Realism, Naturism and Modernism period is one of the most fascinating elements of African American literature. Many of the writers of this period emphasize the harshness of African American life in their work. These writers are simply unapologetic in the way they view life.
Writers of this period held that these three terms had outstanding differences. “Realism is a window by which to view the lives of ordinary people; naturalism examines the most raw and real variables of a culture while modernism is a contemporary form that allows artists to experiment with new styles” (Hakutani 5). Harlem Renaissance preceded the entry of these writers in literature scene, which happened between 1940 and 1960.
Important writers of this era include Melvin Tolson, Ann Perry, Ralph Ellison, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Richard Wright among others. However, Richard Wright is the most important figure of this period; actually, the other writers were said to have attended “Wright School.”
There are different reasons why these writers were said to have attended “Wright School.” Firstly, Richard Wright came before any other writer of this period; he lived between 1908 and 1960. The other writers emulated Wright and bought his theories. Wright never accepted most of the writings from Harlem Renaissance; therefore, he became a big critic of these writings.
The other writers that came after Wright held his believes and became critics of Harlem Renaissance writings. This is the reason they were said to have attended “Wright School.” Moreover, Wright concerned himself with exposing the challenges that were facing black Americans in urban areas; something that the writers that came after him exposed and analyzed further.
The description given to the writers of this age is accurate. For instance, Ralph Ellison, in his book Invisible Man, talks of challenges that blacks were facing. The only difference between Ralph’s work and that of Wright is that, “Ralph’s characters were articulate, educated, and self-aware” (Hakutani 9).
Change of characters does not change theme; therefore, Ralph emulated Wright. Gwendolyn Brook also touched on the challenges facing blacks through her poems. Her main agenda was to call blacks into social and economic awareness, something that was conspicuously missing during Harlem Renaissance. Maud Martha; one of Brooks’ outstanding poems is about life of a young black woman from her birth to marriage exposing the challenges that she went through.
Other writers like James Baldwin, “Spoke of pain and suffering of black Americans and saving power of brotherhood” (Hakutani 11). Baldwin’s writings were inspired by personal experiences that he went through under a strict father and a discriminating society. Finally, Lorraine Hansberry, “Explored African roots of African-American experiences especially the segregation issue her family dealt with in Chicago” (Hakutani 11).
Taking a close look at the literature works of these writers, it is evident that they were unapologetic about their standpoint. They wanted the world to know the sufferings of blacks in America during those times. However, Wright was the ‘father’ of them all for he was the first to write about blacks and criticize Harlem Renaissance writings.
Therefore, it is appropriate to say that writers of Realism, Naturism, and Modernism period attended “Wright School.” These writers matured under the intimidation of Harlem Renaissance; having been provoked by the same, the entry of realism, naturism, and modernism period offered them an opportunity to express their thoughts and feelings unapologetically and harshly.
Works Cited
Hakutani, Yoshinobu. “Richard Wright: Critical Perspectives Past and Present.” African American Review. Kent University, 1995.
In this chapter, Colin Elman describes six different types of realism, which include classic realism, neorealism, structural realism, and neoclassical realism. The author presents the detailed explanation of differences between the above mentioned and also points out the causes and results of the conflict between the reality and its representation for each type.
Classical realism, which can be viewed as the basis for the development of the rest of the approaches in question, has developed significantly, yet the links between different states of realism remain basically the same. Elman explains that whenever a change in interpretations occurs, it most likely happens in the same way. The specified phenomenon can be explained by the fact that human nature, which makes the core of classical realism, is flawed. One could assume that realists have a rather pessimistic point of view, others would take it as prudential. Although classical realism started in 1939 and is regarded as the original one, adherents of realism believe that realist thinking had existed even before twentieth-century classical realism (the one described in this chapter). Classical realism saw a human desire for power as the seed of corruption that affected lots of states during that time. It put emphasis on any aggressive behavior of leaders and the reason for conflicts to occur due to this. (Elman and Jensen 17).
Neorealism does not share such views on the source and content preferences of states. Kenneth Waltz in his Theory of International Politics did not treat motivation of leader and state characteristics as possible causes for international outcomes, which the article under analysis also points to. He was rather skeptic about whether certain micro foundations could justify the changes in the states. Waltz believed that alterations in the states could be either a product of socialization or competition between them. Alliance of individual states is not the only thing that might influence the outcome of communication. Contrary to classical realists, neorealists do not consider international politics as the one driven by an aggressive behavior, but rather as something tragic.
Defensive realism is rather similar to neorealism in certain aspects. For instance, it shares the idea of the insignificance of motivation for change among states and those seeking security in the anarchic international system. However, defensive realism does not accept the explanation of causes and implications of changes in the states. Instead, it relies more on a rational choice of the existing alternatives. It also adds the offence-defense balance that favors defense more and makes conquest harder. Combined with rationalism, followers of defensive realism believed that this concept would achieve states balance in the use of resources. They suggested that states should not seek for all power, but rather limit their control to some extent.
Naturally, supporters of offensive realism did not agree with that statement. According to them, security can only be achieved by gaining as much power as possible. The reason for this is an uncertain environment, where every state can use its power against each other. As we can see, offensive realists consider power as the means of survival: the more powers states have, the more chances they have to survive in a conflict environment. The international system, which is often supported with the help of offensive realism, is anarchic in nature; it contains the primary cause of great power to trigger wars. The number of great powers and their capabilities are the only things that matter.
The central point of rise and fall realism is evident from the name. This type of realism explains how states move from prosperity to decay and, thus, create conflicts. If benefits of conflict initiation exceed its costs, there is no doubt the conflict will be initiated. Rise and fall realism points out how the difference between power levels leads to a confrontation between states. This type of realism also suggests that major wars are usually initiated by dominant military forces.
Neoclassical realists also agree that material capabilities and distribution of power play a big role in all possible outcomes. They also indicate that states often respond inefficiently to threats from their competitors, which results in imbalance. The reason for this is fragmentation and diversity among state’s elite and societal groups.
Based on the analysis of the philosophies mentioned above, one may assume that this chapter provided us with valuable information about six types of realism. Overall, all of them have differences and things in common. They provide different points of views on certain aspects and, at the same time, share certain core ideas.
References
Elman, Colin, and Michael Jensen. The Realism Reader. New York: Routledge, 2014. Print.
Magical realism is explained as the desire of the author to show the ordinary life of people with the instances of unreal, fantastic events. In most cases the desire to present the magical realism in short stories is explained by the desire to create a fairy tale, however, the reasons are deeper.
Garcia Marquez used magical realism to write fascinating short stories such as “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” and “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World” that captivated his readers and kept them interested up to the end of the stories showing human attitude to those who seem strange or not look like others.
The stories under consideration are absolutely different, however, they show human attitude to absolutely strange people. The “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World” tries to show people how they usually consider others knowing about them nothing. A man is found dead and strange people express a desire to bury the body in accordance with the rules.
Reading the story it becomes obvious that strange people are ready for much when they do not know a person, but they like him/her. The main idea of the story is to show how people who absolutely do not know the body make everything for him just because they feel sympathy to him, just because they like the appearance of the man.
The villages know nothing about him, but his appearance helps them create the whole story of his life, they imagine that he had a wife and many other aspects which make sure that he was a good person. The imaginary realism plays the role of human consciousness and the desire to think about people only positive and good things.
The next story has almost the same meaning, but in this case the judgment of people is shown. In “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” Garcia Marquez discusses human opinion about a person they do not know. The magical realism is aimed at presenting more vivid picture, to express human thoughts more powerful and with specific images.
People always have personal opinion about others, and the author tries to make this opinion better. Reading the story, a strange man appears in different images. Some people believed that he was an angel as he had the wings. Others believed him to be a poor one as he was dirty, etc.
Therefore, it may be seen that different people created their opinion about this person on the basis of the particular images. The transformation of the hero depended on one particular thing either in the cloths or on the face expression of the man.
Therefore, it may be concluded that referring to the magical realism Garcia Marquez tried to show the inner world of human beings their relation to strange people and the aspects which create the opinion of different people. The social public opinion is created on the basis of the points of view people express.
The more similar ideas, like in “The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World” the more guarantee that the society will accept the person on the basis of this opinion. However, the general social opinion may be absent as there is no common opinion about a person, like in the short story “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” Garcia Marquez by.
It is hard for readers to ignore the many peculiarities that are found in Winkfield’s novel including the rare multicultural heroine and the book’s deviation from the antagonist/protagonist approach in literature.
The novel also introduces several facts that are difficult to place in the eighteenth century society including the roles of female missionaries in the spread of Christianity and the heroine who alters the fate of an entire population.
The peculiarity of this eighteenth century novel has invited various scholars to criticize the realism and the relevance of Winkfield’s work in the then society. In addition, scholars have often attempted to map the novel’s social placement in light of its far-fetched realism.
Some of the scholars who have examined Winkfield’s novel have found it to be wildly inaccurate in a manner that diminishes its literary value. There are contentious issues that touch on realism and the unreal aspects of Winkfield’s novel including gender, class, imperial, racial, and national issues.
It is easy to dismiss Winkfield’s work as mere fantasy but the novel highlights credible realism on several instances. Some of the cultural and social fantasies that are outlined in the novel are deliberately crafted to deliver some real aspects of Winkfield’s society.
This paper presents the argument that the presence or lack of realism in Winkfield’s novel is used to shed light on both the real and unreal aspects of its eighteenth century society.
The most striking instance of realism in the novel is the situation surrounding the main character’s activities. In the novel, the main character does not face any insurmountable challenges as is common with other heroes and heroines.
Unca Eliza is stranded on an unknown Island but she does not struggle in any manner to find her way around. In many works of fiction, the labors of the main characters and their self-subsistence are often used to make them real and relatable.
Upon her arrival at the Island, the main character stumbles upon a ‘magical’ manuscript that makes her journey through the strange Island to be quite easy (Winkfield 23).
Eliza is also rewarded with several goodies upon her arrival at the Island. The main character’s smooth sailing makes it hard for self-discovery or self-determination to occur. These contradictions highlight the lack of realism in Winkfield’s novel. Self-discovery journeys are not instantaneous and they often take a toll on the travelers.
Consequently, “The Female American” appears to be exempt from the realism that is associated with authentic literature.
Another instance of misconstrued realism is revealed through the main character’s ability to fit into her newfound society. For instance, although Eliza is the stranger in the Island she is still able to supplement the hermit with survival accessories.
In addition, it appears that Eliza is able to speak different languages but the author does not offer an explanation for this ability. The main character’s multilingual abilities are a contradiction to realism. In the novel, Eliza is able to speak English, Greek, Latin, and other Native-American languages with admirable fluency (Winkfield 32).
Further research into the ‘native’ language that is used by Unca’s mother during her exchange with a Christian convert indicates that this dialect is a mixture of Indian and Greek or Hebrew.
The mixture of languages can be interpreted as lack of realism. However, the various languages could be used by the author to reiterate the hybridity of the main character. The hybridity of the Atlantic front during the eighteenth century was real and the author might have used the main character’s fantasy to highlight this fact.
On the other hand, it can be argued that Winkfield’s story like her made up language are components of unintentionally crafted fiction. Consequently, the heroine would bear no significance in relation to the eighteenth century transatlantic society.
“The Female American” was supposedly written when the first European-American encounters were taking place. Therefore, Eliza’s experiences in England should resonate with those of other American individuals who had ventured into Europe in the eighteenth century (Hunter 102).
This coincidence gives the reader a chance to explore the realism and the unreal aspects of Winkfield’s book.
During the eighteenth century, visiting delegations of Native American tribes would be received with outmost curiosity in England. Consequently, the sightings of the Native Americans and their colorful mode of dressing became artistic inspirations for Londoners.
The main character’s description appears to be in line with the artworks that depicted Native Americans. For instance, the narrator speaks of “her lank blank hair that is adorned in diamonds and flowers, and a bow and arrow that are hung on her shoulder” (Winkfield 49).
It is unlikely that a woman who is stranded in a strange Island would appear as the narrator describes her. It is important to note that the overstatement of the costumes that are adorned by the main character is only supposed to appeal to those who encounter Native American Indians in works of art.
The author’s focus on American iconography can be used to point out both the real and the unreal aspects of “The Female American”. It is also likely that the author of the book had very limited knowledge of the Americas and its inhabitants. Consequently, she has to rely on her artistic knowledge of the Americas when she was writing this book.
The American iconography continues with the resemblances between the Indian-themed monument that Unca designs in honor of her mother and the war themed monument that was installed in London around 1761.
There is enough evidence in the book to indicate that the author of “The Female American” was trying to depict her Americas in a relatable manner. Consequently, it is difficult to argue for or against the realism of Winkfield’s book using these aspects.
On one hand, the portrayal of America in the novel might be meant to satisfy the reader’s fantasies. On the other hand, the portrayal of the Americas by the author could be meant to add realism to the book. The author could also be mocking the travel-genre by trivializing the appearances of America to the people of England.
There are several aspects of the novel that articulate its realism or lack thereof but its portrayal of the Americas within England is not one of them.
One of the most obvious fantasies in Winkfield’s book involves the scenes that depict a ‘magical’ oracle. Unca Eliza, who is a Christian convert, uses a pagan oracle to impress the native Indian communities (Winkfield 79). In addition, Unca uses the oracle to prophesy about the introduction of Christianity in her community.
This scenario does not bear any similarities to any other recorded missionary accounts. It is hard to decipher what the author was trying to accomplish with this unreal incident.
Some scholars argue that the author was trying to indicate that the spiritual nature of the Indian tribes was not being taken away from them but it was just evolving into a new form. A further examination of the literature of the time indicates that oracles were not accepted in Christian circles.
For instance, one eighteenth century author explored the conflict between Christian and oracle-related issues. According to this author, there is no clear-cut difference between Christian miracles and oracle-related practices. The oracle is one of the aspects that indicate that Winkfield’s work was not meant to portray any social reality.
On the other hand, the novelist might have been setting new realism standards by portraying futuristic aspects of Christian missionary work. The popular belief among Christians in the 1700s was that the powers and abilities that were possessed by oracles were evil and diabolical in nature.
Consequently, the marriage between oracles and Christianity as is portrayed in “The Female America” defies most aspects of realism.
“The Female American” has often been considered as an unpopular but significant work of literature. The author of this book goes through a lot of trouble to hide the novel’s connection to realism and reality. The main character’s overcomes hurdles easily and integrates into her new society in record time.
This lack of realism is common in the book but there are other incidences that contradict this ‘unreal’ aspect of the book. “The Female American” is a quagmire of realism and ‘unrealness’ that is well disguised by the author.
Works Cited
Hunter, Paul. Before Novels: The Cultural Contexts of Eighteenth-Century English Fiction, New York: WW Norton & Company, 1990. Print.
Winkfield, Unca Eliza. The Female American: Or, The Adventures of Unca Eliza Winkfield, New York: Broadview Press, 2014. Print.
Define Realism and its characteristics as a literary movement
Realism refers to the recreation of life in the literature that took place during the historic eighteenth and nineteenth-century periods. This faithful representation of reality aided in developing the English novel and other literary conventions.
Emphasizing everyday life
Realist writers believe that books should center on everyday experiences that depict workers as real people. These writers inject life into the scenes, objects, and characters, to allow readers experience the reality of the texts. In the text, “Madame Bovary,” Gustave Flaubert depicts the daily tasks of the actors and their social obligations (Flaubert 23). In the text, the main character worries about shopping and household expenses. On the other hand, “Wide Sargasso Sea” explores the daily life of Bertha throughout her marriage, promiscuous behavior, and death (Rhys 8).
Easy to understand texts
Another characteristic of realism is the belief that texts should be simple for the common person to understand. This translates to making the book available not only to the educated aristocrats but to all. As I read the texts, the regular language used in the two texts is evidence that the writers sought to make their texts easy to understand for both the middle-class Americans and the aristocrats.
Absolute objectivity
This characteristic makes a single character the center of interest in a text. The two texts under study cover the development of persons who are struggling with social barriers. In Madame Bovary, Gustave Flaubert (41) centers around the life of Emma, whose marriage fails to meet her idealized expectations and later embarks on an adulterous affair. On the other hand, Wide Sargasso Sea focuses on the life of Bertha Mason, a madwoman who is locked in an attic (Rhys 26). The two characters Bertha and Emma are at the center of the two texts.
The struggle to overcome societal barriers
Another aspect of realism is the autonomy of characters who demand to be accorded their inalienable rights. In both Wide Sargasso Sea and Madame Bovary, the authors represent gender and sexuality through their texts. In Wide Sargasso Sea, the author tries to fortify the madwoman in Jane Eyre by giving her a voice, despite her silent nature as a character (Rhys 26). On the other hand, Madame Bovary constructs class, sexuality, and social morality (Flaubert 43). Together, these two texts contest the paradigms of gender and sexuality by explaining how society hears and silences the voices of women.
Define the Gothic and examine its influence on Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea
Gothic refers to a literal genre-mixing fiction, horror, and romanticism. In Wide Sargasso Sea, the atmosphere of mystery and suspense brings the gothic nature of the text to life. In the text, the Victorian empire gothic focuses on the romance between Jane, a governess, and Edward Rochester, an aristocrat (Rhys 29). Bertha Rochester, the first wife of the aristocrat is the central gothic element for her role as a madwoman. Jean Rhys gives Bertha a life and an identity that enables her to narrate her upbringing in West Indies (Rhys 29). It also goes on to tell the reader the story about her marriage to young Rochester that leads to her incarceration in the attic.
The gothic in this story represents a “backward birth,” given that the text itself is a backward creation. For Antoinette, England represents the gothic element as Jena Rhys assaults her counter-invasion with her backward rebirth (Rhys 29). The text begins from Jane Eyre but is centered on events taking place before the novel is written. Jean Rhys’ uses gothic to confuse a reader who is interested in finding the preceding text intentionally. The author also enacts a gothic reversal through the display of regression from sanity to madness and chaos. She moves from freedom to a locked room in an English manor house. The author tries to challenge the institutional stereotypes, which are present in many cultures.
“The War Prayer” is a poem by Mark Twain that can be considered a short story in prose. First of all, the poem talks about the patriotic spirit and ensuring the well-being of the country. By participating in battles, a person strives to make their life more comfortable. The poem is an example of realism, as it reveals the truth of war, describes events on the battlefields and indicates the consequences of armed conflicts.
Mark Twain denounces the hypocrisy with which the church advocates wars. The author puts his own thoughts into the work regarding the intolerance of the Christian religion. At the same time, “The War Prayer” cannot be considered a strictly pacifist work because the main argument does not concern anti-war rhetoric. The main argument of this story is against the ignorance and hypocrisy of the church, which supports the harmful effects of the war.
The technique of realism was chosen by Mark Twain because it allows the author to write an incriminating work, shocking readers and thereby causing a greater emotional response. Realism helps truthfully present information about events without hiding details, being the cruel truth. The whole poem is an example of realism since the author uses a minimum amount of allegory, presenting information in an understandable and truthful manner.
Mark Twain gives truthful information about the war by discussing what is happening on the battlefield, which is often avoided by other authors. “…visions of the stern advance, the gathering momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender!” – this is how Twain describes the battle (Twain line 7). Twain refers to his own experience and vision in order to give the audience the most accurate idea.
The work immediately gives readers an idea of all the details of what is happening on the battlefields. The image of the war and its consequences in Twain is rather collective and not related to a specific event. The prayer is ignored by the parishioners since its second part talks about the hardships of the living witnesses of military conflicts. Bringing readers into contact with reality through detailed description, Mark Twain is an example of a realistic writer using this technique to captivate and persuade an audience.
Work Cited
Twain, Mark. (1905). The War Prayer. The American Yawp Reader. Web.
In the years after the civil war, Americans experienced remarkable changes in their daily lives. Realism and Naturalism, as artistic styles, found their logical outgrowth in American literature after the Civil War. Realism is the first artistic device that came out first chronologically and it attempts to narrate a story without adding emotions to color the topic. Therefore, realism relies on a truthful piece of literature (Perkins 23). On the other hand, naturalism depends on realism, but they have a slight distinction, as realism does not focus on individuality. Realism and naturalism movements in American literature got representation by individual authors like Walt Whitman.
Naturalism sought to expand and became more explanatory by providing underlying causes of human beliefs and actions. It also provided a dimension that predetermined fate that caused the will of man to be ultimately powerless (Perkins 25). After the civil war, there were unique concerns in American history, such as, class divisions and other social concerns that strongly influenced American literature. Hence, realism and naturalism took their places as important American literary movements after the civil war. The fact is that there is no literature that exists independently of social, economic, as well as, historical variables. Thus, it is crucial to understand the works of writers like Whitman and Dickinson on how social and historical experiences occurred. These attributes influenced their works. In the earlier decades, realism was not the dominant literary style in the US but became more influential and important to a famous novelist in the US. This literary style presents earth in its real form. Realism refers to truthful or realistic literature by providing a plain and sensible account material it describes. Realists did their works with details obtained from everyday experiences of life and facts. These are facts about nature, history, or geographical places.
The description of the ‘everyday world is an important element in realistic work. Realists often speak about plain and normal daily materials using trials of everyday plain travails of a normal daily life. In realist literature, a reader might be left concluding that a character describes a real folk doing a daily chore. On the other hand, realists often write specifically about places they experienced. For instance, the calamus, which celebrated a love of man for man to be the heart of democracy originated like a free-verse sonnet derived from an original manuscript ‘I Saw in Louisiana a Live-Oak Growing’ which was the key poem, having a sequence containing narratives of human relationships. However, homoeroticism indicates a man’s feeling of loneliness, as well as, alienation in society.
Realist writers, such as Mark Twain, who was very famous for realist works in American literature, wrote about people, places, and other materials in their real existence or ‘everyday life’. They used American dialects when setting their literary pieces in places. American realists had excellent ears when making their characters portray sounds like real Americans (Killingsworth 18). Through the representation of different American dialects, realists genuinely assisted in creating a real American body of literature referring to a set of literature that is distinguishable from literature from other regions such as Europe after the Civil War. Consequently, realism celebrates individuals since they mostly deal with central characters obliged to deal with some moral struggle in order to realize something or achieve victory. Realist writers put their characters to experience some normal ‘everyday world (Killingsworth 17). This combines with some interesting external experiences that are not happening. However, most realist writers develop an interest in an individual through the love of the notion that man must learn and grow through the experiences of the changes in his life. Realism literature is always plot-driven. Thus, realism revolves around an occurrence of a conflict, which the audience wants to get resolved. In Realism literature, a writer must use at least a protagonist and an antagonist that will be showing opposing forces within an episode. This makes the audience be anxious to experience the sequence of events that prevail. Realism possesses these attributes which prevail in all standard works of literature, but its significance in realism is that it leads to a more fragmented or conscious style.
Naturalism also remained famous in American literature after the Civil War. This is an outgrowth of the realism style in American literature. Naturalism relates to realism in the sense that it represents an accurate version of reality in everyday life. Naturalism has facts, as well as, details of everyday experiences of the world and how ordinary human beings experience it. Furthermore, there is a similarity with the real American dialect spoken by the characters. In his work, Whitman wrote about the American people, geography, and landscape in a free verse form (Donna 43). On the other hand, Dickinson used tones and poetic styles that were much more measured and compact. Their works evolved in a unique American manner that uniquely portrayed the ‘everyday’ American life. However, naturalist writers show no interest in individuality. They do not believe that individuals have a place to make changes in the everyday life in the world. Hence, any moral struggle by their protagonists does not add up to any little change in the setting of the literary works.
According to naturalist writers, the central belief focuses on the dependence of man to be at the mercy of certain mightier forces in control over nature. Some of these forces include the need for basic needs and social dominance. In a broader perspective, these external forces may include both physical and natural surroundings. The whole point of naturalism is its inevitability. Naturalist writers tend to be more political, for instance, they tend to describe the plight of the working class in society. Hence, they expose the cruelty of a larger external force, such as describing a sense that money could be used to crush the plight of the poor in society. To some extent, this notion is true; hence, the readers should not ignore it. Consequently, realism requires that readers should view a bigger picture than an individual’s political movements that may be crucial to counter the exploitation of the working poor by the capitalists. Therefore, naturalism deals mostly with the extraordinary subject matter in the quest to describe how external forces control and manipulate individuals’ lives. Thus, naturalism supports the notion that free will is capable enough to enact real change in life situations (Donna 56).
In conclusion, American writers sought to have their own voice after the civil war; hence, realism took the first stage then followed suit by naturalism. Realism expounded the virtues of the common person who differed from the capitalist economy. However, most experts in literature argued that naturalism was a pessimistic view of realist, but an independent style of literary writing (Killingsworth 21).
Works cited
Donna, M. Campbell. Realism in American Literature, 1860-1890. Literary Movements. Washington State University. 2010. Print.
Donna, M. Campbell. Some information adapted from Resisting Regionalism: Gender and Naturalism in American Fiction, 1885-1915. Athens: Ohio University Press, 2009. Print.
Killingsworth, M. Jimmie. The Growth of Leaves of Grass: The Organic Tradition in Whitman Studies. Columbia, S.C.: Camden House, 2007.
Perkins, Charlotte. American Literature from the Civil War to Present. McGraw hill. 2011. Print.
The story of Gabriel Garcia Marquez “A very old man with enormous wings” tells of an angel who falls from the sky at the yard of a poor family’s house. The author uses the genre of magic realism, which unites reality with fiction, to create the situations, in which the faults of society are revealed. Marquez introduces the symbol of an angel to show the ugly sights of society – people in the ordinary village where the angel lands do not understand, mistreat and misuse him. Eventually, they feel relieved as the angel flies away. Through the tool of introducing a fantastic storyline in the plot, the author raises the questions of morality, humanity, and religion in ordinary society.
The Use of the Genre of Magic Realism
The author uses the genre of magic realism – a style that uses a realistic approach to describing events with the introduction of some magic elements. The technique is probably used to generate unusual extraterrestrial circumstances in which the characters of the story have to reveal their real faces. With the appearance of a fantastic creature, the inhabitants of the village do not understand what it is. Similarly, miracles come to people’s lives, under the guise of gray everyday life and in an inhospitable attire, one just needs to be able to realize what they are. After all, this magical creature can perform miracles, but people do not need them.
The family near the house where the angel lands consist of ordinary village people, who are not brave enough to make up their mind. They need the opinion and support of a neighbor “who knew everything” (Marquez 1) to be able to identify the creature and to decide what to do with it. They are kind people, but they cannot realize that the miracle happens in the house immediately, as their child who was ill recovers right after the angel’s arrival.
Even though they provide shelter for the angel, they do not protect him from others, who burn his skin and throw stones at him. Eventually, the family has become rich by selling the tickets to those who want to see the angel. Nonetheless, nowhere in the story do they show respect and gratitude to the creature that indirectly helps the family to improve its life. Thus, the magic line of the story shows the problems of humanity in the village where the angel falls.
The angel is described as a strange creature – on the one hand, looks like an ugly old man in a dirty robe, but on the other hand, it has enormous wings, like those of an angel. “He was dressed like a ragpicker… His huge Buzzard wings, dirty and half-packed were forever entangled in mud” (Marquez 1). Marquez’s angel is a toothless old man with frayed wings, which does not resemble the pictures of Raphael, Botticelli, or Da Vinci.
Perhaps the author wanted to depict him as an angel who flies to the world of cruel people, mirroring the qualities of society where the creature lands. This reflection shows the soul of people the way it really is – bare, dirty, and defenseless. Thus, the symbol of an angel reveals the problems of morality and humanity in society.
The events in the story are interwoven with the topic of the role of religion in society. The local priest does not believe that the alien is a true angel, as he does not speak Latin, the language of God, “…his first suspicion of an imposter when he saw he did not understand the language of God or know how to greet His ministers” (Marquez 2). In the story, the church is shown as the body that cannot take decisions, recognize miracles, and where the local priests depend on the conclusion of the Pope in Rome, which never arrives. Thus, in times when a crucial decision must be taken, the church is incapable of making decisions or providing justice.
Despite the miracles that truly happened, society does not even believe in the magical nature of the angel. Not trying to understand, they consider him a stupid creature. “…The blind man who didn’t recover his sight but grew three new teeth, or the paralytic who didn’t get to walk but almost won the lottery, and the leper whose sores sprouted sunflowers” (Marquez 3). These miracles were interpreted as “mocking fun”, and the popularity of the angel falls as a new creature arrives at the village – a girl who turned into a spider for not obeying the will of her parents. Hence, people only believe in what they want, limiting their faith to an invented framework.
Conclusion
The story of Marquez “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” is a very deep philosophical work that makes its reader think about who we are, our soul, humanism, and the desire to be better. Along with cynicism, our world has a place for miracles and mysteries. While reading this story, the ordinariness and cruelty of the human world are felt in a brutal manner. Through the elements of fiction, the author shows the inability of people to stop and to introspect their lives.
The author reveals a human’s desire to look at life events without analyzing and seeing their essence. In this story, everything is as real as it is irrational – the angel is both an ugly old human, and a divine creature that performs miracles. Society shows both compassion to the fallen angel and indifference to his destiny. The genre of magic realism has created a ground where the qualities of the main characters and of the whole society are exposed.
American realism remains an elusive field, and Eric Sunquist asserts, “No genre is more difficult to define than realism, and this is particularly true of American realism.” But certainly, this should not discourage scholars from beginning the process.
Rebecca Harding Davis was a strong-willed, highly intelligent young woman who emerged at the age of thirty-two as an excitingly new and innovative writer. She was born in Washington, Pennsylvania, a small community located twenty-five miles south of Pittsburgh. From the late 1860s, until her demise in 1910, Rebecca Harding Davis was one of the finest and well-known writers in America. She broke into the issue as a youthful woman in the 1860s with “Life in the Iron Mills,” which established her as one of the founders of American Realism. In this enlightening thesis of significant work, I seek to present a skillful investigation of Davis’s literary style and of the aesthetic, philosophical, and political assumptions that fashioned it.
‘Life in the Iron Mills’
Historical, Philosophical and Cultural Forces
The extraordinary intensity and uniqueness of vision in this short story, has earned it a position as one of the revolutionary documents in American Literature’s evolution from Romanticism to Realism. Two factors in Davis’s personal life eternally altered her vision of what the purpose and structure of literature should be. The first factor: being brought up in a rapidly emerging mill town, and the second, Davis’s experiencing at first hand the horrific realities of war.
From these experiences, Davis produced her distinctive literature of the middle to late-nineteenth century. Davis’s letters to her family and friends remained an important avenue for political discussions throughout her life and sometimes even acting as an impetus for her articles and short stories. It was during their apprenticeship years that she gained first-hand knowledge of the national and local particulars of political life and consequently began to recognize her own era as one of incredible growth and equally rampant fiction. It is out of this knowledge that she shaped her literary theory of the “commonplace.”
Treated as a novella in the genre of local regionalism, Life in the Iron Mills begins with an epigraph from Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s popular poem “In Memoriam A. H. H.” 1850),
Is this the end?
O Life, as futile, then as frail!
What hope of answer or redress?
The basic story of “Life in the Iron Mills” is set thirty years in history thus permitting Davis to demystify the historical myths of that era so as to write what she believed was the crucial history: “the story of today.” Davis’s research has centered on “Life” as a milestone in American literary history. Gerald Langford classifies the novella as “one of the revolutionary documents in American writing” and Tillie Olsen admits that the “commonplace” Davis chose as her topic “was nowhere in books” at that time. Jay martin categorizes Davis as “one of the earliest and best of the American realists.”
The three-level narrative structure of “Life” is a re-creation of the hierarchical social stratum of the mid-nineteenth century in America. The “upper” tier is the narrator’s middle-class world and her examinations structure the inner stories. Critics often believe that the voices of Davis and her narrator are exchangeable. The narrator is an essential initial channel, whose language and social status are known and comfortable to Davis’s reading community. The middle stratum is Deborah’s arena and belongs to both worlds. She inhabits the lowest economic stratum but has not yet been entirely dehumanized.
She has no last name. Finally at the heart of the narrative is Hugh Wolfe’s account, one of the most basic renderings of naturalism in American literature. Every stage of the narrative structure tackles the concern of language as an instrument of authority and each challenge submissive, conventional Christianity as a solution to the nation’s tribulations.
The narrator initiates with a conversational “exchange” with the reader that instantly addresses the truth of a mill town. The narrator asks, “Do you know what that is in a town of iron works?” the sky is “muddy, flat, immovable. The air is thick, clammy with the breath of crowded human beings. It stifles me.” Davis reveals how an economic structure terminates human potential and identifies voracious industrialization that distorts nature and defeats the human spirit.
Davis’s insertion of immigrants in her portrayal of the mill town, especially Irish immigrants is a significant aspect of her realism. Between 1815 and 1865, roughly five million immigrants had entered the United States. Two million of these immigrants were Irish comprising the biggest nationality.
Rebecca Harding Davis’ existence in Iron Mills observes the artist’s social and spiritual position in a distorted marketplace. The marketplace bleeds into Davis’ life and controls her voice. Theodore Parker exemplifies the marketplace of 1842 as having “a basis of selfishness; a society wherein there is a preference of the mighty, and a postponement of the righteous, where power is worshipped and justice little honored” (407). Since then, until 1861, when Davis’ text surfaced, conditions grew worse. The site is devoid of the carnival signs of the conventional folk market. A certain tradition of ethics is missing, therefore the distortion. Underneath a lens of historical alteration, the continuation of an industrialized structure did nothing to arrest the suffering in America.
Social and Political factors
As a sensitive analyst of the sociopolitical apprehension that had been emergent in the nation since the 1830s, Davis comprehends that progressively stratifying class divisions were discouraging the actual conception of democracy in American life. By highlighting the working class citizens and daily events, Davis desired to expose industrial capitalism’s deformation of human lives as well as its destruction of nature. America was to Davis’s mind, “a tragedy more real … than any other in life.” For intentions, unknown Davis selects a Welshman as our central character. She communicates the racial diversity casually, as a “crowd of drunken Irishmen” (11), a tall mulatto woman near the end, and the different physicality of the Welsh. “They are a trifle more filthy; their muscles are not so brawny; they stoop more” (15). The variety adds a dimension to the marketplace.
The ruling body and American capital interests which often seem identical factions do not need artisans from their functioning class. Art, in many cases similar to the newly arrived employees, was traded in from Europe, merely produced by the upper class or not appreciated. Davis makes use of the mystery of an artist’s spiritual state as a cry “to live the life God meant him to live” (45) in this relatively fresh cultural setting. This cry is similar to the workers’ cry for social mobility, explicating “the reality of soul starvation” in “a world went wrong” (23, 30).
The Christian Allusion
The most important significant mission of this story has been to solve what “scholars have generally found… difficult to reconcile” (Hughes 114) – the political significance in addition to the Christian allusion. The tale is based on the allegory of Lazarus found in the Gospel according to Luke, chapter 16 (Hughes 116). The allegory is a story of Inversion in which a prosperous man and Lazarus die at the same instance, the rich to hell pleading for pardon while Lazarus is next to Abraham, which acts “to arouse shock and response from her [Davis’] readers” (117). This dissertation emphasizes the key argument that indistinct spirituality and political restoration, are not functioning to supersede one another. On the contrary, they merge successfully.
Davis labors “on the principle that social wrongs can be corrected by the men causing them” (Parker 407). She incorporates “patient Christ-love” as one of the possessions “needed to make helpful and hopeful this impure body and soul” (63), implying Deb’s curing from the trial. Obviously, for Davis, chaste Christian spirituality is a prerequisite for social development. Given the Puritanical paradigm of America regarding religion, at the heart of divine madness, is a different spiritual sense essential for Davis’ political change. It is “the madness that underlies all revolution, all progress, and all fall” (Davis 46).
These themes co-exist parallel to each other. They adjoin sociopolitical entailments and an arguably spiritual festive ideal inside our chief character, a Welshman with the name Hugh Wolfe. Wolfe becomes detached from Christianity and embraces a different religious form. The emptiness of festive themes in his life makes him hungry, only to be converted very late by the Quaker’s Christian solace – that of the natural surroundings and God’s “promise of the dawn” (65) – not a carnival form and possibly an extension of the tainted marketplace philosophy, even though not the perverted marketplace way of life.
Wolfe is an unskilled manual worker and sculptor of the iron mill’s byproduct korl and is at fault because he is born underprivileged, weak, dissimilar from the others, and an artist, defined here merely as one who creates art. He has a somewhat cultured and genderless look, “the taint of school-learning on him” and his “meek woman’s face”, respectively (10,11). “In the mill, he was known as one of the girl-men: ‘Molly Wolfe’ was his sobriquet” (24).
Absence of Feminism?
The men have a dominant position in Wolfe’s consciousness and are preoccupied with wealth, becoming influenced by the philosophy of the marketplace. Mitchell, the chief avatar of Wolfe, “a Man all-knowing, all-seeing, crowned by Nature, reigning”, perhaps most represents the perverted marketplace philosophy (40). He ends the communication abruptly and with a cold conclusion. Mitchell uses the philosophy of psychological self-indulgence.
Psychological hedonism elucidates all actions and emotions as essentially self-centered. For example, a saint is not motivated by selflessness. They are motivated by how their actions will make them understanding sensitively, the achievement of a place in Heaven. It is the converse of Christianity, debasing the very act of self-sacrifice with the blow of self-interest. Mitchell’s mirth is from a platform of contempt where pragmatism is unconcealed by religious conviction and possibly most significantly for Hugh Wolfe; it is a terminal feature of the marketplace.
Possibly, here Davis presents her solution when according to Mitchell the natural order has set the classes apart and the cycles of history bring them together every now and then.
Humor the central theme
Humor is the central theme. God is humorless in the Puritan paradigm. Ideally, it is not humor like Mitchell or Wolfe’s, hidden and personal. Traditional carnival humor is a humor of the people, for all people. It is the laughter of the marketplace, closer to the tall mulatto woman Wolfe spies from his cell. The reader is asked to create an environment where laughter can regain its healing power. Deb, the Quaker, as well as the narrator, do not laugh for adult laughter in the perverted marketplace takes the form of Mitchell’s educated pedestal. It is the distorted laugh of a desperate and suicidal Wolfe.
Irony and Symbolism
In “Life” the naturalistic symbol is iron. Pfizer continues, “A major characteristic of each of these symbols is that it functions ironically within the structure of the novel.” Fro Davis, the ironic symbol is iron itself. Hugh has completely assimilated the values of the iron mill owners; he carries those values with him throughout the core narrative and literally employs iron to hone the piece of tin with which he kills himself.
The Final Question (Or Answer?)
Hidden behind a curtain is the Karl woman statue, now in the possession of the narrator. Her arm reaches out beseechingly and her pale lips appear to question, “Is this the end?” (p. 64). The Karl woman’s question, (“What shall we do to be saved?”) is drawn from scripture, which leads us to the final inclusive theme of Davis’s realism. maybe this question is answered when the narrator becomes aware of a cool gray light pointing to the Far East, the East serves as a symbol for Christ, where “God has set the promise of the Dawn” (p. 65).
The narrator reveals another art object in her room, “a little broken figure of an angel pointing upward from the mantel-shelf; but even its wings are covered with smoke, clotted and black” (p. 12). Hence, although the angel has not attained victory over desolation, maybe the Karl woman, representative of working-class souls, will be rewarded salvation. The korl woman’s “wild gesture of warning” (p. 31) could moreover forecast a potential revolution by the working classes, as signified by Hugh’s statement that “the money was his by rights, and that all the world had gone wrong” (p. 51).
References
Davis, Rebecca Harding. Life in the Iron Mills and Other Stories. New York: The Feminist Press. 1985.
Harris, Sharon M. Rebecca Harding Davis and American Literary Realism.> Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. 1991.
Hughes, Sheila Hassell. “Between Bodies of Knowledge there is a Great Gulf Fixed: A Liberationist Reading of Class and Gender in Life in the Iron Mills.” American Quarterly. 49.1. (1997): 113-135.
Morrison, Lucy. “The Search for the Artist in Man and Fulfillment in Life – Rebecca Harding Davis’s Life in the Iron Mills.” Studies in Short Fiction. 33.2. (1996): 245-253.
Parker, Theodore. “The Perishing Classes in Boston.” The American Mind. New York: American Book Company. 1963. 407.
Rose, Jane Atteridge. Rebecca Harding Davis. New York: Twayne Publishers. 1993.
Published in 1997, Tropic of Orange is the third novel of a renowned, highly acclaimed modern American writer Karen Tei Yamashita. The book embodies the reflection of modern society comprising Yamashita’s original views on technological progress and ethical and moral degradation of the society, highlighting controversial issues of ethnicity, multiculturalism, globalization, problems of homeless and mentally ill, the grave influence of popular culture and social conflicts in Los Angeles. Coupled with the stylistic influence of Magical Realism and Hyperreality, the novel is a profound work that deals with the most crucial problems of today’s society.
Moreover, the story not only provides an interesting, entertaining, and absorbing plot but is intended to send an explicit message that could be easily read between the lines. Tropic of Orange uses the stylistic peculiarities of Magical Realism to enhance the author’s message of the destructive influence of progress and globalization over immigration, racial and social issues, a multi-lingual and multi-ethnic society.
As it has already been mentioned, Tropic of Orange comprises various techniques inherent in Magical Realism, a literary genre characterized by a clash of two conflicting opposites. Thus, the novel may be examined from two levels: the first one dealing with seven ordinary people’s stories that take place in real LA and on Mexican borders. The second level of the novel directly pertains to the notion of Magical Realism, dealing with the surrealistic world of the tropic of cancer with an orange in the center that heading northwards drags the borders of the tropic with it. As a result, geography and space cease to follow conventional laws of physics or common sense and are subject to the artificial magical reality.
The extension of borders of the tropic, the contraposition between the life in LA and the life in Mexico, the change of events is a typical technique of Magical Realism, namely, hybridity that implies extensive use of the images of borders and change. Moreover, according to the laws of this genre, magical elements are perceived as the elements of reality and don’t stand apart from it, mixed with the realistic events they serve the purpose to enhance the author’s initial message to the reader.
Thus, orange can hold borders of the tropic and be carried by an old man who extends the borders till the borderline. Archangel is immortal and when he does such extraordinary things as pulling the bus on his own through the border, it doesn’t surprise anyone. In this case, the real border and the unreal superpowers blend, which is typical of Magical Realism. In addition, Yamashita manages to keep the narration alive and not conventional though following her style. The author intricately intertwines two cultures, American and Mexican, raising the problems of ethnicity and multiculturalism.
Another episode, when poisoned oranges kill innocent people and hold them in awe, causing a massive accident on the road leaving people stuck in their cars only proves this novel to be surrealistic. The absence of clear opinions about the authenticity and credibility of events allows the existence of magical realism in the text. Thus, the characters take everything for granted and questions nothing because otherwise, it would destroy the fragile world of magic.
Moreover, nonlinear time, the shifts in geographical borders serve to support the idea of the destructive tendency of current progress and globalization that should be improved to maintain intercontinental relations, to facilitate the process of implementing human rights: “…progress and other things in which they foolishly believed…” (Yamashita 56).
What’s more, Yamashita keeps an ironic distance from the surrealistic world in the text though having no doubts about the credibility of this world. In addition, the motif of apocalypse, irony, and paradox that the novel abounds in are typical features of the genre in question.
All things considered, the novel is an example of the implementation of the principles of Magical Realism that focuses on such issues as multiculturalism, ethnicity, social deprivation, migration, globalization and the problems connected with them.
Works Cited
Yamashita, Karen Tei. Tropic of Orange. US: Coffee House Press, 1997.