The Realist consists of four members which are:

1. Nor Najihah Binti Mat Zin (1316074)
2. Siti Yasmeen Binti A Zulkiflee (1322586)
3. Nurul Dini Binti Mohd Fadli (1319586)
4. Norain Hirlia Binti Subahir (1328336)

Basically, this blog is created for the purpose of our assignment for ENGL 4620: Literary Criticism. The whole discussion is about the analysis of modernist literature which are:

• Maleficient: Movie
• The Garden by Ezra Pound: Poem
• Guenica (1937) by Pablo Picasso: Painting
• Ulysses by James Joyce: Novel
• The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe: Short Story

Video on Modernism

Maleficient: Movie

The movie that we have chosen to be discussed under the theory of modernism is Maleficent (2014) and based on this movie, it can be seen that there are elements of modernism which can be detected throughout the whole story. The movie is about Maleficent, who is a fairy and she had put a curse on Princess Aurora because of the revenge and grudge towards her father. The curse that would make her fall asleep forever would happen on her sixteenth birthday when she pricked her finger.
The first element of modernism which can be found in this movie is the unreliable narrator. In other words, the whole story is narrated from only one point of view where this movie does not apply the omniscient external narrator technique. Only by the end of the movie, the identity of the narrator is revealed which happens to be the Sleeping Beauty; Princess Aurora. This is quite different from other movies as the narrator would usually be someone who is not one of the characters in order to remain the objectivity of the movies. Attempting to be different from other typical movies, in Maleficent, the narrator is one of the characters. Thus, the story revolves around her as seen from her point of view. The reason why only at the end of the story the identity of the narrator is revealed is because to make the movie appear objective and not bias towards any character right from the beginning until the end of the story. By the end of the story, the narrator said that definitely she would know about this story because she is the Sleeping Beauty.

Another element of modernism in this movie can be seen through the characters. In most of the fairy-tale movies that have been produced, the protagonist is usually the hero and becomes the main focus of the story such as in Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. However, in Maleficent, it is the other way around where the villain (Maleficent) is the main character in that movie and the king (King Stefan) who is supposed to be the protagonist, has been introduced as the antagonist. In addition, there is one scene in this movie where Maleficent put a curse on Princess Aurora and only true love kiss can break the curse. Typically, a prince will come and break the spell since it is a true love kiss but interestingly, in this movie, it is Maleficent who actually broke the spell. This is because of her endless devotion and affection towards Princess Aurora and this part depicts that true love does exist. Thus, Maleficent is considered to be a modernist film because it does not follow the traditional plot of a fairy-tale movie where there are elements of unreliable narrator and plot twist at the end of the movie. 

The Garden by Ezra Pound: Poem

Ezra Pound is one of the famous modernist poet during 18th-century.Basically, 18th century Neoclassicism and 19th- century Romantics relied upon traditional pattern of craftsmanship; iambic pentameter and consistent rhyme scheme up until the early 20th century. However, modernist poets manage to unshackle the pattern out of this cocoon by come out with the poem that have free verse and condensed lines. For instance, Ezra Pound erased the elements of strict rules in poem as “The Garden” does not follow the strict rules regarding rhyme and meter on his poem.

En robe de parade

Even the first line following the title draw the question on the reader as the phrase is not the familiar line to be recognized. This quote by Samain means it is to somewhat loosely translated means dressing to show, or dressing for a state occasion. While it would not initially have meant anything, I personally feel it fits in nicely with the theme of this poem, namely the gap between the social ranks of the British community.

            After reading through the poem, it left me with question on the complex message that Ezra amend to deliver but after going through it multiple times,  I was immersed on the spectacular word choice that he has done and contextual meaning of the poem. As we could realize, this poem was absent from any elements of traditional poem. Whether it was intentional or not, the lack of structure in this poem might serve as a direct opposition to the confinement experienced by the protagonist. The various stanza length of 1-4-1-2-5 lines in “The Garden” also a part of the pattern out of the traditional poem.

            Personally, I loved the way modernist poem be drawn as the poets are more free to create their works. The impressive works emerge by the courage of the modernist poets that dare to create arts out of the boxes. 

Guenica (1937) by Pablo Picasso: Painting

Pablo Picasso (1881-1973)

Modernism is basically a movement in which the methods and ideas used in art, architecture, literature, etc. are very different from those used in past. In other words, the modernists reject the conservative values in creating novel artworks. In terms of painting or art, modern artists experimented with new ways of seeing art and abstraction is one of the main characteristics of modern art. There are many modernist or avant-garde movement under modern art such as cubism, impressionism, constructivism, etc. and the most renowned painter during modernism period is Pablo Picasso. He is the founder of cubism movement (1902-1912) along with Georges Braque. He also came out with the invention of constructed sculpture and collage. Among his most famous works are the proto-Cubist Les Demoiselles d'Avignon (1907), and Guernica (1937).

Guernica (1937)

The painting shown above is Picasso’s famous cubism painting, Guernica where it depicts the inhumanity, brutality, and hopelessness of war. A palette of gray, black, and white is used in completing the artwork. From my point of view, I like the way he only used three colors probably to portray the real meaning behind the painting which is the suffering of people due to violence and chaos. In fact, cubism style of painting concerns with using monochrome brownish and neutral colors only. Since modernism emphasizes on the shapes, colors, symbols and line that make up the artwork, hence we can conclude that Picasso used the combination of gray, black, and white to symbolize the grief, mourning, death, and sadness of the people after the bombing of Guernica, a Basque Country village in northern Spain, by Nazi German and Fascist Italian warplanes. It is very remarkable I must say. In Cubist artwork, objects are analyzed, broken up and reassembled in an abstracted form. Guernica painting looks like a lot of things is jumbled up into one place which creates a very abstract image where not many people would understand the painting as it is different from the normal and traditional painting. This is because modernism paintings are not meant to be looked literally with our own eyes but also with our hearts and minds. In short, it is beyond what we see and it is not what you see but how you see it.

This is definitely the part where I do not really favor in cubism or any modernism paintings as they can be too abstract that sometimes I find it hard to understand and analyze what the painters are trying to portray and deliver. In fact, I am a bit terrified looking at the above painting probably due to the way the subjects are drawn which can be said quite unusual. But then again, if we think about the main idea of modernism itself, we could say that the reason why Guernica or any other paintings look unusual with the subjects are scattered all over the canvas is because Picasso wants the people to interpret the symbols as they understand them. In short, it is up to them to define the meanings behind the symbols and they can be varied from one person to another. Nevertheless, I am totally impressed with those modernism artworks and it makes me wonder as to how did the painters’ or Picasso’s brain actually work that they could actually project it in the form of paintings. It is indeed amazing and incredible.