Modernism and Poetry of the Early 20th Century

       Modernism was a revolutionary and historical time for the late 19^th and early 20^th century. It was a breakthrough in art, poetry, orthography, painting, and photography. The barriers that surrounded the conventional standards of the aforementioned began to disintegrate and unlock the door to a world which allowed the artists to express themselves openly. Glen Macleod, “The Cambridge Companion to Modernism,” speaks to a movement known as “Vorticism.” Ezra Pound, one of the leaders of postimpressionist poetry, joined this movement along with others, which focused on poetry being “less clear.” This “less clear” mentality is synonymous with “abstraction” which allowed the audience to come to their own conclusion about a piece of work because there was no clear form to follow which said, “this is what you have to think, which is what we see in the selection of poems, especially with Mina Loy.
        Ezra Pound’s, “Liu Ch’e,” is a pretty straight forward poem. It uses enjambment from lines 3 to 4 and there seems to be a tone change starting at line 4. There is use of natural imagery which allows the reader to get a mental picture of what is going on in the poem. The reader can move from this once busy and thriving, now unoccupied factory scene, to being outside in a windy, wispy, fall scene. Almost as if someone is waiting for restoration which is signified by the "wet leaf hanging on to the threshold." “Sea Lily,” by H.D., is a little more involved. First she begins the poem with an apostrophe, which is immediately abstract, but it allows the reader to get in touch with their natural surroundings. She uses a caesura in the last stanza and much description to help pull out her points. The poem seems to be speaking about strength and standing through adversity.  The poems by Mina Loy are voiced with ambiguity and confusion at its best. The art of “free verse” is most certainly exercised and she was not the least bit shy in using it. She also employed the techniques of: alliteration, caesura, anaphora, epistrophe, apostrophe, end-stopped lines, diction, tone changes within the poems, and juxtaposition, just to name a few. As time has progressed and terminology has grown, interpretations and criticisms has as well. Mina Loy was a passionate poet. The last poet, T.S. Eliot, also known as one of the “great’s,” his poem, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock," was written a little different than the others.  It is in verse and he even has a couple of couplet’s mixed in there and makes use of alliteration, personification, puns (somewhat), anaphora, caesuras, end-stopped line, and tone changes. Description is heavy, references to time and the speaker's own mortality is strongly voiced. At the end when life is over and you look back over your life, he seems to beg the question, is it worth it?

        The postimpressionist movement allowed poets to break through what society saw as the norm for art, writing and poetry and made way for them to express themselves and their views as they saw fit, despite criticisms.