In Modernism, Mass Culture and Professionalism Thomas Strychacz
argues that modernist writers need to be understood both in their
relationship to professional critics and in their relationship to
an era and ethos of professionalism. In studying four modernist
writers--Henry James, Theodore Dreiser, John Dos Passos and
Nathanael West--Strychacz finds that contrary to what most studies
suggest, modernist writers (in the period of 1880-1940) are
thoroughly caught up in the ideas and expressive forms of mass
culture rather than opposed to them. Despite this, modernist
writers seek to distinguish their ideas and styles from mass
culture, particularly by making their works esoteric. In doing so,
modernist writers are reproducing one of the main tenets of all
professional groups, which is to gain social authority by forming a
community around a difficult language inaccessible to the public at
large. While their modernism arises out of the nature of their
encounter with mass culture, that encounter frequently overturns
commonly-held notions of the nature of modernism. Finally Strychacz
explores his own world of academia and observes that the work of
professional critics in the university reproduces the strategies of
modernist writers.
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