Modernism Project

Anderson, George Parker. "modernism." In Anderson, George P., Judith S. Baughman, Matthew J. Bruccoli, and Carl Rollyson, eds.Encyclopedia of American Literature, Revised Edition: Into the Modern: 1896–1945, Volume 3. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= EAmL1234&SingleRecord=True (accessed April 17, 2011).

Faulkner, William. "William Faulkner "A Rose for Emily"" LitWeb. W.W. Norton and Company, 2005. Web. 25 Apr. 2011.
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Gaydosik, Victoria. "modernism." Facts On File Companion to the British Novel: 20th Century, vol. 2. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006.Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= GCBNII371&SingleRecord=True (accessed April 17, 2011).

Howe, Irving. William Faulkner: A Critical Study. (New York: Vintage Books, 1962): p. 265. Quoted as "The Limitations of 'A Rose for Emily'" in Harold Bloom, ed. William Faulkner, Bloom's Major Short Story Writers. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 1998. (Updated 2007.) Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= BMSSWF09&SingleRecord=True (accessed April 25, 2011).

Kurtz, Elizabeth Carney. "Faulkner's 'A Rose for Emily.'" The Explicator 44, no. 2 (Winter 1986): p. 40. Quoted as "'A Rose for Emily'" in Harold Bloom, ed. William Faulkner, Bloom's Major Short Story Writers. Philadelphia: Chelsea House Publishing, 1998. (Updated 2007.) Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= BMSSWF13&SingleRecord=True (accessed April 25, 2011).

Werlock, Abby H. P. "modernism." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= CASS589&SingleRecord=True (accessed April 17, 2011).

"William Faulkner - Biography". Nobelprize.org. 26 Apr 2011 http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/laureates/1949/faulkner-bio.html

John Coltrane's Blue Train

Well when I hear this song the imagery that I being to visualize is that of a band playing the song in a low lit bar. This is all that I can imagine happening during this song. Just kidding. But in all seriousness I do see a lot more to this song. At the beginning of the song I picture a man walking down a street. I would imagine that it is somewhere in the south like in Georgia or Alabama or somewhere like that. He is walking down a very hoppin part of town and there are people all over the place. As he is walking he can hear the jazz music being played at all of the different bars and restaurants. He finds a bar that he wants to go into and he does just that. He sits down at the bar and orders a drink. Then a lovely lady comes over and asks him to dance. He agrees and as the music picks up you can tell that they are on the dance floor. They both are enjoying the dance very much, but another man cuts in and kind of steals her away from him. He returns to the bar and watched the two dancing, never leaving the gaze of the woman that he has just lost. When the music slows down, she comes over to the bar to talk with the man. They begin talking and move over to a booth and order some drinks. As the music speeds up again, this is like their hearts beating because they are kind of nervous around each other. They have really seemed to hit it off and they finish their drinks. As the song ends it goes back to the same very smooth introduction that was used and I picture them walking out of the bar together at dawn towards the sunrise. That is the image that I saw when listening to John Coltrane's Blue Train.

Modernism and Realism

Realism and Modernism are both very important literary genres from our country. There was a lot that happened historically to spark the change to each genre. There are many differences, but also similarities in these two literary genres. A theme relating to the wars of the time is a common characteristic while the actual style in which they are written differ greatly.

Realism was a very different style of literature from its predecessor of Romanticism. For the first time authors were depicting a setting and the story as how it would be in the real world, rather than what they wanted it to be. This was caused by the increase in scientific and rationalist thoughts after the Civil War. The style became less about an artistic style and shifted more to a more simple telling of the story. The middle class hero became the main protagonist for most works of Realism.

Historically there were many events that caused the shift to Modernism. There was the Great Depression, the Roaring Twenties, The Great War, and many other changes in culture. Black culture was also on the rise with new African Amercian artists and musicians surfacing in the popular culture of the nation. This is what is commonly refereed to as the Harlem Renaissance. It was these cultural changes that caused the change to modernist literature from the previous realism.

One major difference in the literary genres is the actual style in which the stories and poems are written in. Oftentimes there is a connection to the characters in a modernist work and the author that wrote it. The writing style is obviously different, because Modernist writers wanted to avoid the simple and rather use very deep words with significant meanings.

One characteristic that the two genres share is the depressing nature of some of the works. This comes from the time period that each genre occurred during. Realism began shortly after the Civil War, and the war was a topic of many works. There was a lot of reflection on what the soldiers went through, and also about the feelings of a country that had been divided. Modernism on the other had began during the Great War. This was a very depressing time, as people had never really seen such a war before. There was a lot of violence and this caused there to be the same depressing theme appear in some works of Modernism. This is not to say that all modernist works were like this because with the great cultural expansion of the country, there were more happy topics to write about.

Both of these genres are similar and different in many ways. What was going on during the time that they started had a drastic impact on the principals of each respective genre. The common factor of a war going on makes some characteristics of the genres very similar, but the writing style still remains very differed from each literary group. These are obviously two of the most important and influential genres in American literature.

Job Shadowing Experience

I did learn a lot from my experience job shadowing at CMT. I wouldn't say that I enjoyed it very much, but still it was a good opportunity. Everyone was talking about basically the same thing over and over again. They might not have known that, but it still got kind of annoying. They were working on a big project of turning a cloverleaf intersection into what is known as a single point intersection. When I saw the plan I thought it was kind of dumb because all of the traffic had to go through one intersection. But hey, what do I know, I'm no engineer, just a concerned motorist. The one really cool thing was that we were able to view pictures of the new Scheel's store. The guy that showed them to us was pretty laid back and seemed to be the coolest of all of the people. We also got to see so pictures and designs of the new waste management center off of Veterans. Lunch was pretty cool because we went to Lime Street Cafe. I have always liked that restaurant so I enjoyed lunch there. It was interesting because the main person we were shadowing said his boss's daughter went to Butler where is where my brother goes. I don't think that I really want to be a civil engineer. I knew this before the shadowing, but still this was kind of a bad day. I'm not saying that I am turned off to engineering as a whole, but there is no way that I ever want to be a civil engineer. The end.