Ephemeral Modernisms
W.B. Yeats’ 1919 paradigmatic claim that “things fall apart, the centre cannot hold” encapsulates the twentieth-century fascination with figuring and conceptualizing the inevitability of instability and the certainty of entropy. For this panel, we are seeking papers on modernisms or modernist studies that dwell in the crumbling center. Approaches may include an investigation of:
Decay
Decline
Decomposition
Ephemerality
Exhaustion
Fragmentation
Half-lives
Ruins
While The Waste Landmay attempt to “shore” the world’s “fragments,” we are instead interested in the places where decay, exhaustion, or fragmentation itself are central to a work.
Please submit a 250-word abstract and a brief bio to Christopher Walker (Christopher.Walker@Colby.edu) and Nissa Cannon (ncannon@bu.edu) by 3/2