Monday, May 12, 2008

1916. Literature.

Literature
"Birches." Robert Frost. American. 1916. Poem. Trees bent to ground by ice storms. Imagines bent by boy swinging. Longs to swing again.

The Brook Kerith. George Moore. Irish. 1916. Novel. Alternative view of Christ's fate. Lives by the Brook Kerith. Renounces his earlier message as blasphemous.

From Morn Till Midnight. Georg Kaiser. German. 1916. Play. Embezzles money to escape his circumscribed existence. Disappointment. Betrayed. Suicide.

Lustra. Ezra Pound. American. 1916. Poetry. Title, from Latin, refers to offerings made by Roman censors "for the sins of the people."

The Man Against the Sky. Edwin Arlington Robinson. American. 1916. Poetry. Man symbolized as lonely figure against sunset, i.e., death. WWI and world of science.

A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. James Joyce. Irish. 1916. Novel. Growing self-awareness as artist leads to rejection of world in which he was brought up. Severs family ties, nationalism and Catholic religion. Not straight narrative. Revolves around experiences crucial to Stephen's development as artist. First version, written in 1904, more conventional in form.

Seventeen. Booth Tarkington. American. 1916. Novel. Adolescent in the throes of his first love affair: Billy, Lola and Flopit.

The Underdogs (Los de abajo). Mariano Azuela. Mexican. 1916. Novel. Mexican Revolution. Blind, futile struggle by nameless masses who took up arms for a cause they did not understand. Swept along by turbulence; continued fighting because they did not know how to stop.

You Know Me Al: A Busher's Letters. Ring Lardner. American. 1916. Stories. Letters from half-literate baseball rookie. Captures vernacular speech, tone, outlook. Combination of humor and misanthropy.

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