MODERNISM AND THE AESTHETICS OF VIOLENCE The notion that violence can give rise to art and that art can serve as an agent of violence is a dominant feature of modernist literature. In this study, traces the modernist fascination with violence to the middle decades of the nineteenth century, when certain French and English writers sought to celebrate dissident sexualities and stylized criminality. Sheehan presents a panoramic view of how the aesthetics of transgression gradually mutates into an infatuation with destruction and upheaval, identifying the First World War as the event through which the modernist aesthetic of violence crystallizes. By engaging with exemplary modernists such as Joyce, Conrad, Eliot and Pound, as well as lesser-known writers including Gautier, Sacher-Masoch, Wyndham Lewis and others, Sheehan shows how artworks, so often associated with creative well-being and communicative self-expression, can be reoriented towards violent and bellicose ends. is a senior lecturer in English at Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia. He is the author of Modernism, Narrative and Humanism (2002) and the editor of Becoming Human: New Perspectives on the Inhuman Condition (2003). Most recently, he has published essays in SubStance, Twentieth-Century Literature and Textual Practice, as well as book chapters on Thomas De Quincey, Cormac McCarthy and Ralph Ellison, and several articles on Samuel Beckett.
MODERNISM AND THE AESTHETICS OF VIOLENCE PAUL SHEEHAN Macquarie University
cambridge university press Cambridge, New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore, São Paulo, Delhi, Mexico City Cambridge University Press 32 Avenue of the Americas, New York, ny 10013-2473, usa Information on this title: /9781107036833 2013 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2013 Printed in the United States of America A catalog record for this publication is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Sheehan, Paul, 1960 Modernism and the Aesthetics of Violence /. pages cm Includes bibliographical references. isbn 978-1-107-03683-3 1. Modernism (Literature) Great Britain. 2. Modernism (Literature) France. 3. Violence in literature. I. Title. pr888.m63s53 2013 823 0.9109112 dc23 2012043743 isbn 978-1-107-03683-3 Hardback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of urls for external or third-party Internet Web sites referred to in this publication and does not guarantee that any content on such Web sites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate.
For Lynda
Contents Acknowledgements page ix part i Introduction: Modernism s Blasted History 1 decadence rising: the violence of aestheticism 23 1 Revolution of the Senses 25 2 Victorian Sexual Aesthetics 45 3 Culture, Corruption, Criminality 66 4 A Malady of Dreaming: The Picture of Dorian Gray 74 part ii modernism s breach: the violence of aesthetics 85 5 Prologue: Transgression Displaced 87 6 No Dreaming Pale Flowers 94 7 Modernist Sexual Politics 109 8 Maximum Energy (Like a Hurricane) 135 9 Forbidden Planet: Heart of Darkness 155 Epilogue: Traumas of the Word 168 Notes 173 Bibliography 211 Index 227 vii
Acknowledgements I wish to acknowledge, first and foremost, two of my colleagues in the English Department at Macquarie University. First, I give thanks to Virginia Blain for her advocacy and encouragement; her help was instrumental in my being awarded a research fellowship, during which most of the book was drafted. In addition, I profited greatly from Virginia s knowledge of nineteenth-century poetics and gender politics. Second, I am also grateful to Tony Cousins, who granted me research leave so that the manuscript could be completed. Tony s tenacious support, even in the face of bureaucratic adversity, was a true indicator of his spirit of generosity and collegiality. Of those who read portions of the manuscript and offered suggestions for improvement, John Attridge was the most dauntless, providing detailed comments on modernist issues that unfailingly enlarged my understanding. I also had the benefit of in-depth discussions with Neil Levi, Anthony Uhlmann, Michael Hollington and Claire Potter; and with Phyllis Connors, whose Paterian knowledge and expertise are seemingly boundless. Thanks, too, to Ronan McDonald and Russell West-Pavlov for their judicious advice and clear-sightedness; to James Mackenzie, for meticulous research assistance; and to Tara Quintana, for sourcing some elusive material. Ray Ryan, my editor at Cambridge University Press, was steadfast in steering this project towards production, for which I give thanks. Finally, I offer much more than gratitude to Lynda Ng, for unwavering support and for reshaping the contours of my life, both intellectual and nonintellectual. This book is dedicated to her. ix