Chronology of World, British and American Literature
Eugene O’Neill. American. 1924. Play. All God’s Chilun Got Wings. White woman marries black struggling to become a lawyer. Tragic results of her mental inferiority.
PC Wren. British. 1924. Novel. Beau Geste. Life in the French Foreign Legion.
Margaret Kennedy. British. 1924. Novel. The Constant Nymph. Sanger’s large family “circus.” 15-year-old nymph has to deal with the adult problems of love and fidelity.
Eugene O’Neill. American. 1924. Play. Desire Under the Elms. Based on the Phaedra-Hippolytus story. Father’s young wife seduces his youngest son.
Chronology of World, British and American Literature
George Bernard Shaw. British. 1923. Play. Saint Joan. Presents Joan as an early nationalist; prototype of the Protestant thinker who puts conscience before the judgment of the Church.
Rainer Maria Rilke. German. 1923. Poetry. The Sonnets to Orpheus. Sonnets center around the myth of Orpheus: man must be fluid to exist in a changing world. Death is one metamorphosis among many.
Wallace Stevens. American. 1923. Poetry. “Sunday Morning.” Narrator debates with woman who feels the need for some imperishable bliss. Death is the mother of beauty; earth is all the paradise we will know.
Chronology of World, British and American Literature
Willa Cather. American. 1923. Novel. A Lost Lady. Frontier woman moves from her husband to a lover, then disappears; rumored to be the wife of a wealthy Englishman in South America. She is seen through the eyes of an adoring young boy.
Wallace Stevens. American. 1923. Poetry. “Le Monocle de Mon Oncle.” Affirmation of the imagination of middle age vs. the invalid fancy of youth.
Wallace Stevens. American. 1923. Poetry. “Peter Quince at the Clavier.” Recalls part of the biblical story of Susanna and the Elders: “beauty is momentary in the mind, but in the flesh it is immortal.”
Kahlil Gibran. Syrian. 1923. Prose and Poetry. The Prophet. Presents the elements of Gibran’s mystical faith.
Chronology of World, British and American Literature
Robert Frost. American. 1923. Poetry. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” Stops horse to contemplate beauty of the scene, but then must move on. Frost has said he could have added forty pages of footnotes.
Aldous Huxley. British. 1923. Novel. Antic Hay. Long, futile conversations of London intellectuals; everything seems valueless. Despair.
Rainer Maria Rilke. German. 1923. Poetry. Duino Elegies. Personal solutions to existential problems and to those posed by the industrial age.
Edna St. Vincent Millay. American. 1923. Poetry. The Harp-Weaver and Other Poems.39 sonnets. “Euclid alone has looked on Beauty Bare.”
DH Lawrence. British. 1923. Novel. Kangaroo. Vivid account of Australia. Husband keeps trying to assert his will over his wife, unsuccessfully.
Chronology of World, British and American Literature.
James Joyce. Irish. 1922. Novel. Ulysses. Greatest 20th century novel written in English. Obscurity. TS Eliot: A landmark because it destroys our civilization. Disillusioned study of estrangement, paralysis and disintegration of society. Records events of one average day, June 16, 1904, in the lives of the three leading characters. Journeys about the city of Dublin, matched by inward journeys into the consciousness. Dispassionate description of details of daily life; details become symbols. Relates time in world of Dublin to timeless myth, history, religion. Plan of book parallels Odyssey; echoes episodes in the Odyssey. Central theme is exile; cannot find key to loneliness and frustration. Molly Bloom: embodiment of feminine regenerative principle of the universe. Her soliloquy in one uninterrupted long sentence ends with “yes.” Joyce perfected interior monologue; parodies variety of literary styles.
TS Eliot. American/British. 1922. Poetry. The Wasteland. Breaks from conventional modes of poetic expression in its condensed use of language. Wealth of literary and historical references; lack of narrative sequence. Violent literary controversy on publication. Explores different psychic stages of soul in despair, struggling for redemption. Wasteland = central image of spiritual drought; contrasts with sources of regeneration. Doubt is not resolved; literary, religious fragments offer hope of rebirth, however, in foreign languages, suggesting unassimilated memories. In medieval legend, wasteland ruled by Fisher King, sterile by curse. Cured by purifying ordeals undertake by a knight. Important event in development of modern English poetry. Like Joyce’s Ulysses. Contrast spiritual stagnation with myths from the past. Both use city as major symbol of paralysis. Full of scenes, phrases, references with little meaning in themselves, but echo, explain one another. Both depend on readers’ knowledge of many works of literature, religions and history.
Chronology of World, British and American Literature
Willa Cather. American. 1922. Novel. One of Ours. Boy grows up on farm, goes to university, enters army, killed in France in WWI.
Carl Sandburg. American. 1922. Children’s Stories. Rootabaga Stories. Rich in language and cadences of folk song.
Hermann Hesse. German. 1922. Novel. Siddhartha. Search for ultimate reality through profligacy and asceticism. Wisdom cannot be taught; must come from one’s own inner struggle. Parallels to Buddha’s life, but not a fictionalized life of Buddha.
DH Lawrence. British. 1922. Story. “Things.” Cynical account of two American idealists who devote their lives to art, beauty, Buddhism and European culture. Succeed only in collecting “things.”
Roger Martin du Gard. French. 1922/40. Novels. Les Thibaults. Brothers react as individuals to bourgeois environment. One leads simple, dutiful existence. The other rebels. Both killed in WWI.
Chronology of World, British and American Literature.
Edith Sitwell. British. 1922. Poetry. Façade. Sound and imagery rather than meaning.
Katherine Mansfield. New Zealand. 1922. Story. “The Garden Party.” Preparing for a party; wealthy Laura encounters reality in the death of a poor laborer.
Eugene O’Neill. American. 1922. Play. The Hairy Ape. Crude stoker disillusioned with his life when inspected by a society girl in the depths of the ship.
Virginia Woolf. British. 1922. Novel. Jacob’s Room. Life and death of a promising young man from childhood through death in war. Describes his empty room.
David Garnett. British. 1922. Novel. Lady into Fox. Fantasy about man whose wife suddenly turns into a fox.
