Abhinav Prasad TCAS-The Movement Poetry in English Literature

The Movement Poetry in English Literature

1. Abhinav
Prasad
T.Y.B.A. Sem
6
Roll. No.
145

2. Presentation On
The Movement
Poetry
Guided By
DR. Yagnesh
Dhoriya

3. 1.
•OVERVIEW

4. There have been several controversies and debate regarding the existence of this
movement in 1950’s.
Each decade of a century has thrown up a poetic idiom to match the time.
Throughout the twentieth century, modern British poetry progressively
moved away from centre to include a wide range from Northern Ireland,
Scotland, Wales.
When war broke out in 1939, the impulse to warn which had characterised the
people.

5. 2.
•The Movement

6. The Movement refers to the particular movement of the 1950s with a definite group of poets,
characteristics, specific aims and manifesto, and its identity as an important document in
literature.
The Movement was a reaction against the excessive romanticism of the previous
identifiable major movement in British poetry; the New Apocalyptics.
The Movement produced two anthologies: Poets of the 1950’s by D.J.Enright (1955) and The
New Lines (1956) by Robert Conquest.
He described the connection between the poets as ——‘little more than a negative
determination to avoid bad principles’

7. The introduction to the New Lines targeted the excesses of the 1940 poets
especially Dylan Thomas and Barker.
A second New Lines anthology appeared in 1963, by which time The
Movement came into existence in the shape of The Group.
The Movement in general, seems to have played an important and
significant role in leading English poetry from Modernism to
Postmodernism.
Thus it can be perceived that the Movement has staged a rebellion against
the modern poetry of the 1920s, represented by Eliot and Pound.

8. 3.
•Origin & Development
of Movement

9. The Key factors responsible for the origin and development of the
Movement were the Friendships made at Oxford and Cambridge between
the different Movement poets.
Another major role was played by Journalism in the development of the
Movement.
The Movement took its first breath in Oxford and then in Cambridge in
the 1940s when the young writers came close to one another.
Their interaction with one another influenced their writing in the beginning
of their career as literary artists.

10. By 1951, the first stage of the Oxford influence on the Movement had been
completed.
This was underscored by Bateson founding Essays in Criticism as a
match to the work of Scrutiny.
Essays in Criticism became the only Oxford “contact” between
Movement poets as the poets dispersed in different directions later on.
Morrison remarks “Without those friendships neither the group
──
programme nor the impressive individual works which emerged out of it
would have not been possible.”

11. 9
Movement
Poets

12. Philip Larkin
(9Aug 1922-2 Dec 1985)
Kingsley Amis
(16 Oct 1922- 22 Oct
1995)
John Wain
(14 Mar 1925- 24 May
1994)
Robert Conquest
(15 July 1917- 3 Aug
2015)
John Holloway
(1947)

13. Thom Gunn
(29 Aug 1929- 25 April
2004)
D.J. Enright
(11 March 1920- 31 Dec
2002)
Donald Davie
(17 july 1922- 18 Sept
1995)
Elizabeth Jennings
(18 July 1926- 26 Oct 2001)

14. 3.
•Major Traits of the
Movement Poetry

15. 1. Simple Themes and Subject Matter:
The subject matter of the Movement poem is common human
experience.
It has little to do with the myth poetic tendency of the
Modernists.
The Movement poets wrote their poems on simple subject and in
Straight- forward manner.

16. 2. Englandism and Provincialism
The Movement Poets cultivated Englandism, provincialism,
regionalism and Londonism.
Davie defended English culture and civilization as the poetic
subject in his essay England as a Poetic Subject.
Their poetries were provincial because of their concern and love
for England.

17. 3.Concern with the reader:
The modernists were unattached to the readers and hence
were isolationists and did not care for the readers.
In contrast to the modernists the Movement poets feel a keen
attachment to their readers.
All most all poets preferred ‘we’ instead of ‘I’ of the Modernists and
‘they’ of the sociological approach.

18. 4.Syntax
The significant point to be noted regarding Movement diction
is its control of strict economy in the use of metaphor.
The Movement’s use of syntax is totally opposed to the
symbolist use of it.
The strength of Movement verse lies in its compactness and
closeness of expression which are products of an appropriate
handling of syntax.

19. 4.
•Dispersion

20. After the publication of the New Lines in 1954 the group affinity
began to dissolve.
Then the lines diverged. They united for a common cause.
In 1957 John Wain wrote “The revolt is now over. Its work is
─
done”.
The Movement gradually lost its recognition.