Transcript Age Of Anxiety

Age of Anxiety
1920s to 1950s
Post WWI
Music
“Unentrinnbar” from Four Pieces for Mixed
Choir
by Viennese composer Arnold Shoenberg
Characteristics of Music included:
1. abandon traditional harmony and tonality
2. 12 tone music common in 1920’s
3. uses abstract or mathematical tone row
4. no patterns detected by average person but
can be heard by trained person
Reasons for Anxiety
Brutality of WWI
Impersonal attitude of warfare
Industrialization created impersonal
atmosphere
Pessimism for the future
Lack of belief in reason, progress and
rights of individuals
Writers of the Times
Frenchman- Paul Valery; poet
German- Friedrich Nietzsche; philosopher
Frenchman- Henri Bergson; philosopher
Frenchman-Georges Sorel; socialist
Frenchman- Jean-Paul Sartre; philosopher
Frenchman- Albert Camus; philosopher
Paul Valery
Poet
“Crisis of the Mind”
“Almost all the affairs of men remain in a
terrible state”
Reflects the uncertainty of the political,
economic, and social scenes post WWI
Friedrich Nietzsche
Philosopher turned insane
Claimed Christianity embodied
“slave morality” to glorify
weakness, envy and mediocrity
“God is Dead!”(death of God leaves
people disoriented)
Friedrich Nietzsche
Superman” can free himself from humdrum thinking of the masses (Germans
liked this part)
Questioned all values; saw morality –
reason, democracy, progress and
respectability as worn out and
suffocating self-realization and
excellence
Henri Bergson
Dissatisfaction with established ideas
Immediate experience and intuition as
important as science for understanding
reality
Philosophy sought to combine mystical
experience with enlightenment
rationalism in explanation of the
world(reality)
Georges Sorel
Tried to give socialism a mystical (religious)
aura rather than a rational scientific truth
Rejected democracy(rule by the masses)
Believed in the success of the worker’s
revolution BUT…
Believed that the masses of a new socialist
society would need the leadership of a small
revolutionary elite(Lenin felt the same way)
EXISTENTIALISM
This is the true voice of anxiety!!
Most were atheist(how can one believe in a God that
allowed the carnage of WWI to occur?)
Search for values in a world of terror
Recognize that people, in order to define their
existence, must make choices to ACT(unless they
kill themselves then they have no choices)
Choices define existence
Jean-Paul Sartre
Human beings simply exist; “they appear on the
scene” /attempt to define their purpose
With no God to help, honest people experience
despair
“Man is condemned to be free”(compare to
Rousseau)
Believe one gives meaning to life through actions
If one acts courageously and consistent, one can
overcome life’s absurdities
Albert Camus
Defined existentialism for the masses
Defined existence by choosing to fight Hitler in
WWII
Became a freedom fighter in the French
resistance/chose not to accept tyranny
Nobel prize for Literature 1957 (The Plague1947)
Argued that people hold on to life with no
meaning– therefore “absurd”.
Scientists of the Time
Freud- the unconscious
Einstein- relativity; fluidity of time
Rutherford- split the atom/precursor to the
atomic bomb
Planck- quantum physics
Curies- radiation
Attitude of Literature early 20th
Century
General climate of pessimism, relativeness
and alienation
Writers adopt a limited often confusing
viewpoint of the individual
Focus on the complexity and irrationality of
human mind where memories and desires
are forever scrambled
Authors/Literature
Virginia Woolfe: literary group the
Bloomsbury; dealt with women’s issues;
Jacob’s Room
William Faulkner-The Sound and the Fury
James Joyce- Ulysses
T.S. Elliot- The Wasteland
George Orwell- 1984
Kafka-The Trial and The Castle
Architecture= functionalism
Functionalism- buildings must be useful; serve the
purpose for which they were built
Bauhaus- German school combined art as well as
architecture; attracted talent worldwide
Chicago House- Louis H Sullivan; created
skyscrapers to sustain urban growth
Frank Lloyd Wright- most famous functionalist ;
Falling Waters (in western PA)
Bauhaus-Dessau, Germany
Frank Lloyd Wrightfunctionalism/Falling Waters
Art
Most was a reaction to the French Impressionists of
the mid-1800’s such as Monet and Renoir.
New style emerged as post-impressionism or
expressionism
Portray unseen worlds of inner emotion (influence
of Freud)
Create an image that needs interpretation—not the
normal image/look beyond the obvious
Art- Fin de Siecle
The Fauves-the wild beasts- group of
painters led by Matisse –painting so extreme
given nickname
Cubism- Picasso; complex geometric shapes
Dadaism- means hobbyhorse in French;
attacks conventional techniques-delights in
outrageous
Surrealism-painted fantastic world of wild
dreams
Vincent Van Gogh-Potato Eaters
Matisse-Red Room
Gaugin-The vision after the Sermon
Picasso- Les Demoiselles d’Avignon
Picasso- Girl with Mandolin/cubism
Picasso-cubism/Guernica
Duchamps-Nude descending
staircase
Duchamps- Fountain/Dadaism
Dali- Surrealism/Persistance of
Memory
Dali- Soft Construction of Boiled
Beans
Munch- The Scream