Contemporary

American Literature
1950 to Present
 WWII Influence
• Similar to Modernism’s WWI
influence
• WWII advanced technology,
horrific casualties, introduction
of nuclear warfare Marine Corps War
• Human nature questioned – Memorial
Holocaust
• LITERARY FOCUS - Writers
focused on the meaning of
war, the great loss of human
life, and feared what the
future would hold.
Entrance to Auschwitz: the words translate to
“work makes one free.”
 The Cold War
• Atomic Anxiety after bombing
of Hiroshima effectively ended
the war in 1935
• America a new world power;
competitive with communist The Berlin Wall
Soviet Union
• Arms Race to see who could
create the most catastrophic
weaponry
• LITERARY FOCUS – Boom in Nuclear Warhead
science fiction & end-of-the-
world literature
American Soldier Coffins

Monk burns himself in protest

The Vietnam War
– Effort to contain the spread of communism
– U.S. Military became deeply involved in civil
affairs of other countries. (Korea and then
Vietnam)
– Vietnam War lasted more than 20 years and
caused a great deal of conflict stateside.
U.S. death toll was more than 58,000, and
many Americans saw this as an unnecessary
loss.
– LITERARY INFLUENCE: literature
reflects the conflicts of the time. People
were scared, disillusioned, and wanted to
understand the actions of the government.
 The Civil Rights Movement
– rooted in protests and legal actions of
the 1950s
– Brown vs. Board of Education 1954
case struck down school segregations
as unconstitutional
– Protests, marches, voter registration
drives, sit-ins became increasingly
evident
– Martin Luther King gave his “I Have a
Dream Speech.”
– Many protests were met with mob
violence and brutality
– Civil Rights Act 1964, outlawed
segregation in public places
Civil Rights Continued
– LITERARY INFLUENCE: People needed to
change laws and the minds of the general public
– Building upon the work of early abolitionist
writings and the later Harlem Renaissance,
contemporary writers began to question race
relations and civil injustice.
– For the first time, African American writers
began receiving awards. (Pulitzer Prize for
Gwendolyn Brooks and the National Book Award
for Ralph Ellison
– Rise of the autobiography and life stories. (i.e.
The Autobiography of Malcolm X)
– The Beat Poetry generation was born –
“spontaneous prose”
The American Dream
– Modernists of the previous era became
disillusioned with the American Dream
(Remember OMAM?)
– The dream became simpler than what it
used to be. It became the idea of
owning a home or property.
– There was a shift to suburbia
– As the economy boomed, it gave rise to
materialism (cars, TVs, etc)
– LITERARY INFLUENCE: writers began
to protest the shallowness of America
and those that conformed to the norm.
This is where the idea of a “beatnik” was
born
Modern Drama & Theatre
– Post WWII, there was a
great deal of theater
writing that would serve
to revive its popularity
– Arthur Miller and
Tennessee Williams served
as models of the liberated
playwright with
provocative themes
The Rise of Culture Driven Literature
• Widespread appreciation of cultural
literature
• Native America, Asian, Latin and
African American literature
increasingly popular
• Authors born outside the U.S. became
popular with Americans
• Literary Focus: Where older texts
were focused on experiences of
discrimination, contemporary authors
focus on positive and negative
experience, colorful culture and
individuality.
 Responses to War
– “War, with all its moral complexities and attendant brutality, has had a strong
influence on writers throughout the 20th and 21st century .
– Unimaginable casualties, the genocide of the Holocaust, nuclear weapons and anxiety
– Many still wrote with Modernist style: detailed, realistic and somewhat detached—
like an outsider giving accounts of the war
– Straight nonfiction became a powerful account of the war
– Growth of journalism
– Steinbeck works as a war correspondent
– Many wrote of their own experiences. (i.e. Elie Wiesel wrote about the horrors of
the Nazi concentration camp he lived in)
– LITERARY INFLUENCE: writers questioned authority, conventional values and the
nature of reality.
– “Postmodern literature” became popular where there was a blur between fiction and
non-fiction (i.e. Tim O’Brien’s stories about the Vietnam War are both true and
fiction)
 Wrap Up
– Modernist writings – dark view of war and
the reality of achieving the American
Dream; they seek a solution to the
problems of the world (Modernism carries
through contemporary lit)
– Postmodern writing – blend of truth and
fiction, different styles and POVs. It
differs from modernism, in that
modernists questioned the meaning of
life, whereas postmodernists sought to
outline the absurdities of the world.
Rather than seek a resolution,
postmodernists recognize that a solution
to the chaos is insurmountable.
– Contemporary Literature is post WWII,
during the atomic era, through the civil
unrest of the 60s and 70s, the rise of
materialism and pride in ethnicity of the
80s and 90s, through to the present.
– People began to creatively
experiment with style and form. (i.e.
Novels in 2nd person, chapters with
words all starting with the same
letter)
– BOTH Modern and Postmodern
represent a break from the ideas of
realism.
– Pastiche: the pasting together of
different styles and elements across
all genres of literature (i.e. Mix of
science fiction and a western)
– Intertextuality: the intertwining of a
text or novel that is interwoven with
the elements of history (i.e. Style
with many allusions to the past)