Not Belated: Canadian Late Modernism Organizers: Gregory Betts (Brock U), Paul Hjartarson (U of Alberta), and Kristine Smitka (U of Alberta) Contact: gbetts@brocku.ca
Late modernism begins after the spirit of revolt against 19th Century/Victorian values dissipated and ends with the arrival of postmodernism. It begins, as Tyrus Miller argues, with the recognition of a much bleaker future than the initial wave of modernists had envisioned. Robert Genter counters that late modernists broke from earlier models in pursuit of less esoteric concerns, more playfulness, and greater connection to wider publics. Theories of late modernism are beginning to proliferate and it is time to extend the discussion to Canadian writers from the 1930s-60s who have too often been awkwardly and inappropriately situated with the first wave of international literary modernism. Writers such as A.J.M. Klein, Sheila Watson, Wilfred Watson, Elizabeth Smart, Dorothy Livesay, Anne Marriot, and many more, refer to Eliot, Pound, Joyce, and Lewis in their work, but mark themselves as different from the initial efforts of the so-called “titans of modernism” by this reference. One aspect of this group of particular interest is the increased awareness of writing in the age of mass media, within McLuhan’s electric age, or as part of diverse global networks of competing modernisms as per Laura Doyle and Laura Winkiel’s notion of geomodernisms.
We invite papers that consider how late modernist awareness infiltrates writing in the period. Please send a proposal with no identifying marks (300-500 words), an abstract (100 words), a brief biographical statement (50 words), and a Proposal Submissions Information Sheet to gbetts@brocku.ca by November 1.
Association: ACCUTE
Congress of the Humanities, Brock University
24-30 May 2014