Boucquey Thierry (General Editor). Encyclopedia Of World Writers. 3 volumes

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Another Work by Mo Yan

“My American Books.” In World Literature Today 74:3

(Summer 2000).

Works about Mo Yan

Goldblatt, Howard. “‘The Saturnicon’: Forbidden

Food of Mo Yan.” In World Literature Today 74:3

(Summer 2000).

Inge, M. Thomas.“Mo Yan through Western Eyes.” In

World Literature Today 74:3 (Summer 2000).

Wang, David Der-Wei. “The Literary World of Mo

Ya n.” In World Literature Today 74:3 (Summer

2000).

modernism

The term modernism generally refers to the literary

and cultural movements associated with the early

part of the 20th century from the start of World

War I in 1914 to the start of World War II, though

there are claims that it began in the middle of the

19th century with the publication of BAUDELAIRE’s

Les Fleurs du mal and FLAUBERT’s Madame Bovary

in 1857, as a response to urbanization, the increas-

ing commodification of life, and the devaluation of

art. The modernist movement in literature was

created by a change in the way writers looked at the

world around them. Influenced by the horrors of

World War I and the rise in societal materialism, as

well as socioeconomic and religious suppression,

these writers’ perceptions, not only of the world as

a whole but also of humanity’s place in that world

shifted radically. They needed new ways to express

their shifting perceptions.

Modernist writers experimented, often radi-

cally, with form. In poetry, formalized rhymes and

meters became free verse. Novelists began to write

more loosely, for example, forsaking a logical se-

quence of thoughts for a stream-of-consciousness

style. In particular, the conventions of REALISM

were discarded in favor of distorted time sequences

and collages of imagery. These new forms and

styles were often complex and posed a challenge

to readers, who then had to struggle to find their

own positions relative to the fragmented nature of

the works. This creation of a feeling of isolation

and dislocation in the reader was one of the main

ideas behind modernism.

Modernist writers wanted their readers to think

differently about the cultural and political changes

occurring throughout Europe and America at the

start of the 20th century. The horrors of World

War I as well as the discovery of hidden forces mo-

tivating and governing human behavior (made by

thinkers such as Karl Marx, Sigmund

FREUD, and

Friedrich NIETZSCHE) led to a search for hidden

meanings elsewhere in society. There was also a

shift towards mysticism as an alternative to tradi-

tional ideology.

A widespread loss of confidence in the concept

of identity was also foremost among the philo-

sophical questions that plagued modernist writers.

Longstanding scientific beliefs about the origin of

humanity were challenged. The industrialization

and mechanization of society was rapidly displac-

ing people from their jobs. Christianity was be-

coming widely associated with capitalism and with

an oppressive, often hypocritical, view of morality.

At the same time, the critical study of biblical texts

and the rising popularity of Darwin’s theory of

evolution gave rise to further religious challenge.

Finally, a growing awareness of other cultures also

influenced modernist concepts and world views,

leading to changes in the perception of reality,

which began to seem like an external concept

rather than an innate one.

Like many other eras of social and political up-

heaval, the early 20th century found its expression

through the arts, with modernism at the heart of

that ideology. World War II brought a new period of

social change, thus marking the end of this particu-

lar movement and paving the way for other trends.

Latin-American Modernism

Modernismo, or Latin-American modernism, was

a mostly poetic literary movement, distinct from

European and American modernism, that began at

the end of the 19th century and lasted until the end

of World War I. It resembles French SYMBOLISM and

borrowed extensively from the ideas of Charles

298 modernism

BAUDELAIRE, especially those concerning art for art’s

sake.

Modernism rose in a cultural framework de-

fined by a disillusionment with ROMANTICISM and a

desire for a renewal of spiritual ideals. Its central

figure is poet Rubén DARÍO, who, in the 1880s, re-

vitalized Latin-American poetry through his

unique diction and his upholding of artistic beauty

as life’s ultimate ideal.

The modernist poem valued sensations over

ideas. This was a revolutionary position in Latin

America where, up until that time, most poetry had

been either didactic or sentimental. Modernist

writers also employed a collection of symbols, bor-

rowed from the French and from antiquity, to rep-

resent their ideas in a more visceral fashion. The

swan was the most prominent of these symbols.

White and graceful, it was a symbol of ideal beauty;

at the same time, its neck—hooked in the form of

a question mark—represented the doubts of mod-

ern humanity.

The erotic, which earlier Latin-American writ-

ers had avoided, was embraced by modernists.

The sensual aspects of love were celebrated, and

erotic passion was equated with the artist’s desire

to create.

The modernists proposed that artists were in

contact with a higher being and were able to un-

lock life’s mysteries by the powers of art. To this

end, they concentrated a great deal of effort on de-

veloping formal virtuosity and inventing new

kinds of versification.

The high modernism of Darío and his follow-

ers, with its French influences, was a highly aes-

theticized movement, cosmopolitan, and not tied

to national or patriotic issues. Modernism took a

different turn in Brazil, where writers such as

Mario de Andrade (1893–1945) and Oswald de

Andrade (1890–1954) sought to create a new na-

tion by assimilating the eclectic influences of its

history, including indigenous and African cultures,

in a new tapestry of national identity. Avant-garde

movements in Nicaragua, Mexico, and Cuba also

incorporated indigenous and African-based popu-

lar cultures.

The modernist movement, and Darío in par-

ticular, prepared the way for such poets as Pablo

NERUDA and Octavio PAZ. It is important to note,

however, that modernists had not yet completely

accepted the idea of a world without absolute

values and meanings as their 20th-century descen-

dents would. Their poetry was rigorously struc-

tured in imitation of their conception of reality. It

remained logical and was essentially neoclassical in

its ambitions. Unlike their descendents, mod-

ernists reacted to the uncertainty of the world by

trying to create an art form that reassured them

that a moral order could exist. As the 20th century

progressed this idea became more and more un-

tenable.

Chinese Modernism

Modernism in China had a more progressive

meaning than in Europe and Latin America. Its be-

ginnings can be dated to 1899, when Liang Qichao

(Liang Ch’i-ch’ao) (1873–1929), a leading intel-

lectual, called for a “revolution in poetry” and the

overthrow of traditional literature, which was writ-

ten in a formal literary language. He advocated the

use of both old and new vernacular mixed with

literary Chinese. Other writers, such as Huang

Zunxian (Huang Tsun-hsien) (1848–1905), advo-

cated further reforms, such as the addition of col-

loquial vocabulary and references to modern life in

poetry. These reforms were augmented by an in-

creased number of translations of foreign works

that had a modernity all their own.

By 1916, despite China’s political chaos, writers

found unprecedented freedom to experiment and

modernize. The decade saw the birth of many lit-

erary journals. One of the most influential was

Chen Duxiu’s New Youth, which he founded in

1915 and which served as a focal point in the mod-

ernist movement. Chen Duxiu blamed the Confu-

cian classics, which formed the foundation of

Chinese literary tradition, for China’s inability to

modernize.

1917 marks a milestone in the development of

China’s literary modernism: In January, Chen

Duxiu published

HU SHIH’s “Some Tentative Sug-

modernism 299

gestions for the Reform of Chinese Literature.” Its

suggestions were indeed modest, but the article

was held up as a modernist manifesto. Hu Shih ad-

vised against the use of clichés and advocated

timeliness in topics, but the most important inno-

vation he urged was to write in the Chinese ver-

nacular language, known as baihua, that is, to use

the national language to create a national litera-

ture. Hu Shih insisted that the use of a “dead” lan-

guage produced a “dead” literature.

Hu Shih’s article took the literary world by

storm. By the time that the second beginning of

modernism rolled around on May 4, 1919, experi-

ments in baihua literature were already underway.

Hu Shih published several baihua poems in Janu-

ary 1918, and in May, LU Xun published what is re-

garded as the first Chinese modernist short story,

“Diary of a Madman.” A vicious satire that attacks

the old Chinese morality, the story is about a para-

noid man who suspects all of conspiring to kill and

eat him.

The political climate in China urged further

change in its literature.After World War I, the 1919

Treaty of Versailles awarded parts of China in con-

cession to Japan. This outraged the Chinese peo-

ple, and many began to turn their attention to

China’s weaknesses in the new world and to mobi-

lize in protest. A demonstration on May 4, 1919,

drew thousands, including many students and

scholars. The task of rectifying China’s humiliation

instilled literary modernism with a sense of politi-

cal urgency; writers committed to writing with a

cause—that of national pride.

Some of the main themes of modernism were

to write in an accessible and truthful language

(baihua), to think and write critically as a means

for change in society and government, to celebrate

individualism, and to experiment with new forms.

The short story rose to prominence as a vehicle for

modernism. The May Fourth era had begun, and it

was a time of great productivity, openness to for-

eign literature and ideas, and a deep commitment

to social change. Writers such as

DING LING used

modernism to explore modern ideas, such as fem-

inist independence.

Eventually, the May Fourth era gave way to the

ascendancy of

SOCIALIST REALISM under the Com-

munist regime. Modernism experienced a revival

after the easing of restrictions in the 1970s and

1980s, and it is still currently as much the subject

of examination and debate in China as is POST-

MODERNISM, as Chinese writers reexamine history

through literary innovation. Since the Cultural

Revolution, modernism has focused on form, such

as SYMBOLISM in poetry (as in the writing of BEI

DAO) and the avant-garde in theater (as in the plays

of Nobel laureate GAO Xingjian). Also, a number

of writers have turned to explorations of MAGIC RE-

ALISM, satire, and stream-of-consciousness writing.

Much of the writing that is done in China and in

exile by Chinese writers continues the modernist

experiment.

Works about Modernism

Ellison, David Richard. Ethics and Aesthetics in

Modernist Literature: From the Sublime to the

Uncanny. New York: Cambridge University

Press, 2001.

Fekkema, Douwe, and Elrud Ibsch. Modernist Conjec-

tures: A Mainstream in European Literature,

1910–1940. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1988.

Goldman, Merle, ed. Modern Chinese Literature in the

May Fourth Era. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Uni-

versity Press, 1985.

Gross, John, ed. The Modern Movement: A TLS Com-

panion. Chicago: University of Chicago Press,

1993.

Larson, Wendy, and Anne Wedell-Wedellsborg. Inside

Out: Modernism and Post-Modernism in Chinese

Literary Culture. Aarhus, Denmark: Aarhus Uni-

versity Press, 1993.

Lee, Leo Ou-fan. “Beyond Realism: Thoughts on

Modernist Experiments in Contemporary Chi-

nese Writing.” In Howard Goldblatt, ed., Worlds

Apart: Recent Chinese Writing and its Audiences.

Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1990.

Search for Unity: The Modernist Recourse to Eso-

teric Tradition. Austin: University of Texas Press,

1983.

300 modernism

Montale, Eugenio (1896–1981) poet

Winner of the 1975 Nobel Prize in literature, Eu-

genio Montale was born in Genoa, Italy. The

youngest of five children born to Domenico Mon-

tale, an import businessman, Montale’s formal ed-

ucation was cut short by poor health, but summers

spent observing the harsh landscape surrounding

his family’s villa on the Ligurian Riviera soon af-

fected the tone and vision of his poetry. He had

originally aspired to a career as an opera singer, but

a brief tour as an infantry officer during World

War I caused him to set his plans aside.

Montale continued to read fervently, devour-

ing the works of philosophers such as Benedetto

Croce and Henri Bergson but also delighting in the

classics of both Italian and French fiction. Return-

ing from the war, he again began to sing, but the

death of his voice teacher in 1923 caused him to

abandon his desire to pursue an operatic career

and to look instead toward a literary career.

In 1927, Montale moved to Florence where he

secured employment with a publishing house be-

fore moving on, in 1928, to accept the position as

director of the Gabinetto Viesseux research library.

He worked primarily as a critic and is best known

in this field for assisting James Joyce in promoting

Italo

SVEVO as an emerging Italian voice. At the

same time, Montale also began to establish his own

literary voice as a poet; he published his first col-

lection of poems, Bones of the Cuttlefish (1925), in

which he focused on the scenery of his childhood

summers in Liguria. Subsequent collections, such

as The Occasions (1939), became increasingly in-

trospective and focused on personal emotions set

against a background of current events.

In 1938, Montale, who had always vocally op-

posed fascism, was dismissed from his cultural po-

sition because of his refusal to join the Fascist

Party. He withdrew from public circles and ceased

to write, working instead on translations of other

writers. In particular, he became very much af-

fected by T. S.

ELIOT’s poem The Waste Land. Mon-

tale believed that this work expressed succinctly

the confusion and pessimism felt by people living

in the time between World War I and World War

II. Eliot, in turn, knew of Montale’s works and

translated his poem Arsenio into English at the

same time that Montale was working on Eliot’s

piece. The two writers, separated by vast cultural

and geographic distances, seemed to share a simi-

lar view of the world. Much of Montale’s poetry,

like Eliot’s, focuses on the dilemma of everyday life

and explores modern history, philosophy, and the

nature and effect of love on the human condition.

Montale’s third collection, The Storm and Other

Poems (1956), engaged similar themes. His fourth

collection, however, took on a slightly more auto-

biographical tone, containing elements drawn di-

rectly from the author’s life. This work, Satura

(1962; translated 1971), also experimented with

dialogue and nontraditional form. Some of the

poems are satirical in nature, particularly in their

look at the empty promises made by certain pro-

ponents of ideologies.

In 1967, Montale was made a member for life in

the Italian Senate. Shortly thereafter, in 1975, he

was awarded the Nobel Prize. His two final works

were both diaries written in verse. Diaro del ’71 e

del ’72 (1973) and Diaro di Quattro Annini (1977)

both express aspects of Montale’s own life as an

artist and as a human being. He died in Milan on

September 12, four years after his final publication.

Another Work by Eugenio Montale

Collected Poems: 1920–1954. Translated by Jonathan

Galassi. New York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1998.

A Work about Eugenio Montale

Ó Ceallacháin, Éanna. Eugenio Montale: The Poetry

of Later Years. Oxford: Legenda, 2001.

Morante, Elsa (1918–1985) novelist

Elsa Morante, best known for her critically ac-

claimed novel La Storia (1974), was born in Rome.

She left home at the age of 18 to live with an older

man, her education incomplete. A year later, how-

ever, she met the writer Alberto MORAVIA,whom

she married after a brief affair with a younger man.

Moravia recognized Morante’s natural gift as a

Morante, Elsa 301

writer and introduced her to many of the leading

Italian writers and intellectuals of the time.

Morante’s first published work, Il Gioco Segreto

(1941), was a collection of short stories, several of

which she had already published in magazines and

journals. She followed this with a children’s book,

Le bellissime avventure di Cateri dalla trecciolina

(1942). Although both works were well received,

they received little critical attention. She spent the

latter half of World War II hiding from fascist au-

thorities in the countryside. This rural environ-

ment later played a great role in her fiction.

Late in the 1940s, William Weaver, an Ameri-

can translator, befriended both Morante and

Moravia and introduced their works to an Ameri-

can audience. Simultaneously, Morante began to

translate the works of writer Katherine Mansfield.

Influenced by Mansfield’s style, Morante wrote

Menzogna e Sortilegio (1948; translated 1951)

which, with the help of Weaver, was translated into

English as House of Liars. The work presented what

would come to be Morante’s common themes of

memory, dreams, and obsessions, and the novel

gained immediate critical success.

Morante was never a prolific writer and was

critical of her own work, much of which she de-

stroyed. Her major work, La Storia (1974), trans-

lated into English as History, was set in Rome

during and after World War II and dealt with the

impact of historical events on the individual

human beings who lived them. Each of the work’s

eight sections begins with an omniscient narrator

who relates the events of the war as they are hap-

pening and then describes how these events affect

the lives of individuals, both physically and psy-

chologically. The novel was awarded the Viareggio

Prize and was adapted to film in 1985.

Morante’s final novel, Aracoeli (1982), a sensi-

tive treatment of homosexuality, was also highly

acclaimed. She continued to write, publishing es-

says and short stories, until her death in Rome.

Another Work by Elsa Morante

Arturo’s Island: A Novel. Translated by Isabel Quigley.

South Royalton, Vt.: Steerforth Press, 2002.

Moravia, Alberto (Alberto Pincherle)

(1907–1990) novelist, short-story writer,

essayist, playwright

Alberto Moravia was born in Rome to Carlo

Pincherle Moravia, an architect and painter, and

Teresa DeMarsanich, a countess. At age 9,

Moravia’s health deteriorated when he became ill

with coxitis, tuberculosis of the bone. After several

months in bed, he recovered somewhat and was

taken to Viareggio on vacation. In Life of Moravia

(1990), a book he wrote with Alain Elkann,

Moravia said, “In Viareggio, many things hap-

pened: I found out what sex was. More or less the

basic experience I narrated in Agostino, though the

situations and characters there are the fruit of in-

vention.”

Moravia published his first novel, The Time of

Indifference, in 1929, which gained him recogni-

tion. This existentialist (see

EXISTENTIALISM) novel is

the story of siblings who explore the themes of

alienation and a society that they perceive as shal-

low and false. Moravia won more praise for his two

novels Agostino (1944) and Luca (1948). He fused

the two works and published them in English

under the title Two Adolescents. The story of

Agostino, depicting themes of a teen’s sexual ex-

ploration, loss of innocence, and disillusionment

with the world, melds into the story of Luca, a 15-

year-old boy, chronicling the angst and rebellion of

the teen. It follows him through his sexual initia-

tion, a grave illness, and ultimate redemption.

Another important theme in Moravia’s novels is

the condemnation of society’s values. His works,

such as The Wheel of Fortune (1935) and Two

Women (1958), were censored and ultimately

banned by the fascist government for their allegor-

ical representation of capitalism and fascism as de-

stroyers of innocence.

Moravia told an interviewer for The Guardian,

“A writer has few themes if he is faithful to himself.

He should not have much to say, but what he has to

say he should give depth to and say in different

ways.” One recurring theme in Moravia’s novels is

the relationship between perception and reality,

between one’s internal thoughts and the outside

302 Moravia, Alberto

world. Of his own reality, in terms of his writing,

Moravia says, in Life of Moravia, “My books never

satisfy me completely. I’ve always had the impres-

sion I could improve them, make them better.”

Although Moravia may not have been satisfied

with his writing, his list of prestigious honors con-

firms his talent. Agostino was awarded the Corriere

Lombardo Prize in 1945. In 1952, he won the

Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur and the Strega

Prize.

Another Work by Alberto Moravia

The Voyeur: A Novel. Translated by Tim Parks. New

York: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1987.

A Work about Alberto Moravia

Peterson, Thomas E. Alberto Moravia. Boston:

Twayne, 1996.

Mori

Ogai (Rintar¯o Mori) (1862–1922)

novelist, short-story writer, poet, essayist

Mori

Ogai was born in the remote town of

Tsuwano to a physician during the last years of

Japan’s feudal system. A gifted student, he was

studying the Chinese classics by the age of five, and

at 19, he graduated from Tokyo Imperial Univer-

sity with a medical degree and joined the army.

The government sent Mori in 1884 to study med-

ical hygiene at German universities. While there,

he also read widely in Western literature. Shortly

after his return, he served as a medical officer dur-

ing the Sino-Japanese War (1894–95) and the

Russo-Japanese War (1904–05). In 1907, he be-

came surgeon-general. Mori retired from the army

in 1916 to become director of the Imperial House-

hold Museum and head of the Imperial Art Acad-

emy.

On his return from Germany, Mori wrote sev-

eral novellas, including The Dancing Girl (1890), a

story about an affair between a Japanese student

and a German woman in Berlin. Although his early

stories were romantic, Mori became increasingly

interested in history as a medium for storytelling.

The Wild Geese (1911–13), a romantic story of un-

requited love, is relayed as an “old tale.” Then, four

days after the ritualistic suicide of Gen. Maresuke

Nogi, who loyally followed Emperor Meiji into

death in 1912, Mori wrote “The Last Testament of

Okitsu Yagoemon,” which examines the Confucian

ideal of blind loyalty to one’s master. This short

story created a new Japanese literary genre called

rekishi sh¯osetsu (historical fiction), which Mori

used to explore ideals and character in the rapidly

changing society of early 20th-century Japan.

Mori’s renown stems from his medical accom-

plishments, complex prose style, and creation of a

new genre, adopted by such writers as AKUTAGAWA

Ry¯unosuke and Yasushi Inoue. Mori also con-

tributed to the modernization of Japanese theater

by translating more than 50 European plays. For

these accomplishments, he is regarded, along with

NATSUME S¯oseki, as one of the greatest influences

on modern Japanese literature.

Other Works by Mori O

gai

Dilworth, David, and J. Thomas Rimer, eds. Saiki K ¯oi

and Other Stories. Honolulu: University of Hawaii

Press, 1977.

Rimer, J. Thomas. Youth and Other Stories. Honolulu:

University of Hawaii Press, 1994.

Works about Mori

Ogai

Marcus, Marvin. Paragons of the Ordinary: The Bio-

graphical Literature of Mori

Ogai. Honolulu: Uni-

versity of Hawaii Press, 1993.

Rimer, John Thomas. Mori

Ogai. Boston: Twayne,

1975.

Mro˙zek, Slawomir (1930– ) playwright,

short-story writer

Slawomir Mro˙zek was born in Borzecin, near

Kraków, Poland. The son of a postal carrier,

Mro˙zek first began his career as a journalist and

cartoonist, writing satirical short articles that used

wordplay and grotesque situations as a backdrop

for their humor.

While writing for a Kraków newspaper, Mro˙zek

began to write satirical short stories. The first col-

Mro˙zek, Slawomir 303

lection of his works, Slon (1957; translated The Ele-

phant, 1967) satirized various aspects of Polish

communism in the 1960s. It was immediately suc-

cessful both critically and publicly. The title story

pokes fun at a small-town zoo which, when it is al-

located government money to acquire an elephant,

decides to save the government the money by in-

flating a large elephant-shaped balloon. They tell

visitors that the elephant is very sluggish and that

is why it hardly ever moves. Their scheme works

until a gust of wind blows the elephant away. Other

stories in the collection include a tale in which a

lion refuses to take part in the eating of Christians

because it knows that one day the Christians will

rise to power and remember its actions. Another

story focuses on an uncle who cannot tell his

nephew what a giraffe looks like because he only

reads books on marxism. When he looks through

all of his Marxist books, he discovers they say noth-

ing about giraffes, and the nephew, therefore, con-

cludes that giraffes do not exist.

In the late 1950s, Mro˙zek left journalism to

write plays. His first drama was The Police (1958).

As a playwright, he is most noted for his subtle

parody and his use of stylized language. His dra-

mas present simple situations and human behav-

iors that are taken to the absurd. Mro˙zek’s works

belong to the style of theater known as the THEATRE

OF THE ABSURD

, which creates dramatic effect

through distortion and parody.

In 1963, Mro˙zek emigrated to France and then

to Mexico. His first full-length drama, Tango

(1964; translated 1968), was first staged in 1964

and was eventually performed throughout Europe.

The play presents a satirical psychological observa-

tion of totalitarianism.

In the 1990s, Mro˙zek focused his attention on

war, the disintegration of morality, and a political

system based on genocide. Love in Crimea (1994)

focuses on the fall of the Russian empire; The

Beautiful Sight examines the Balkan War from the

point of view of two European tourists vacationing

at the seaside in the former Yugoslavia who be-

come annoyed by the interruption of the war; and

The Reverends looks at religious hypocrisy.

Mro˙zek continues to write and to express his

views about the tragedy still facing much of East-

ern Europe in the 21st century. His works are in-

fluential both from their political standpoint and

in their accurate representation of history in the

making.

Another Work by Slawomir Mro˙zek

Striptease; Tango; Vatzlav: Three Plays by Slawomir

Mro˙zek. New York: Grove, 1981.

A Work about Slawomir Mro˙zek

Stephan, Halina. Translating the Absurd: Drama and

Prose of Slawomir Mro˙zek. Amsterdam: Rodopi,

1997.

Müller, Heiner (1929–1995) dramatist

Heiner Müller was born in Eppendorf, Saxony,

into a working-class family. His father, a socialist,

was beaten, arrested, and lost his job during the

Nazi regime. Müller too became a socialist and was

a civil servant in East Germany and later worked as

a journalist and technical writer for the East Ger-

man Writers’ Union. He honed his skills as a

dramatist working at the Maxim Gorki Theater in

East Berlin in the late 1950s.

Müller wrote three plays with his wife, Inge

Müller. The pair won the Heinrich

MANN Prize in

1959. Their collaborative work Der Lohndrücker

(The Wage Shark, 1957) was a critique of working

conditions in East Germany. Because the Müllers

refused to whitewash negative aspects of the so-

cialist state, their own government disapproved of

their plays, but their works were more successful in

the West. After the government forced Müller to

abandon contemporary subjects, he began to write

adaptations of classical works in the 1960s; how-

ever, he added his own interpretations to the plays

of Sophocles, Shakespeare, and the Soviet drama-

tist Mikhail SHOLOKHOV. These adaptations finally

brought Müller fame in East Germany: He won the

prestigious BÜCHNER Prize in 1985.

Müller’s writing reflects a strong influence

from Bertolt BRECHT. Although his dialectical dra-

304 Müller, Heiner

mas elicited official disapproval in East Germany,

Müller’s work with classic dramas earned him

widespread acclaim. His biographer Jonathon

Kalb notes in The Theater of Heiner Müller (1984)

that Müller saw “that overvaluation of originality,

the bourgeois-era cult of the absolutely new, was

a factor in the devaluation of history (in the West

and East), and responded with a string of texts

that refused to treat originality with proper capi-

talistic seriousness.” He is also known for com-

bining lyrical prose with poetry to create

language in his plays. Müller frequently depicted

the individual’s struggle with society, and his

works address the causes of late 20th-century

German angst.

Another Work by Heiner Müller

A Heiner Müller Reader: Plays, Poetry, Prose. Edited

and translated by Carl Weber. Baltimore: Johns

Hopkins University Press, 2001.

A Work about Heiner Müller

Kalb, Jonathon. The Theater of Heiner Müller. Mu-

nich: C. H. Beck, 1984.

Munonye, John (1929– ) novelist

John Munonye was born in Akokwa, Imo State,

Nigeria. He was the fourth of seven children.

Munonye’s father, a farmer, worked hard to send

him to Christian schools. He first completed his

undergraduate education at the University of

Ibadan before leaving for London to obtain his

masters in education at the University of London’s

Institute of Education. Munonye returned to Nige-

ria in 1954 and worked as a teacher for three years.

He was promoted to the positions of administrator

and school inspector in 1958, and he became prin-

cipal of the Advanced Teachers College in 1970.

Munonye’s writings reflect the cultural and psy-

chological conflict he experienced balancing tradi-

tional Igbo values and Western ideology. His

themes consist of the predicament of the common

person’s struggle in a rapidly modernizing world,

colonial experience, cultural conflict, family fric-

tion,and love.In The Oil Man of Obange (1971),

for example, Munonye tells the tragic tale of a

palm-oil seller’s sacrifice for his children in colo-

nial Nigeria. Jeri, the main protagonist, literally

works himself to death to give his children a West-

ern education. In The Only Son (1966), Munonye

begins a trilogy that examines issues of religious

differences and the generation gap between old

and young people in Nigerian society.

Munonye’s literary achievements tend to be

overshadowed by the popularity of fellow Nigerian

Chinua ACHEBE, whom he used as a model for his

writings. Unlike Achebe, however, Munonye incor-

porates humor into his reflections of the somber

realities of life in colonial Nigeria. Munonye is a

member of the first generation of Nigerian writers

to write about their pasts in the initial stages of

Nigeria’s independence. His writing represents a

voice among many, which bespeaks a clear opti-

mism tainted by apprehension.

Works about John Munonye

Lindfors, Bernth. Dem-Say: Interviews with Eight

Nigerian Authors. Austin, Tex: African and

Afro-American Studies and Research Center,

1974.

Nnolim, Charles E. “Structure and Theme in

Munonye’s The Oil Man of Obange.” African Lit-

erature Today 12 (1982): 163–73.

Munro, Alice (1931– ) novelist, short-story

writer

Alice Munro was born Alice Laidlaw in Wingham,

Ontario, to Robert Laidlaw and Ann Chamney.

During the Depression, her father bred silver foxes.

Munro began college at the University of Western

Ontario but left in 1951 to marry James Munro.

During the 1950s and 1960s, she privately wrote

short stories. Her first collection, Dance of the

Happy Shades, was published in 1968 and drew on

her own experiences; for example, the story “Boys

and Girls” begins, “My father was a fox farmer.

That is, he raised silver foxes, in pens; and in the

fall and early winter....”

Munro, Alice 305

After the success of her first work, Munro con-

tinued publishing stories and novels. She writes

“regional” fiction, realistic, domestic stories about

ordinary people grounded in a particular region,

Western Ontario; she was inspired by southern

U.S. writers such as Eudora Welty. Her second

work, Lives of Girls and Women (1971), is an

episodic novel set in Jubilee, Ontario, and explores

the emotional and imaginative development of the

protagonist Del Jordan. Geoffrey Wolff of Time

magazine noted the homespun realism of the

work: “The book is a fiction for people who like to

read brittle, yellow clips from newspapers pub-

lished in towns where they never lived, who like to

look through the snapshot albums of imperfect

strangers.”

Who Do You Think You Are? (1978), considered

Munro’s best work, is a collection of interrelated

stories that follow the life of a character named

Rose through childhood, college, marriage, and

back to her childhood home. It explores the dark

secrets underneath the surface of small-town life,

such as incest and abuse: “He shakes her and hits

her against the wall, he kicks her legs. She is inco-

herent, insane, shrieking. Forgive me! Oh please,

forgive me!” One of Munro’s hallmarks is the co-

herence of her short story collections, as critic

Ildiko de Papp Carrington notes: “Although eight

of the ten stories in Who Do You Think You Are?

were originally published separately, the collection

constitutes an organic whole.” The collection was

short listed for the

BOOKER PRIZE. Munro’s latest

collection of short stories, Hateship, Friendship,

Courtship, Loveship, Marriage, continues her ex-

ploration of life in rural Ontario. Critic Beverly

Rasporich contends that “the fictional world that

Munro creates is an expanding, visionary location

but at the same time always recognizably hers.”

Another work by Alice Munro

Selected Stories. New York: Knopf, 1996.

A Work about Alice Munro

Howells, Coral Ann. Alice Munro. New York: St. Mar-

tin’s Press, 1998.

Murakami Haruki (1949– ) novelist,

short-story writer

Murakami Haruki was born in Kyoto, Japan, to

Murakami Chiaki and Miyuki, both teachers, who

often discussed classical poetry and medieval war

tales at home. Thus instilled with a love of litera-

ture, Murakami entered the drama program at

Waseda University with the intention of becoming

a scriptwriter. After graduating, Murakami, with

his wife, Yo¯ko, opened a prosperous jazz club called

Peter Cat in Tokyo. Then in 1986, Murakami

moved to Europe, where he lived for most of a

decade.

Reputedly inspired by a baseball game he at-

tended in 1978, Murakami began to write novels,

publishing his first a year later. Hear the Wind Sing

(1979) is a retrospective story based on bar con-

versations between the unnamed protagonist, boku

(I), and his friend “the Rat.” The book won Gunz¯o

magazine’s New Novelist Prize.

His next novels further developed the character

of boku, an everyman who represents the inner

workings of the mind. In 1985, Hard-Boiled Won-

derland and the End of the World split the world of

boku in two: the real and the fantastic. Murakami

then spent two years at Princeton University where

he researched his next two books, South of the Bor-

der, West of the Sun (1998) and The Wind-up Bird

Chronicle (1997). Since the 1995 sarin gas attack on

a Tokyo subway, Murakami has published two vol-

umes of interviews with both the victims and the

members of the religious sect that took responsi-

bility for the attack.

Murakami is regarded as one of the first Japan-

ese authors at ease with the Westernization of

Japan, largely due to his incorporation of foreign

words into his prose and his open portrayal of

postwar Japan. He has won the Tanizaki Jun’ichir¯o

Prize and the Yomiuri Literary Award.

Other Works by Murakami Haruki

The Elephant Vanishes. Translated by Alfred Birn-

baum and Jay Rubin. New York: Vintage Interna-

tional, 1993.

306 Murakami Haruki

A Wild Sheep Chase. Translated by Alfred Birnbaum.

Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1989.

Works about Murakami Haruki

Aoki Tamotsu. “Murakami Haruki and Contempo-

rary Japan.” Translated by Matthew Strecher. In

John W. Treat, ed., Contemporary Japan and Pop-

ular Culture. Honolulu: University of Hawaii

Press, 1996.

Rubin, Jay. “Murakami Haruki’s Two Poor Aunts Tell

Everything They Know About Sheep, Wells, Uni-

corns, Proust, and Elephants.” In Stephen Snyder

and Philip Gabriel, eds., Ôe and Beyond: Fiction in

Contemporary Japan. Honolulu: University of

Hawaii Press, 1999.

Musil, Robert von Edler (1880–1942)

novelist, playwright

Robert Musil was born in Klagenfurt, Austria, to

Alfred Musil, a professor of engineering at the

Technical University of Brunn and an arms manu-

facturer, and Hermine Musil. Robert Musil’s child-

hood was difficult: His father was devoted to his

career, and his mother was involved in an affair

with Robert Musil’s private tutor for many years.

In elementary school, Musil had a nervous break-

down as a result of frequent family dramas at

home. At the age of 12, he was sent away to a mili-

tary academy by his father and, between 1898 and

1901, attended the Technical University of Brunn.

Forced to study engineering by his domineering

father, Musil finally revolted, left for Germany, and

decided to study philosophy instead. In 1908, he

received a doctorate in philosophy from the Uni-

versity of Berlin.

Musil began his writing career as a student at

the University of Berlin. In 1906, he published his

first novel, Young Torless, which was based on his

experiences in the military academy. Although

Musil’s work was somewhat popular, he could not

support himself by writing; from 1911 to 1914, he

worked as a librarian in Vienna. He served in the

Austrian army during World War I and, after being

wounded, edited the army newspaper. After the

war, Musil worked in various administrative ca-

pacities for the ministry of defense, but he lost his

position and became a full-time writer and jour-

nalist in the 1920s.

After producing a number of short plays and

satires, Musil concentrated on writing his major

work, The Man Without Qualities (1930–43). This

monumental novel describes the social, cultural,

and political life during the last days of the Habs-

burg empire. In a style often compared to Marcel

PROUST’s, Musil focused on the emotional and in-

tellectual development of the individual and con-

centrated on such themes as sexuality and survival.

The attention that Musil devoted to this work led

to the financial ruin of the family. Ulrich, the pro-

tagonist of the novel, a highly educated but psy-

chologically immature man, desires to find his

place in modern life. He undergoes a deep emo-

tional transformation, marked by an almost psy-

chologically incestuous relationship with his sister

Agathe.

Married to a Jewish woman, Musil feared perse-

cution by the Nazis and fled Austria for Switzer-

land in 1938. In Switzerland, he published a

number of short essays; however, he remained an

obscure writer. Robert Musil died in poverty and

without due recognition. Most of his works have

been rediscovered and published since his death.

Today, Musil is considered one of the great writers

of Austria. His works have been translated into

more than 20 different languages.

Other Works by Robert Musil

Diaries, 1899–1941. Translated by Philip Payne. New

York: Basic Books, 2000.

Five Women. Translated by Eithne Wilkins. New York:

David R. Gordon, 1999.

Precision and Soul: Essays and Addresses. Chicago:

University of Chicago Press, 1995.

A Work about Robert Musil

Jonsson, Stephen. Subject Without a Nation: Robert

Musil and the History of Modern Identity. Durham,

N.C.: Duke University Press, 2001.

Musil, Robert von Edler 307