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Although the rise of the bureaucratic state was one of the most startling transformations of early twentieth-century British society, novelists raised on a diet of laissez-faire liberalism tended to shy away from direct representations of bureaucracy (with some prominent exceptions, such as the Circumlocution Office in Charles Dickens's Little Dorrit or Anthony Trollope's Three Clerks). Although squarely set within the "governing-class spirit" of Westminster and populated with a bevy of civil servants, Virginia Woolf's Mrs Dalloway tends to be read as maintaining a strict public-private division with a marked preference for the richness and beauty of private life. This article argues that Woolf, no stranger to the civil service through her family and personal networks, had a more strained and ambivalent response to bureaucracy as an idea and government form. A close reading of the structural importance of Hugh Whitbread's character, a minor figure who is often read as an empty, flat Dickensian caricature of the gentleman, shows a more ambivalent response to how bureaucracy and its forms impacted the wider concerns raised about governmentality in Woolf's novel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay examines Ezra Pound's behind-the-scenes control of the little review Four Pages, which ran for fifteen issues from 1948 to 1951. After his return to the United States in 1945 to face charges of treason, Pound was declared mentally incompetent and institutionalized in amental hospital in the nation's capital. With his publishers attempting to rehabilitate Pound's public standing by spotlighting his purely "literary" efforts, Pound had to resort to anonymous publication to continue to have a say on contemporary matters. This essay shows how Pound essentially created and edited a little review to have a venue that pushed his social and political ideas at a time when doing so openly was problematic for legal and political reasons. The use of anonymity as a writer and editor was part of the wider "literary camouflage" that Four Pages engaged in to advance Pound's wider cultural and political agenda. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of the ill-fated 1922 Congress of Paris, an international conference organized by Andre Breton, was to diagnose the sources of the "modern spirit." Although the congress had ambitious international goals, it was brought down by a remark with xenophobic connotations. Largely remembered today as the death knell of Paris Dada--the public fight between Tristan Tzara and Breton meant not only that the congress never took place but also that Paris Dada was dissolved--the congress's failure stemmed from the tensions involved in self-consciously defining modernism. Arguing that ambivalence over the concept shaped the main participants' understanding of the congress, I read the congress as a concrete manifestation of the impulse to federate the arts in post-World War I France. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the depiction of the social group Bright Young People in modern British literature, which activities were covered by journal "Criterion" amid criticisms on the mission of the newspaper. Topics discussed include their lives in three novels in the 1930s including "Vile Bodies," by Evelyn Waugh and Henry Green's "Party Going" and how the Bright Young People were considered a class apart due to their language.

In this article the author discusses meanings of "generation" in context with world literatures which is affected by World War II, terrorist attacks on the U.S. on September 11, 2001, and military involvement of U.S. in Afghanistan. He mentions that the generational language has been well exploited by French, Spanish, and Hispano-American literary scholars but has not found its place in American or British scholarship. He mentions the contributions of authors Robert Wohl and Samuel Hynes.

The article discusses the monocle as a social symbol of modernity during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The role that the monocle played in social identity, including of aristocrats, military officers, dandies, women and avant-gardists, is discussed. The relationship between modernist fashion and the wearing of the monocle, including as depicted in the main character of the short story "The Monocle," within the book "Two or Three Graces and Other Stories," by Aldous Huxley, is discussed.

The article critiques the diary section of the book "Blindness," by Henry Green, interpreting it as a reflection on the author's own life. It addresses the common reading of the diary section as a means of establishing the protagonist's artistic abilities, and refutes this interpretation based on the amount of personal information contained in the diary section. It comments on errors in the book's chronology, speculations into Green's life, and reading the novel as an autobiography.

The essay discusses the professionalization of novel-writing in Great Britain throughout the 1920s. Emphasis is given to the publishing of young British writers largely affected by the destruction of World War I. The author explains that young authors were published because post-war youth culture became largely synonymous with British national identity in this era. The importance of Alec Waugh's "The Loom of Youth," which dealt with Great Britain's public school system, to the increased popularity of young authors and literature dealing with youth is assessed.

An essay is presented on the different methods of presenting a back story in novels. It provides an analysis on the narrative presentation on the summary of the novel based on the technical concept of fabula and sujet. An effective backstory must contain all the necessary information which provides an overview of the novel.

Henry Green’s 1946 novel Back is effectively cut in two because at the arithmetic middle of the book, there is a translated (and quite long) passage from the purportedly eighteenth century Souvenirs of the Marquise de Créquy. While most critics have agreed upon the importance of this passage to the novel, not only structurally but thematically, none have actually looked into the original source and considered the most crucial thing about it: the original source was a forgery. When considering the forged status of this passage and its vital importance to Back, our reading of Green’s novel must change drastically: no longer does the novel read as a quest for authenticity on the part of its protagonist, the disabled war veteran Charley Summers. Rather, one must consider the possibility of a true self in a world of forgery and duplicity. This also implicates our understandings of modernist intertextual practices. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A literary criticism of the book "A House for Mr. Biswas," by V.S. Naipaul is presented. It mentions that the first chapter of the book is named "Pastoral". The book views pastoral as a literary form and also explores the institution and tradition of British literary. It examines the various aspects of a colonial society.