Malcolm X

When discussing African-American literature, poetry, and speeches, it is essential to study the writings and speeches of Malcolm X. He was an outspoken advocate of Black Nationalism and separatism as a meas of building up the self-esteem, confidence, righteousness, and self-respect of black men and women. Malcolm X never advocated violence, nor was he ever involved in any violent movements or protests; he did advocate self-defense as an intelligent and naturally human response to violence and oppression. Over the course of his life, his ideas were constantly changing as he grew as an individual, and he was never afraid of new ideas and new information as he sought to grow spiritually and intellectually. Early in his life he espoused the doctrines of the Nation of Islam, and he believed the Muslim faith was the answer to the problems facing the black community in North America.

Harlem Renaissance

During the same decade T. S Eliot's The Waste Land proclaimed the disintegration of Western culture, setting the despairing tone for modernist literature for the rest of the century, popular culture exploded in Hollywood and in Harlem. Although writers like Eliot viewed the 20th century breakdown of rules and beliefs as detrimental to Western culture, it allowed other forms of art and culture to establish themselves and find a place in the reconstruction of the modern world. Minority artists were able to find their voice and an audience, and they were able to be recognized for their talent and creativity in a modern world that was looking for "new" art. Harlem, the district in northern Manhattan, became a center of learning and expression for blacks following a great migration to the North to escape poverty and oppression in the rural South. Musicians explored new realms in musical experimentation and interpretation in Jazz, and writers and poets experimented with language and imagery to capture the essence of the black experience in America. People soon found in these many black artists and musicians an unexpected source of hope and inspiration in an otherwise desolate and chaotic modern world. The Harlem Renaissance can be likened to a flower that grows out of the 20th century "waste land."

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

J. Alfred Prufrock is a character who is overwhelmed by anxiety, indecisiveness, and fear. He is afraid to confront a woman and declare his love, afraid of rejection. We can argue Eliot uses this "love" situation to illustrate mankind's fear of rejection in its search for a universal and spiritual love. Just like Prufrock, mankind has a fear of rejection, meaningless, and insignificance. It is better to not ask the "overwhelming question" (is there meaning/am i significant) than to ask the question and receive a curt rejection, or even worse, no reply at all, an empty echo in the emptiness of space. As a result of his fear, Prufrock does nothing at all but sit and watch time go by, "measuring (his) life with coffee spoons; he is paralyzed "like a patient etherized upon a table," "formulated, sprawling on a pin...wriggling on the wall." He lives a life of meaningless indecision and triviality rather than boldly search for love and meaning. The poem reflects Eliot's perception of modern civilization as a spiritual void, empty of faith and meaningful love, and paralyzed by anxiety and fear.

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.

20th Century: An Age of Uncertainty and Chaos

In the 20th century, more than in any other period in its history, art has been a mirror of science. A scientific counterrevolution exploded certainties inherited from the 17th and 18th centuries. Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity directly questioned our long standing belief in the certainty and reliability of Time as a constant in the universe, something by which we could measure ourselves and our progress as a species. Henry Bergson proposed the idea of time being completely subjective, or something that is not a series of successive moments but a construct that arises in our own mind and which we project onto events. Charles Darwin's theory of evolution reaches mainstream thinking and gains credibility among scholars and laymen. The increasing discovery of dinosaur fossils fuels the public imagination of a lost past in earth's history, one that was not mentioned in ancient scriptures and historical texts. The discovery of radium and radioactive decay leads to very accurate methods of dating organic material, leading to the accurate discovery of the age of the earth being 4.5 billion years old. Niels Bohr and others explore the world of quantum physics and reveal a world of uncertainty and chaos as it is revealed sub-atomic particles, the building blocks of the universe, behave in inexplicable and chaotic ways. New and increasingly more powerful telescopes allow us to view deeper into the universe, leading scientists to learn more about our infinitesimal position in an infinite and, as Edwin Hubble discovered, an expanding universe. The age of the universe is calculated to be 15 billion years old. Our notion of the earth as existing for 6,000 years is shattered, and people begin to realize the earth has had a very long past, one that excludes humanity and minimizes our significance in the universe. We realize our brief history on the planet is insignificant and we, like many other species before us, are a small link in an infinite chain of events, and we, too, will be a mere historical reference of a long-forgotten past. New ideas had subverted or exploded the certainties of the past, and the universe seems chaotic and bewildering. And, oh yeah, we cannot forget about the unspeakable horrors and destruction of World War I and II.

Realism and Naturalism

In the later half of the 19th century, writers were interested in representing life as it truly is, or as William Dean Howells stated, realism is "nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material." Beginning with the "local color" movement, writers attempted to accurately observe human behavior and experience and portray life in writing; however, local color did not satisfy many emerging writers because of the sentimentality, humor, or moralistic qualities of the local color stories. In other words, local color was not keepin' it real enough for the writers of the Realism movement. Life is not always fair, good things happen to bad people, bad things happen to good people, and not all characters and subject matter are "literary" but that does not mean the writer should neglect or avoid addressing them. Realism sought to represent these aspects of life realistically and without censure. Naturalism grew out of Realism, but naturalist writers believed realistic writers to fall short of the ultimate goal of writing; realism was little more than a call to accurate observation, and it did not penetrate the surface of life- or of human character - to see the principles operating within. Highly influenced by the scientific explorations of the time, naturalist writers approached human character and society in the same spirit of scientific investigation the chemist and physicist bring to their study of the physical world. For these writers, the laws of individual and social development are as fixed as those of science. Determinism governs everything, and free-will is an illusion. The two principle forces in this determinism are heredity and environment. Human fate is controlled by these two forces and humans must exist in a universe that is completely indifferent to struggle and attachment.

Walt Whitman's Rebel "Yawp"

Walt Whitman is the bridge connecting the romantic idealism of the early 19th century and the realism and changed realities of the post-war period. He greatly impacted American literature with the publication of Leaves of Grass in 1855, and he is often referred to as the father of modern poetry. He believed poetry should embrace every aspect of life, and in his poems he wrote without apology on subjects that had previously been excluded as ugly or shameful. He embodied the modern democratic man who would speak of all things without hindrance. His poetry celebrates the "divine condition" of being alive with an intensity that unites all forms of life without discrimination. He was the voice of all people and all things.