20th Century: Modernism

How are we to react to this changing world of the 20th century? With the many social, scientific, and philosophical upheavals, many people viewed the world as being divested of meaning, purpose, and significance. If everything we do is completely and utterly insignificant, how can we attach meaning and purpose to our actions? T.S. Eliot perceived the modern world to be a shattered, fragmented version of the medieval world, where order and balance were achieved through religion, social structure, and faith in god and human significance. He believed the medieval world to be the high point of civilization, and our contemporary world has seen a breakdown of these ideal structures, resulting in a wasteland filled with anxiety and boredom. With an expanding universe and a fading, almost obsolete notion of god, humans felt a growing unease and sense of forlornness, or hopelessness in the face of our insignificance as transient beings in an infinite universe. The old microcosm of safety that was the medieval world is shattered and we are left to pick up the pieces and re-create our modern world; but on what are we to base this modern world? T.S. Eliot says we are "Hollow Men" who live in a "wasteland." Are we living in a delusion? Many writers and thinkers felt a growing sense of disillusionment, as if they were seeing the world for the first time. What they saw was a wasteland of illusion, forlornness, and obsolescent beliefs.