What is Post Modernism? How it is different from modernism?
or:
What are the main characteristics of Post Modernism.
Or:
How Post Modern writers projected the contemporary world through
their creations?
Ans:-
Post Modernism emerged after the second world
war as a reaction against the modernism and anti-modernism tendencies. The term
'Post Modernism' was in fact coined in 1940's by the historian Arnold Bee.
Historically, it can be traced back as far as the 'Dada Movement or "Dadaism" which started
in Zurich in 1916. This movement contributed a significant force in modern
writing.
Post Modernism is fairly a recent phenomena and
is more evident in America and France than in England except in the field of
drama. Beckett showed post modernist tendencies more than any other English
writers. Among other writers are John Barth, Leonard Mitchell, Brigid Brophy,
John Fowles and Richard Brautigan.
When someone refers to the modern period, they mean
the period from about 1898 to the Second World War (1939). This is a term of
wild experimentation is literature art, music and politics. This is the period
that saw such revolutionary political movements such as fascism, Nazism,
communalism, enachism and so on. Modernists therefore participated in a
general questioning of all the values held by the Victorian Period. Many
modernists also called the romantic exploration as a primitive consciousness of
the romantic writers. This thought has been highlighted in Joseph Conrad’s,
“The Heart of Darkness.”
In general, there is a fear that things have gone of
track and we need to follow new paths if we are to extricate ourselves. Some of
the features of Post Modernists aesthetic works include:-
1.
Self reflection (Ex- Picasso’s ‘Women in the studio’)
2.An exploration of psychological and subjective
states (rejection of realism or stream of consciousness writing by James Joyce
and Virginia Woolf)
3.Alternative ways of thinking about representation
(to see the some object or event form multiple perspective at the same time)
4.Radical experimentation inform and style
(Breakdown in generic distinction in prose and poetry)
5.Fragmentation inform and representation of past
(T.S. Eliot’s "The Waste Land" )
6.Extreme ambiguity (quality of being open to more
than one interpretation, ex- William Faulkner, “The Sound and the Fury”)
7.Breakdown between high and low form (Eliot’s and
Joyce’s inclusion of folk and pop culture in the same work)
8.Use of parody and irony (In James Joyce’s
‘Ulysses’)
One of the problems dealing with
post modernism is distinguishing it from modernism. In many ways most modern
artists and writers continued those experiments that we can also find in
modernists’ works. Post modernism generally speaking the cultural era through
which the skeptical stances have emerged. It has been tried to view any product
of human culture, in particular literature, art, philosophy and criticism. It
may refer to various movements in reaction to modernism by ironic self reference
and absurdity or to a theory that involves a radical assumption about culture,
identity history or language.
Post
Modernism takes the realistic position that here is no absolute truth or
subjective reality that we experience as reality in our social life what we experience
consist of our interpretation of what the world means to us individually. Since
individual response tends to differ from one another and change our time so the
post modern presents a skeptical explanation that a conception cannot be valid
for all human groups, cultural or time. On the other hand, they gave importance
to individuals subjective response to a given a poem or painting or other
cultural product. Post modern literature is post world war two and to
characterised by heavy reliance on technique. Post modernism as a whole is hard
to define and there is little agreement on the exact characteristics, scope and
interpretation.
***Write
a short note on Post Modern drama or new theatre.
Or:
How
the concept of new theatre brought a radical change in English dramatic
tradition.
Answer:
Drama of the post war period shares in some ways the
dominant spirit of the age that was in novel and poetry from 1950’s onward. The
central stance of in all the literary form seems to be to face the realistic of
life, to take sufferings as it comes and to learn to except the un heroic
status that men seem to have been assigned in the absurd universe in which he
is condemn to live. Dramas of this period bring a sharper focus on all those
aspects and have been more daring then the other two literary forms. It has
been more innovative and convincing in technique more shocking in revealing
social and moral conventions.
When John Osborne’s, ‘Look Back
in Anger’ was opened at the Royal Court Theatre on 8th May 1956, it
at once made an impression that a dramatic revolution was afoot in the Modern British
theatre. The early audience did however feel shocked as well as its more
sensitive critics into deeper response. The play shook the middle class values
of the “Well Made Play” founded by Ibsen and practiced in England by Bernard
Shaw. The audience saw in Osborn’s play a new kind of drama which addressed,
“The Issues of the day” by rejecting all the traditional conception of the
drama. What was new about this drama is that the play was revolutionary neither
in its form nor in its policies. It was however by the standards of its time
alarming in its rancor, its language and its dramatic setting.
The transformation of the
British theatre in the late 1950’s and early 1960’s was both gradual and truly
radical then which can be explaining by focusing on a single production or on
the work of a sing playwright. John Osborn, Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, John
Osborn, Christopher Fry, John Arden and Terence Rattigan belong to the first
post war generation playwrights who responded innovatively to the society that
demanded a change in dramatic orientation. It Beckett’s absurdist plays open up
a previously uncharted dramatic field, Osborn’s satirical attack well with its
initial audience.
John
Osborne: If the British theatre was shocked by
John Osborne’s “Look Back in Anger” need to be occurred for, it was because
Osborne’s works were more obviously a response to social evils, as much as a
reaction against the established native tradition. He was the rebellion of an
insider. The anger, the protest of Osborn’s character has always been an
extension of his perception of himself; Osborn began his career as an actor and
wrote three plays in collaboration before the master piece, “Look Back in
Anger” which was the first play by a new dramatist produced by the English stage
company at the Royal Court. Its success was mainly due to the angry dialogues
by the central character, Jimmy Porter. Through this drama, Osborne introduced
the character of the ‘Angry Young Man” to theatre audience.
“Look Back in Anger” was
something of a sensation projected social evils, political corruptions and
frustration of English Society. Osborn’s conception of anger was a new theme
for the British drama as it fought against the so called “System” and projected
the evils in a different manner. In this way the hero’s personal anger becomes
universal through his dialogues and activities.
Samuel
Beckett:-
Although
considered a foreign influence, Samuel Beckett was in fact the real pioneer of
the New Theatre in Europe. He is an Irish novelist and playwright. The novels
‘Murphy’(1938) and ‘Watt’ (1956) were written in English and show his characteristic
concern with the helpless individual consciousness. Beckett is primarily known
for his contribution to the theatre of ‘Absurd’ and in this respect his play
which made international reputation is ‘Waiting for Godot’. It is a prose play
with poetic overtones. The simplicity of its design, its structure economics,
its poetic quality and the element of universality is made as a celebrated
drama. ‘Waiting for Godot’ is a story of two tramps, Estragon and Vladimir, who
are forever waiting of the arrival of the mysterious Godot, who never comes.
They had a notion that with the arrival of Godot their lives will be changed.
But, they became confused about the arrangement and wondered if they were
waiting at the right time or on the right day. Beckett was consistent in his
use of drama as an extension of his wider interest in the functioning of human
mind. In his lays ideas, images, phrases and minds overlay. His voice starts as
some plays but ends elsewhere. This is the characteristic of Absurd drama as
these dramas tried to project the existence of human being in this world and
according to the playwright, In our life itself become absurd in this modern
world. Beckett’s dialogues in ‘Waiting for Godot’ are particularly remarkable.
His characters are symbolic through which Beckett presents the situation of
modern human being with all his problems and solution in most realistic way.
Poetic
Drama:
Christopher
Fry:- Fry’s attempt to rivide the fortunes of poetic
drama was contemporary with T.S. Eliot’s later experiments of the same topic.
Like Eliot, Fry felt poetry as the medium for a re-exploration of religious
mystery in the theatre. He never found a voice or a subject which satisfactory echoes the essential characteristics of
modern life and thought. His famous comedies are: “A Phoenix too Frequent”,
“The Lady’s Not for Burning”, “Venus Observed” and “A sleep of Prisoners”.
Through all these dramas, Fry enables to create a dramatic discourse from
surface realism. In his plays, Fry presents the relation between human being
and how they are separating from each other. His dramas are most metaphysical
with some unexpected twist.
John
Arden:
John
Arden was in many ways launched typical of new generation playwrights at the
Royal Court. His plays are provocated an argumentative. Arden’s “Live Like
Pigs” is a play about the re-settlement of gypsy in a housing estate explores
anti-social behaviour. This drama leaves in impression that the official
guardians, the police who has the so responsibility to maintain the so called
customs which were ultimately far more damaging to the society. Arden’s other
plays like “The Life of Man”, “The Waters of Babylon”, “Serjeant Musgrve’s
Dance”, are showed the bold unpredictable mixture of verse and prose. In
most of the other plays like “The Hero
rises Up”, “Left-Handed Liberty”, “The Happy Haven”, in these plays, Arden
put forward his questions on British Politics, legal military and imperial
tradition. The pays of John Arden are essentially nonliterary and illustrate the
main perfection. His plays need to be performing to have their full effect.
Arnold
Wesker:-
Wesker
has given himself to the crusade for working class culture. He manages to
relate his intense respect for working class community to a social, historical
and political perspective. His first play, “Chicken soup with Barley”, is a
drama following the life of an East and Jewish
family. Other two plays of the trilogy, “Roots”
and “I’m Talking about Jerusalem.” Wesker conveys a sense of place by
capturing distinctive ways of rhythm of urban and rural life. The other
dramatic works like “The Kitchen”, “The Four Seasons” etc constitute a
definite achievement and annexed to English drama a new social Fertility.
Harold
Pinter:
Much
of Harold Pinter’s work emphasizes the fear lurking just round the corner.
Through his drama, he conveys to us a sense that place is only an illusion
which is subject to sudden destruction by their appearance of an intruder. It may
be a neighbour, a stranger or a figure from our past. Regarding “Birthday Party”, Pinter himself said, “Fear doesn’t come from extra-ordinary people
but from you and me”. It is all a matter of circumstances”. Some of the
famous full length and one act plays of Pinter are “The Birthday Party”, “The care
Taker”, “The Home coming”, “The Room”, “A Night out”, and “The Party”.
Harold Pinter is the first modern dramatist who revealed of human life and
their effects upon a normal person. The faithlessness and emotionless has been
nicely projected by this dramatist.
God Bless you all & best of luck, by your dearest & nearest by Podmeswar