Modernism and Mimesis

Stephen D. Dowden is Professor of German Language and Literature at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts, USA.

• 1. Chapter 1:  Uneasy Modernism.- 2. Chapter 2:  Novelistic Style and the Disappearance of Breakfast.- 3. Chapter 3:  Painting the World Picture.- 4. Chapter 4:  Music as Natural Magic.- 5. Chapter 5: The Gift of Babel.

“Modernism and Mimesis boldly reassesses the massively overused term »modernism. «What is more–because this is not merely a terminological debate–Dowden seeks in this study to elucidate the thing itself. Wide-ranging in its purview, this ambitious book examines not only literature, but painting and music as well.” (Georg Mein/Rolf Parr/William Collins Donahue, andererseits – Yearbook of Transatlantic German Studies, Issue (11-12), 2022-2023)“Modernism and Mimesis is a major study that reclaims literary modernism from abstruse erudition and places it squarely within an egalitarian framework of aesthetic play. … Dowden’s passion to ground the significance of art and to justify its distinctive epistemology is worthy of careful consideration. … Modernism and Mimesis passionately recommends modernism to its readers as the kind of art most likely to produce insight and enlightenment in the modern age. This is thus a work of advocacy, not just dispassionate academic elucidation.” (William Collins Donahue, LA Review of Books, lareviewofbooks.org, January 5, 2023)