Modern American Literature Realism and Naturalism Research Paper

Group Members Shazil Ahmad

Abstract Realism is a literary technique centralized on the faithful representation of reality, the immediate specific action and its verifiable outcome whereas naturalism focus on the Lahore School of Economics Page 1

application of principles of objectivity and detachment to its study of human beings, fathoming the factual or superficial to find the scientific law behind its actions. The two stories written by Sherwood Anderson are a presentation of a compare and contrast stance between realism and naturalism. John Holden is main character of the story The Return in which the author adopts a realistic approach whereas in the Death in the woods a naturalistic is set forth through the character of the women Grimes. The Return is a manifestation of truth likeness and verisimilitude in which reality is itemized regardless of its effect on the plot. It holds veracity as celebrated and revered importance .The Death in the Woods initiates with a distress propagates in an agonizing tone and terminates at the climax of misery.

REALISM AND NATURALISM John Holden in The Return depicts that realism is a literary technique centralized on the immediate specific action and its verifiable outcome whereas Grimes in Death in the Lahore School of Economics Page 2

woods illustrates that naturalism focuses on fathoming the factual or superficial to find the scientific law behind its actions.

The issue of interpretation is given an acute, dramatic importance in literature. They show how incisive a force is the interpretive lens, when what for centuries was taken as eternal masterpiece can in a day become insidious fiction. At the blink of an interpretive eye, ordinary becomes distinctive and distinctive becomes ordinary. The two interpretive approaches in literature that gained immense importance are those of realism and naturalism. The literalists in America were equally influenced by the changes in modes of literal interpretation as the rest of the world. These alterations also encroached on the previously adopted style of surrealism and romanticism and were actively replaced by more realistic approaches that are realism and naturalism, in many work and compositions of those people. There arises confusion while differentiating between realism and naturalism, and some troupes of populace tend to regard both as the same. But there exists an implicit distinction between the two. According to William Harmon and Hugh Holman, "Where romanticists transcend the immediate to find the ideal, and naturalists plumb the actual or superficial to find the scientific laws that control its actions, realists center their attention to a remarkable degree on the immediate, the here and now, the specific action, and the verifiable consequence". (Harmon, H., and Holman. W, 1980, Realism and Naturalism). With middle-class at its spotlight and centre of attention realism is an enormously tremendous technique. Realists believe in truth, accuracy and precision of the substance being presented, rather than a stylized or embellished version as in romanticism etc. They aspired to present the society as it is. They represent the reality faithfully what they call the truthful representation of reality. They are believers of loyal transmission of arts and literature in its purest form. Originality is the absolute and the superlative cardinal of their work. They discourage any fantasy or imagination. The realists describe the

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happening of the present without any linkage to the past or present, dissuade anachronistic and promote contemporary. Naturalism replaces supernatural thinking with natural thinking and entails the explanation of natural events without the use of supernatural causes. It is a product or more simply put development of realism. Most easily understood, the realism which espouses and advocates a deterministic viewpoint and a pessimistic thinking with its center of attention the lower class is naturalism. Although they used the techniques of accumulating detail pioneered by the realists, the naturalists thus had a specific object in mind when they chose the segment of reality that they wished to convey. It requires that hypotheses be explained and tested only by reference to natural causes and events. Explanations of observable effects are considered to be practical and useful only when they hypothesize natural causes i.e., specific mechanisms, not indeterminate miracles. Sherwood Anderson was an American novelist and short story writer. Sherwood Andersons two stories The Return and Death in the Woods are two pieces of writing which reflect realism and naturalism respectively. Anderson used the two literary techniques in his stories, depicting and stipulating different settings and circumstances as par the two modes.

Amy Kaplan has called realism a "strategy for imagining and managing the threats of social change" (Kaplan, A., 1987, Social Construction of American Realism ix). The story The Return truly fulfills the meaning. Realism is a gambit which states reality and at the same time being considerate about the alterations brought about by the society. The focus of realism is middle class. It has traditionally served the interests and aspirations of an insurgent middle class. The class is of prime importance in realistic approach. It encompasses the middle class populace and their predilections. Sherwood Anderson in his story The Return tells about a person John Holden. The story starts by with the description of his vehicle, an expensive roadster. He was a successful architect that indicates the man is well-off and earned a handsome living. Lahore School of Economics Page 4

The writers vocabulary choices and styles of expression are neither poetic nor imaginative during realism. The tone of the literary work might be satiric in which human folly is attacked through irony, derision, or wit. It may also be comic or matter-of-fact. As in case of the character John Holden, the tone taken on is satiric about the way in which John Holden led his life. He always was an uninteresting man following principles and people in his life wanted him to show a glint of some enthusiasm. The character is of gigantic importance. It is indeed more essential than the action and plot. Frequently it happens that complex ethical values are subject. John Holden was a man of non-elastic ethics. When he went to sit on the front porch with Lilian before her fathers house late, he thought that a daughter cavorting about half the night wasnt wise. He abstained from doing anything because he cared about her respect. Then he went away with a startled Lilian left behind. On his return, the lady in the hotel showed interest but he remained unresponsive. Realism, as the name suggests is a method fond of reality. It mentions every minor detail encircling reality closely and in comprehensive detail. The Return brings up many small features that would have been absent if it was some other mode of writing. The specifications like certain great buildings, two or three skyscrapers, several huge industrial plants, any number of handsome and expensive residences mentioned as the products of his architect brain is an example. Later while recounting the experience of getting drunk with his friends Joe and Herman, things are listed in a wide-ranging detail. Emphasis on verisimilitude is an important feature, even if it has to be achieved at the expense of a well-made plot. The appearance or semblance of truth attained at the cost of a well-designed plot can be seen in The Return. The reality is supersaturated. The events that take place in The Return are highly probable and believable. The going back of a man to his hometown, sitting with a girl outside her porch, going to a ball match with her, getting married to a woman someone is not really happy with, death of a wife etc all are highly likely and conceivable. This is a predominant feature of realism that it episodes and events will usually be plausible. Realistic novels avoid the Lahore School of Economics Page 5

sensational, dramatic elements of naturalistic novels and romances. Nothing is of such sort that intrigues or enthralls the reader. Throughout there is a straight-laced reality discussed. The fascinating and alluring elements of other modes of techniques are absent in the realistic technique. Characters appear in their real complexity of temperament and motive. They are of explicable relation to the nature, to each other, to their social class and to their own past. John Holdens relation to all the above factors can be said to be highly understandable. His association is highly explainable. Objectivity in presentation becomes increasingly important. The story proceeds towards defining the motive as it moves on. As it goes on the objective becomes clear.

In Black and White Strangers, Kenneth Warren suggests that a basic difference between realism and sentimentalism is that in realism, "the redemption of the individual lay within the social world," but in sentimental fiction, "the redemption of the social world lay with the individual".(Warren.K,2000,In black and White Strangers). John Holden at the end of The Return becomes a changed person. John got past his old habits. He decides to become a change man. He wants to unleash the energy and enthusiasm that he never did. He gets loose his principles. In the end he hits the road at a fast speed with Maud in his mind. The conversion takes place within the social world.

The characters in a naturalistic piece of writing are often ill-educated. Grimes in her youth worked on the Germans farmer. This along with the abusive attitude of German and his wife is a substantial proof that she was not educated. Furthermore her husband used to steal horses which somehow indicate that he wasnt literate. In the whole story there was no mention of Grimess son attaining any education. Sherwood Anderson populates his story Death in the Woods from the lower class which is a predominant feature of naturalism. All naturalists focus on lower classes as it is done Lahore School of Economics Page 6

in this writing. The main character Grimes lived in a farm near a small town. Her fatherin-law owned a handsome sum of money which he wasted the reason being debauched habits and the rest was blown by her husband Jake. On the whole they were an extremely poor lot. The world for the main characters in naturalism is that of the commonplace and unheroic in which life would seem to be chiefly the dull round of daily existence. Life for Grimes was anything but felicity. She was a bound girl who didnt know where her parents were, spent her childhood and early youth at the Germans place abused by him and maltreated by his wife. She spent those days of life feeding them; tiresomeness and tediousness were the only elements of her life. Then after she ran away with Jake, she had to feed him and their son. She also fed the stocks. All her life she kept feeding people and animals. Her daily routine was to manage food only the people were different at different spans of life. Throughout her life she never knew what enthusiasm or excitement was. .The characters face numerous constraints in exercising their freewill. They dont have liberal expressions in their lives. All their activities are restrained and limited as in Death in the Woods. Grimes was a poor woman with no will of her own in her whole life. She had managed that way when she was a young girl at the Germans and ever since she was married to Jake. It didnt bother her much; she was used to it. Her starting years were governed by admonishments and later by his husbands beatings. Even her son and his woman gave him orders. There can be numerous themes in a naturalistic approach. It may be a craving for dominance and pleasure; a struggle to survive in an amoral and unscrupulous universe or to endure an indifferent apathetic surrounding. Grimes was trying to adapt and to survive throughout her life. She fought a battle of survival since she was born. She worked rigorously at the Germans to stay unhurt from the couple and still at her husbands place for the same reason. The survival in an amoral and indifferent universe is an appropriate theme for this story in which the woman is spending a life with no affability being offered. The setting of the story stipulates every odd against subsistence.

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The force of environment affecting and afflicting the life of the woman is maintained throughout the context. Her childhood saw no relation blood or non-blood, neither had she talked to anyone nor did anyone recognize her importance. She was never considered important anytime anywhere by anyone. As a matter of fact, she was totally dejected by the environs. Therefore naturalism dramatizes the loss of individuality at a physiological as well as psychological level which exactly took place in the story of Grimes. She had accepted her fate as of misery and forlornness. Sigmund Freud held a viewpoint in his theory of unconscious sublimation that unresolved unconscious conflicts cause fixation in one of the psychosexual stages of an individual. Freudian approach says that these conflicts need to be resolved because if they arent, than they occupy a place in your unconscious memory which tend to affect your future predilections and dispositions. Grimes lived with an already accepted fate, one of dejection. The ruthlessness of his circumstances dwelled in her mind for ever. She literally lost her individuality due to repression. Naturalist way of writing often terminates with a tragic setting leading to callous pitiless demise. The naturalist as he approaches the end writes something adventurous or heroic, and human attributes that involve ultimate passion and bodily strength. After that the escapade culminates in desperate moments and violent death. Death In The Woods has Grimes who went out of her home in severe cold because she had to buy dog-meat, pork etc. Her age couldnt stand the harshness of weather and the tedious clearing on her way home. She exerted all the strength to cross but couldnt go past it. She sought refuge under a tree and sat there. She kept on sitting there dreaming about her unpleasant life. The dogs kept running around her in a circle as if performing a death ritual. She died there weak and fragile her clothes worn-out her life deserted. In whole her life she kept feeding everyone, and at the end when she was dead the food was taken away from her by the dogs, an ultimate pity. She was white with snow which in Christianity symbolizes peace that might indicate her setting free from this ruthless world.

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The Return is a manifestation of truthlikeness and verisimilitude in which reality is itemized regardless of its effect on the plot. It holds veracity as celebrated and revered importance .The Death in the Woods initiates with a distress, propagates in an agonizing tone and terminates at the climax of misery. It certainly fulfills the meaning of a naturalistic saga, of which an uneducated lower class of heart-rending life is of absolute importance. Grimes is a reflection of such character. The compare and contrast of the above two stories provide with a thorough understanding of the two modes of literary interpretation that is realism and naturalism.

REFERENCES

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1. Campbell, Donna M. "Realism in American Literature, 1860-1890." Literary Movements. Dept. of English, Washington State University. 2. Methodological Naturalism and Philosophical Naturalism: Clarifying the Connection (2000), Barbara Forrest, Retrieved 2007-05-20. 3. Kaplan,A.,1987, Social Construction of American Realism ix.

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