James
T. Farrell:
The
novels of Farrell give the sense that
they are the product of depression,
frustration and despair. Subject of
his novels are catholic working class
and lower middle class of Chicago that
existed before World War II. He shows
complexities of the time through the
complex aspect of the character. His
characters are frustrated and unhappy
since they are trapped in difficult
situation and frustration. War basically
creates depression, sense of helplessness,
frustration, despair, economic crisis
and sometimes leads to the state of
suicide. Farrell shows the painful condition
of catholic working class and lower
middle class which was the exact picture
of contemporary American especially
1930s scenario of depression. Farrell
developed the stories in series because
he was so careful about detailed description
where his characters grew gradually.
This is the reason he used the trilogy
or tetra-logy format in his works. Farwell
used the language of working class people
hence his characters are also uneducated
people. The language used by Farwell
was male language working class language
and language of sports. He delivered
language in clipped, direct, bleak style
that made his style similar to that
of Hemingway. It is to be noted that
Passos wrote about war whereas Farrell
wrote about the psychological aspect
of war.
His novels are:
Study Lonigan: A Trilogy
(1935), Young Lonigan: A Boy hood in
Chicago Street (1932)
The young manhood of studs Lonigan (1934),
Judgment Day (1935)
Beat
Poets :In the later half of
the 1950s a group of poets like
Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, Jack Kerovac,
Gregory Corso etc formed a
group of young rebels called Beat poet
and thus, young rebels developed the
Beat Generation. The Beat Generation
is a group of writers centered in San
Francisco and New York City in the later
half of the 1950s. The poet of this
generation called themselves beat because
they felt themselves to be very much
beaten. Read
More...
The
Black Art Movement :This
is a new movement which came to be institutionalized
in the sixties and seventies. It was
a radical separatist ethnicism proposing
to disengage itself not only from the
larger world of American literature
but also from the western (white) tradition.
Read
More...
Black
Drama:
After the end of Second World War the
Negro writer did not paid so much attention
to fiction as much they motivated to
poetry and Drama. Drama became the easiest
form to reflect the pain and suffering.
Read
More...
Broadway
Theaters: Broadway theaters
are highly commercialized and established
theatres, especially situated on Manhattam.
There theatres are especially situated
in Manhattam. There theatres are musical
as well as they were powerful sources
of entertainment on 1920s and 1930s.
Read
More...
Off
Broadway: Off Broadway came
on 1940s as a reaction against costly
and commercialized Broadway theatres.
This theater has stage on center and
audience could watch the performance
from all corners. During the 1940s,
there was the heyday of this theatre;
it was highly popular during that time.
But till 1960s there remained no fundamental
differences between Broadway and off
Broadway, it became more commercialized
as Broadway. Read
More...
Confessional
Poetry: The second generation
poets born from 1920 to 1935 were under
the influence of New critical mode,
but they were less burdened by the legacies
of the great modernists. So some poets
of this generation stuck to the New
critical mode, but some poets developed
a new style in poetry called confessional
mode. Read
More...
Harlem
Renaissance:
Harlem Renaissance is a cultural moment
of Afro- American people during 1920s.
It was concentrated on New York City’s
Harlem so it is called Harlem. It is
also called as New Negro Renaissance,
New Negro movement. It affected different
fields like art, literature, politics
etc. Read
More...
Arthur
Miller: Miller belongs to the
second half of the twentieth century.
Miller was leftist and being leftist
he starts his dramatic career with the
propaganda plays. In his propaganda
plays he explicitly overthrows capitalism
and advocates for the establishment
of socialism. Miller is influenced by
Marxism. His propaganda plays are not
published until the publication of
Death of a Salesman in
1949. In his later plays after propaganda
plays he implicitly advocate Marxism.
Read
More...
Eugene
O’ Neill: Eugene O’
Neill, an American dramatist, who is
internationally reputed in the field
of drama, also got the noble prize in
1936. He was influenced by Henric
Ibsen, August Strindberg and
Maurice Maeterlinck.
He is remembered for realist, naturalist
and expressionist drama. Moreover the
credit goes to Eugene O’Neill
for his realist and naturalistic play.
Before O’Neill in American theater,
there were melodrama which were sentimental
and having the sense of excitement.
Read
More...
Tennesse
Williams:
If
Eugene O’ Neill, Susan Gospel,
Thornton Wilder Clifford Odets dominated
the first half of the twentieth century.
Arthur Miller, Edward Albee, Lawrance
Hensbery, Sam Shepard, David Moment
dominated the second half of the twentieth
century, but Tennessee Williams is very
much important between this two ages
.
Tennesse
Williams was brought up in the South,
we can clearly see element of the southern
literary tradition in his work. The
elements like complicated
feelings about time and the past. The
past is usually looked up on with sadness,
guilt or fear. He describes his society
as a kind of hell of brutality and race
hatred. Read
More...
|