EXISTENTIALIST-INFLUENCED REALISM

Dr. doCarmo's Notes on EXISTENTIALIST-INFLUENCED REALISMRealism first got big in American fiction in the second half of the 19th century; Mark Twain, many critics say, was its first great practitioner.  It stayed big through the mid-1920s or so; then (though this is simplifying things a bit) the avant garde experimentalism of the modernists stole the spotlight for a while; then realism got big again after WW II. As a style of fiction, realism has a few big hallmarks:  1) it�s usually plot-driven (even if subtly); 2) it�s usually concerned with �ordinary� people and the details of ordinary life;  3) it usually tries for �psychological depth� � that is, it spends a lot of time exploring the minds and thought processes of its characters; and  4) it generally uses �transparent� language, or the sort that doesn�t draw attention to itself but rather (if it's working right) just lets the reader see right through it to the world it�s representing. (Bear in mind it�s not called realism because it�s the most realistic way, necessarily, of representing the world in fiction: modernists of the 1920s were convinced their plotless, fragmented, �stream of consciousness� fictions were the most accurate way of showing reality, and many critics believed it.  Though Mark Twain�s stories might have seemed particularly �realistic� when they were first written, and so were given that label, �realism� for us at this point is basically just a conventional label given to fiction with the qualities I�ve listed above.) So�a lot of fiction of the late �40s and �50s is not only realistic but �existentialist.�  Existentialism is a European philosophy advanced most famously by Jean Paul Sartre and Albert Camus, and it was at its height in Europe in the 1940s.  It has a few central beliefs:  1) that the absurdity and inhumanity of the godless modern world must be combated by brave, non-conformist individuals; 2) that �existence precedes essence� -- that is, you�re born with no God-given soul or human �essence,� so it�s your job to create it for yourself as you go about "existing;" and  3) though separation from society may be painful, the brave, non-conformist individual who is the existentialist hero will preserve his or her separateness as an emblem of his or her independence. Despite the fact that existentialists are almost by definition atheists (it�s your job to forge an �essence� for yourself, they�d say, precisely because no almighty power is going to hand one over to you), their writings often take on an almost religious tone or sensibility.  Why?  Because existentialism is basically a secular religion, if that�s not too completely oxymoronic.  They may say you have to create your own essence, but existentialists still believe in essences � thus the heroic characters in their books who conduct searches for Meaning, Insight, and Transcendence (or who go looking for their own essences, basically) are on a mission no less religious for being human-centered rather than God-centered.Existentialism got big with American writers after WW II for a couple key reasons.  The first is that fiction writers, like a lot of American intellectuals, had had it with big, state-level politics.  Before World War II, many intellectuals were �lefties� who placed great faith in communism and socialism as potential saviors of humanity.  During that war, though, it became clear that plenty was rotten in Russia, the place many intellectuals had looked to as a shining example of communism in practice.  Stalin, Russia�s leader, had not only made dirty deals with Hitler to keep him out of Russia but was also, out of his own paranoia, imprisoning and murdering officials in his own government at an alarming rate.  His clear new status as a dictator made lots of American intellectuals lose faith in any type of national-level governmental politics and made them look to individuals as agents of change instead. Another reason American writers take to existentialism after WW II: the �monoculture� is gaining ground in the newly suburbanized United States.  Everyone�s living in the same pre-fab houses, watching the same TV shows, driving the same cars, working the same types of paper-pushing office jobs....  Some bold existentialist individualism is clearly in order. One other thing worth noting: much of the most famous existentialist realism of the �50s comes from Jewish-American writers (Philip Roth, Saul Bellow, Cynthia Ozick, Bernard Malamud) whose novels feature a character type literary critics often call the schlemiehl (�fool,� in Yiddish).  He (occasionally she) is a character unafraid to express emotion, be introspective, and be �different� from the regimented masses.  This character, according to a critic named Ruth Wisse, �declares his humanity by loving and suffering in defiance of the forces of depersonalization and the ethic of enlightened stoicism.�   In other words, s/he�s all about being self-expressive in a world that often demands that you just shut up and join.

from- http://faculty.bucks.edu/docarmos/realism.html