Modern Roman
This session we have been asked about the previous sessions. Also, after that, we studied The Dead by James Joyce.
James Joyce and his wife is are different in a way that one is to get rid of past while the other longs for it.
Decadence
They were influenced by the artistic movement. They were trying to remove the influence the society has on art. Because they are individualist, the sense of self is important to them.
Surrealism
It was largely influenced by Dadaism. It focuses on mind and unconsciousness. They use symbols and images. They try to eliminate the difference between conscious and unconscious. To them, we are not driven by rationality.
Expressionism
Scream, the painting.
Virginia Woolf
Materialists
According to Woolf, they are the writers who are depicting the outside world and not including the inside world of a person.
Spiritualists
The modern writers using stream-of-consciousness.
Epiphany
A sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.
Grand Narratives
Narrative knowledge is knowledge in the form of story-telling. In the tribal times, myths and legends formed knowledge of this type; that such-and-such a mountain was just where it was because some mythic animal put it there, and so on. The narrative not only explained, but legitimated knowledge, and when applied to the social relations of their own society, the myths functioned as a legitimization of the existing power relations, customs and so on.
During the start of the modern times. According to modernists, the established understanding of life has connections to these narratives which it should detach from.
The Dead (1914) - James Joyce
Gabriel Conroy
- Lack of sense of belonging and attachment
- Out of place
- Alienation from Irish culture and language (Trinity College)
- Intellectual rather than sentimental
- Robert Browning, galosh, cycling in Europe, three graces
- Lack of confidence
- Lack of sympathy and empathy (his interaction with Lily and Miss Ivors)
- Emotional paralysis, inability for self-expression
- Against nationalism
- Frustration, disillusionment and disappointment
- Disinterestedness in politics (Literature is above politics)
How does Gretta differ from Gabriel?
- She has a greater emotional capacity.
- Nostalgia for the past (Why?)
- She took shelter in the past.
- Michael Furrey: expression in the dark eyes, walking out together in Galway, untimely dead, passionate love, dying for the sake of love.
Read the first part of To the Lighthouse for the next week.