The question 'What is modernism?' has provoked intense critical discussion. A Route to Modernism explores this area; it focuses on the strange and dangerous journey taken by Hardy, Lawrence and Woolf towards unknown regions of the mind and the universe. In a discussion of these novelists, both individually and in relation to one another, a radical reconsideration of modernism is developed. Woolf envisaged her contemporaries 'flashing past on another railway line'. A Route to Modernism shows the hypothetical train of Hardy, Lawrence and Woolf not following an existing track but tunnelling beneath surfaces, following routes which are 'spasmodic, fragmentary', sometimes taking off like a rocket into the cosmos. Their fragmented, modernist works deny us 'the comfort of ... a single meaning, either in works of art or in the world'. This book offers new approaches to modernism, while insisting on books being left 'open - no conclusion come to '.

Ezra Pound referred to 1922 as Year One of a new era. It was the year that began with the publication of James Joyce's Ulysses and ended with the publication of T. S. Eliot's The Waste Land, two works that were arguably "the sun and moon" of modernist literature, some would say of modernity itself. In Constellation of Genius, Kevin Jackson puts the titanic achievements of Joyce and Eliot in the context of the world in which their works first appeared. As Jackson writes in his introduction, "On all sides, and in every field, there was a frenzy of innovation." It is in 1922 that Hitchcock directs his first feature; Kandinsky and Klee join the Bauhaus; the first AM radio station is launched; Walt Disney releases his first animated shorts; and Louis Armstrong takes a train from New Orleans to Chicago, heralding the age of modern jazz. On other fronts, Einstein wins the Nobel Prize in Physics, insulin is introduced to treat diabetes, and the tomb of Tutankhamun is discovered. As Jackson writes, the sky was "blazing with a ‘constellation of genius' of a kind that had never been known before, and has never since been rivaled." Constellation of Genius traces an unforgettable journey through the diaries of the actors, anthropologists, artists, dancers, designers, filmmakers, philosophers, playwrights, politicians, and scientists whose lives and works—over the course of twelve months—brought a seismic shift in the way we think, splitting the cultural world in two. Was this a matter of inevitability or of coincidence? That is for the reader of this romp, this hugely entertaining chronicle, to decide.

An engagement with the continued importance of modernism is vital for building a nuanced account of the development of the novel after 1945. Bringing together internationally distinguished scholars of twentieth- and twenty-first-century literature, these essays reveal how the most innovative writers working today draw on the legacies of modernist literature. Dynamics of influence and adaptation are traced in dialogues between authors from across the twentieth century: Lawrence and A. S. Byatt, Woolf and J. M. Coetzee, Forster and Zadie Smith. The book sets out new critical and disciplinary foundations for rethinking the very terms we use to map the novel's progression and renewal, enhancing our understanding not only of what modernism was but also what it might still become. With its global reach, The Legacies of Modernism will appeal to scholars working not only in the new modernist studies, but also in postcolonial studies and comparative literature.

The quality of today's literary writing arouses the strongest opinions. For novelist and critic Gabriel Josipovici, the contemporary novel in English is profoundly disappointing--a poor relation of its groundbreaking Modernist forebears. This agile and passionate book asks why. Modernism, Josipovici suggests, is only superficially a reaction to industrialization of a revolution in diction and form; essentially, it is art arriving at a consciousness of its own limits and responsibilities. And its origins are to be sought not in 1850 or even 1800, but in the early 1500s, with the crisis of society and perception that also led to the rise of Protestantism. With sophistication and persuasiveness, Josipovici charts some of Modernism's key stages, from Dürer, Rabelais, and Cervantes to the present, bringing together a rich array of artists, musicians, and writers both familiar and unexpected--including Beckett, Borges, Friedrich, Cézanne, Stevens, Robbe-Grillet, Beethoven, and Wordsworth. He concludes with a stinging attack on the current literary scene in Britain and America, which raises questions not only about national taste, but about contemporary culture itself. Gabriel Josipovici has spent a lifetime writing and writing about other writers. This book is a strident call to arms and a tour de force of literary, artistic, and philosophical explication that will stimulate anyone interested in art in the twentieth century and today.

Modernism in music still arouses passions and is riven by controversies. Taking root in the early decades of the twentieth century, it achieved ideological dominance for almost three decades following the Second World War, before becoming the object of widespread critique in the last two decades of the century, both from critics and composers of a postmodern persuasion and from prominent scholars associated with the ‘new musicology’. Yet these critiques have failed to dampen its ongoing resilience. The picture of modernism has considerably broadened and diversified, and has remained a pivotal focus of debate well into the twenty-first century. This Research Companion does not seek to limit what musical modernism might be. At the same time, it resists any dilution of the term that would see its indiscriminate application to practically any and all music of a certain period. In addition to addressing issues already well established in modernist studies such as aesthetics, history, institutions, place, diaspora, cosmopolitanism, production and performance, communication technologies and the interface with postmodernism, this volume also explores topics that are less established; among them: modernism and affect, modernism and comedy, modernism versus the ‘contemporary’, and the crucial distinction between modernism in popular culture and a ‘popular modernism’, a modernism of the people. In doing so, this text seeks to define modernism in music by probing its margins as much as by restating its supposed essence.

This volume combines a clear overview for those with no prior knowledge or experience of modernism with a subtle argument that will appeal to higher level undergraduates and scholars.

The first detailed, student-focused introduction to modernist avant-garde performanceThis textbook introduces the reader to modernist avant-garde theatre. It clearly explains the key terms as well as the major movements, including Expressionism, Dadaism, Futurism, Workers theatres, Constructivism and the Living Newspaper, and Mass Performance, using a case study approach. It introduces the important innovations of the modernist avant-garde, reassesses theatrical techniques, and provides examples of plays and performances from across Europe and America. There are also chapters on The Modernist Body and on Interdisciplinary Performance. The book approaches the modernist avant-garde both as an area of academic study and as potential raw material for contemporary performance. Key Features:nbsp;The first introductory guide to the modernist theatrical avant-garde nbsp;Includes case studies, practical exercises at the end of each chapter, an annotated bibliography and a glossary of performance termsnbsp;Includes links to performance-based explorations of theatrical techniquesnbsp;Provides a springboard for further independent study, both theoretical and practicalClaire Warden is Senior Lecturer in Drama at the University of Lincoln. Her research focuses primarily on constructing new, fluid narratives for modernist performance. She is the author of British Avant-Garde Theatre (Palgrave MacMillan 2012), and multiple journal articles and book chapters on modernism, interdisciplinarity, theatre, art and cultural studies.