This book tests critical reassessments of US radical writing of the 1930s against recent developments in theories of modernism and the avant-garde. Multidisciplinary in approach, it considers poetry, fiction, classical music, commercial art, jazz, and popular contests (such as dance marathons and bingo). Relating close readings to social and economic contexts over the period 1856–1952, it centers in on a key author or text in each chapter, providing an unfolding, chronological narrative, while at the same time offering nuanced updates on existing debates. Part One focuses on the roots of the 1930s proletarian movement in poetry and music of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Part Two analyzes the output of proletarian novelists, considered alongside contemporaneous works by established modernist authors as well as more mainstream, popular titles.
Author(s): Simon Cooper
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Year: 2020
Language: English
Pages: 338
Tags: Twentieth-Century Literature
Front Matter ....Pages i-x
Introduction (Simon Cooper)....Pages 1-28
Front Matter ....Pages 29-29
Yes, but Is It Art? The Revolutionary Transformations of Michael Gold (Simon Cooper)....Pages 31-75
The Longing for a Line: Modernism Meets the New Deal (Simon Cooper)....Pages 77-113
Front Matter ....Pages 115-115
‘A Moment of Ecstasy, a Lifetime of Regret’: The Popular Limits of the Proletarian Novel (Simon Cooper)....Pages 117-168
The Bastard as Art Object Bastardised: Erskine Caldwell’s Fine Art of Standing Still (Simon Cooper)....Pages 169-211
Front Matter ....Pages 213-213
Gladiators in the Century of Progress: The World’s Fairs, Pulp Modernism and Popular Contests of the 1930s (Simon Cooper)....Pages 215-241
Affirming the Modernist Principle: Invisible Man, Blues Signifiers and the Return of the Bottom Dogs (Simon Cooper)....Pages 243-296
Conclusion (Simon Cooper)....Pages 297-309
Back Matter ....Pages 311-338
