On Sunday 25th October seven students, hailing from far and wide but united in a passion for seriously good books, took part in a tutorial day devoted to modernist literature.

We began the day with a discussion of the historical and cultural context from which a period of fervent artistic experimentation emerged in the early twentieth century – from futurist sculpture to cubist painting to imagist poetry. We used the career of Ezra Pound, from his early critical writings and Chinese-influenced imagist poems to the late Cantos, to examine the challenges faced by a poet trying to ‘make it new’ in this period.

In the afternoon we examined extracts from early and late works by James Joyce as examples of different approaches to the problem of representing consciousness in writing. In the closing session we discussed the interest of modernist authors in madness and despair using extracts from Eliot and Beckett.

Madness and despair notwithstanding, the session proved extremely rewarding. English seminars are always most exciting when students’ varied interests allow them to share ideas and bring new insights to each other’s attention. This group of students, all intending to study English at university, were keen to bring their own prior knowledge of authors from Dylan Thomas to T.S. Eliot to bear on the texts we worked on as a class. It was a joy to see old texts through new eyes.

You can see details of all Debate Chamber’s English Tutorials here.

Adam Bott, English Tutor