Andrei Codrescu (1946) American writer
“The Shipwreck of Dada and Surrealism,” The Disappearance of the Outside: A Manifesto for Escape (1990).
Laura Riding and Robert Graves from A Survey of Modernist Poetry (London: Heinemann, 1927)
Andrei Codrescu (1946) American writer
“The Shipwreck of Dada and Surrealism,” The Disappearance of the Outside: A Manifesto for Escape (1990).
Clement Greenberg (1909–1994) American writer and artist
"T.S. Eliot: A Book Review" (1950/1956), p. 244
1960s, Art and Culture: Critical Essays, (1961)
Clement Greenberg (1909–1994) American writer and artist
1960s, Modernist Painting (1960)
“The pure modernist is merely a snob; he cannot bear to be a month behind the fashion.”
G. K. Chesterton book All Things Considered
"The Case for the Ephemeral"
All Things Considered (1908)
Context: It is incomprehensible to me that any thinker can calmly call himself a modernist; he might as well call himself a Thursdayite. … The real objection to modernism is simply that it is a form of snobbishness. It is an attempt to crush a rational opponent not by reason, but by some mystery of superiority, by hinting that one is specially up to date or particularly "in the know." To flaunt the fact that we have had all the last books from Germany is simply vulgar; like flaunting the fact that we have had all the last bonnets from Paris. To introduce into philosophical discussions a sneer at a creed’s antiquity is like introducing a sneer at a lady’s age. It is caddish because it is irrelevant. The pure modernist is merely a snob; he cannot bear to be a month behind the fashion.
“Modernistic-Abstractionist-Art… consists of 75% explanation and 25% God knows what!”
Maxfield Parrish (1870–1966) American painter and illustrator
Statement to William O. Chessman (27 March 1936); as quoted in Maxfield Parrish by Coy Ludwig (1997)
G. K. Chesterton book All Things Considered
"The Case for the Ephemeral"
All Things Considered (1908)
Context: It is incomprehensible to me that any thinker can calmly call himself a modernist; he might as well call himself a Thursdayite. … The real objection to modernism is simply that it is a form of snobbishness. It is an attempt to crush a rational opponent not by reason, but by some mystery of superiority, by hinting that one is specially up to date or particularly "in the know." To flaunt the fact that we have had all the last books from Germany is simply vulgar; like flaunting the fact that we have had all the last bonnets from Paris. To introduce into philosophical discussions a sneer at a creed’s antiquity is like introducing a sneer at a lady’s age. It is caddish because it is irrelevant. The pure modernist is merely a snob; he cannot bear to be a month behind the fashion.
“The modernist object does not possess inner life; only internal conflicts.”
Nicolás Gómez Dávila (1913–1994) Colombian writer and philosopher
Sucesivos Escolios a un Texto Implícito (1992)
Roberto Mangabeira Unger (1947) Brazilian philosopher and politician
Source: False Necessityː Anti-Necessitarian Social Theory in the Service of Radical Democracy (1987), p. 22
Randall Jarrell book Five Young American Poets
"A Note on Poetry," preface to The Rage for the Lost Penny: Five Young American Poets (New Directions, 1940) [p. 49]
Kipling, Auden & Co: Essays and Reviews 1935-1964 (1980)