SOURCE: WIKIPEDIA
1. William Carlos Williams(1883-1963) was closely associated with the modernism and Imagist movement. The Caribbean culture in the family had an important influence on William. English was not his language of communication until he was a teenager. While he wrote in English, the poet's first language was Spanish.
2. A physician by profession, William published his first book, Poems in 1909. While studying medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, he met Ezra Pound. His second book, Tempers was published by London Press with the assistance of his friend Ezra Pound.
3. Later, Carlos's brand of modernism differed from Pound and H.D(he too met H.D at Penn). He derived modernist inspiration from his immediate environment. In 1920, he published his experimental book Kora in Hell: Improvisations. It was met with huge criticism from the contemporary imagists for being incoherent and flippant.
4. In 1923,William published Spring and All, one of his highly influential collection of poems. It contained classic poems like- ' By the Road to the Contagious Hospital' , ' The Red Wheelbarrow', and ' To Elsie'. However, in 1922 Eliot's ' The Waste Land ' had already become a literary sensation and it overshadowed Carlos's brand of modernism.
5. William Carlos also wrote an introduction to Allen Ginsberg's first book Howl and Other Poems(1956). Ginsberg was an artistic ally of Carlos. His letters to Carlos have been an inspiration in writing the fifth section of his epic, Paterson( published between 1946 and 1958)
6. Carlos guided many young poets and also influenced many American literary movements of the 1950s- Beat Movement, the San Francisco School, Black Mountain School and New York School.
7. On going through his experimental works, we can say he was the champion of European Avant Garde. William and his allies wished to cut the cords with derivative style. As a result, he started the magazine Contact with Hartley. The aim of the magazine was to give encouragement and emphasis to artist's direct sense of experience and rejecting traditional notions of rules.
8. In May 1963, he was awarded Booker Prize posthumously for Pictures of Brueghel and Other Poems(1962). William also won the first National Book Award for Poetry. It recognized both the third volume of Paterson and Selected Poems.
9. Ford Maddox Ford (1873-1939) was an English poet, novelist, critic and editor. His journals- The English Review and The Transatlantic Review were instrumental in developing early twentieth century British and American literature.
10. Maddox's work-The Good Soldier (1915), the Parade's End Tetralogy(1924-1928), the Fifth Queen trilogy (1906-1908) - have an irreplaceable place in the annals of literature.
11. The Good Soldier (1915), one of Ford's most famous work has a ' Dedicatory Letter to Stella Ford' in the preface of the novel. The novel is about the two expatriate ' perfect couples' weaved in flashbacks.
12. Ford enlisted in the army at the age of 41. His previous war experience and propaganda activities inspired his tetralogy Parade's End (1924-28). The novel is set in England before, during and after World War I .
13. Ford collaborated with Joseph Conrad in writing three novels- The Inheritors (1901), Romance, and Nature of a Crime (1924). The Fifth Queen Trilogy (1906-1908) is based on the life of Catherine Howard. Conrad said about the novel as, 'the swan song of historical romance.'
14. Ford's poem 'Antwerp' (1915) was admired by Eliot. He said ' the only good poem I have met with on the subject of war.'
15. Another of Ford's novel 'Ladies Whose Bright Eyes' (1911) is a time-travel novel. It is similar to Twain's classic A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. Ford was also a model for the character Braddocks in Hemingway's 'The Sun Also Rises'.
16. Realism is an art movement which depicts things as they are. The representation is without artificiality, imaginary elements and supernatural elements. Naturalism, though considered as an offshoot of Realism has a scientific bent in presenting reality. The latter avoids social issues and politics.
17. While Realism depicted things as they are, naturalism inquired into why things were that way. It took into account environment, heredity and social conditions into account. The naturalist were influenced by Charles Darwin's theory of evolution.
18. The term naturalism was coined by Emile Zola. The author maintains detachment and disinterested point of view. Zola influenced by the scientific method of August Comte argued that characters should function as phenomena in literature and naturalism should be a controlled scientific method. Zola's famous work is La Debacle.
19. Realism and Naturalism originated in France. In the mid nineteenth century, in French literature, the works of Stendhal marks the beginning of Realism, whereas in Russia, the works of Pushkin offer a start to the movement.
20. In American literature, William Dean Howell's The Rise of Silas Lapham(1885) gives a start to Realism. Other writers like: Samuel Clemens also known as Mark Twain( The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn), Frank Norris( McTeague: A Story of San Francisco), Stephen Crane (The Red Badge of Courage), John Steinbeck, were also prominent writers of the Realist art movement.
21. Some of the major writers and their works in realist and naturalist style are:
1) Honore de Balzac- La Comedie Humaine
2) Gustave Flaubert- Madame Bovary
3) Arnold Bennett- Clayhanger and The Old Wives Tale
4) John Osborne- Look Back In Anger ( Kitchen Sink Drama)
5) Eca de Queiroz- famous Portuguese writer in realist style
22. The term Stream of Consciousness was coined by William James in 1890 in his work The Principles of Psychology and in 1918, the novelist May Sinclair applied the term in her work. (PAPER2, Q27, 2004)
23. Stream of Consciousness is a narrative technique which depicts multitudinous thoughts and feelings which pass through the mind.
24. Pointed Roofs(1915) by Dorothy Richardson, first work in the series of 13 semi-autobiographical books titled 'Pilgrimage' is the first complete stream of consciousness novel published in English.
25. The main precursors of the stream of consciousness technique have been Laurence Sterne's 'Tristram Shandy'(1757), Poe's story ' The Tell-Tale Heart'(1843), Tolstoy's ' War and Peace' (1869), Edouard Dujardin's Les Lauriers sont coupes (1887) and Ambrose Bierce's An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge(1890).