Modernism and Nihilism PDF
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Modernism and … Series Editor: Roger Griffin, Professor in Modern History, Oxford Brookes University, UK. The series Modernism and ... invites experts in a wide range of cultural, social, scien- tific and political phenomena to explore the relationship between a particular topic in modern history and ‘modernism’. Apart from their intrinsic value as short but groundbreaking specialist monographs, the books aim through their cumulative impact to expand the application of this highly contested term beyond its conven- tional remit of art and aesthetics. Our definition of modernism embraces the vast profusion of creative acts, reforming initiatives, and utopian projects that, since the late nineteenth century, have sought either to articulate, and so symbolically tran- scend, the spiritual malaise or decadence of modernity, or to find a radical solution to it through a movement of spiritual, social, political – even racial – regeneration and renewal. The ultimate aim is to foster a spirit of transdisciplinary collaboration in shifting the structural forces that define modern history beyond their c onventional conceptual frameworks. Titles include: Marius Turda MODERNISM AND EUGENICS Shane Weller MODERNISM AND NIHILISM Forthcoming titles: Tamir Bar-On MODERNISM AND THE EUROPEAN NEW RIGHT Maria Bucur MODERNISM AND GENDER Frances Connelly MODERNISM AND THE GROTESQUE Elizabeth Darling MODERNISM AND DOMESTICITY Matthew Feldman MODERNISM AND PROPAGANDA Claudio Fogu MODERNISM AND MEDITERRANEANISM Roger Griffin MODERNISM AND TERRORISM Ben Hutchinson MODERNISM AND STYLE 99778800223300223311003300__0011__pprreevviiiiii..iinndddd ii 1111//11//22001100 1122::5599::1188 PPMM Carmen Kuhling MODERNISM AND NEW RELIGIONS Patricia Leighten MODERNISM AND ANARCHISM Thomas Linehan MODERNISM AND BRITISH SOCIALISM Gregory Maertz MODERNISM AND NAZI PAINTING Paul March-Russell MODERNISM AND SCIENCE FICTION Anna Katharina Schaffner MODERNISM AND PERVERSION Richard Shorten MODERNISM AND TOTALITARIANISM Mihai Spariosu MODERNISM, EXILE AND UTOPIA Roy Starrs MODERNISM AND JAPANESE CULTURE Erik Tonning MODERNISM AND CHRISTIANITY Veronica West-Harling MODERNISM AND THE QUEST Modernism and ... Series Standing Order ISBN 978–0–230–20332–7 (Hardback) 978–0–230–20334–4 (Paperback) (outside North America only) You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order. Please contact your bookseller or, in case of difficulty, write to us at the address below with your name and address, the title of the series and the ISBN quoted above. Customer Services Department, Macmillan Distribution Ltd, Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS, England 99778800223300223311003300__0011__pprreevviiiiii..iinndddd iiii 1111//11//22001100 1122::5599::1188 PPMM MODERNISM AND NIHILISM Shane Weller 99778800223300223311003300__0011__pprreevviiiiii..iinndddd iiiiii 1111//11//22001100 1122::5599::1199 PPMM © Shane Weller 2011 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted his right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2011 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. Palgrave Macmillan in the US is a division of St Martin’s Press LLC, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010. Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies and has companies and representatives throughout the world. Palgrave® and Macmillan® are registered trademarks in the United States, the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries. ISBN 978–0–230–23103–0 hardback ISBN 978–0–230–23104–7 paperback This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of the country of origin. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Weller, Shane. Modernism and nihilism / Shane Weller. p. cm. ISBN 978–0–230–23104–7 (pbk.) 1. Philosophy, Modern. 2. Nihilism. I. Title. B791. W45 2011 149'.8—dc22 2010034765 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 Printed and bound in Great Britain by CPI Antony Rowe, Chippenham and Eastbourne 99778800223300223311003300__0011__pprreevviiiiii..iinndddd iivv 1111//11//22001100 1122::5599::1199 PPMM In memory of my father John Jeremy Weller (1938–2010) 99778800223300223311003300__0011__pprreevviiiiii..iinndddd vv 1111//11//22001100 1122::5599::1199 PPMM This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Introduction: Modernity, Modernism, Nihilism 1 Part I: Philosophical Modernism and Nihilism 15 1. From the French Revolution to Nietzsche 17 2. Nietzsche’s Long Shadow 42 Part II: Aesthetic Modernism and Nihilism 75 3. From Flaubert to Dada 77 4. Kafka and After 102 Part III: Postmodernism and Nihilism 137 5. Our Only Chance? 139 Bibliography 166 Index 177 99778800223300223311003300__0011__pprreevviiiiii..iinndddd vviiii 1111//11//22001100 1122::5599::1199 PPMM This page intentionally left blank INTRODUCTION: MODERNITY, MODERNISM, NIHILISM In the field of modernism studies, it has long been the accepted practice to consider modernism primarily, if not exclusively, as an aesthetic phenomenon. As Roger Griffin argues in Modernism and Fascism (2007), however, there are also philosophical and political forms of modernism, and if one wishes to move towards a more com- prehensive understanding of the movement, then one has to analyse all three forms in a manner that takes account of their relation to one another. The second major claim made by Griffin in his work on fascism is that modernism in this broader sense is to be understood as a reaction against a modernity that is seen to have passed from a revolutionary, progressive phase in the late eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth century, to a decadent and ultimately nihil- ist phase in the later nineteenth and first half of the twentieth cen- tury. In short, modernism is a ‘revolt against decadence’, an attempt both to destroy that which, in the realms of philosophy, politics, and aesthetics, no longer effectively bestows shape and meaning on experience, and to find ‘new sources of meaning, spirituality, and communality’ (Griffin 2007: 52). At their most fundamental level, all forms of modernism, be they philosophical, political, or aesthetic, are committed to the idea of palingenesis, to the rebirth of culture in a form that is uncontaminated by the spiritual sickness besetting modernity. As David Harvey remarks, however, modernism is ‘a troubled and fluctuating aesthetic response to conditions of modernity pro- duced by a particular process of modernization’ (Harvey 1989: 98). These fluctuations are nowhere more evident than in the history of modernism’s relation to the concept of nihilism. If one is to begin to grasp in its complexity the relationship between modernity, modern- ism, and nihilism as a whole, then, as we shall see, the c onjunction 1
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