Modernism in Literature

MODERNISM IN
LITERATURE
an introduction
SIGMUND FREUD
The “science of the unconscious”=
psychoanalysis
• Freud challenged the cherished belief that humankind is rational and
primarily governed by reason, replacing it with the disturbing notion that
we are in fact driven by unacceptable and hence repressed aggressive and
sexual impulses that are constantly at war with the “civilized” self.
• The Unconscious refers to the existence of thoughts and feelings of which
we are not aware that motivate our strivings (activities, effort) and
behaviour. It is the place where wishes, impulses and drives reside, a place
not beholden to the realities of logic or time or the constraints of socially
acceptable behaviour.
• The contents of the Unconscious are usually experienced as painful and/or
forbidden and have therefore been repressed, that is, excluded from
consciousness.
• Individuals express their repressed thoughts or feelings in subtle, symbolic
or disguised ways, such as in dreams, slips of the tongue, jokes, and clinical
symptoms. The hidden meaning of such signs and symptoms must be
uncovered in order to effect a “cure” for the mentally sick.
• So, at the heart of Freud’s revolutionary approach to mental illness was his
concept of repression, the denial by the conscious mind of deep-rooted
feelings and motivations, frequently sexual in nature.
Shell shock or Posttraumatic stress
disorder (PTSD)
"The shell-shock cases were the worst to see and
the worst to cure. At first shell-shock was regarded
as damn nonsense and sheer cowardice by
Generals who had not themselves witnessed its
effects. They had not seen, as I did, strongly, sturdy,
men shaking with ague, mouthing like madman,
figures of dreadful terror, speechless and
uncontrollable. It was a physical as well as a moral
shock which had reduced them to this quivering
state.“ (Philip Gibbs, journalist on the Western front and
official British reporter during the FWW)
“I saw a sergeant-major convulsed like
someone suffering from epilepsy. He
was moaning horribly with blind terror
in his eyes. He had to be strapped to a
stretcher before he could be carried
away. Soon afterwards I saw another
soldier shaking in every limb, his
mouth slobbered, and two comrades
could not hold him still. These badly
shell-shocked boys clawed their
mouths ceaselessly. Others sat in the
field hospitals in a state of coma,
dazed, as though deaf and dumb.”
(Philip Gibbs)
Common Symptoms Treatment
Physical: paralysis, blindness, Disciplinary treatment: shaming,
deafness, contracture of limbs, fixed physical re-education and the
postures mutism and limping; infliction of pain (electric shock
Mental/Psychic: nightmares, anxiety, treatment). Another form of
insomnia, depression and treatment consisted of "finding out
disorientation, intrusive the main likes and dislikes of patients
recollections and flashbacks (which and then ordering them to abstain
overlap with the normal ways in from the former and apply
which veterans remember their themselves diligently to the latter".
experiences), hallucinations,
survivor guilt, avoidance and
impaired social interaction.
Siegfried Sassoon – Survivors (1917)
No doubt they’ll soon get well; the shock and strain
Have caused their stammering, disconnected talk.
Of course they’re ‘longing to go out again,’—
These boys with old, scared faces, learning to walk.
They’ll soon forget their haunted nights; their cowed
Subjection to the ghosts of friends who died,—
Their dreams that drip with murder; and they’ll be proud
Of glorious war that shatter’d all their pride...
Men who went out to battle, grim and glad;
Children, with eyes that hate you, broken and mad.
SIGMUND
FREUD
Traumatic
neurosis
• The term traumatic neurosis designates a psycho-pathological state
characterized by various disturbances arising soon or long after an intense
emotional shock (the trauma of killing or seeing others being killed).
“The traumatic neurosis demonstrates very clearly that a fixation to the

moment of the traumatic occurrence lies at their root. These patients
regularly produce the traumatic situation in their dreams, in case showing
attacks of a hysterical type in which analysis is possible; it appears that the
attack constitutes a complete reproduction of this situation. It is as though
these persons had not yet been able to deal adequately with the situation, as
if this task were still actually before them unaccomplished.”
ALBERT • He determined that massive objects in
EINSTEIN space will cause warping or distortion of
The general space-time which we all "feel" as gravity.
• The force of gravity arises from the
theory curvature of space and time. Objects such
of relativity as the sun and the Earth change this
geometry. In the presence of matter and
energy it can evolve, stretch and warp,
forming ridges, mountains and valleys that
cause bodies moving through it to zigzag
and curve. So although Earth appears to
be pulled towards the sun by gravity, there
is no such force. It is simply the geometry
of space-time around the sun telling Earth
how to move.
The special theory of relativity - E =
mc2
→ mass and energy are interchangeable
• According to the theory of special
• The energy of an object is given relativity, it is impossible to say in an
by its mass multiplied by the absolute sense whether two distinct
speed of light squared (the events occur at the same time if
speed of light is a constant those events are separated in space.
independent of any observer). • In our daily lives, everybody is
This equation implies that a tiny synchronized to one clock. But out
amount of mass could be in space, with celestial objects
converted to a large amount of moving at noticeable fractions of
energy → nuclear energy the speed of light, relative to each
other, every object keeps its own
time.
HENRI
BERGSON
Theories of “real time” = time as
time experienced rather than
“manufactured time” = Clock- measured – which he terms
time or calendar-time is durée or “duration” = the time of
arbitrary/artificially constructed; individual consciousness,
it is standardized and inner/subjective time.
measurable/countable
- psychological, internal,
- external, objective, subjective, time of active living
chronological, historical time
The rational mind can only comprehend
time by organizing it into measurable,
standardized units that is spatializing the
‘real’ time of duration into ‘clock-time’. In
other words, time exists only as duration
whereas the clock or the calendar are only
convenient means for human beings to
refer to it (it was designed for practical
purposes).
Theories of memory
‘habit’ or ‘automatic’ (mechanical, ‘pure’ or ‘spontaneous’ memory =
parrot-fashion) memory (in which contemplation, it is does not
the mind repeats consciously to appear in our consciousness in
itself a scene, an event); it is a real life, it is revealed only in
voluntary mechanism of retrieval of dreams; as it is unconscious →
memorized information (learning by one can reach it through intuition
rote, by heart); it is non-reflective not through reason. This type of
→ it is purely mechanical, a mere memory produces independent
reflex recollections
CONCLUSIONS
• The theories of Sigmund Freud, which radically altered the popular
understanding of the mind and identity with the emphasis on
subconscious motivations, were influential to Modernist writers.
• So was the revolutionary aspect of Einstein’s thought. First of all,
Einstein's work influenced much of European art of the post-World War I
years: Cubist painting introduced a shifting, or relative point of view, in
which a single object is seen from several sides at once. Secondly, in
literature, events are described from multiple relative perspectives which
seem to unfold in a subjective, personal time.
• Bergson’s view of time changed the way many Modernists represented
time in fiction. His theories also influenced the view of ‘reality’ as
personal and flexible not objective and stable and the conviction that
individual experience is understood by intuition and personal reflection
rather than rational analysis.

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MODERNISM IN

“The traumatic neurosis demonstrates very clearly that a fixation to the

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