Week 14 Reading Notes A : Postwar Lit

Postwar Lit. 1945-1968 (671-675)

• United States vs. Soviet Union - conflicting ideals, a republic vs communism. Americans historically hate communists. Counters the culture and existence of our country and we like to be right about everything. Our way is the best way. (Ideology not reality)
• “To avoid planetary disaster, the two sides fought wars by proxy, notably in Korea ( 1950 - 53) in Vietnam ( 1955 - 75). “ (671). - playing war with other players, against those who are like them yet not them. No sides win these conflicts. There are only losers. There is only death.
• Stalin’s techniques were adapted by communist China after his death (Mao’s China) (672).
• China’s “Great Leap Forward (1958-59)= famine that resulted in approximately twenty million deaths. This is an astronomical number in just ONE year time. That is way OVER 5,000 people dead per day!
• China’s Cultural Revolution (1966- Mao’s death in 1976) “attacked intellectuals and the middle classes, resulting in the distraction of most of the countries functioning institutions. “ (672) - I do not know much about this or what the text mean by functioning institutions? Schools? Factories? Family stores?
• Smallpox 1970’s eliminated in developed nations. - Good medical advancements for the western countries.
• Post war thinkers and writers still struggled to understand and interpret the Holocaust.  
• “... the theme of choice became critical to a generation of authors…” (672)
• Existentialism
• Neorealism, intense irony, individual consciousness, modernist technique. (675)

So much pain and violence all across the world during this time. It is so terrible to think about how people must have felt. We live in a relatively peaceful time now compared to then. Growing up in those days must have felt like the world was about to end.

There was also a time of growth. Rebuilding and new jobs for people who survived. New opportunities for marginalized people. Such as the end of segregation in America (674). Civil rights laws and movements gained more momentum as the times progressed.