The Twentieth Century

"Modernism in art, literature, and music flourished especially from around 1890 to 1918, the end of World
War I. It was . . . a sharp reaction to late nineteenth-century culture, especially to the accepted rules of art
within that culture . . ." (Kerman 289)

What caused such a reaction in the first few decades of the twentieth century? People in the nineteenth
century were convinced that the progress in technology and science would lead to progress in human affairs.
But the horrific weaponry created by technology and used in WW I (submarines, tanks, poison gas) caused
many people to question the advances of science. "Groundwork for such loss in confidence had already been
laid by science in other areas. Men and women were shaken in their most basic assumptions about life by
puzzling advances in physics, biology, and psychology" (Kerman 290)

Albert Einstein, theory of relativity: "The idea that things depend on the standpoint of the observer, and
cannot be counted on according to the 'objective' rules of Newtonian physics, rocked people's sense of
certainty" (Kerman 290).
Charles Darwin, evolution: ". . . uncertainty simply deepened a crisis in religion that the Victorians had
already experienced as a result of scientific theories of evolution. Were human beings created by God in
God's image, as the Bible teaches, or were they descended by an impersonal process from animals?"
(Kerman 290).
Sigmund Freud, psychology : Freud's ideas "suggested that in spite of what people thought they were
doing or feeling, they were in fact controlled by unconscious drives. [This idea contradicted the concept
of free-will] The idea of men and women in the grip of irrational forces of their own (or their parents')
making was a troubling one. At the same time, the prospect of working out one's 'problems' through
psychology gave the new century its paradigm for personality change" (Kerman 290).

First half:

Writers:
Marcel Proust, 1871-1922
Yeats
James Joyce
T.S. Eliot
Albert Camus
Samuel Becket

Music:
Debussy, Prelude a l'apres-midi d'un faune, 1894
Stravinsky, The Rite of Spring, 1913
Prokoviev, The Love for Three Oranges, 1919


Painters: Derain, Matisse, Roualt, Picasso, Kandinsky, Beckman


After WW II

Writers:
Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes
Raymond Carver


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