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    Modern Poetry

    Uploaded by

    Mahmut Kayaalti

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    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
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    Umm-2-Rooman Yaqoob Roll no, 3 BS (English) 6 semester Modern Poetry >» Modern Poetry: Modem poetry's te rabellious attitude that faurished betwaen 1900-1930. This movement allowed poots, thinkers ‘and writers to think for new altemabves: Writers beganto wslte on new concepts. Al the new forms af writing were ‘domolished and new were broughtin the saciely. Modemism isa philosophical movementthat. along with cultural ‘trends and changes, arose trom wide-scale and far-reaching ransformators in Wester socieyin the late 191) and ‘early 20th centuries. Among the factors thal shaped Modemism were ine developmento{modem industial societies ‘andithe rapid growth of cites, followed then by the horror of Werld War |. Modemism also rejected the certainty of Enlightenmentthinking, and manymadernistsrejected religious belief. > Background of Modern Poetry: ‘The athent of writing enabled scfbes and bards from China, Mesopotamia, Persia, India, and Ancient Egypt to write ‘downodes, Vedas, legends, and myths thathad existadin their cultures for thousands ofyears, Pastry itself probably dates back io cavemenand the earliest shamans whachranicled events inpicure-s tories, ‘symbols, songs, and tales to chronicie hunts and features ofthe land an which these paople surdved, Poetry also took nomads intoaliered ar supernatural realms Since hen, people have depicted hor innerandouter worlds =andthe worlds oftheir poers.logends and -ivlizations ~ through hundreds or thousands ofpacticforms, Like other yes of art and music, the evaluton of pootry escalated during ferble creatwotimos andinparicularly pensociovos. Posts mayhave ereated, modined, orused posticforms, bul centuries katerthase same forms provide a snapshotof ‘the civilizations fram which they emerged. The gorgeous Iyricallove poems of Ancient Greace and Rome reflected ‘cultures opento physical andemotionaterpression, ‘So esteemedwas poetry nat three of te clas sicnine Muses inspire specificforms of poetry: Calliope (epic poetry). Erato (love poetry}, and Polythythmia (sacred poetry), In a culture thal routinely mined poetry, music, and the stage, |wo others are close cousins: Eutorpa (musie)and Melpamane (aged). ‘Shakespeare's sennets and plays reflected an Elizabethan era when creat, expression, and experimantaton {ignited Engkandintellectually, “The developmentof modem poatryis generallyseen as having tartedal the beginningofthe 20tcentury and ‘extends into the 21stcentury. Among its majorpractitoners are Robert Frost Wallace Stewns, and Anne Carson. Most of the characteristics that distinguish iftor other forms ofuterance—myhm, rhyme. compression, inlensivot feeling. te use of retrains—appeartohave comeaboutfiom efforts to ft words to musical forms. In the European \radition the earliosts uring pooms, the Homeric and Hesiodic epics, dently hemselves as poomstobe recited or ‘chaniad to a musicalaccompantmentratherthan as pure song. Another interpratabon is that rhythm, retrains..and ‘kennings ave essentallyparatactedevices that onable the reciterla reconstruetine poem fiom mamory. In pretiterate societies. thes. forms ofpoetry were composed for, and sometimes during. performance. There was.a ‘eartain degree of fuldiy to the exact wording of poams. The intreduetion of writing fame the content of a poem to the ‘version that happened fo be writen downand surdve, Written composition meant poets began fo compose foran absent reader. The invention of printing accelerated thes etrends. Poets werenowwrting more forthe eye than for the ear. > Foreground of Modern Poetry: ‘Foregroundingis usedas a major stylistic deviceby many authars whetherthal isin plays, novels, shoststories or {ong poems. One of te mostilus tative (ia litla brash) examples of he usec! foregrounding inthe shortstary gare isin the story The Scarlet Ibis.’ In this story, a siticken bird lands in a tree ina Family's yard while the people are ‘nawng lunch. tis a Notday and graduallythe bird slumps, collapses and falls trough the branches tabye ground ina 'noap, I's ganglytegs and.eddish colorforeshadow the manner in which the litte disabled:son willdie (pemapsof ‘near failure or exhaustion tateron, his legs andhear simitarydopicted. “The term faregrounding is borrowed from artcritcis m. Ast critics usualy distinguish the foreground of apainiing from its background. The foragroundis thatpar of paining whichisinthe canbe and towards the botiom of the canvas {the items which opcurin he foreground of» peinting willusvallyappeartange in elalion tothe restof the objects." Foreground isthe anionym of background. In iterary tet, in orderto highiight something ar to put specialemphasis ‘on Gomathing is te reason afforegrounding. To make a part percepluallyprominan|.and notable thareby, te authors take help of foregrounding. De ations, parallelism, repetition -al these are created to foreground different ‘eortain parts, According to NTC's Dietionaryof Literary Tarms, calling atenbon to somothing {an ides, acharactar, 8 \iewpoint)to make itstandoutfrom ordinary by placing Itto the foregroundis.called foreqrounding.. For example, look at the following excerpt iom e.g. Cummings’ powm: ‘Ply this busyrmanstes, manunkind, Not Progressis a comfortable disease. Here, the poethas created new word “man unkind and gone through neotagism. This worthas been foregrounded ‘because ofthe fact thal itis Cummings’ own invention, This lexical davation has emphasiznd te cruelty oF ruthlessness of modem mankind, and io supportthe theme of the poem, the post has broken the normal paradigm of 2 verse by not capitalizing the frstlaters. Thus, through these deviations. halvas been able to foreground tha feature ‘af modem humans. > Trends of Medern Pastry: Follewingare tha trends presontin the modemist sacietyand.amang the modam writings, ob Death of Truth: “The New Criticism ushered in by Pound and Elio, nding in the admired packyol he pastso much that was ne longer true, deciared that truth was not to be looked fori poatry. Ail thal mattered wore the wards onthe page, and ‘he ingenious $kilwith which tay deployed, The experiance of historians was sat aside, 65 was indeed thatoF ‘readers ofhistorical romances, bath af whom can cemain happily suspendedbetween the pastand present Whatthe [New Crites wanted were the unchanging laws ofsclance, andthay adopled a language oftansions and psychology ‘witoutunderstanding the issuvsinvohed. + Poot as Social Outcast: “The tater nineteentn-century poets contended thaipoety was natlanguage used nits fullestexdent, but an altogether diteron( way of using language. Pooky couldna longerbe writenin high-minded lesion, or perhaps atalt ater he honors ofthe Second World War. Infact itwras the cold efficiency of state organization thet had so vastly inereased, bulpoets did not reashistery, ar perhaps much philotophy, at some hazardous simplifeasons were made Jn identifying mans tue nature with his mostelementary 4 The Decline: Tradition and innovation : (Many have sincarelyfelt that in the twentieth cenluryno greal poetry was written andinone is being witlan naw.As a ‘eric has put it, thera have been manypoetic persons inthetwenteth century, but nopoets. lis saidthatas ‘ivlizalion advances poetry declines. Poetry indeed has dedlined, though itis somewhat debatable ifcivlization has advanced, At the beginning of the new century atleast here was no poeta! anystature. 4 Modern Themes: Mader poetry exercises agreat readam in he choice of thames. Gone are days whenit was believed that the job ‘of he post was only to create “beauly:”T. S, Eliotollers a representative ew: “The essentialadvantage ofa posts. ‘not fo have a beautiful world.withwhichto daat:it isto be abla to see beneath both beauty and ugliness:losee the ‘boredom and trehorror and the glory.” He is free fo white poems on themes ranging rom kings toeabbages and trem ‘the cosmos to apin’s head. + Pessimism: ‘The two wars and impending dangerota thied (and perhaps the last) have casta gloomy shadowon muchotihe posty ofthe twentieth century Well has the modern age beancalled "ha.age of arsiety” In spiteof our material [prosperitywe are full of tensions and anxieties which are almostan inseparable feature of modernlivng.Add to them ‘the disappearance ofreligious faith. T, S, Eliotwas quite religious buthis atttude towarae ife-as we findiljn such poems a5 The Waste Landand 7he Hot/owen.is far from optimistic. To quote a few lines trom the latter We are the hollowmen We aro the stuffed men Leaning together ‘Headpiaca filed with straw. Alas! Oursiried voiews whan We whisper together Are quietand meaningless As wind in dy grass. ‘The pessimism of wentith-conturypoets is-not of the nature-of the somewhatstyisedmetanchoWof Shelleyor what David Daiches des cibes as “the Tennysonian ategiac modewith is lingering anjoyment of elf-pity.” His more intollectuatand moreim personal. ‘+ Romantic Tendency: ‘Such prosaiesocial concem is basicallyinimical to allramantictendency mast modem poats, as wehave said earl -scom allromanticism-«ven the ubduad kind ofromanticismasin Tennyson, Hume. majorinfluence on’Eliotand ‘others, asserted in his es say"Romaniicism and Classicsrm’ inthe few Age:"lobject'o the sloppinesswhieh doesn't ‘considerthata poem isa poem unless lis moaning or whining abovtsomething ar othe + Nature: Another ‘ramantictendency to be found in some madern poets is interest in nature, Nature fascinates some poets ‘because she offers such a wonderful contrast with te hubbubandugliness ofanindustrialised and owr= ‘sophisticated age."n the face of modern industrialsm,"says A C. Ward, "they [modem poets solace theirsouls by ‘etring 1 the country and colebrating the beauties of unspoiled Nature.” Such poets as Nasefeld, Robor Bridges, W. E, Davies, and Edmund Blundenmaynotfind any mystic significance in mature buttheyare, allthe same charmed [by hor unsophisticated beauty. Masefield in “Sea-Faver exprosses astiong desire torun away from the dreary ito into “he lonelysea andthe sky” Edmund Blunden points his inger iovinglyat the litbe noticed things ofnatue. Davies pooty has the feature of childtke curiosityin the naturalobjects evenbody finds around himsel 4 Religion and Mysticism: Religion and mysticism isofind aplacain the work of some poets ofthe twentieth century. Coventry Patmoreand Francis Thompson, who wiote raligious pootiytawards the end of tha preceding century, seem tohave inspired a ‘numberofpoets in this century. The nameof Ns. Alice Meynell deserves to be mentioned. Inthe poetryof the Jesuit ‘Gerard Manley Hopkins to0, we have sornathing religious now and then, Ralph Hodgson's The Song of Honouris a ‘notable poem pulsating with religious feelings. Even in the poetry of such posts as Yeats there are mysticalstrains. + Rejection of the Past: ‘No doubtthe new approaches challenged whatpoetryhad once been. but the newpracttioners rewrote his try. Pastry had always been contemporary, trey argued, which now meantbeing direct personal and American, Great poetry had in fact been mare than that, butthe supporters of popular Modeenis m—Nitlam Carlos Willams, the Biack ‘Mountain School, Beat Poets and the San Franeiscans—hod answers ready Poetry mustbe unmediated sincere, andthe techniques ofverse werea handicapta expression. Theyremembered Pound's ‘make itnew",and assertad ‘hata more:demoeraticage musthave a more democratic poeby. Theoretical scaffolding became anezessarypart of ‘contemporary poet, the more sos the foadgates were soan ta be openedin schools and writing classes "hroughoutthe county, 4 Diction and Metre: “This movemianthas also revatubonalised tre conceptof poaticdictian and mete. Traditional pestclicion" ‘saccharine poeticisms. and even reqularmetre have been discarded almost cam pleely.As Nobody and Lovet! paint ‘out, “imagism did modom poatya tremendous sence by pointing iheway to a renovation of the vacabularyaf [poetry and the necessityo! ridding poeticiechnique of vague and emply werbiageand dishonesiand windy ‘gonaralies." Tough rhyme has almostcomplatalygone, yet as Oaiches puts Irhythm freed from the artificial ‘demands of meticalragularityis stil used. A language withthe flaw and turns of common speech is mostly ‘employed, Verse libre (fee verse} is the most usual modeofallsertous poetyat today. in the twentieth century many experiments have been made anthe technique and diction of poetry. Doughty, fr example, as Grierson and ‘Smith put i, "manhandled English. The American poetCummingsrefusedto startevery lineof his poetry with a ‘capitalletar, and s0.0n, Many of such experiments have boon interesting -butintaresting only. s& Concluding Thoughts: ‘Sa.arose the presentscens,a vast medlayof communities, all sharingsome belies and working practices and ‘uniting round common problems, butstil competing forattenton, status and economictivelihood. Perhaps thatis only _natural, and antwropologists often preture communities as successive waves oflnvaders interbreeding with earlier ‘peoples butalso dispersing them iomore dificultterain, where their gene

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