World Literature Time Line - Due

Timeline contemporary literature

Authors and their work

Historical Events Showing the Context of the Writing

1904

Constantine Cavafy-waiting for the Barbarian

He revived Greek poetry both locally and internationally. His poetry was a self or historical reflection he was going through. In this poem, he poetry a state that is in despair when their hope does not turn up. The officials place their hope on the arrival of Barbarians to save their city. At evening the barbarians were yet to arrive and every one was scared

1873 the long depression

1882 Anglo-Egyptian war

1919-1922 – Greece defeated in Greco-Turkish war

1920

Marcel Proust-in search of lost time

Revolutionized the modern writing through this monumental novel. The novel was published in seven volumes. The novel is not only complex with 2000 characters but also bulky. The author recalls his early life as a child in the Guermantes way. He recalls how a nurse “sang me to sleep with that old ditty”

1871- end of Franco- Prussian war

1900-1905 : death of his parents

1914 world war I

1925

Franz Kafka-the trial

Introduced the fusion of realism with fantastic. His works are attributed to the themes of absurdity, guilt, and alienation of incomprehensive measures. The trial shows the trial of a man, Josef k who is a chief cashier at a local bank. He is arrested on his 30th birthday by unknown un-identified agents from an agency, which they do not identify without even being told of his crime. The main character, K, is persecuted by being stabbed. His final words were ”like dog”

1914: world war I

1958

Louis Aragon-holy week

Was a great contributor to the surrealist movement that saw a resurgence in French art and writing. Aragon work on the holy week covers the march 1895 when napoleon was in a struggle to gain authority from king louis the 18th. He uses the imagination and reflection of the characters to flashback on their roles and characteristics. The author also shows his own personal reflections during the French invasion by Germany. The king is unable to keep his reign and runs away. The most notable episode is at the end where Theodore say he “ sees no sense to die for the crippled king who has fled away or Napoleon with his imperialist police state”

1914: world war I

1919 France occupies Germany territory

1919-1924- Dadaism

1920- 1970’s surreal movement

1922-1953 – Stalinism movement

1933-1945 World war II

1933 -1939 the commune journal launched

1940 Germany invades France

1948

Bertolt Brecht – the Caucasian Chalk Circle

Shaped the epic theatrical views by making the spectators see the drama as everyday reality surrounding them. They saw that the reality of life as a human construction that can be changed.

I like when the judge uses the “Solomonic” decision-making by drawing a chalk circle and tells them to pull the child from the circle and then divide the child into halves. The woman who did not pull the child was declared the mother of the child

1914-1918: the first world

1933: Adolf Hitler takes over the leadership in Germany

1933-1945 World war II

1945-1956: the fall of Hitler reign and era of the cold war.

1954- received the Stalin peace prize