic, and
highly suggestive ways (134).*

In Mrs. Dalloway’s poetic mode, many peculiarities appear when a spectacle is considered. These
peculiarities add to the poetic value of the depiction. It may have to do with a word that is only
vaguely real. Many a time, an image comes to the rescue of the writer, or a snatch from memory.
Woolf is ever vigilant to the emerging shape of a perception and participates in its final capturing.
Use of the psychological terrain proves helpful. The writer is half committed to the picture in front
but also dares to add an imaginative glance to it. The result is a phenomenon open to intervention.
There is an anarchic urge, let us admit, to take things in one's hand and interfere with our own
preference. Therein lies the issue of elitism -- the literary effort is seen as a means to realize oneself
and dictate to the fiction one's own choice. Rightly, Clarissa Dalloway is recognizable as Woolf's
own selfhood, projected more or less indulgently. See Clarissa's interpretation of Peter Walsh and
Richard Dalloway. They are denied the right to stand on their own merit and do the bidding of the
author-protagonist.

Psychology lends breadth to characterization in a general sense and it conveys to the reader that
individuals act in a specific way bound as they are by a logic that is built into them. Thereon, the
activated sensibility takes over and begins movement in whichsoever direction it might, depending
on the existing circumstance.

Woolf does not distinguish between the supposedly positive and negative characters. It is due to
the psychological dimension of the stream of consciousness mode. All characters have a mental
make-up that evolved in the process of social living in the past. They have one or the other episode
to refer to in their moment-to-moment activity. As characters proceed along their chosen path,

31
Clarissa Dalloway for buying flowers in the beginning of the day for instance, they are constantly
reminded of some happening in the past. Woolf lets the reader know that no one is ever alone, or
with a blank mind. All are walking as actively participating in the world, so to say, and with stray
principles to guide them. This enables the observer, the writer included, to remain free from the
act of judging whether people are right or wrong, acceptable or unacceptable. The element of
tolerance and appreciation is inherent in the writer's outlook keeping it from being judgmental and
maintaining a safe from norms and prejudices.

We have consistently used the word modernist in our discussion. That seems yet more relevant
with respect to the supposed plot. The twentieth century necessity of focusing on the moment and
keeping away from concrete comment is the point at issue. “Necessity” is a heavy word. It brings
in the compulsions of life the various characters bear with while integrating with the fellow beings.
Yet, the said integration does not take place in a meaningful sense. Most persons walk alone. They
meet their old acquaintances as a chance happening. It is true that individually they carry a whole
world inside them. Do we not see that the choices they made guided them minimally since they
were extraneous to their temperament? Another set of choices would have equally well served the
purpose. Boredom and dullness, as is the case with the meetings in which Mr. Dalloway and the
group he is part of engage.

The novel follows the pattern of modern-day rituals. These are shown at the level of the family,
the roadside happenings, the discussions and exchanges taking place during lunches of the rich
and privileged. The reader is kept wondering about the rationale of the incidents chosen by the
author. The non-plot may be an important factor in that regard. Perhaps this creates aesthetic needs
of being evocative and experimental. When narrative is pushed to the background, the image takes
over and poetic suggestion is deployed to give cohesion to the disparate situations. The poetic
mode contributes to the complexity of representation as it does not allow a statement and an
observation to enlighten the social scene. There appears a kind of vested interest in leaving the
issues unresolved. We may consider that this perhaps is at the root of the novel’s modernism. The
non-novel trait of representation coupled with internally rich poetic images renders the account
inaccessible to the reader whose rationality is constantly under attack from free-flowing and
wayward comments.

Check your progress 3

Would it be true to say that being a stream of consciousness novel Mrs. Dalloway has no link with
life outside memory? Discuss.

11.8 LET US SUM UP

In this unit, we have particularly focused upon the departure of Mrs. Dalloway from the
conventional fictional form. It leaves the sequence of incidents and the overall plot structure and
takes liberties with the novel form. The novel dwells on sharp and telling images of a society that
has no future to look forward to. It is also highlighted that something wrong has occurred to the
social fabric of England, leaving it without verve and dynamism. In those parts of the novel where
satire is used for attacking priorities, the reader is left to wander aimlessly in an atmosphere of
doom. At the end of the novel, Clarissa is sidelined and stasis has taken over. Likewise, the death

32
of Septimus has a paralyzing effect on the novel’s descriptions. It stands to reason that the
deployment of the poetic in preference to the accepted prose depictions takes the novel away from
a concrete rendering of the phenomenon to the realm of uncertainty and dismay. There is much in
the interpretation that is closer to mental states than to a passionate attempt at winning significance.

11.9 REFERENCES:
Cuddy-Keane, Melba. Virginia Woolf, The Intellectual, And The Public Sphere. Cambridge:
Cambridge U.P., 2003.

Woolf, Virginia. Mrs. Dalloway. Maple: Noida, India. Rpt. 2020.

11.10 GLOSSARY:
Social fabric: The term denotes more than a pattern. It is a metaphor and has built into it a design,
a combination of colours and shades as well as a quality of the threads woven into the structure.
In that sense, Mrs. Dalloway as a novel is rich in connotation. That is why a whole discussion is
accorded to the idea in the unit.

Ritualism: This has reference to the party organized by Clarissa. We are struck by the mechanical
movement of the characters attending the party in which greetings are exchanged as a matter of
routine. There is little genuineness about them.

Anarchic motivations of human behaviour: Anarchy indicates lack of discipline or accepted

notions of behaviour.

Vacuity and Stasis: We may grasp these from the activities the characters in the novel engage in.
None in the novel has a sense of purpose. The reference to a gap of twenty years in the age of
Clarissa tells little about the ground she may have covered in life. The same could be said about
the empty and airy efforts of Peter Walsh wishing to settle down in life.

Proportion: A heavy word. It is a euphemism for normalcy and rightness of values. Dr. Bradshaw
hides much behind the use of this word.

11.11 QUESTIONS

1. Write a critical note on Septimus Warren Smith.

2. In what ways does Mrs. Dalloway depart from the traditions of the nineteenth century realist
novel?
3. Consider Mrs. Dalloway as a modernist novel.

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UNIT 12 MRS. DALLOWAY: THEMES AND CONCERNS
12.1 Objective
12.2 Introduction
12.3 The First World War as a Crucial Issue
12.3.1 The Reach of the Colonies and the Problems
12.3.2 Effects of the War on the Common people
12.3.3 Influence of the Phenomena on Literature
12.4 The Medical Profession
12.5 Love and Madness
12.5 Idealism and Humanism
12.7 The Social Critique
12.8 Let us Sum Up
12.9 Bibliography
12.10 Glossary
12.11 Unit End Questions

12.1 OBJECTIVES

After studying this unit, you would have gained a view of the issues and themes in Mrs. Dalloway.
They relate to the society and culture of the time in which the novel was composed. Written in the
early nineteen twenties, Mrs. Dalloway reflects a deep awareness of the destruction and
devastation caused by the First World War. Social critique is another issue that the novel grapples
with. The unit also focuses upon madness, love and the distorted values pursued by the medical
profession. All those combine with the pressures working on the common people and making them
insecure. The unit attempts a brief analysis of these ideas and related concerns.

12.2 INTRODUCTION

As is clear from discussions in the previous units in this block, Mrs. Dalloway provides a picture
of mental states in the early twentieth century English society. The mental states in question are of
specific individuals bearing stress of the given circumstance. We are face to face here with those
who made a grade in life and the others who became losers in the conflict-ridden, market-driven
society of the time. As we get close to the specific individuals, we know that most of them merely
react to their situation, not engaging with it. Their struggles are behind them; to them they refer in
the depth of their minds. Mark the two distinct levels. One is that they have a history of actions,
and two, their present moment is without any motivation to achieve a new aim. What do we make
of such a novel? The writer tells us about the presence of a process of self-evaluation and
assessment in the modern man. As readers, we are expected to go over the modern man’s condition

34
forged by his struggles. Indeed, modern man’s struggles are clues to the themes and concerns of
the novel.

In the twentieth century social situation, modern man faces the issue of inaction. It may have to do
with the absence of jobs caused by the economic crisis of the day. Another factor could be the
rising literacy and increased consciousness about the working of society. Since outlets for jobs are
not available, the common citizen not only feels helpless but also becomes inward-looking. This
fact has struck the writer who wishes to understand the mental make-up of the citizen. When we
think of Mrs. Dalloway as a novel capturing the new circumstance, we relate to the characters at
the level of their thoughts and feelings. We recognize that both the author and her characters focus
upon what to do in an environment of non-action.

This takes us to the concrete situation in the first few decades of the twentieth century that
witnessed upheavals in the economic and social spheres. Isn’t that the subject of the novel at hand?
That sure appears to be the case. We also note that it is vitally connected with the First World War
when the economic crisis of the time compelled England and other countries of Europe to retain
hold on the markets spread over the world, particularly to exploit resources of the colonies caught
in the imperialist structure. We are made to wonder about the cut-throat competition intensifying
in the European world. However, politics of the time failed to resolve the issue of economic
clashes. In that sense, the First World War was a ‘natural’ outcome.

The state of social life being an important concern of literature, writers empathized with the
suffering humanity that was in pursuit of livelihood, sense of purpose and tangible goals. This is
indirectly highlighted in the novel. The narrative carries symptoms and signs of the malaise that
the said social stalemate may have caused.

The documentary style of the novel made it incumbent upon the writers to consider the weakening
bonds between individual and social groups. Psychology added to the complex nature of the
fictional representation; characters in the novel began to be explored differently. Men and women
were shown as thinking more than ever before and laying bare their internal processes. The element
of memory was adopted in these novels to cover aspects related to religion, morality and ethics.
The latter had lost credibility against the background of leaps in science, historical analysis and
secular thought in the preceding century. Another major player in the period was the sense of doubt
and self-doubt; it made society appear shaky and uncertain. One of the indicators of this
phenomenon was the use of the stream of consciousness trend. The first unit of the present block
has dealt with it in detail.

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12.3 THE FIRST WORLD WAR AS A CRUCIAL ISSUE

The First World War is a historical event that is most significant in one’s understanding of
twentieth century experience. It had far reaching consequences. It reconfigured existing values -
in life and literature.

12.3.1 Reach of the Colonies and the Associated Problems

Think of the ending of the First World War in 1918 and of the years following it. In that span, the
world had radically changed from a chaotic phenomenon to a deeply divided world. It was bad
enough in the recent past, and it became worse in the years that followed the War. Europe was
highly industrialized and followed capitalism as its chosen economic path. The countries in the
continent had colonies in South America, Africa, Asia, and the Far East. All of a sudden, one
witnessed a scene in which the old political structure had weakened. Particularly, England lost its
sheen and was faced with the challenge of managing its colonies in the new situation when the
capitalist answer of merely exploiting the local populace did not seem to deliver. This rings true
in some parts of Mrs. Dalloway and Woolf refers to the suppression of people in the colonies. At
the same time though, Woolf gives all the chances to the upper sections in England to establish
themselves as rulers with qualities of etiquette, high culture, and enriched tastes. It became
incumbent on the literary field in England to rethink its creative strategies and adapt it ideologically
to the existing scenario.

12.3.2 Effects of the War on the Common People

In the context of the War, the war-veteran Septimus Warren Smith becomes a symbol of the
modern-day violence and cynicism. That is where the First World War comes out in its true
colours. At first, it appeared a necessary event to Septimus. In spite of losing his close friend Evans
on the front, Septimus remained unruffled by the loss and thought of bright prospects. He thought
nothing of the destructiveness he witnessed first-hand. We are given the following picture of the
War that affected Septimus’ mind superficially, first in an ordinary sense and later in a fearsome
way:

For, now that it was all over, truce signed, and the dead buried, he had, especially in the
evening, these sudden thunder-claps of fear. He could not feel. As he opened the door of
the room where the Italian girls sat making hats, he could see them; could hear them; they
were rubbing wires among coloured beads in saucers; they were turning buckram shapes
this way and that; the table was all strewn with feathers, spangles, silks, ribbons; scissors
were rapping on the table; but something failed him; he could not feel. Still, scissors
rapping, girls laughing, hats being made protected him; he was assured of safety; he had a
refuge. (76)

36
See the effect of the War on Septimus’ mind. In the middle of peace, he has the “thunder-claps of
fear.” When he looks at a normal scene of the market, “something fail[s] him,” and he cannot
“feel.” That is only the beginning but it anticipates a deep malady forming in him. After marrying
Lucrezia, the two plan to have a child. But something has gone wrong with his physical impulse
and he cannot attain arousal, even as there is no medical reason for the problem:

“So there was no excuse; nothing whatever the matter, except the sin for human nature had
condemned him to death; that he did not feel. He had not cared when Evans was killed;
that was worst; but all the other crimes raised their heads and shook their fingers and jeered
and sneered over the rail of the bed in the early hours of the morning at the prostrate body
which lay realizing its degradation…” (80)

Death of Evans is disturbing enough. It jolts Septimus completely, making him confront a sense
of vacuum. It is the loss of a friend and the sweetness of a climate the two friends created with
each other’s help. They would invent games in the middle of gunshots and smoke, and the killings
would move to the background. But did they? That is indicated by “all the other crimes … [that]
jeered and sneered over the rail of the bed.” The long sentence in the description follows the
rhythms of a flow. And those would not cease when peace in the formal sense returned. The ending
of the sentence with “the prostrate body which lay realizing its degradation” is a whole different
construct of deathliness spreading all over the place. It goes to the credit of Virginia Woolf’s
creative skills that take the reader suddenly into the middle of “degradation.” Septimus feels it
crawling over his mind and disturbing his normal perceptions. From this point, the long
hallucinations are not far.

12.3.3 Influence on Literature

In the post-War period, literary principles of projecting reality as it is had become untenable. They
made writing subservient to social change and that caused raising of eyebrows. The post-War
reality of the regime did not look kindly at literature with political implications. The emphasis had
to be on acceptance and self-criticism rather than on the curiosity to know and understand the
circumstance. It is illustrated by fiction that dwells upon fantasy, loneliness and the helpless mental
state. These were the dominant features of modernism that offered the least challenge to the powers
that be. The elite of the society would keep their eyes focused upon immediate and distant
economic goals.

Check your progress 1

How does Mrs. Dalloway engage with the trauma caused by the First World War?

37
12.4 THE MEDICAL PROFESSION

In the novel, we have Doctor Holmes and Doctor Bradshaw providing medical advice and
treatment to the needy. The former is a general physician and the latter, a specialist. They are
trained well to talk and explain the health issues connected with the well-being of citizens. Woolf
deploys subtle mimicry to portray them. Later, it turns into a sharp satire. It is made clear by Woolf
that the field of medicine has no serious concern for public health. It is more of a sham than a
genuine pursuit to serve the noble cause of providing care. Holmes and Bradshaw pay little
attention to the requirements of patients. In treating Septimus, Dr. Holmes has no sympathy for
the patient and is easy in his approach. He finds Septimus over-anxious to perform in bed and fails
to address his mental condition. For him, Septimus’ ailment is a simple matter. He terms Septimus’
condition a part of human nature and believes there is nothing the matter with him. Also, he eyes
Septimus’ wife Lucrezia with interest and is not bothered to pay heed to the patient’s fears related
to his visions. On his side, Septimus does not trust him and has angry outbursts off and on. He
does not like Dr. Holmes one bit. We are told the following about Septimus by the author-narrator:

Human nature, in short, was on him (Septimus)—the repulsive brute, with the blood-red
nostrils. Holmes was on him. Dr. Holmes came quite regularly every day. Once you
stumble, Septimus wrote on the back of a postcard, human nature is on you. Holmes is on
you. Their only chance was to escape, without letting Holmes know; to Italy—anywhere,
anywhere (79)

Later, Lucrezia is more worried seeing the condition of Septimus deteriorate further. The vision of
Evans’ ghost gives Septimus a mix of perspectives too difficult to handle. Lucrezia does not know
what to do when she hears him speak the following:

“Communication is health, communication is happiness, communication—” he muttered.

“What are you saying, Septimus?” Rezia asked, wild with terror, for he was talking to
himself. She sent Agnes running for Dr. Holmes. Her husband, she said, was mad. He
scarcely knew her. “You brute! You brute!” cried Septimus, seeing human nature, that is
Dr. Holmes enter the room. “Now what’s all this about?” said Dr. Holmes in the most
amiable way in the world. “Talking nonsense to frighten your wife?” But he would give
him something to sleep. And if they were rich people, said Dr. Holmes, looking ironically
round the room, by all means let them go to Harley Street; if they had no confidence in
him, said Dr. Holmes, looking not quite so kind. (82)

We can see here the author’s opinion about doctors—they are non-serious while treating patients.
Dr. Holmes’ attitude towards Septimus is cynical. He is clear that being of low economic status,
Septimus does not deserve more than he is getting. The doctor’s eye is on the patient’s pocket.

38
Still worse is the case of Dr. William Bradshaw who is presented in strongly critical terms. Woolf
characterizes him as follows:

Sir William … had worked very hard; he had won his position by sheer ability (being the
son of a shopkeeper); loved his profession; made a fine figurehead at ceremonies and spoke
well—all of which had by the time he was knighted given him a heavy look...He could see
the first moment they came into the room (the Warren Smiths they were called); he was
certain directly he saw the man; it was a case of extreme gravity. It was a case of complete
breakdown-- complete physical and nervous breakdown, with every symptom in an
advanced stage, he ascertained in two or three minutes (writing answers to questions,
murmured discreetly, on a pink card). How long had Dr. Holmes been attending him? Six
weeks. Prescribed a little bromide? Said there was nothing the matter? Ah yes (those
general practitioners! thought Sir William). It took half his time to undo their blunders.
Some were irreparable). (83-4)

In this quote, Woolf has drawn the reader’s attention to Bradshaw’s social background that affected
his value system. The son of a shopkeeper coming to the medical trade and aiming to rise high in
the general esteem is his chosen course. The three traits mentioned by the author—sympathy, tact,
and understanding of the human soul—define Bradshaw aptly. These have been acquired by him
with hard work and application. For him, the knowledge of medicine has crystallized into a
valuable acquisition called expertise. His language, too, is affected by his standing in the
profession; it makes him view Septimus and Lucrezia as a social category, “the Warren Smiths
they were called.” He also brushes aside the general practitioners as people who take “half his time
to undo their blunders.” The authorial intent in the context is to expose the hollowness of the
medical profession, a stream of social life with no relation whatsoever with the common good.

Check your progress 2

1. Write a note on the two doctors Dr. Holmes and Dr. Bradshaw, keeping in view their
attitude towards the patients.

12.5 LOVE AND MADNESS

Love is a major theme in Mrs. Dalloway. The emotion captured in the novel looms large in the
general scheme of things and affects them variedly. It gives people a purpose beyond social or
national boundaries. Within it, individuality comes into play and achieves the status of rich,
passionate living. Between Septimus and Lucrezia, love prospers, giving the two lovers stability
and commitment. Traumatized by war, Septimus meets Lucrezia in the market in Italy. Soon, the
two fall in love and decide to tie the knot. Lucrezia likes Septimus’s quiet ways and innocence as
well as his penchant for literature. On his side, Lucrezia attracts him for her soft charm and
industrious nature. She works earnestly for livelihood. Following their marriage, they shift to
England and set up home there. Contrary to expectations though, life does not prove to be simple

39
and cozy for them. The villain in this case is Septimus’s memory of the War. Initially, it stayed in
his subconscious; he thought all was left behind and he could settle down peacefully with his wife.
We may call it love of the natural kind based on attraction, urge and inspiration.
The simple story of Septimus and Lucrezia soon takes a disturbing turn when the former is visited
by the ghost of his comrade-in-arms, Evans, on the war front. Septimus saw him dying in front of
him. The incidence of death did not sink in. After marriage with Lucrezia, Septimus one day sees
him walking towards him in London. It is a hallucination. But how would he see the difference
between a visual image of him and the reality that he is dead. He takes the image as real. This is
the onset of madness. The question is whether he starts seeing ghosts because his emotion of love
for Lucrezia gave him a heightened mental state? Love is ethereal and half imagination. Lovers
cannot distinguish between the real and the imaginary as easily as normal people would. In the
present case, it is not easy to match the real with the imagined in a world that was rocked by
processes of death and destruction. Without one’s clear knowledge, the country and the city of
London have undergone change in the post-War period. The political set up, the overall regime as
well as power equations stand radically altered in the aftermath of a deeply shaken environment.
That seems to be the background of Septimus’s madness. He fought well in the War and earned
laurels for his bravery. But that was also the time when he sensed the futility of war in the existing
scenario. For a short while, the company of Lucrezia worked as balm for him. But not any longer.
The image of the ghost of the friend and that of the loving wife alternate to distress him in crucial
moments such as the viewing of children, or unknown men and women relaxing on benches in the
park. This is the time when Lucrezia tries to pull him out of the frenzied state. Entirely devoted to
him, Lucrezia is ever mindful of his reactions to the two doctors he consulted for his ailment. They
treat him solely for his hallucinations whereas his ailment is unique. It is caused by the larger
phenomenon of killings in the battlefield. That resulted in Septimus’ split personality. In the novel,
this issue is raised through Lucrezia’s dismay. As the husband and the wife wander in the park and
prepare to meet the doctor, Lucrezia faces the dilemma. Read the following:

She frowned; she stamped her foot. She must go back again to Septimus since it was almost
time for them to be going to Sir William Bradshaw. She must go back and tell him, go back
to him sitting there on the green chair under the tree, talking to himself, or to that dead man
Evans, whom she had only seen once for a moment in the shop. He had seemed a nice quiet
man; a great friend of Septimus's, and he had been killed in the War. But such things happen
to everyone. Everyone has friends who were killed in the War. Everyone gives up
something when they marry. She had given up her home. She had come to live here, in this
awful city. But Septimus let himself think about horrible things, as she could too, if she
tried. He had grown stranger and stranger….He saw things too—he had seen an old
woman's head in the middle of a fern. Yet he could be happy when he chose. They went to
Hampton Court on top of a bus, and they were perfectly happy....Suddenly he said, "Now
we will kill ourselves," He would argue with her...and explain how wicked people were;
how he could see them making up lies as they passed in the street...He knew the meaning
of the world, he said. (59)

40
Trauma of the two is set against the trite circumstances of the rest of the characters in the novel.
Both madness and love in this case become a background against which the ups and downs of the
London elite can be viewed.

Woolf extends the scope of the phenomenon of London life. Initially, it is a mix of sentiment and
the fluctuating fortunes of love in a real situation. The deployment of the Stream of Consciousness
technique helps in deepening the impression of a tortuous scenario. The cause of the individual
pain lies distant from where Septimus Smith and Lucrezia stay in the city:

“Was it that she had taken off her wedding ring? "My hand has grown so thin," she said. "I
have put it in my purse," she told him.

He dropped her hand. Their marriage was over, he thought, with agony, with relief. The
rope was cut; he mounted; he was free, as it was decreed that he, Septimus, the lord of men,
should be free; alone (since his wife had thrown away her wedding ring; since she had left
him)...The supreme secret must be told to the Cabinet; first that trees are alive; next there
is no crime; next love, universal love, he muttered, gasping, trembling, painfully drawing
out these profound truths which needed, so deep were they, so difficult, an immense effort
to speak out, but the world was entirely changed by them forever.

No crime; love; he repeated, fumbling for his card and pencil, when a Skye terrier snuffed
his trousers and he started in an agony of fear. It was turning into a man! He could not
watch it happen! It was horrible, terrible to see a dog become a man! At once the dog trotted
away. (60)
Woolf has taken care to maintain the semblance of the stream of consciousness in which social
events are structured. Woolf relies on the impressions social living leaves on the mind of Septimus.
That is how Septimus holds a dialogue with himself in flesh and blood. Towards the end of his
observations, the flow is broken by chance of the dog “trotting away.” On the writer’s part, this is
a conscious act. The flash of madness in which love is constituted along with the general malaise
serves the purpose of dramatizing the scene. Yet, the serious point is made about the mental states
the shaken environment has caused. In it, both marriage and love are negated. The wedding ring
taken off by Lucrezia points towards the irrelevance of marriage. All of a sudden in the sequence
of description that holds Septimus in its fold, we have important issues coming up before our eyes
using the supposed “war hero” as a case:

Heaven was divinely merciful, infinitely benignant. It spared him, pardoned his weakness.
But what was the scientific explanation (for one must be scientific above all things)? Why
could he see through bodies, see into the future, when dogs will become men? It was the
heat wave presumably, operating upon a brain made sensitive by eons of evolution.
Scientifically speaking, the flesh was melted off the world. His body was macerated until
only the nerve fires were left. It was spread like a veil upon a rock. (60)

Once again, the attack is sharp on the reigning sections of society. It is launched through the
consciousness of Septimus. Mark the makings of the scene in the hands of a heated mind, excited

41
by a plethora of developments in the country’s body politic. Septimus’s vision is blurred. Woolf
has used the terminology of science to pour scorn on those who wield power and make the
argument to suit their interests. The disenchantment of the author with the goings on in her world
takes effect by remarks such as “It was spread like a veil upon a rock.”

Check your progress 3

1. Septimus Warren Smith’s madness is depicted with utmost sympathy and concern.
Comment.

12.6 IDEALISM AND HUMANISM

Both these aspects of life form the core of Mrs. Dalloway as an exploratory piece of fiction. We
might see them as compelling reasons working behind the descriptions, particularly those of
Clarissa and Peter Walsh. Clarissa is in search of an identity. Let us keep in mind that she is
referred to in the title as somebody’s wife only, as if she had no name of her own. Is it true that
she has drawn any degree of authenticity from the man she married, Richard Dalloway? He is
nondescript, except that he puts her at ease without making her self-conscious. On the first
occasion, she in fact forgot his name and called him Wickham. To Peter and a few others, it was
hilarious:

For of course it was that afternoon, that very afternoon, that Dalloway had come over; and
Clarissa called him “Wickham”; that was the beginning of it all. Somebody had brought
him over; and Clarissa got his nae wrong. She introduced him to everybody as Wickham.
At last he said “My name is Dalloway!”—that was his first of view of Richard—a fair
young man, rather awkward, sitting on a deck-chair, and blurting out “My name is
Dalloway!” Sally got hold of it; always after that she called him “My name is Dalloway!”
(55)

The answer to the question asked about authenticity is that Richard Dalloway has no important
part to play in Clarissa’s life, that he exists in the novel only because Woolf uses him as a prop.
Through him, she can tell the reader that the central character of the novel represents loss of
identity and purpose. What about Peter Walsh, then, the person Clarissa has thought about all her
life as one who could give her close company and guide her?

Apparently, Clarissa and Peter Walsh do not register as a tangible presence in the novel since the
writer has focused on loss and emptiness. The aim is to capture the essence of an empire. The
imperialist project swallowed whole generations of men, enabling it to grow in size and worth.
Peter’s imagination is particularly suited to dream about what he considers a failed mission, one
that could be rejected in favour of attaining fulfilment through intimate friendship and bonding. It
starts with Peter going over his personal history and gradually merging it with that which ensued.

42
See how in the early pages of the novel, he interprets his personal experiences followed by a
counter-spectacle through the stream of his consciousness:

He was not old, or set, or dried in the least. As for caring what they said of him—the
Dalloways, the Whitbreads, and their set, he cared not a straw—not a straw (though it was
true he would have, some or other, to see whether Richard couldn’t help him to some job).
Striding, staring, he glared at the statue of the Duke of Cambridge. He had been sent down
from Oxford —true. He had been a Socialist, in some sense a failure—true. Still the future
of civilization lies, he thought, in the hands of young men like that; of young men such as
he was, thirty years ago; with their love of abstract principles; getting books sent out to
them all the way from London to a peak in the Himalayas; reading science; reading
philosophy. The future lies in the hands of young men like that, he thought. (45-6)

Here, Peter Walsh is taking up the point of a social system in which individuals search for roles.
Peter needed that guidance when young. Later, he became “old, or set, or dried.” Nothing could
be more damning for a person than the description of having wasted life’s journey. In the context,
he refers to the institutions influencing his career.

12.7 THE SOCIAL CRITIQUE

At the age of fifty when Peter is no longer young and is incapable of pursuing meaningful goals,
he nostalgically recounts ideals such as engaging with the future of civilization, the love of abstract
principles, procuring books to peruse, reading science, reading philosophy, and so on. Woolf
follows his mental track to expose the system that goes by success and earning laurels than making
a mission of doing that which one’s heart might go after. The ordinary human concerns are crushed
under the heavy heals of the deeply structured social machine. In the imagination, the past is seen
to have entered the present and the present is working to replicate the same old story. The view is
projected as follows:

A patter like the patter of leaves in a wood came from behind and with it a rustling, regular
thudding sound, which as it overtook him drummed his thoughts, strict in step, up
Whitehall, without his doing. Boys in uniform, carrying guns, marched with their eyes
ahead of them, marched, their arms stiff, and on their faces an expression like the letters of
a legend written round the base of a statue praising duty, gratitude, fidelity, love of
England.
…
I can’t keep up with them, Peter Walsh thought...on they marched, past him, past every
one, in their steady way, as if one will worked legs and arms uniformly, and life, with its
varieties, its irreticences, had been laid under a pavement of monuments and wreaths and
drugged under a stiff yet staring corpse by discipline. One had to respect it; one might

43
 laugh; but one had to respect it, he thought. There they go, he thought. There they go,
thought Peter Walsh, pausing at the edge of the pavement; and all the exalted statues,
Nelson, Gordon, Havelock, the black, the spectacular images of great soldiers stood
looking ahead of them, as if they too had made the same renunciation (Peter Walsh felt he
too had made it, the great renunciation) ... (46)

Connect this quote with the previous one and mark that the point of an overall social dimension
has been given here a wider scope. It indicates a journey from self-aware individuality to the
inclinations of a whole nation. The form, the aesthetic and the guiding principle cannot be missed.
These strengthen the realism of a peculiar kind. Indeed, the weakened and emptied individuality
of Peter has been given a rationale—no person in England in the latter half of the nineteenth
century would be encouraged to realize his dreams. See the lionization, so to say, of the military
commanders and war victors and think of the bent of the upper sections in the country. What the
propaganda in newspapers or political rallies would not achieve is done by the statues that are
symbols of modern-day heroism. Boys marching with “their eyes ahead of them'' send out a
message of the desired social endeavour geared to work nobly for specific ideals—"duty, gratitude,
fidelity, love of England.”

Even as this goes on in the manner of Peter’s imaginative flight, it emanates from the author who
is committed to an alternative paradigm. Peter the lover and Clarissa the lover’s obvious aim would
miss their subconscious wishes in the flow of the campaign stressed effectively in the society
around them. In the situation, Clarissa would find a safe bet in marrying Richard Dalloway and
Peter will keep hanging helplessly, his sense of incompetence reflected in the movements of the
knife he always carries. Symbolically, he would never be able to wield the knife emblematic of his
initiative. Thus, the two lovers in the novel, Peter Walsh and Septimus Warren Smith would work
in vain to realize themselves—they would not be a match for the ideological onslaught of the
society of the time. The former lover languishes in the middle of minor episodes of failed marriage,
the latter faces violent threats posed by war and madness.

12.8 LET US SUM UP

In this unit, we have discussed themes chosen for treatment by Virginia Woolf in her novel Mrs.
Dalloway. Our contention is that Woolf was deeply engaged with specific questions that arose in
the initial years of the twentieth century. Questions related to the First World War, love and social
alliances, madness, and the medical profession. The medium used by Woolf was the interiority of
the individual mind where clashing ideas could influence the decisions and action of men and
women. The central issue emerging from the discussion was the author’s disenchantment with her
world where forces of money and war had the upper hand. That left the people of the time helpless,
uncertain and disturbed.

44
12.9 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Cuddy-Keane, Melba. Virginia Woolf, the Intellectual and the Public Sphere. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2003.

Humm, Maggie. The Edinburgh Companion to Virginia Woolf and the Arts. Edinburgh: Edinburgh
University Press, 2010.

Woolf, Virginia. Mrs. Dalloway. Maple: Noida, India. Rpt. 2020. All page numbers in the unit
refer to this edition.

12.10 GLOSSARY

self-evaluation and assessment: these are the processes of the mind. In them, the individual goes
over his decisions and choices and matches them with the results he sees. Meanwhile, the world
outside remains unchanged.

inward-looking: the individual cuts himself off from that which is in front.

empathized: feeling deeply sympathetic with another person.

social stalemate: the condition in which rituals are blindly observed.

chaotic phenomenon: the situation where things have no connection with one another.

It gives them a bonding and purpose beyond social or national boundaries: the context is of
love. The emotion does not consider larger consequences and is rooted in the sweetness of the
company one is in love with.

12.11 UNIT END QUESTIONS

1. Write a critical note on the dilemmas faced by Peter Walsh in Mrs. Dalloway.

2. How does Clarissa come to terms with her married life in the novel? Is it done through
organizing parties and get-togethers alone? Explain.

45
46
 ignou
lTHE PEOPLE'S
UNIVERSITY

Indira Gandhi National British Literature: Early Twentieth Century

Open University BEGC-112
School of Humanities

Block

4
Poetry
BLOCK INTRODUCTION 02

UNIT 13
W.B. Yeats: “The Second Coming” 03

UNIT 14
T.S. Eliot: “Journey of the Magi” 12

UNIT 15
W. H. Auden: “The Unknown Citizen” 20

UNIT 16
Stephen Spender: “I think continually of those who were truly
great.” 28

1
BLOCK INTRODUCTION
Block 4 “Poetry” is devoted to a discussion of the work of some of the most significant poetic
voices of early twentieth century Britain. These poets adopted a new poetic language and style
to express their responses to the general sense of rootlessness and monotony that seemed to
afflict modern existence.

Unit 13: W.B. Yeats, “The Second Coming”: introduces the poetic world of W. B. Yeats,
focusing on the poem “The Second Coming.” The symbolism of the poem and its Biblical and
historical contexts are explained in detail.

Unit 14: T.S. Eliot: “The Journey of the Magi”: briefly discusses the key role played by T. S.
Eliot in creating a new sensibility in British poetry, and critically analyses the poem “The
Journey of the Magi”.

Unit 15: W. H. Auden: “The Unknown Citizen” introduces Auden as a major War Poet of
the early twentieth century, and offers a critical reading of his poem “The Unknown Citizen”.

Unit 16: Stephen Spender: “I think continually of those who were truly great”, focuses on
the poetry of Stephen Spender and critically interprets the poem “I think continually of those
who were truly great”.

Acknowledgement

The material and images we have used is purely for educational purposes. Every effort has been
made to trace the copyright holders of material used in this book. Should any infringement have
occurred, the publishers and editors apologise, and will be pleased to make the necessary
corrections in future editions of this book.

2
UNIT 13 W. B. YEATS: “THE SECOND COMING”

Structure

13.0 Aims and Objectives

13.1 Introduction to W. B. Yeats
13.2 Famous lines from Yeats
13.3 The poem The Second Coming
13.4 Critical summary of the poem
13.5 The Historical and the Biblical context
13.6 Analysis of the poem
13.7 Symbolism in the poem
13.8 Summing up
13.9 Unit end questions
13.10 Glossary
13.11 References
13.12 Further Reading

13.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

After studying this unit devoted to Yeats’s poem “The Second Coming” you would have learnt
about:

• The life and writings of William Butler Yeats, one of the most prominent poets of the 20th
century
• His works and contribution to Modernism
• His poem, The Second Coming
• Analysis of the poem
• Its historical and Biblical references
• Yeats’s use of symbols in this poem and their significance.

13.1 INTRODUCTION TO W. B. YEATS

Source: www. Wikipedia.com

Born in 1865 in Ireland, William Butler Yeats was one of the greatest English language poets, a
towering figure in 20th century English Literature. Like T. S. Eliot, he was also a dramatist and a

3
writer of prose. He was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1923 “for his always inspired
poetry, which in a highly artistic form gives expression to the spirit of a whole nation."1

Born in 1865, he began writing at the early age of seventeen, and his first published poem The Isle
of Statutes revealed the influences of Shelley and Spenser on him. The poets who influenced Yeats
were diverse and include the English Romantic poets - Wordsworth, Blake, and Keats, and the
French Symbolists, such as Stephen Mallarme and Arthur Rimbaud. He was also influenced by
Irish mythology and folklore as is seen in his formative work, The Wanderings of Oisin and Other
poems, published in 1869. Yeats was an Irish patriot who desired Ireland's political independence
from England and many of his works are in praise of Irish culture and heritage.

In 1889, he met the Irish nationalist, Maud Gonne who was the great love of his life. It was mainly
her influence that made him get involved in Irish politics and propelled him to join the Irish
Republican Brotherhood. Though Maud Gonne never consented to marry him, she was the Muse
who inspired him to write many poems and plays for her. He was passionate about Irish cultural
identity and Irish heritage which was in line with Maud Gonne’s fervent struggle for political
independence for her nation. Among the most famous poems of Yeats are The Stolen Child, The
Second Coming, The Lake Isle of Innisfree, Sailing to Byzantium and Among School Children
alongside his powerful poems that document political unrest such as September1913 and Easter
1916.

Activity: Read some of the poems he wrote in the 1890s and identify the works that reflect Yeats’
love for Ireland and its cultural heritage.

Yeats with his friend and patron, Lady Gregory founded the Irish Literary Theatre to revive Celtic
dramatic literature. He was a cultural revolutionary and wrote 26 plays. Yeats joined hands with
another outstanding Irish playwright John Middleton Synge and established the famous Abbey
Theatre, one of the leading cultural institutions of Ireland. The motto of the Abbey theatre was to
‘bring upon stage the deeper emotions of Ireland’. In his manifesto to the Abbey Theatre group,
Yeats declared, "We hope to find in Ireland an uncorrupted & imaginative audience trained to
listen by its passion for oratory ... & that freedom to experiment which is not found in the theatres
of England, & without which no new movement in art or literature can succeed." 2. Yeats was thus
a pillar of the Irish literary establishment. The Abbey theatre he founded continues to play a vital
role in launching new, young Irish writers and playwrights

Source: www.flicker.com

4
13.2 FAMOUS LINES OF W.B.YEATS
Yeats truly celebrated status can be best seen in some of the famous lines he wrote:

“Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.”

“There are no strangers here; only friends you haven’t met.”

“Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure, neither this thing nor that but simply growth. We are
happy when we are growing.”

“People who lean on logic and philosophy and rational exposition end by starving the best part of
the mind.”

Such lines stand testimony to the romantic and humane aspects of Yeats’s mind.

Activity: Read other poems by Yeats, and identify some of his most memorable lines. Yeats is
remarkable for writing on multifarious subjects that include nationalism, mythology, culture,
heritage, romantic love of life and beauty, Christianity etc.

Check your progress 1:

Write a note on Yeats’s involvement in the Irish literary movement of the early twentieth century.

13.3 THE POEM: THE SECOND COMING

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,

5
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

13.4 CRITICAL SUMMARY OF THE POEM

The above poem was written in 1919 and published in both The Nation and The Dial in November
1920 and later in Yeats's collection Michael Robartes and the Dancer (1921).Yeats wrote the
poem to coincide with the end of World War I (1914-18) that had caused suffering and death,
torture, hunger and disillusionment to millions of people. The First World War had let loose
anarchy in the world. During the War, bombs were dropped, and many thousands of innocent
people were killed which made people think that the time had come for the end of the world. The
War proved catastrophic, almost signalling the end of the world and people began to wait for relief
from the cruel happenings. This parallels the waiting of those who had earlier, witnessed the
crucifixion of Jesus and had waited for his promised second coming, that is, the second coming of
Jesus to earth, as revealed in the Book of Revelation (the last Book of the New Testament). In the
New Testament, it is stated that the second coming would happen at the end of a catastrophic war
and that the Saviour would arrive and take all devout people to a joyous life in heaven. The
apocalyptic prediction of the collapse of civilization as revealed in the Book of Revelation seemed
truly prophetic in the context of the deadly world War

The New Testament made many Christians long for Jesus’s return to the world a second time as
their Saviour. The concept of time span is revealed by the title with the three words, ‘The Second
Coming’. Just as Christ’s earlier arrival in the world was for saving men and women from their
sins and punishments, in the same way the poet feels the second coming of Jesus will be to save
mankind from total annihilation as evidenced in the First World War.

The poem is difficult to understand with its shocking imagery and obscurity. Once the images are
well explained, it is easy to apprehend the theme of the poem. Simply stated it is a lament for the
death of the old world and an expression of hope and expectation of a possible rebirth of a new
one. The poem draws upon the Biblical symbolism of the apocalypse and the second coming of
Christ to make the point. The poem is deeply pessimistic for the "Second Coming," since it is only
an event that people desire; where people think there will be light, given the reality of the
catastrophic war, only darkness remains.

“Yeats believed that history is cyclical, and his poem ‘The Second Coming’— a two-stanza poem
in blank verse—with its imagery of swirling chaos and terror, prophesies the cataclysmic end of
an era. Critics associated the poem with various contemporary calamities, such as the Easter rising
of 1916, the Russian Revolution of 1917, the rise of fascism, and the political decay of eastern
Europe.”3

13.5 THE HISTORICAL AND THE BIBLICAL CONTEXTS

This is an elaboration of the previous section (13.3) that provided you with a brief summary of the
poem. Yeats’ genius is seen in his fusion of the historical and the Biblical contexts in the poem.

1. This poem is based on The Book of Revelation. The title of the poem, The Second Coming
is a phrase out of the Book of Revelation. The Book of Revelation – also variedly called
the Apocalypse of John, Revelation to John or Revelation from Jesus Christ is the final
book of the New Testament, and consequently is also the final book of the Christian Bible.

6
 The Bible is of two parts- the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Book of
Revelation, the final book of the New Testament is the only apocalyptic book in the New
Testament canon. The word Apocalypse means ‘unveiling’ or ‘revelation’. Thus, it
occupies a central place in Christian eschatology . We have evidence of the second coming
of Jesus in the Gospels (Matthew 24–25; Mark 13; Luke 21:5–26; John 14:25–29), in
the Book of Revelation, and in other biblical and traditional sources.

“Second Coming, also called Second Advent or Parousia, in Christianity, is the future return
of Christ in glory, when it is understood that he will set up his kingdom, judge his enemies, and
reward the faithful, living and dead.”4 John in his Gospel says that he received new revelation
concerning the return of the Lord Jesus Christ. In Revelation 1:18, the figure whom John sees,
identifies himself as ‘the First and the Last,’ who ‘was dead, and behold I am alive forever and
ever’, a reference to the Resurrection of Jesus. In the first ten verses the emphasis is on what he
heard in special announcements in preparation for the return of Christ. In verses 11-21, however,
the stress falls on what John sees concerning the actual return of the Lord. The return of the Lord
brings to a close the Tribulation and the wrath of God.

The key literary influence running through this poem from start to finish is the biblical Book of
Revelation (and the Bible more generally). In the Book of Revelation, Jesus is predicted to return
to the Earth (in what's called "The Second Coming") and usher in a new era of peace, joy, and
union with God. This poem is a kind of subversion of that story, seeing a bizarre beast in place of
the expected saviour.

Historical Context

Since the date of composition of Yeats’ poem is 1919, i.e., a year after the end of World War I,
the historical period is clear and significant even though Yeats does not make any explicit reference
to it. The fallout of the war was the death of nearly 20 million people while another 20 million
were wounded..

The first few lines of the poem (starting from the 3rd line) sum up the disjointed time after the war.

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

These lines detail the devastation caused by the War and the last two lines in particular is almost
a foretelling of the second World War, almost prophesying the coming of “the worst” like Adolf
Hitler , ‘full of passionate intensity’. Though Yeats is no prophet or foreseer, his words anticipate
the deadly fascist violence that Hitler unleashed two decades later leading to World War II (1939-
45). Yeats juxtaposes the historical context of the First World War that he is presently concerned
with with an end-of-the-world scenario, which transforms the work partly to a work of
eschatology—that is, writing about the apocalypse. The Biblical revelation had foretold the
futuristic happening of a degenerate world, speedily coming to an end. Thus the poem has both a
historical context woven around the Biblical narrative of the birth and crucifixion of Jesus and his
resurrection that holds the promise of his possible second coming to save mankind.

7
Check your progress 2:

Explain the biblical and historical contexts of this poem.

13.6 ANALYSIS OF THE POEM

While the first stanza describes the catastrophic state of the people, the second stanza is explicit
about the Biblical reference:

Surely some revelation is at hand;

Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming!

But the main idea in "The Second Coming" can be elusive, especially because the poem ends
with a complicated question that takes up the last five lines of the poem.

The darkness drops again; but now I know

That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Before we take up the analysis of these last five lines, it is pertinent to focus on Yeats’s use of the
word ‘gyre’ which appears in the opening line: ‘Turning and turning in the widening gyre’. The
word ‘gyre’ is used in oceanography and climatology. It means a vast circular system made up
of ocean currents that spirals about a central point. The world gyre simply means spiral that widens
on going up or down. Here the falcon (refer to the next line) is seen spinning round and round. As
the falcon gyrates, it cannot hear the falconer. The ‘Falcon’ symbolizes the hawk which is the
symbol of logic. Thus the falcon represents man’s intellect while the falconer stands for his strong
feelings about the way the world has turned anarchic (with no controlling rules or principles to
give order). The image of Falcon and Falconer continues throughout the poem. Here in the poem
it can also stand for the interacting and conflicting eras. According to the poet “things fall apart
and the centre cannot hold”, where the centre refers to the falconer and the things refer to
the Falcon.

The word ‘gyre’ is also significant in its reference to the cyclical nature of history. Yeats
believed in the theory that history consists of cycles that lasts two thousand years and then
repeats itself. Yeats suggests that at the end of the 20th century the current cycle will end and the
next one will be ushered in. The current cycle of 2000 years thus includes 1919 when the poem
was written. This cycle had begun long time back when Jesus was born. You must remember that
a new era started with the birth of Christ. Yeats says that he and his generation are living in a
chaotic time. The world had gone through a terrible War, which was widespread throughout
Europe and had caused the death of millions of innocent people.

Yeats, looking back on the present times as characterised by chaos, feels that the world has
regressed to the point where "the best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate
intensity." Anarchy and confusion are prevailing all over the world post- War, which had
degenerated into a bloodbath of innocent killings. The virtue-rewards and the sin-punishment

8
syndrome had taken a reverse turn whereby good people do not get justice while those full of
passionate intensity enjoy the best of times. The first stanza presents a world devastated by war,
inhumanity and violence and sets the tone for the second and concluding stanza that presages a
new era with the second coming of Jesus. These conditions have been prophesied in the Bible
and the poet prepares us for the next stage which according to him is not a sanguine expectation;
he is sceptical about it providing relief and ushering in a new era of peace and harmony.

The poet starts the second stanza with a reference to the Book of Revelation and repeats the idea
of second coming in the next two lines. Soon the poet sees a big image of Spiritus Mundi.
This phrase means the spirit or the outlook or the social and cultural values characteristic of an
era of human history. Though it was supposed to provide relief, the poet is troubled by
visualizing it. Why?

This is because Yeats pictures the spirit to be like a beast, a man-lion where the head of a man is
conjoined to the body of a lion. In this avatar, it shows itself to be without compassion or
empathy for humans. The brutality of war had dried human feelings to such an extent that human
beings are no longer capable of reacting to the sorrow and misery of fellow beings all round.
Yeats’s lines remind one of the twin poems The Lamb and the Tiger where the poet contrasts
God’s creation of a fearsome tiger with that of a gentle lamb. The speaker is in awe of the
fearsome qualities of the tiger, and rhetorically wonders whether the same creator could have
also made the lamb earlier. Jesus in his first descent into the world was like a gentle lamb. But
the second coming may be like that of a tiger. This is how Yeats describes the coming of an
apocalypse to ravage the world, no longer like a gentle lamb, but as a ferocious tiger.

“The twenty centuries of stony sleep” relates to the barbaric age prior to the advent of
Christianity. But after the arrival of Jesus, the earlier 2000 years of barbarism had ended. As the
world was moving towards the end of the 20th century once again barbarism had erupted. Now as
the Christian Era is about to end, it is moving “towards Bethlehem to be born”. Bethlehem is
the city of Jesus’ birth. The beast is slouching towards Bethlehem. Slouching means to trudge;
or, to move lazily. It is not a gentle Jesus, but a malevolent beast from the spirit world – Spiritus
Mundi – that will now take birth at Bethlehem.

The sight of Spiritus Mundi vanishes and “the darkness drops again”. The ending of the poem
suggests the wait for the promised relief that Christ will be born when the world goes through
such a cataclysmic upheaval. But this time, Yeats fears it is not going to be the gentle, kind,
peace loving Jesus to save mankind who will be born, but a rough beast to punish the sinners and
the wicked. It sems as though Yeats fears punishment and not pardon at the end of the 2000 year
cycle. “Thinking of the next 2000-year cycle, which he calls "the Second Coming," Yeats is
filled with pessimism and dread. He imagines a "rough beast" rising from the sands in the desert
and wonders what it is, but from the description and the questions, it is clear that he anticipates
that nothing good can come in the next cycle. If the current cycle, as bad as it is, was kicked off
by "a rocking cradle," a harmless event, then how much worse will be the next cycle, which is
being heralded by this ominous beast? The main idea, then, seems to be pessimism about the
current age and even more pessimism about the future”5.

13.7 SYMBOLISM IN THE POEM

From a detailed analysis given above, it is easy to identify the symbols used by Yeats in the poem.
It begins with the title “The Second Coming”, a phrase from the Book of Revelation to signify the
coming of Jesus a second time. Yeats use of the ‘gyre’ is related to his belief in the 2000 year cycle

9
the world goes through. The world in 1919, the year of the poem’s creation, is slowly moving
towards 2000, symbolic of the end of 2000 years after the death of Jesus. Christian values taught
by Jesus of love and peace, service, thankfulness. compassion, forgiveness, and empathy have all
been forgotten as evidenced in the just concluded World War. Yeats anticipates a new cycle to
begin. But he does not hold any hope of God sending his Son, but more likely a man-lion to destroy
wickedness. “A page of history is about to flip; one epoch is about to give birth to another”6.

13.8 LET US SUM UP

In this Unit, we discussed the poetry of W. B. Yeats, an outstanding Modernist poet of the early
twentieth century. We also read his poem “The Second Coming”, and discussed the historical and
biblical contexts of the poem. The symbolism of the poem was also discussed against the
background of Yeats’s concept of cyclical history.

13.9 Unit end questions

(1) How does the title relate to the poem?

(2) Discuss the symbolism in this poem with reference to Yeats’s cyclical theory of history.
(3) Explain the pessimistic overtone of the poem
(4) Is the poem relevant to our times? Explain.

13.10 GLOSSARY
Celtic: today, the term generally refers to the languages and respective cultures of Ireland,
Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, the Isle of Man, and Brittany, also known as the Celtic nations
Saviour: ((in Christianity) God or Jesus Christ as the redeemer of sin and saver of souls.
Annihilation: extinction, destruction
Obscurity: a thing that is unclear or difficult to understand
Apprehend: Understand, perceive
Apocalypse: the complete final destruction of the world, as described in the biblical book of
Revelation
cataclysmic: causing sudden and violent upheaval
Easter rising of 1916:: The Rising was launched by Irish republicans against British rule in Ireland
with the aim of establishing an independent Irish Republic while the United Kingdom was fighting
the First World War.
Russian Revolution of 1917: Russian Revolution took place in 1917 when the peasants and
working class people of Russia revolted against the government of Tsar Nicholas II. The new
communist government created the country, the Soviet Union.
fascism: a form of far-right, authoritarian ultra-nationalism characterized by dictatorial power,
forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and of the economy, which
came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe.
The Old Testament: the first part of the Christian Bible, comprising thirty-nine books and
corresponding approximately to the Hebrew Bible. Most of these books were written in Hebrew,
some in Aramaic, between about 1200 and 100 BC. They comprise the chief texts of the law,
history, prophecy, and wisdom literature of the ancient people of Israel.
The New Testament: the second part of the Christian Bible, written originally in Greek and
recording the life and teachings of Christ and his earliest followers. It includes the four Gospels -

10
of Matthew, John, Mark and Luke, the Acts of the Apostles, twenty-one Epistles by St Paul and
others, and the book of Revelation.
canon: the list of works considered to be permanently established as being of the highest quality.
Eschatology: in the history of religion, the term eschatology refers to conceptions of the last things:
immortality of the soul, rebirth, resurrection, migration of the soul, and the end of time. This
concept also has secular parallels as for example, in the turning points in one's life and in one's
understanding of death.
Second Advent: the prophesied return of Christ to earth at the Last Judgment. The Last Judgement
is the day when God judges everyone and decides whether they will go to Heaven or Hell.
Parousia: another term for the ‘Second Coming’.
Resurrection: in Christian belief the rising of Christ again to life from the dead
Tribulation: grievous trouble; severe trial or suffering
bizarre: very strange or unusual
oceanography: the branch of science that deals with the physical and biological properties and
phenomena of the sea.
climatology: the scientific study of climate
Gyrate: cause to move or whirl rapidly in a circle or a spiral
Anarchic: with no controlling rules or principles to give order
Presage: be a sign or warning of (an imminent event, typically an unwelcome one
Sanguine: optimistic , positive, hopeful
Sceptical: not easily convinced; having doubts or reservations

13.11 REFERENCES
1. "Nobel Prize in Literature 1923", NobelPrize.org.
2. Foster, R. F. (1997). W. B. Yeats: A Life. Vol. I: The Apprentice Mage. Oxford University
Press.
3. Encyclopaedia Britannica
4. ibid
5. www.enotes.com
6. Scott Simon, ‘Reading Wiliam Butler Yeats 10 years later’ NPR,www.ctpublic.org/2020-
11-28

13.12 FURTHER READING

‘Occultism in Yeats's "The Second Coming": A Critical Interpretation’, researchgate.com
C. S. Lewis. (1960). The World's Last Night and Other Essays. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
James Stuart Russell. The Parousia, A Careful Look at the New Testament Doctrine of the Lord's
Second Coming, London 1887.

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UNIT 14 “JOURNEY OF THE MAGI” BY T. S. ELIOT
Structure

14.0 Aims and Objectives

14.1 Introduction
14.2 A Brief analysis of Eliot’s works
14.3 The poem: “Journey of the Magi”
14.4 Biblical background of the poem
14.5 Interpretation
14.6 Symbolism in the poem
14.7 Summing Up
14.8 Unit end questions and answers
14.9 Glossary
14.10 References:
14.11 Further Reading

14.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

This Unit introduces you to T. S. Eliot, leader of the Modernist movement in poetry in England. After a
study of this unit which includes the prescribed poem, Journey of the Magi, you will get to know
*the biblical account of the birth of Jesus
* the journey of the Magi to Bethlehem to witness the birth of Jesus
* the metaphorical meaning of the journey which is essentially a spiritual journey
*the significance of Jesus’ birth and death and
*the spiritual transformation that comes with the understanding that life is a journey that all humans have
to go through.

14.1 INTRODUCTION
In Unit 2 of the earlier Block, you have read about modern poetry, where we mentioned some of the
leading English poets of the first three decades of the 20th century. Thomas Stearns Eliot who was one of
them, was born in September 1888 in the USA and settled later in England where he died in 1965. His
writings can be distinctly divided into two phases - the early phase that reflects an undercurrent of
despair, disenchantment and disillusionment with the period after World War I (1914-18) and the later
phase when he wrote poems after his conversion to Anglo-Catholicism. that had a pronounced
theological bent. The year he wrote this poem Journey of the Magi was 1927 which was an important year
for Eliot. It was in 1927 that Eliot got his British citizenship and converted to Anglo-Catholicism, to
which he was committed for life. Worshipping in church became a crucial part of his routine and this
directly influenced the composition of the poem Journey of the Magi.

14.2 A brief analysis of the writings of T. S. Eliot

Eliot was a versatile writer. His oeuvre spanned all literary genres. He was a poet, playwright, essayist
and literary critic. He was a leader of the Modernist movement, as is notably reflected in his early poems
like The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, The Waste Land and the later poem The Four Quartets
which led to his recognition as the greatest living English poet and man of letters. He was awarded both
the Order of Merit and the Nobel Prize for literature. Both through his poetry and critical essays, he
broke new ground in versification, diction and style. There was an undercurrent of hope in his early
poems despite the despair and disillusionment of the War years as he referred to the ancient philosophical
and religious texts that included the Hindu texts like the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads along with

12
the writings of ancient Greek philosophers like Heraclitus and Socrates, Parmenides and Pythagoras, not
to leave out the English philosopher, F. R. Bradley. He wrote: ‘these fragments I have shored against my
ruins’.1 His early reading of 17th century English writers like John Donne and John Webster and the 19th
century French Symbolist LaForgue helped him to find his own style. Eliot said: “LaForgue was the first
to teach me how to speak, to teach me the poetic possibilities of my own idiom of speech.”.2 The Love
Song of J. Alfred Prufrock was the first poem that introduced a new poetic diction in English poetry. Just
as Wordsworth and Coleridge brought to poetry the language of ordinary men, Eliot and his contemporary
Ezra Pound created new diction using the contemporary speech that was ‘neither pedantic nor vulgar’.

His early poems marked a new turn in the history of English poetry. In them, Eliot articulated distinctly
modern themes using contemporary diction that were a marked departure from those of 19th century
poetry. The most influential poems of Eliot during this period were The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,
Gerontion and The Waste Land (1922). While the origins of The Waste Land are in part personal, the
voices projected are universal. In The Waste Land he diagnosed the malaise discomfort, illness, or of his
generation and indeed of Western civilization in the 20th century.

Let us have a brief summing up of these three influential poems to illustrate Eliot’s themes. Love Song of
J. Alfred Prufrock is a poem written in 1910 and published in 1915. It is considered to be a typical
representative poem of modernism and contributed to the literary movement of the early 20th century by
focusing on themes of “alienation, isolation, and the diminishing power of the traditional sources of
authority.”3

Gerontion by T. S. Eliot is a poem about an old man reflecting on his youthful years and the world that
was undergoing rapid changes. “Written in 1920, it shows a view of the nineteenth century and World
War I as man experienced them, and it is sombre in his yearning for the kind of deeper meaning that
others found during that time”4 The main themes of The Waste Land are: “Eliot's portrait of women, or the
female characters as presented in the poem and the metaphor of the title and the emptiness and sterility of
the modern world”5

After his conversion to Anglo-Catholicism, from 1930 onwards the second phase of his writing begins. In
1930 he published his next major poem, Ash-Wednesday. This was followed by his masterly poem
The Four Quartets consisting of. Burnt Norton (1941), East Coker (1940), The Dry
Salvages (1941), and Little Gidding (1942). The Four Quartets is one of the greatest and mature poetic
achievements of Eliot and read alongside his early poems like The Wasteland and The Hollow Men, we
recognize the change and progression in Eliot’s state of mind - from despair to a fleeting glimmer of
wishful hope in the early poems to an affirmation of redemption through God’s grace.

Eliot was almost as renowned a literary critic as he was a poet. From 1916 through 1921 he contributed
approximately one hundred reviews and articles to various periodicals. Eliot contributed significantly to
the emergence of New Criticism, one of the most influential schools of literary study in the 20th century.
Eliot’s literary criticism was followed by his religious and social criticism. In The Idea of a
Christian Society (1939), he writes as a Christian poet trying to make sense of the world between the
two World Wars. These writings reflect his misgivings about Western culture prevailing in the 1930s and
they complement his poetry, plays, and literary journalism. Eliot is also an important figure in 20th
century drama. He was inclined from the first toward the theatre - his early poems are essentially
dramatic, and many of his early essays and reviews are on drama or dramatists.

Eliot’s first play , Sweeney Agonistes was published in 1932 and performed in 1933. In the 1930s he
wrote an ecclesiastical pageant, The Rock (performed and published in 1934), and two full-blown
plays, Murder in the Cathedral (performed and published in 1935) and The Family
Reunion (performed and published in 1939); and in the late 1940s and the 1950s he devoted himself
almost exclusively to plays, of which The Cocktail Party (performed in 1949, published in 1950) has
been the most popular. His most significant contribution to English theatre was the revitalization of poetic
drama in terms that would be consistent with the modern age. He experimented with language which was

13
close to contemporary speech, but also essentially poetic and thus capable of expressing spiritual,
emotional, and intellectual experiences.

14.3 JOURNEY OF THE MAGI

A cold coming we had of it,
Just the worst time of the year
For a journey, and such a long journey:
The ways deep and the weather sharp,
The very dead of winter.” 5
And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.
There were times we regretted
The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,
And the silken girls bringing sherbet. 10
Then the camel men cursing and grumbling
And running away, and wanting their liquor and women,
And the night-fires going out, and the lack of shelters,
And the cities hostile and the towns unfriendly
And the villages dirty and charging high prices: 15
A hard time we had of it.
At the end we preferred to travel all night,
Sleeping in snatches,
With the voices singing in our ears, saying
That this was all folly. 20
Then at dawn we came down to a temperate valley,
Wet, below the snow line, smelling of vegetation;
With a running stream and a water-mill beating the darkness,
And three trees on the low sky,
And an old white horse galloped away in the meadow. 25
Then we came to a tavern with vine-leaves over the lintel,
Six hands at an open door dicing for pieces of silver,
And feet kicking the empty wine-skins.
But there was no information, and so we continued
And arrived at evening, not a moment too soon 30
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.
All this was a long time ago, I remember,
And I would do it again, but set down
This set down
This: were we led all that way for 35
Birth or Death? There was a Birth, certainly,
We had evidence and no doubt. I had seen birth and death,
But had thought they were different; this Birth was
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.
We returned to our places, these Kingdoms, 40
But no longer at ease here, in the old dispensation,
With an alien people clutching their gods.
I should be glad of another death. 43

14.4 BIBLICAL BACKGROUND TO THE POEM

The stories about the early life of Jesus Christ by different writers are found in four books called the
Gospels, a term which means good news. They are the Gospels of Matthew, of John, of Mark and of
Luke. Together they form the New Testament which tells us though not in great detail, about his birth but

14
mostly about his later life that comprises his teachings, the miracles he performed, his death by
crucifixion and his Resurrection (rising from death).

This poem, Journey of the Magi, is based on the Gospel of St. Matthew. Jesus was born in Bethlehem
and the poem describes the journey undertaken by three wise men who travel to witness the birth
of Jesus Christ. The word Magi is a plural form of Magus representing the three wise kings of
the eastern world. The three Magi travelled to Bethlehem so as to witness the birth of Jesus
Christ. The journey is arduous as it takes place in the cold wintry month of December. Jesus’
birth heralds the dawn of a new world. Jesus dies on the Cross and his disciples founded the new
religion Christianity based on the teachings of Jesus.

His birth and death constitute a paradox as his birth marks the death of the earlier pagan world
order and his death marks the birth of a new era , the Christian era. Thus death refers to both the
death of Christ and the death of the old religious order, including the magical power of the Magi and birth
refers to the birth of Jesus and the birth of Christianity. The Magi visiting Bethlehem to witness the birth
of Jesus end the poem with an anticipation of Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection, signalling a new
Christian era. The journey of the Magi thus becomes a renewal of hope after despair, where birth and
death alternate. In spiritual terms the birth of a child is seen as the Birth of Jesus and his death signals the
birth of a new world order. The journey thus represents a spiritual journey that witnesses a drastic change
in the world: the death of the old pagan order and the beginning of a new world order of Christianity.

The poem focuses on the epiphany of Matthew. The name ‘Epiphany’ comes from the Greek
‘epiphaneia’, meaning “appearance” or “manifestation,” and refers to the manifestation of Jesus
Christ to the world. The theme of the poem is the effect of spiritual/ cultural events on individual
identity and society; it deals with birth, death and regeneration or renewal. Eliot echoes the views
of Shelley who wrote “When Winter comes, can Spring be far behind”? The binary happenings
on earth are seen in the alternation of winter and spring, scorching summer and freezing winter
not to leave out day and night, morning and evening, full moon and new moon, light and
darkness, sunrise and sunset. Birth and death are of the same binary quality. The physical
journey of the Magi gets transformed into his spiritual journey when he gets a deeper
understanding of life as a binary alternation between birth and death, exemplified by Jesus’s
birth and death and the dawn of Christianity.

14.5 INTERPRETATION
The opening lines with a graphic description of the harsh wintry weather are taken by Eliot from a sermon
given by the Anglican Bishop Lancelot Andrewes in 1622.The Bishop’s sermon was as given under:
“A cold coming they had of it at this time of the year, just the worst time of the year to take a journey, and
specially a long journey. The ways deep, the weather sharp, the days short, the sun farthest off, in solstitio
brumali, ‘the very dead of winter’”.

The poem is a dramatic monologue, a poem written in the form of a speech by an individual character.
This means there is no dialogue coming from another speaker. It captures in a single scene the essence of
what the speaker wants to express and the speech also provides a psychological insight into the character
of the speaker. The poem is addressed to a silent listener. There are three specific characteristics of the
Dramatic Monologue:

• A character speaks in an uninterrupted flow

• The audience may be either present or absent
• The speaker reveals something about his or her character or situation through the monologue

15
Activity: Read the poetry of Robert Browning who wrote some of the notable dramatic monologues in
English Literature. Identify in his My Last Duchess the characteristics of a dramatic monologue.
Read Tennyson’s Ulysses and try to see how Ulysses reveals his character that has an affinity with
Victorian conflict between art for art’s sake and art for the reformation of mankind.

In the Journey of the Magi, the speaker is one of the Magi. The singular form of Magi is Magus. Who are
the Magi? In the Bible, the Magi represent three men who were called three Kings or three wise men.
They followed a star to witness the great event of Jesus’s birth. and give baby Jesus presents. What were
the gifts they had taken? Gold, a symbol of earthly kingship, frankincense, a symbol of godliness; and
myrrh, a symbol of death. Thus the gifts were given in recognition of Jesus's importance within the
Christian story. Jesus was known as the King of the Jews or the Judaeans (hence gold is offered); he was
also the Son of God (hence frankincense as a symbol of godliness is offered) and Jesus was crucified by a
fanatic mob who refused to acknowledge him as the Son of God (hence, myrrh,as the symbol of death is
one of the gifts brought by the Magi). According to the Bible, crucifixion is important for Christians who
believe that God sacrificed Jesus, his only Son, to atone for the sins of humanity.

The Poem is in three stanzas:

• the journey to the birthplace and the doubt.
• the arrival, the prefiguring and satisfaction.
• the reflection and acknowledgement of a new faith.

Stanza 1

Lines 1-5: It is the month of December, a time of freezing cold. It was hardly a time for travel.
Lines 6-7: Even the camels that carried them were in pain and refused to move and lay down in the
melting snow.
Lines 8- 12: The three Magi longed for the days in their luxurious palaces. The camel drivers also ran
away wanting various comforts.
Lines 13-20: Added to the inclement and the frosty weather, there were no places of shelter to take
temporary refuge from rain and storm. Cities were hostile and the villages they came across were filthy.
It was a difficult journey. They thought it better to travel through night, sleeping when they could, than go
and stay in lodgings which were expensive. They heard voices telling them to stop being foolish and turn
back.
Stanza 2
Lines 21-31: Then one morning after the arduous journey, the Magi arrived at a pleasant valley full of
vegetation. There was a stream and a water mill, and three trees on the horizon and a white horse in a
nearby meadow. As they stopped at a tavern with vines above the door, they met people fully drunk and
asking for money. No one gave them any useful information, so they continued along their way. That
evening, they finally got to Bethlehem.
Lines 32-43: All that had been narrated had happened long time back - a clear reference to the pre-
Christian days , to the days written about in the Old Testament that included the birth of Jesus.
The Christian Bible has two sections, the Old Testament and the New Testament. The Old Testament is
the original Hebrew Bible, the sacred scriptures of the Jewish faith, written at different times between
about 1200 and 165 BC. The New Testament books were written by Christians in the first century AD.
Jesus who was hailed as the son of God was put on the cross and crucified by the Jews. Christianity,
founded on the teachings of Jesus was the new religion marking the Christian era.

The Magus, the speaker asserts that if they had to undertake such a journey again, they would do it again
as their visit to Bethlehem to witness a glorious event was more than satisfactory. But the visit provokes a
question - did they undertake the journey for birth or death? They witnessed the birth of Jesus. But Jesus’
birth, his death and the birth of Christianity are far beyond our inane and puerile notions of birth and
death. Jesus’s whose birth marked the birth of the Son of God, and the death of their pagan religion.
When they returned to their kingdoms, they felt their old pagan world was alien to them and all their idols
were false. Jesus’ death begins yet another birth – the birth of a new dawn, a new religion. The speaker

16
concludes that he would be happy to encounter another death by undertaking another journey to witness
such a glorious birth.

Check your progress 1

1. Why does Eliot use capital B for Birth and capital D for Death in lines 36 and 39 respectively?

2. Why does the speaker say “I shall be glad of another death”?

14.6 SYMBOLISM IN THE POEM

What is symbolism? Symbols are used as literary devices to represent ideas or qualities. It is an artistic
and poetic movement or style using symbolic images and indirect suggestion to express mystical ideas,
emotions, and states of mind. It originated in late 19th-century France and Belgium. In the 20th century, it
was used by English and American writers as a literary device that used symbols, be they words,
people, marks, locations, or abstract ideas to represent something beyond the literal meaning.

Let us start from the first word,” journey”. The Journey of the Magi to Bethlehem is undertaken, to
witness a glorious event. It turns out to be a spiritual journey.The Journey through the harsh wintry
weather is difficult and creates doubt as to the worth and wisdom of undertaking such a journey. The
months were the dreadful months of winter. If you know the life history of Jesus, you will discover that
he was born in the last week of December (25th) and he was crucified in April, the spring season. Eliot
had written in another poem “April is the cruellest month”. The symbolic shift from birth to death is seen
in the shift from winter to spring.

‘Sherbet’ (a sweet drink) is a symbol for sensuous pleasure, and by extension ‘Pagan’ pleasure which is
hedonism or motivated by desire for sensual pleasures. Coming to the symbol of the River, we should
note that water is a symbol of Jesus. In the Gospel of John, Jesus calls himself ‘the Living Water’. Here it
is symbolic of the Grace offered by Jesus. With Water as the symbol, the references are to the running
stream, vegetation and water mill - suggestive of fertility, birth and light.. The stream powers a water mill
“beating the darkness”. In a watermill, the energy to spin the rotor is supplied by moving water, and it
can generate energy to power lights. The allusion is to Jesus’s claim in the Gospel of John to be the
Light of the World.

The symbol of the “three trees low on the sky” has been interpreted variously by scholars to symbolize
the crucifixion of Christ with the two thieves on the other two crosses to either side of him. It can also
represent the Trinity –God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. According to the Gospel of Luke,
Jesus was crucified with two thieves in an attempt to degrade him as a thief and a rebel. One of the two
thieves was called the Penitent Thief, also known as the Good Thief, Wise Thief, Grateful Thief or
the Thief on the Cross. He requests Jesus to "remember him" when Jesus arrives at his kingdom. The
other, known as the impenitent thief, challenges Jesus to save himself and save both of them by asking
Jesus to prove that he is the Son of God.

The symbol of the ‘White Horse’ refers to someone who announces the coming of Jesus.
Vine leaves are symbolic of Christ as the “True Vine”. The True Vine is a parable given by Jesus himself
where he describes his disciples as branches of himself, who is the "true vine". As Jesus spoke of Himself
by saying, "I am the true vine," he was trying to make people understand the value of being connected to
Him by faith. A deep and growing relationship with Him will result in peace in all circumstances, hope in
trials, strength in adversity, and joy.

The lintel represents the threshold of conversion. ‘Dicing’ is another symbol in the poem. The men
gambling is a reference to Judas’s betrayal of Jesus for 30 pieces of silver (Matthew 26:14-16) and to the
dicing of Roman soldiers for Christ's clothing after he was killed. The reference to the ‘Wine-skins’ is an

17
allusion to Jesus’s parable of the “new wine” (Matthew 9:17). Christianity will be the new religion to fill
new wine-skins. The kicking of the empty old wine-skins represents the change of the old dispensation to
the new.

Check your progress 2

How does Eliot use symbols in this poem? Explain their significance.

14.7 SUMMING UP
This is a poem with a Christian theme with several references to the Old and the New Testaments. After
a study of this Unit you would have learnt that the journey in the poem, is a spiritual journey that speaks
of Jesus’s Birth and Death. “Death’ refers to Jesus’s sacrifice for the sins of the people, the death of the
Pagan order and the birth of a new religion, Christianity. Jesus’s Birth and Death are seen not as negative
aspects of the narrative, but as positive signs of a renewal of a new order- an affirmation of the reality of
existence where birth and death alternate. The theme of the poem is thus the process of renewal, that helps
in the journey of the human spirit through history.

Journey of the Magi specifically focuses on the Epiphany (Matthew 2. 1-12), despite the lack of named
references to this event. The speaker is deeply affected by the Birth and Death of Jesus, that changed their
lives forever.

14.8 UNIT END QUESTIONS

1. What is the central theme of the Poem Journey of the Magi?
2. The poem, Journey of the Magi is a Christian poem. Discuss.
3. Write a note on Eliot’s contribution to Modernism.

14.9 GLOSSARY
Anglo-Catholicism: movement that emphasizes the Catholic rather than the Protestant heritage of
the Anglican Communion. It sought to renew Catholic thought and practice in the Church of England
Pronounced: noticeable, distinct
Theological: study of the nature of God and theological belief
Versatile: able to adapt or be adapted to many different functions or activities.
Oeuvre: body of work
Pedantic: excessively concerned with minor details or rules
Malaise: a general feeling of discomfort, illness, or unease
Revitalization: reactivation, renewal, giving new life and vitality
Paradox: a person or thing that combines contradictory features or qualities.
Paganism: a term first used in the fourth century by early Christians for people in the Roman Empire who
practised polytheism or ethnic religions other than Judaism
Frankincense: a fragrant gum resin from trees of a genus found in Somalia and southern coastal Arabia
that is an important incense resin which was used in religious rites, perfumery, and embalming
Myrrh: an embalming oil
Inane: lacking sense or meaning; silly.
Puerile: childishly silly, immature

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14.10 REFERENCES
1.The Wasteland, Book V
2. American Literature Vol. 55, No. 2, May, 1983 Published by: Duke University Press

https://www.jstor.org/stable/i347215
3. https://www.poetryfoundation.org ›
4. ibid
5.ibid

14.11 FURTHER READING

1 Kirk, Russell. Eliot and His Age: T. S. Eliot's Moral Imagination in the Twentieth
Century. (Wilmington: Isi Books, 2008),
2. Eliot, T(homas). S(tearns). "Journey of the Magi" (London: Faber & Faber, 1963)
3. Murphy, Russell Elliott. Critical Companion to T. S. Eliot: A Literary Reference to His Life and
Work. (New York: Facts on File/InfoBase Publishing,2007
4. Stead, Christian. The New Poetic: Yeats to Eliot. Harmondsworth: Pelican Books, 1969.
5. Smith, Grover . T.S. Eliot’s Poetry and Plays: A Study in Sources and Meaning. Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1956.

19
UNIT 15 W. H. AUDEN: THE UNKNOWN CITIZEN
Structure

15.0 Aims and Objectives

15.1 Introduction to British War Poetry of the 20th century
15.2 Auden: his life and works
15.3 The Poem: The Unknown Citizen
15.4 Analysis
15.5 Auden, the modernist poet
15.6 Summing up
15.7 Unit end questions
15.8 Glossary
15.9 References
15.10 Further Reading

15.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

This Unit aims at giving you an understanding of:
• War poetry in 20th century English literature
• Themes and analysis of the poem The Unknown Citizen and
• Auden’s place in Modern poetry

15.1 Introduction to War Poetry in English Literature of the 20th

Century
Auden wrote poetry during the War years and is regarded as one of the outstanding War poets of
his time. In Block 1, Unit 3, on Modern Poetry, we had referred to War Poetry.
“We have War poets belonging to the First World War period whose central theme was ‘anti-
War’. War poetry captures themes that carry across generations. It also seeks to create new
language, which later generations use as a framework for understanding war history. Notable
among them were W. H. Auden, Wilfred Owen, Isaac Rosenberg, Siegfried Sassoon, Herbert
Read, Robert Graves to name a few.”1
What is war poetry? It is a literary genre which originated during the First World War, when
hundreds of both soldiers and civilians who had experienced the brutality and vengeful fury of
the War started to write poetry to express their emotions - tragic, bitter and at times ironic on the
basis of their real experience.
War poetry is not just a World War phenomenon of the 20th century. It had been written from the
very early times of the Greeks but what is new is the establishment of War poetry as a literary
genre. The 20th century witnessed many wars - the Spanish Civil war (1936-39), the First World
War and the Second World War(1914-18 and 1939-45), the Cambodian War (1968-75) besides
the intermittent wars in Eastern Europe. Soldiers and civilians with their respective experiences
of active and distant involvement in the war and belonging to different nationalities contributed
to War poetry which became some of the defining texts of twentieth century Europe.
We describe World War II as a Global War as many countries were involved in it. World War II
took place between 1939 and 1945. It was between Germany, Italy and Japan (known as the Axis
Powers) on one hand and the Allies comprising the U.S., France, Britain and the U.S.S.R, on the
other side. As mentioned above, this period also witnessed the Spanish war and other Eastern

20
European wars. So almost every poet who wrote on this theme, expressed his own experience of
War.
War poetry should not be misread as ‘anti-war’ alone. It is “about the very large questions of life:
identity, innocence, guilt, loyalty, courage, compassion, humanity, duty, desire, death. Its
response to these questions, and its relation of immediate personal experience to moments of
national and international crisis, give war poetry an extra-literary importance.”2 The significance
of war poetry lies in its ability to rouse both historical consciousness and political consciousness
as it speaks for the individual and for the nation.

Check your progress 1

1. What is War poetry? What were the causes that contributed to the rise of the genre?

Source: www.grograph.org.uk

15.2 AUDEN: HIS LIFE AND WORKS

Auden was born in England in 1907 and later migrated to the United States in 1939. Hence it is
best to describe him as an Anglo-American poet. He came from an educated professional family,
with his father being a medical officer and his mother a nurse. The family was devoutly Anglo-
Catholic.
In the pantheon of great poets of the 20th century, Auden cannot be compared with T. S. Eliot or
W.B. Yeats who wrote masterpieces such as The Wasteland, The Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock, Sailing to Byzantium or The Second Coming . But Auden enjoys the status of a
modernist poet along with “ Stephen Spender, Cecil Lewis and others — a generation of English
poets from the 1930s, who found themselves engulfed in the soaring menace of Second World
War (WWII), the rise of fascism and economic crisis in the West”.3 Auden and his Oxford
contemporary poet Stephen Spender introduced new themes that have become a part of
Modernist poetry of the 20th century. The next Unit in this block will be on Stephen Spender.
One of the best introductions to Auden’s poetry is from his own short poem, Epitaph on a
Tyrant:
Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after,
And the poetry he invented was easy to understand;
He knew human folly like the back of his hand,
And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;

21
When he laughed, respectable senators burst with laughter,
And when he cried the little children died in the streets.
These lines highlight his invention of new themes, his insistence on perfection, his simple and
elegant style, shorn of pedantry and numerous classical and biblical references that we associate
with the poems of Eliot and Yeats. W.H. Auden was a poet of general ideas, which were mostly
political in nature. He was interested in matters concerning war and had empathy for the
suffering of ordinary masses. This could be because of his interest in Karl Marx and Sigmund
Freud.

Activity: Identify the words and the lines from the above poem that fits with the salient features
of Auden’s poetry.

15.3 THE POEM: THE UNKNOWN CITIZEN

To JS/07 M 378
This Marble Monument
Is Erected by the State)
He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the War till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.
Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Instalment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace: when there was war, he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his generation.
And our teachers report that he never interfered with their education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

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15.4 ANALYSIS
The poem in 32 lines is simple, direct and uncomplicated. It is easily comprehensible as the
theme relates to our times where the discordance between the State and the people is a quotidian
experience. The poem is in the form of a satirical elegy, where two literary genres - ‘elegy’ and
‘satire’ are fused. What is an elegy and what is a satire?
An elegy is a song or poem expressing sorrow or lamentation especially for one who is dead. A
satire is a literary form in which human or individual vices, follies and shortcomings are
criticized by means of ridicule, derision, burlesque, irony, parody, caricature, or other methods,
though at times with an intent not so much to mock but to inspire social reform. In a satirical
elegy, the elegy is used to make it perform a task directly opposed to its intended purpose.
In The Unknown Citizen, W.H. Auden, laments the loss of man’s individuality by making him
conform to the rules laid down by the government/society to ensure its smooth running. The
Unknown Citizen never deviates from those norms and therefore Government has no complaints
to make against him - holding him as a model of disciplined citizen, but in reality, a man's life is
so much more than mere compliance to set rules. Such life negates all exercise of human powers,
emotions, desires and wants.
Who is the speaker? From the language and content of the poem it is possible to surmise the
speaker to be a spokesman of the government, a bureaucrat who addresses the elegy to an
individual referring to him not by his name but by alphabets and numbers - JS/07 M378. This
form of address by the heard but unseen voice of the speaker sets the tone of the poem. It is
impersonal, officious, lacking in sensitivity and empathy. The speaker represents the faceless,
indifferent and ruthless bureaucrat of the State or the Government who exerts his authority on the
nameless citizens masquerading as a concerned, caring, and benevolent power. The individual
(JS/07M378) is denuded of his individuality in such a way that he can only be recognized by the
various government agencies that keep track of his life to make sure that he is a pliant and
willing subject, totally subservient and obedient to the powers above him.

The nameless and faceless individual is shown as a model citizen who is willing to abnegate his
individuality to conform to the ideals set out by the State /government to hold on to its
authoritarian power. This, in essence is the everlasting conflict between the people and the
Government. When the latter establishes a totalitarian regime, the gap between the masses and
the Superpower structures widens. Influenced by Marxian ideology, Auden in his works
highlights contemporary issues overlaid by totalitarian governments. He looks at the voiceless
and faceless citizen as a cog in the wheel of the State machinery who does everything that is
expected of any obedient citizen and therefore is rightly addressed as the Unknown Citizen.

Except for the War till the day he retired

He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn’t a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues

How does the speaker describe him?

One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint.
The faceless citizen does not suffer from any social tension and psychological abnormality. He
follows all the norms that the society has laid down - is friendly, enjoys a drink in company, is a
regular reader of a newspaper which invariably reflects the State’s views and accepting it

23
without critical questioning, pays his insurance policies and follows investment plans and
follows whatever the State decides, in times of Peace and War. He is one among the multitudes
of people to live a fault-less life as the State desires.
But the two end lines reveal the mechanical, dour, stagnant life where he remains emotionally
sterilized and paralyzed, transposed almost into a robot.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.
The Unknown Citizen has submerged his thinking mind and feeling heart to the norms that
society and the state have decreed as those of an ideal citizen. His intellect and his emotions
have been dwarfed by the macro-power of the State. The poem ends on the cryptic note that had
he been unhappy, had he rebelled against his slavery to the State, we would have heard a
different story far from the elegy spoken in praise of the unknown citizen for not leading an
‘exemplary’ life as the State had deemed.
The Unknown Citizen describes the average citizen (the aam admi) –the common man who leads
a life deemed utopian by the State and which, in reality is a dystopian life as he abdicates his
thinking and feeling faculties to remain impassive and phlegmatic as required by the State. The
standadarization prescribed by the state saps human desire for freedom to think, feel, express, act
and live without ticking the right boxes . That is why Auden reasons that for the modern man
living in the war-torn 20th century, freedom and happiness are absurdities. All that matters is to
be a conformist and remain a conformist. The State will erect a monument to one who did the
right things as desired by the State. This monument is at the beginning of the poem dedicated to
an unknown citizen, a faceless, emotionless, mindless man.

Check your progress 2

1. What is a Satire and what is an Elegy?

2. Why does Auden fuse the two to write a satirical elegy?
3. Analyse the last two lines of the poem:
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

15.5 AUDEN THE MODERNIST POET

Form and content in Auden’s poetry reveal the qualities of Modernism. It is not that all aspects of
Modernism are present in his poems. But some of the salient characteristics can be seen in his
poems that give him the status of a Modernist poet. Auden’s poetry has the following themes:

1. The idea that Love is fleeting

2. Theme of horror in modern life
3. Theme of death
4. Theme of bureaucracy and totalitarianism; - the last three (2-4) can be subsumed under a
single theme – the theme of suffering.

While Auden’s poems deal with death and totalitarianism, , he is also known for his love poems.
For discussion let us look at one poem, though to appreciate Auden’s poetry and his contribution
to modern poetry, it is advisable to read a few more of his love poems, such as “As I Walked Out
One Evening and “O Tell Me the Truth About Love,” that show how love is beautiful and
inspiring and how it is equally ephemeral like life itself as both are affected by the vicissitudes of
time. In many of his love poems we find an undercurrent of sorrow. Love is sweet, but it exists

24
alongside suffering and death that reveal an irrefutable finality when life ceases to exist. In
Funeral Blues, he writes:

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,

Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

The poem is in four stanzas and each one of them present a study in grief. The poem resonates
with the readers as it speaks about the cruel finality of death, though it does not stop the world
from moving on. If a most loved person ceases to exist, all the shared experiences with him/her
also come to an end. But Auden is disturbed to see how one has to endure a tragic crisis in the
midst of others who go about their mundane routines.

But when a celebrated person like Yeats died in 1939, the year that saw the beginning of World
War II, the whole world seemed to be consonant with the sad event and mourned his death. Yeats
even after his death continues to live through his poems. Yeats is almost like an avant-garde poet
who could foresee the horrors of war and which came true during the Second World War. In the
elegy for Yeats, he asserts his belief that poetry can still lift the human spirit and “persuade us to
rejoice” and “teach the free man how to praise.” Auden affirms the power of art and culture to
transcend death. The enduring quality of art is in contrast to the transitoriness or the impermanence
of life. A poet like Yeats never dies as he continues to be alive in his poems that affirm the basic
dignity of the individual soul:

With the farming of a verse

Make a vineyard of the curse,
Sing of human unsuccess
In a rapture of distress;
In the deserts of the heart
Let the healing fountain start,
In the prison of his days
Teach the free man how to praise.

While love and life do not enjoy permanence and life’s beautiful moments are temporary and
fleeting, the poignant loss experienced in Funeral Blues underscoring humanity’s most cynical
impulses is in a paradoxical way countered by the sustainable quality of Poetry. Auden’s poetry
is meaningful and relevant not only during the period he wrote, but to all times. Life is
temporary; art is eternal.

All other themes listed above are seen in Auden’s poetry expressing the horrors and fears of living
in the 20th century, during and after the two World Wars. The World Wars were the result of the
rise of totalitarianism and fascism in Europe when dictators in Europe suppressed their people’s
freedoms, led their countries into war, and resorted to barbaric acts of mass slaughter. Auden’s
poems mirror the horrors of life in a world where humanity was dead. In a few of his poems he
wonders what the role of poetry can be in the face of such nightmares, and why he should honour
the death of one man when so many were being killed on the battlefield, on the streets, and in gas
chambers. Writing about Freud, he asks, “of whom shall we speak” when “there are so many we
shall have to mourn.”

25
Auden’s poetry is about the horrors of the modern world and that itself vouches for his Modernism.
He speaks of authoritarians and their mad quest for domination not only in their nations, but all
over the world. Hitler’s madness and cruelty witnessed in his acts of genocide, his manipulation
of the masses on the pretext of racial superiority, his ruthless dominance over the bureaucracy to
do his bidding, General Franco’s brutality in Spain to put down the left leaning Popular Front
government of the Second Spanish Republic and the resulting mental, physical, psychological and
spiritual scars of the heinous wars that bludgeon the human spirit, form the background to Auden’s
poetry. Through all this, one can discern Auden’s optimism that such an expose’ may free the
human spirit from the shackles of dictators and authoritarians. Auden does not shy away from the
theme of death. The State and its bureaucracy can do everything to destroy the human spirit, but
Auden’s belief in the value of poetry as well as in the enduring human spirit rejuvenates the eternal
optimism dormant in the human heart.
What are some of the characteristics of modern poetry we see in Auden’s poem?
1. Modern poetry is written in simple language, the language of every day speech
2. Modern poetry is highly intellectual; it is written from the mind of the poet and it addresses
the mind of the reader, like the poems of T. S. Eliot.
3. Modern poetry is pessimistic as a result of the miserable condition of people in many parts of
the world, but there is always an infusion of hope at the end.
4. Modern poetry is suggestive; the poem may suggest different meanings to different readers.
5. Modern poetry is cosmopolitan. It appeals to readers everywhere and at every time because it
deals with the problems of humanity.
6. Interest in politics and the political problems of the age and the problems of the average man
and the lower classes.
7. Experimentation is one of the important characteristic features of modern poetry. Poets try to
break new grounds, i. e. to find new forms, new language and new methods of expression.
8. Irregularity of form. Modern poetry is mostly written in written without metre and rhyme scheme,
in free verse and prose (the prose poem). The most peculiar quality of the modern poetry is the
poet’s tendency to experiment with different kinds of metre and versification. Auden is modern in
this respect also. He has experimented with free verse, blank verse, the ballad metre etc.
10. Modern poetry addresses the modern man of sensibility who lives a state of spiritual and
intellectual scepticism. Individualism is a key element in Modernist literature where the individual
is given more focus than society. Auden, like Eliot before him is a sensitive poet who writes of the
world in which he lives, and reflects many of the characteristics of that world. Auden has come to
be one of the most outstanding poets of our time.In conclusion, we find Auden concerned with
war, its cruelty and the aftermath of wars that result in social, political and economic upheavals.
He argues that most of the ills of the contemporary society are a consequence of the inhumanity
embedded in Wars. Modern age is marked by violence and war. That had always been from the
very early times to modern ages. Auden is a social poet, a war poet and a Modern poet.

“In a nutshell, 'The Unknown Citizen' fits easily into the trends of modern literature and highlights
the problems that people face. The citizen remains unknown even though he serves the community
because we are not shown who he really is as an individual which elucidates that individuality is
reduced and diminished for the sake of worldly business. The poet says that statistics cannot sum
up an individual and physical facts are inadequate to evaluate human happiness. Therefore, the
poem reflects Auden’s insight of the concept of control versus freedom which brings to light the
dangers of losing the sense of individuality.4

15.6 SUMMING UP
A study of this Unit would help you in understanding

26
*War poetry written in the 20th century by English poets
* Auden’s satirical elegy The Unknown Citizen
* An analysis that highlights the blending of the two genres – satire and elegy
* The themes in Auden’s poetry
*Auden as a Modernist poet.

15.7 UNIT END QUESTIONS

1. Discuss the relevance of Auden’s poetry to our times
2. What is the significance of the title The Unknown Citizen?
3. Write a note on Auden as a Modernist poet.

15. 8 GLOSSARY
Intermittent: Occurring at irregular intervals
Anglo-Catholic: Anglo-Catholicism, movement that emphasizes the Catholic rather than the
Protestant, which sought to renew Catholic thought and practice in the Church of England
Shorn of: removed from
Pedantry: Excessive concern with minor or trivial details
Discordance: Lack of agreement or consistency
Quotidian: occurring daily
Derision: contemptuous ridicule or mockery
Burlesque: an absurd or comically exaggerated imitation of something
Irony: the expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite
Parody: a humorously exaggerated imitation of a style or a writer
Caricature: exaggeration by means of often ludicrous distortion of parts or characteristics of a
person
Officious: assertive of authority in a domineering and intrusive way
Masquerading: pretending
Denuded: stripped off
Abnegate: renounce or reject
Macro-power: Great or excessive power
Cryptic: having or seeming to have a hidden or ambiguous meaning
Utopian: modelled on or aiming for a state in which everything is perfect; idealistic
Dystopian: modelled on or aiming for a state in which there is great suffering or injustice
Impassive: not feeling or showing emotion
Phlegmatic: having an unemotional and stolidly calm disposition
Absurdities: the quality or state of being ridiculous or wildly unreasonable.
Vicissitudes: a change of circumstances or fortune, typically one that is unwelcome or
unpleasant.
Avant-garde: new and experimental ideas and methods in art, music and literature

15.9 REFERENCES
1. Modern Poetry, Block I Unit 3
2. Paul O’Prey. What is War Poetry? An Introduction.
3. Encyclopedia Britannica.com
4.The Unknown Citizen by W H Auden, www.gdctangmarg.com

27
15.10 FURTHER READING
1. Smith, Stan, ed. (2004). The Cambridge Companion to W. H. Auden.
Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
2. Davenport-Hines, Richard (1995). Auden. London: Heinemann.
3. Auden, W. H. (1934). Greene, Graham (ed.). The Old School: Essays by Divers Hands.
London: Jonathan Cape.
4. ."Poems. Auden's first published collection of poems, published by Stephen
Spender". The British Library. 2021.
5. Hoggart, Richard (1951). Auden: An Introductory Essay. London: Chatto & Windus.
6. Beach, Joseph Warren (1957). The Making of the Auden Canon. Minneapolis: University
of Minnesota Press.

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UNIT 16 STEPHEN SPENDER: “I THINK
CONTINUALLY OF THOSE WHO WERE TRULY
GREAT”
Structure

16.0 Aims and Objectives

16.1 Introduction to Stephen Spender
16.2 The works of Stephen Spender
16.3 The Poem The Truly Great
16.4 Analysis of the poem
16.5 Spender, An Assessment
16.6 Summing Up
16.7 Glossary
16.8 Questions and Answers
16.9 References
16.10 Further Reading

16.0 AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

This Unit is the last unit in this Block that deals with four of the major English poets of the 20th
century. At the end of the study of this Unit, you will come to know about

* Stephen Spender, who is regarded as one of the Oxford Poets

* His works that reflect the history of that period
* The major influences on Stephen Spender’s works
* An analysis of the poem The Truly Great
* Stephen Spender, an assesment

16.1 INTRODUCTION TO STEPHEN SPENDER (1909-1995)

Stephen Spender was born in 1909 and came into prominence as an outstanding poet of his
times. He was one of the celebrated poets of the group called Oxford Poets in the 1930s. W.H.
Auden, Stephen Spender, Cecil Day Lewis and Louis MacNeice are known as the Oxford poets.
These poets are called “the four Musketeers of the Oxford Movement”. These poets
were Oxford graduates. They were given the nickname “MacSpaunday" , that was made up of
the four poets: Louis MacNeice ("Mac") Stephen Spender ("Sp") W. H. Auden ("au-n") Cecil
Day-Lewis ("day"). Auden was the leader of this group. This group was also called the Auden
Group or the Thirties Poets, representing a new, more experimental literary style. This group was
concerned with tumultuous issues of the day both political and social such as the Great
Depression, the Spanish Civil War, the rise of Fascism, and World War II. The Auden group
existed for nearly ten years from 1930–1939, comprising writers, musicians, and painters who
were members belonging to what T. S. Eliot described as a 'definitely post-war generation'.
They shared a left-of-centre political ideology. After the World War ended, Spender focused on
prose writing that included literary criticism and autobiographical writing and fiction.

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Stephen Spender had the good fortune to inherit the artistic and educated lineage of his parents,
with his father being a political journalist and his mother, a poet and a painter. Hence his interest
in art and literature helped him in his critical and original work.

Activity: Read some of the poems of the Auden group or Oxford poets and state their social
themes.

16.2 THE WORKS OF STEPHEN SPENDER

Stephen Spender brought out his first volume of poetry, Nine Experiments: Being Poems Written
at the Age of Eighteen in 1928. His second volume Poems was published in 1933 which included
several of the poems he wrote between 1928 and 1930.

The 1930s marked a period between the two deadly World Wars. The first World War was
between 1914 and 1918, the second between 1939 and 1945. The two Wars devastated Europe
and brought about a change in people’s perspective on the meaning of life, their faith in God
almost bordering on atheism and nihilism, the collapse of all values that had hitherto been
regarded as hallowed and inviolable. The established world order had crumbled and idealists like
Spender turned to Communism as an alternative to Fascism. Europe was reorganized, and a new
world was born. The European nations that had fought in the Great War emerged economically
and socially crippled. Economic depression prevailed in Europe for much of the inter-war period.
“The political atmosphere of the inter-war years was sharply divided between those who thought
the extreme left could solve Europe's problems, and those who desired leadership from the
extreme right. This situation kept the governments of Britain, France, and Eastern Europe in
constant turmoil, swinging wildly between one extreme and the next. Extreme viewpoints won
in the form of totalitarian states in Europe during the inter-war years, and communism took hold
in the Soviet Union, while fascism controlled Germany, Italy and Spain”1.

Spender went to Spain during the Spanish civil war to fight the Fascist forces under General
Franco, though he personally did not participate in the fighting. Instead he wielded his pen to
write Poems for Spain. From his early days Spender was concerned with social and political
issues and gained celebrity status as a poet. His poem Vienna of 1934 details Fascist suppression
of the Socialists’ revolt in Austria. Poems in The Still Centre are about his experience in Spain
and hints at his growing disenchantment with communism. These poems also reveal his rejection
of the heroic idea of war. Those of you who have read Arms and the Man by Bernard Shaw,
which premiered in 1894 can understand how writers and thinkers of the 20th century were
concerned with the futility of wars and criticized romantic ideals of heroism and sentimental
love. Spender’s later publication of essays under the title The God that Failed further reflects his
disillusionment with leading Communist intellectuals like Arthur Koestler, Andre Gide and
Richard Wright. But during this period- i.e., during the Second World War, besides editing an
anti communist periodical Encounter, he turned to poetry writing and published two volumes of
poems.

Activity: Read Bernard Shaw’s play Arms and the Man along with Auden’s poem The Unknown
Citizen and Spender’s The Truly Great.

But in his post -war life, his focus was more on prose that included literary criticism and fiction
and also drama. His literary criticism in his first prose work was on authors like Henry James,
W. B. Yeats, T. S. Eliot, James Joyce, and D. H. Lawrence. His prose fiction includes a book of
short stories, The Burning Cactus (1936), almost Lawrentian in tone in expressing suppressed

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emotion, and a full-length novel, The Backward Son (1940), an autobiographical account of
English boarding school life, which he disliked. He also wrote a five-act, verse drama, Trial of a
Judge against Fascism.

Spender’s critical output comprises The Destructive Element and its sequel, The Creative
Element. The Destructive Element is a study of modern writers aimed to “alert one that human
nature and values are precarious, not immutable, and that the forces of destruction facing them
are enormous”. 2

Activity: If you want to know more about Modern writers, read Spender’s two volumes - The
Destructive Element and The Creative Element.

The Creative Element is about the vision, despair and orthodoxy among some modern writers.
In The Struggle of the Modern Spender defines literary modernism as an endeavor to reconcile
the past and the present, and heal the divide between art and life. “He also produced several
volumes of autobiography, journals, and collected letters, most notably the 1951 memoir World
within World, a valuable document of literary and cultural history that re-creates the social and
political atmosphere of the 1930s. This book exemplifies the commitment to honesty and candor
of an author who claimed that all of his art is essentially autobiographical.”3

Check your progress 1

Who were the major influences on Spender’s poetry?

16.3 THE POEM, THE TRULY GREAT

BY STEPHEN SPENDER
I think continually of those who were truly great.
Who, from the womb, remembered the soul’s history
Through corridors of light, where the hours are suns,
Endless and singing. Whose lovely ambition
Was that their lips, still touched with fire,
Should tell of the Spirit, clothed from head to foot in song.
And who hoarded from the Spring branches
The desires falling across their bodies like blossoms.

What is precious, is never to forget

The essential delight of the blood drawn from ageless springs
Breaking through rocks in worlds before our earth.
Never to deny its pleasure in the morning simple light
Nor its grave evening demand for love.
Never to allow gradually the traffic to smother
With noise and fog, the flowering of the spirit.

Near the snow, near the sun, in the highest fields,

See how these names are fêted by the waving grass
And by the streamers of white cloud
And whispers of wind in the listening sky.
The names of those who in their lives fought for life,
Who wore at their hearts the fire’s centre.

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Born of the sun, they travelled a short while toward the sun
And left the vivid air signed with their honour.

16.4 ANALYSIS OF THE POEM

The first line of the poem, “I think continually of those who were Truly Great”, gives us the clue
that the poet is talking about the truly great personalities from the past and how continually
thinking about them suggests that the past is always connected to the present and therefore all
those truly great individuals are connected to us across time. As the poem progresses, we realize
how they have close correspondence with perennial Nature which, in turn, confers eternity on
them. Time cannot erase their memory. Like Nature that is eternally present in sunshine, spring
blossoms, snowy mountains and lush green meadows, these truly great heroes are omnipresent
and make us identify the connection between Nature and grandeur of Man and their perennity.

By stressing on the word ‘continually’, the poet says Nature is always present and so are the
stellar individuals who are ever present at all times and in all places. In Hindi, we have a term
Rinanubandhan (ऋणानुबन्धन) which means an invisible chord that ties you together to your past
life. Without going into the religious and astrological dimensions, it can be said of Spender’s
poem that it is about human bonding with the past through historical, ecological, and spiritual
connections.

Spender does not name or identify the truly greats of the past. Simply they are heroes, nameless
and faceless and they are recalled in the present on account of their heroic deeds that have left
lasting footprints on the sands of time and place all over the world. Some critics point out the
absence of any heroic action of the present. But Spender pays his tributes solely for the past
heroes who had contributed to and shaped the world that we live in today. He is not interested in
criticizing the present for lack of heroism. The poem is one of grateful acknowledgement of their
grand contributions that have made a difference to the world, making our heritage better than
what they had inherited.

“This poem, broadly, is an attempt to describe what makes a person "truly" great. The poem was
written in the 1930's during wartime, this no doubt influenced the poet. However, soldiers are not
the only people he is referring to. He is essentially referring to anyone who selflessly fights for
what they believe in.4/ The “Truly Great” can be poets, soldiers, selfless and passionate artists.
What defines them is their actions, deeds, words, artistic and aesthetic creations that inspire
generations that come after them. They have made a difference to the world and hence our
thoughts in grateful acknowledgement of what they have bequeathed to the present generation.

The “truly great” are remembered for their ceaseless toil from the womb to the tomb - from birth
to death. Like the sun that shines all through day and night, as it orbits from East to West, and
back from West to East, these great celebrity heroes shone all through their living hours. Spender
equates hours with suns, as all their hours are resplendent like the shining sun and like the sun,
these great personalities also lived active hours. The poet says to the reader that these truly great
people dwelt in a constant light where the hours are likened to the suns. “The sun is the main
source of energy on earth. It is brilliant and a source of great inspiration, therefore Spender could

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be saying that their every hour was a source of great inspiration and full of achievement. Spender
goes on to state that these great people had their aspirations, and their aspirations could be seen
by the words that they spoke to the people”.5 Their visionary ideas to transform the world are
compared to blooming blossoms that lend colour and beauty to Nature. Sun, light, fire and
blossoms are loaded with symbolism and they relate to eternity and energy, inspiration and
achievement.

The poem is replete with symbols as we move into the second stanza. But the symbols cannot be
treated as having one-to one correspondence that is easy of comprehension. At times, one
wonders if Spender’s long-drawn similies are a trifle laboured and stretched! What is to be
noted is they once again reflect the connection between the work of Nature and the work done by
the truly great heroes of the past. The idea is to show that however hard the task is, there is
always an essential happiness in doing hard work and achieving the fruits of one’s toil. Just as
there is satisfaction and joy in drawing the blood from springs, these individuals conducted all
their great acts and hard work with true happiness.

Madeline Wells explains: “Here, the "blood" of the "truly great" is of divine origin. It is "drawn
from ageless springs," meaning God himself has infused his divine essence into the bloodstreams
of the "truly great." So, "ageless springs" are a metaphor describing God or Providence, whose
power is ageless and eternal. This "ageless spring" is formidable enough to break through "rocks
in worlds before our earth." Essentially, the narrator may be intimating that the "truly great" have
charted new territory in areas beyond the average citizen's comprehension. Because of this, we
should remember them with deep gratitude and strive to emulate their wisdom and nobility of
spirit.”5

The exaggerated symbol of breaking through the rocks is an index of the timelessness of their
hard work. They were not distracted by words of discouragement from reaching for their goals
and ambitions. Spender attributes their single minded pursuit of realizing their passion to
transform the world to the vision and will they possessed what he terms as ‘the Spirit’.
He continues the thread from the second stanza that these heroic works will never be forgotten,
‘what is precious is never to forget’, and this justifies why he thinks continually of them. The
snow of the mountaintops, the waving grass-filled meadows, the clouds, and the winds all
whisper the names of these great people. In this stanza, Spender reveals that these heroes may
not be poets but rather war heroes who lost their lives fighting for their country - ‘fought for
life’.

Spender describes these truly great people as those ‘who remembered the soul’s history from the
womb’. ‘Soul’s history’ implies history of humankind from the beginning of time By forever
remembering what humankind had gone through from the beginning of time, it allowed these
individuals to be passionate about making a change and therefore they become so great.

Stephen Spender was always in contact with artists, litterateurs and cultural aesthetes and he
shared with them their taste and sensitivity for art and aesthetics. He was concerned with art
beyond borders, collaboration between artists and writers; solidarity against their censorship; and
the moral responsibility of the creative individual in times of social crisis. This poem is very
likely a summation of Spender’s love for art, his deep engagement with social issues and his
belief in the responsibility of artists to play a significant role in shaping society and the world.

Check your progress 2

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(1) Explain the title of the poem I think continually of those who are truly great.

(2) What is the theme of the poem? How does Spender integrate the past and the present?
(3) Explain the symbolism in this poem.
(4) List the images in the poem and discus how it sums up Spender’s love for art, his deep
engagement with social issues and his belief in the responsibility of artists to play a significant
role in shaping society and the world

16.5 STEPHEN SPENDER, AN ASSESSMENT

Stephen Spender may be assessed as follows:

* A writer of social protest

* Celebrated for his literary and critical writings as a poet, novelist, literary critic and prose
writer.
*Was deeply concerned with economic and political fall- out as a result of the First World War
such as labour unrest, unemployment, the rise of Fascist-Nazi totalitarianism.
* His sympathy for the sufferings of common people made him write in a direct, simple style that
made his poetic communication easy to follow.
* His ideal was democratic socialism, “No man shall hunger: Man shall spend equally (from
‘Not Palaces, An Era's Crown’).
*In his poems, he used modern imagery from industry and warfare.
*He was honest and open-minded in his writings. To begin with he was drawn towards
Communism as a counter to Fascist dictatorship of Hitler and Franco and this was reflected in all
his works. Later when he became disillusioned with leftist ideology under the totalitarian regime
of Soviet Russia, his writings became critical of the celebrated Communist ideologues like
Koestler and Gide. His poems stand testimony to his self-critical and honest personality.

* He was a humanist and compassionate to the core, as reflected in—Ruins and

Visions (1942), Poems of Dedication (1947), The Edge of Being (1949), Collected
Poems (1955), Selected Poems (1965), The Generous Days (1971), and Dolphins (1994)

* This tribute by Gerald Nicosia sums up the high standard of craftsmanship, that Spender and
the Oxford poets had achieved. “ [these poets] turned away from the esotericism of T.S. Eliot,
insisting that the writer stay in touch with the urgent political issues of the day and that he speak
in a voice whose clarity can be understood by all.”6

* Spender’s poetry reveals three major influences that make him both a modernist and Romantic
poet. His idealism, his use of powerful imagery and graceful ability to express his emotions
remind us of the Romantic poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley. He is like Rainer Maria Rilke, a
modernist poet, who tried to express his traumatic experience of war horrors and despite the
disillusionment with war and its inhumanity, his poems affirmed life. Similarly, D.H. Lawrence
had a strong influence on him as his poems give expression to suppressed emotions. The third
and the most powerful influence was that of his fellow Oxford poets. In particular mention has to
be made of Auden and Christopher Isherwood who shaped his views on the poet’s role in
commenting on society.

* All the modern poets of the Oxford Group were engaged with the issues of the day. And they
tried to reconcile the artistic muse and the urge to confront fascism. ‘The struggle to connect
outer and inner reality is, in fact, Spender's overarching theme.’7

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* The two poets Auden and Spender present the seamy side of urban-industrial landscape and
reflect both the social and political concerns of their times.

*Spender breaks free of formal poetic conventions and wrote free verse. “The sound of his
poems is distinctive, although he uses few seductive aural techniques, such as alliteration,
assonance, full or near rhyme, or regular rhythms. The imagery, though painterly, often lacks
concreteness. One weakness of his poetry is a tendency toward rhetorical abstraction.”8

*A lot of autobiographical elements are included in Spender's poetry. “Its obsessive theme is an
introspective search for a valid, sustaining faith, a coherent approach to uniting the self with the
world, the personal with the political.”

Honours came to him in recognition of his literary achievements and humane personality. Sir
Stephen Harold Spender was honoured as an English poet, novelist and essayist who
concentrated on themes of social injustice and class struggles in his work. He was appointed the
seventeenth Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the United States Library of Congress in 1965.
Spender was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) at the 1962 Queen's
Birthday Honours, and knighted in the 1983 Queen's Birthday Honours.

16.6 SUMMING UP

At the end of your study of this unit you would have learnt about
* The Oxford Poets
* Stephen Spender and his works
* The major influences on his poetry
* An assessment of his works
* The poem “I think continually of those who were Truly Great”
* A critical analysis of the poem and
* Significance of the symbols used by the poet

16.7 GLOSSARY
Great Depression: worldwide economic downturn that began in 1929 and lasted until about 1939.
Although it originated in the United States, the Great Depression caused drastic declines in
output, severe unemployment, and acute deflation in almost every country of the world.

Spanish Civil War: War between the leftists, known as the Republicans (formed by the Spanish
government together with unions, communists, anarchists, workers, and peasants) and the
Nationalists - the rebel part of the army, the bourgeoisie, the landlords, and, generally, the upper
classes.

Fascism: a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism characterized by dictatorial power,

forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and of the economy,
which came to prominence in early 20th century Europe.

Atheism: The literal definition of “atheist” is “a person who does not believe in the existence of
a God or any gods.

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Nihilism: the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless.

Totalitarian: relates to a system of government that is centralized and dictatorial and requires
complete subservience to the State.
Perennial: lasting or existing for a long or apparently infinite time
Perennity: the state or quality of being perennial
Omnipresent: present everywhere at all times
Ecological: of or relating to the science of ecology or the patterns of relationships between
living things and their environment
Orbit: An orbit is a regular, repeating path that an object in space takes around another one
Seamy: Sordid and disreputable
Seductive: tempting and attractive; enticing
Aural: relative to the ear, sense of hearing
Alliteration: the occurrence of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely
connected words.
Assonance: resemblance of sound in words or syllables.
Painterly: artistic, appropriate to a painter
Rhetorical abstraction: refers to language that describes concepts rather than concrete images
(ideas and qualities rather than observable or specific things, people, or places)

16.8 UNIT END QUESTIONS

(1) Write a critical analysis of the poem The Truly Great.
(2) Critically assess Spender’s literary output.
(3) Explain from your reading of the poem The Truly Great, Spender’s tendency towards
rhetorical abstraction. Give examples from the poem.

16.9 REFERENCES
1.Stephen Harold Spender. Encyclopedia.com
2. https://ir.nbu.ac.in › bitstream .
3. Madeline Wells,e.notes.com
4. https://www.cram.com/essay/Truly-Great-Poem-Analysis
5. https://www.cram.com/essay/Truly-Great-Poem-Analysis
6. Gerald Nicosia, Stephen Spender: a life Fulfilled through Poetry. www. chicagotribune.com
7. op. cit, Encyclopaedia.com

16.10 FURTHER READING

Books
Connors, J. J. Poets and Politics: A Study of the Careers of C. Day Lewis, Stephen Spender and
W. H. Auden in the 1930s. New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1967.
Fraser, George S. Vision and Rhetoric. London: Faber &Faber, 1959.
Hoskins, Katharine B. Today the Struggle: Literature and Politics in England during the Spanish
Civil War. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1969.
Hynes, Samuel. The Auden Generation: Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s.
London: Bodley Head, 1976.

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Kulkarni, H. B. Stephen Spender: Poet in Crisis. Glasgow, Scotland: Blackie, 1970.
Maxwell, D. E. S. Poets of the Thirties. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969.
Press, John. A Map of Modern English Verse. London: Oxford University Press, 1969.
Scarfe, Francis. Auden and After: The Liberation of Poetry, 1930–1941. London: Routledge,
1942.
Sutherland, John. Stephen Spender: The Authorized Biography. London: Viking, 2004.
Weather head, A. K. Stephen Spender and the Thirties. Lewisburg, Pa.: Bucknell University
Press, 1975.
Periodicals
Fuller, Roy. “Ungenerous Measure.” London Magazine, February/March 1972: 145–46.
Stanford, Derek. Review of The Generous Days. Books and Bookmen, January 1972: 64–65.
Gale Contextual Encyclopedia of World Literature
Susannah Fullerton, Stephen Spender & 'The Truly Great' , https://susannahfullerton.com.au

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