What are some major characteristics of the modern age, as constructed in literary modernism?
Literary modernism originated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in answer to the call of Ezra Pound: "Make it new." Modernism rejects Realism, instead examining realms of the consciousness and subjective states in characters.
Writers such as Virginia Woolf and James Joyce exemplify Modernist writers as they employ such techniques as stream-of-consciousness, or internal monologues, in order to allow readers into the characters' subconsciouses. The theories of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung regarding the unconscious mind allowed these writers to explore such things as repressed feelings, subliminal thoughts, complexes, desires and fears. Modernist writers opened up new avenues of literary composition.
In addition to the examination of the unconscious mind, Modernist writers also explored both the positive and negative affects of urban life with its anonymity, industrialization, power, and darkness. Clearly, Modernism...
