UNIT 3: REALISM TRADITION
Literary realism is the trend, beginning with mid nineteenth-century French
literature and extending to late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century authors,
to representations of life and society, as it was contemporary. Realist authors opted for
representations of everyday and banal activities and experiences, instead of a
romanticized or similarly stylized presentation. There is the belief that the
novel’s function is simply to report what happens, without comment or judgment.
Seemingly inconsequential elements gain the attention of the novel functioning
in the realist mode. Realism was, in summary, the contraposition of the
Modernism. The characters that the realistic school of novelists produced are
some of the most famous in literary history, they are psychologically
complicated, multifaceted, and with conflicting impulses and motivations that
very nearly replicate the daily tribulations of being human. Thus for realist
authors the character is more important than action and plot. The fascination
with things falling apart was unpleasant to many, and critics sometimes accused
the practitioners of Realism of focusing only on the negative aspects of life.
By the end of the nineteenth century, Realism in the pure sense had given way
to another form called Naturalism. With Naturalism, authors looked to heredity
and history to define character. Ironically, many of the qualities that people
found distasteful in realism – the obsession with character, the superficially
mundane plots – were all intensified in Naturalism.
ARNOLD BENNET (1867- 1931)
English writer who was, along with H. G. Wells and J. Galsworthy, one of the last authors of
classic Victorian narrative. He worked and administrative in London. In 1900 he left journalism
and dedicated himself entirely to literature itself.
The first text that caught the attention of critics was Anna of the Five Towns (1902), which
describes the poor environment of your Staffordshire, one of the central themes of the
writer. But his masterpiece was The Old Wives’ Tale (1908), which Clayhanger trilogy
follows it: Clayhanger (1910), Hilda Lessways (1911), These Twain (1916), The Roll Call
(1918), and Riceyman Steps (1923).
The copious production of Bennett also covers genres like humorous and sensational which
are intended to be easier to achieve public favor. Bennett adapted some of his productions the
theater, and also wrote numerous comedies. He also composed narrations, manners studies
and autobiographical works and reviews of journalistic purpose generally. The originality of
Bennett’s production is almost circumscribed by his early novels. Even when submitted
himself to the influence of foreign authors and although mainly he is refered to naturalist
line, sometimes the writer's personal appearance is based on a conscious purification of
natural motifs. In the last stage of his life he felt harassed by the emergence of modernist
innovators (J. Joyce, V. Wolf, TS Eliot), who considered obscurantist destroyers classical
genres.
H. G. WELLS (1866- 1946)
Narrator and political philosopher of British nationality. Writer with high creativity and originality
thematic. He studied biology and and his thinking on ethical matters took place in
