1. Disillusion, Defiance, and Discontent

2. Snapshot of the Period
The America that entered the 20th century was a nation achieving dominance while silmuntaneously losing innocence. Two World Wars, a decade of prosperity, and a Depression marked this era. These upheavals ushered a period of literary boldness and lasting achievement. During this time the movie industry became a commercial powerhouse.

3. Historical Background
The Great War
The Roaring Twenties
The Great Depression
The New Deal
World War II

4. The Modern Age (1914-1945) Cities Towns and Farms
What American places affected American life in the first half of the 20th century?
What non-American places affected American life in the first half of the 20th century?
Cities
Towns and Farms
Battlefields and Boulevards

5. How Did These Places Show Up in the Work of Modern American Writers?
Paris and Modernism
Urban Waste Lands
The Harlem Renaissance
Towns, Farms, and Plains

6. What Values, Attitudes, and Ideas Grew From These Events?
The Modern Age ( )
What Major Social and Political Events affected American Writers in the First Half of the 20th Century?
What Values, Attitudes, and Ideas Grew From These Events?
World War I
The Depression and the New Deal
World War I, the Atomic Bomb, the Holocaust
Disillusion with Old Ideas and Ideals
Wider Cultural Awareness
Greater Democratization
Fragmentation of Experience

7. How Were the New Forces Expressed in Literature?
Out with the Old
A Global Vision
More Writers
Literature in Pieces
Rise of Popular Culture

8. What Changes in Literary Elements Contributed to American Modernism?
Narrative Conventions
Forms
Themes
Tone
Style
Imagery
Allusion

9. How Did the Relationship Between Writers and the Public Change During the Modernist Period?
Modernism began an overall distancing of serious writers from the general reading public. With the mass communication and pop culture, Modernist works were seen as obscure or elitist. More imaginative effort was required to read, so as a result some of the literary audience was turned away! Modernist writers became teachers. People learned to read the new works and appreciate the new images.

10. By 1945, What Identities has emerged in American Literature?
Denizen of the Waste Land
Member of the Lost Generation
Triumphant Commoner
Poetic Maker
African American Artist