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Dissecting the Modern Age

Eric Turner

The British Literature Since 1800 experience continued on April 3, 2012 with the introduction of yet another marvelous reward quiz. After the cheers and applause subsided and the quiz ended Dr. Foss explained how the final chapter of BLSEH was going to feel. The twentieth century and beyond would be a faster, looser, freer experience compared to the Victorian section; no more going over those same tired old themes over and over. No, the twentieth century and beyond would be a time of cool section headings like “Burying Victoria” and “Beyond the Pale” and relative intellectual independence where you, yes you, will set the agenda for thematic focus. The section covers the greatest works of literature ever written in the English language that are for the most part ambiguous and subtle, making it absolutely necessary to attack the works from every angle conceivable.

The class then split into small groups with reinvigorated passion in order to discuss “Indissoluble Matrimony” by Rebecca West. In my group someone asked if West was racist because of Evadne being exoticized in passages as “the depraved, over-sexed creature, looking milder than a gazelle” (2145). After some discussion, the group came to a consensus that the racism was on the part of George, not the author. After that question, we soon began to examine the comedic value of the story; was it meant to be funny or not? George and Evadne attempt to fulfill their gender roles in a comically overzealous way leading them to the point where one of them must kill the other; they are like caricatures rather than real people. George is consumed with the need to affirm his masculinity. West describes his drive, writing, “Spiritual nausea made him determined to be a better man than her” and after being led to believe that he has murdered his wife, George says to himself, “I must be a very strong man” (2154). Given all of his posturing, the real comedy of the story comes from the fact that George is a spineless and cowardly character, crying in self-pity at every small thing that goes wrong for him. At the end of the story when he realizes that he has failed in killing Evadne, he thinks that “Nothing beautiful had ever happened to him” and there is really no better punch line than that (2157).

Our fruitful small group discussion was then ended and we returned to a large group to share our findings. The class must have been on a similar wavelength because we continued to talk about gender. One student put it succinctly that the gender roles are switched but the duty to follow societal expectations remains. Dr. Foss pointed out that many male modernist writers struggled with the idea of Woman. He then asked the class to think about Matthew Arnold and his writings on detachment and alienation, saying that each of the assigned readings for the day could be examined as stories of alienation, a revelation that brings the comedic value of “Indissoluble Marriage” into question.

With Matthew Arnold now in the minds of every student, they were able to smoothly transition into a discussion on James Joyce’s “The Dead.” The majority of the big group discussion focused on the end of the story, paying attention to Gabriel’s Joycean epiphany. Just learning that his wife had had a lover die for her when she was young, George realizes that “he had never felt like that himself towards any woman but he knew that such a feeling must be love” (2255). For Joyce, it seemed like deep personal connections between people are still possible in the modern age, but it still worried some students that Gabriel was unable to attain such a connection. Dr. Foss then brought up the snow that fell all over Dublin: was it a suffocating snow, making Dublin like Eliot’s Wasteland or was it something else? One student responded that Joyce’s detail that the snow was falling “upon all the living and the dead” represented that Gabriel had come to understand that the dead remain in the same world as the living, that they continued to influence the lives of the living. Another student further fleshed this comment out, explaining how Gabriel has changed in the story. Before he came to his epiphany, George had given a speech about focusing on the future and leaving the past behind but after hearing his wife’s story, he comes to realize that it is impossible to ignore the past.

For the class’s final reading, “The Daughters of the Late Colonel” by Katherine Mansfield the class returned to small group discussion. Still thinking about Matthew Arnold, my group turned to the end of the story where the two sisters found themselves unable to share their thoughts about the emptiness of their lives. After the death of her father, Constantia thinks “it was only when she came out of the tunnel into the moonlight that she really felt herself. What did it mean? What was she always wanting? What did it all lead to?” and it seems like Jospehine struggled with the same questions but in the end, they are both unable to face the questions alone or together (2490-2491). Such a dismal result between two sisters contrasts with the more hopeful response from “The Dead” in regard to Arnold’s question of whether or not connection is possible. The same question from “Indissoluble Marriage” about humor came up and it was decided that, although the characters were somewhat funny because of their odd, sheltered behavior, their inability to connect ultimately makes them tragic. Our small group ended by looking at an illuminating quote found in the biographic outline of Mansfield: “Now we know ourselves for what we are. In a way it’s a tragic knowledge. Its [sic] as though, even while we live again we face death. But through Life: thats [sic] the point” (2478). Not only can this be applied to the sisters in the story, who are on the verge of self-discovery following the death of their father, but to “The Dead” as well where Gabriel is able to understand more about himself through a story of death.

As the class came to a close, it became clear that the literature of the 20th century took a unique stance on the questions raised from the previous era and authors refused to give tidy answers. The structured thematic lenses used to analyze the Victorian age were no longer as useful; however, a free and open dialogue proved suitable to navigate through the subtle layers of ambiguity.

Word Count: 1,098