Literature of the Middle Ages. The Anglo-Saxon period Beowulf

Jack London was born in California. The circumstances of his family life did not give him a chance to get a proper education but made him try different jobs: a sailor & quite odd occupations (for example he was involved into the Gold Rush which brought him to Alaska). He was greatly influenced by thesocialist ideas & joined the American socialist party, took part in marches & demonstrations. All these experiences were reflected in his writing which was also influenced by his reading on different, sometimes
contrasting authors - Spenser (a philosopher - positivist), Marx, Engels, Nietzsche, Darwin, etc.
The real fame came to London when he published his collection of stories "'The Son of The Wolf” Actually he wrote an enormous number of short stories. Their value varies - as London had decided to become a rich man one day, he was often like a literary time worker. Nevertheless many of his works are really brilliant; they are examples of real mastery & a combination of realism, romanticism & of course, naturalism. They certainly influenced the next generations of writers. Among London's best & most famous novels & most famous stories of the 1^s' period of his work are the following ones:
"A Daughter of The Snows" (1902);"The Call of the Wind" (1903) - a collection of animal short stories about a dog which becomes a wild wolf; “The White Fang” (1906) a collection of animal short stories;“Children of The Frost” (1902) - a collection of stories.
London’s first works were all based on his dramatic experience of the life in the North. In many of them the writer turns to the theme of nature, human & animal life, and very often the animal world is shown
kinder & fairer than the world of people. Besides their entertaining plot the stories show the great power of
psychological insight & analysis.
London’s social works are also very important & written at the beginning of the 20^th c.:
--- "The People of The Abyss" (1903) - it is a publicist work which gives a picture of the life of the working class people, proletariat, which London knew from his experience as he had spent several months in London & there he witnessed the misery & privations of the people as well as their struggle for belter wages & better conditions;
— "The Iron Heel" (1907) this novel call be considered one of the very first books which touched upon the genre of dislopia in llic 20^th c. & which raised the problem of future possibilily of fascism with its dictatorship of the Iron Heel;
— "Martin Eden" (1909) - it is an autobiographical novel which traces all the life stages & hardships that London himself had overcome; the story deals with the eternal problem of the artist & society. The novel depicts the inner stresses of the American Dream as London experienced them during his meteoric rise from obscure poverty to wealth & fame. Eden, an impoverished but intelligent & hardworking sailor & laborer, is determined to become a writer. Eventually, his writing makes him rich & well-known, but Eden realizes that the woman he loves cares only for his money &fame. His despair over her inability to love causes him to lose faith in human nature. He also suffers from class alienation, for he no longer belongs to the working class, while he rejects the materialistic values of the wealthy whom he worked so hard to join. He sails for the South Pacific & commits suicide by jumping into the sea. Actually in this novel London predicts the end of his own life. He was disillusioned & disappointed with his dreams, ambitions & may have committed suicide – he took an overdose of drugs, though no one can say for sure whether he did it deliberately or by chance.
Like many of the best novels of that time "Martin Eden" is an unsuccessful story. It looks ahead to F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby" in its revelation of despair amid great wealth.
Jack London was often called a "socialist boy" by the press. But by the end of his life he got
disappointed with the socialist idea & abandoned his membership in the socialist parly in 1916. London's
psychological crisis was deepened by his chronic alcoholism & the shock he had experienced after the fire in his mansion house (London had put almost all his money into this house, the dream of which he had
described in his novel "The Little Lady of the Big House". Thus the novels he wrote in his last years show his attempt to find some other ideals & life principles. These works concentrate mostly on family affairs and devoid of any social conflicts: "The Valley of the Moon" (1913) - a novel; "The Scarlet Plague" (1915) - a long short story;"Hearts of Three" (1920) - a novel.
20. Modernism in American literature. W. Faulkner

THE I^st HALF OF THE 20th CENTURY. MODERNISM IN AMERICAN LITERATURE(1914-1940s)

Many historians call the 1920s the roaring 20s or the Jazz Age. On the one hand American people were recovering from the tragedy & trauma of World War I. Those, who had taken part in the war, had come back home crippled either physically or morally or both. They tried to adjust themselves to the post - war mode of life, but often failed to do that as the dramatic war experience had ruined their old set of ideals & values, & made them unable to adopt themselves to the changed conditions. These people as well as the writers who described such people got the name of the “lost generation”.
— Ernest (his real name was Miller) Hemingway (1 899 -1961);
—Francis Scott Fitzgerald (1896 - 1940);
—John Don Passos (1896- 1970) -"Three Soldiers" (1921);
—William Harrison Faulkner (1897 - 1962) - "Soldier's Pay" (1926) - his first novel based on the problem of "the lost generalion", it was not very successful, especially in comparison with the two titans of American "lost generation" writers – Ernest Hemingway & Francis Scott Fitzgerald
On the other hand the 20s with their industrial boost also saw the great upheaval of the moods of the people, their desire to compensate for the austerity & deprivations of the war years. Moreover World War I turned out to be quite profitable for America as it was, the only country which really profited from the war. So the Americans partied, partied & parlied. Besides the 20s can be summed up as the age of prosperity, entertainment (jazz music gets enormous popularity) & fashion.
In the 30s the situation changed drastically because of the Great Depression (not only in America but in the whole world). The living standards dropped very low. There was a rise of proletariat movement in America The 30s are sometimes called the red 30s, as society was oriented on socialist ideas. So the Depression & the natural disasters which aggravated the economic disaster – all this was naturally reflected in literature (especially in realistic literature),
One of the best books on the 30s was John Ernest Steinbeck's (1902 - 1968) novel "The Grapes of Wrath” (1939) a story a family in Oklahoma which is a victim of the natural disasters & the economic crisis. They have to move to California - a sort of "promised land". And the author depicts their sufferings very well. The writers of that day tried to reflect the everyday life of common people, they showed people's search for the "promised land" & showed that there was no surely land. Steinbeck's personages also move from place to place lo find a better life.
Ihe period between the two World Wars also saw the emergence ofmodernism, the trend which broke up with the traditional realistic manner of writing & which ignored the social aspect of literature &
concentrated on the inner world of man.The vision & viewpoint became an essential aspect ol the modernist
novels. Novelists gave up writing a straightforward narration & began to experiment with fictional points of
view, that is - representing the world as it seen from the inside of the characters. Their narration became
fragmentary, incoherent.
The most prominent modernist prosaic writers were Henry James (1843 -1916) & William Faulkner (1897 - 1962), while Thomas Eliot (1888 - 1965) & St Ezra Weston Loomis Pound (1885 - 1972) excelled in modernist poetry