The Edinburgh Companion to Modernism, Myth and Religion (Edinburgh Companions to Literature and the Humanities)

Until fairly recently, the ‘Authorized Version’ of cultural modernism stated that the secularizing trends of liberal modernity – and the resultant emphasis on irony, parody and dissolution in modernist artforms – had pushed religion to the edges of early twentieth-century culture. This Companion complicates this ‘Authorized Version’ by furnishing students and academic researchers with more nuanced and probing assessments of the intersections – and tensions – between religion, myth and creativity during this half century of geopolitical ferment. The Companion addresses the variety and specificity of modernist spiritualities; as well as the intricately textured and shifting standpoints that modernist figures have occupied in relation to theological traditions, practices, creeds, and institutions. What emerges is a multi-textured account of modernism’s deep-rooted concern with the historical and established forms of religion as well as new engagements with ‘occulture’ and indigenous traditions. In short, this Companion supplies a lively and original introduction to the aesthetic, publishing, technological and philosophical trends that shape debates about spirituality, community and self from the 1890s to the 1940s and beyond. Contents 6 List of Figures 9 Acknowledgements 10 Introduction • Suzanne Hobson and Andrew Radford 12 Part I: Key Figures and Movements 28 1. Ezra Pound versus T. S. Eliot on Christianity, Apocalypse and Myth, 1934–1945 • Erik Tonning 30 2. Virginia Woolf and Christianity • Jane de Gay 46 3. H.D. and Spirituality • Lara Vetter 61 4. D. H. Lawrence’s Dark God • Luke Ferretter 78 5. Harlem’s Bible Stories: Christianity and the New Negro Movement • Steve Pinkerton 92 6. The Jewish East End and Modernism • Alex Grafen 111 Part II: Secularity, Disenchantment, Re-enchantment 130 7. Troubled: Reverse Theodicy in Ward, Eliot and Baldwin • Douglas Mao 132 8. Modernism, Secular Hope and the Posthumous Trace • David Sherman 148 9. C. K. Ogden, I. A. Richards and ‘Word Magic’: Rethinking the Relation of Language to Myth • Leigh Wilson 162 10. Jean Toomer and the Face of the Real: Between Sacred Presence and Disenchanting Violence • Matthew Mutter 177 11. Modernism and Political Theology • Charles Andrews 191 Part III: Religious Forms 206 12. Virginia Woolf’s Agnostic, Visionary Mysticism: Approaching and Retreating from the Sacred • Gabrielle McIntire 208 13. Modernism, Abstraction and Spirituality: Barbara Hepworth and Hilma af Klint • Lorraine Sim 224 14. Modernism and the Hymn • Sean Pryor 244 15. William James, Mysticism and the Modernist Epiphany • Graham H. Jensen 261 Part IV: Myth, Folklore and Magic 276 16. Modernist Mythopoeia • Scott Freer 278 17. Yeats’s Sacred Grove • Seán Hewitt 296 18. The Modernist Grail Quest • Andrew Radford 310 19. The Burial of the Dead in Mann’s The Magic Mountain • Pericles Lewis 326 Part V: Modern Esotericism, Pantheism and Spiritualism 338 20. The Modernist Afterlives of Theosophy • Allan Kilner-Johnson 340 21. Rebecca West, Modern Spiritualism and the Problem of Other Minds • Jennifer Spitzer 354 22. ‘What God hath joined, let no pragmatist put asunder’: May Sinclair’s Philosophical Idealism as Surrogate Religion • Rebecca Bowler 369 Part VI: Religious Space, Time and Ritual Practice 382 23. Sacred Ground: Orthodoxy, Poetry and Religious Change • Jamie Callison 384 24. Liminal Spaces and Spiritual Practice in Naomi Mitchison, Keri Hulme and Lorna Goodison • Elizabeth Anderson 400 25. Finnegans Wake, Modernist Time Machines and Re-enchanted Time • Gregory Erickson 415 Part VII: Global Transitions and Exchange 434 26. Global Seekers in The Quest: A Case Study of an Occult Periodical’s Worldly Religion • Mimi Winick 436 27. ‘A Miserable Attenuation’: T. S. Eliot, Rabindranath Tagore and Irving Babbitt • Mafruha Mohua 452 28. ‘Part heathen, part Christian’: Recording Transitions and Amalgamations of Belief Systems in Constantine Cavafy’s Poetry • Sanja Bahun 468 Part VIII: Queer[y]ing Religion 488 29. ‘It was really rather fine to be suffering’: Radclyffe Hall at the Queer Intersection of Masochism and Martyrdom • Jennifer Mitchell 490 30. The Byzantine Modernism of Djuna Barnes • Christos Hadjiyiannis 505 31. ‘Mixed sex cases among goats’: The Modernist Sublime • Matte Robinson and Lisa Banks 520 Contributor Biographies 534 Index 541 Until fairly recently, the ‘Authorised Version’ of cultural modernism stated that the secularising trends of liberal modernity – and the resultant emphasis on irony, parody and dissolution in modernist artforms – had pushed religion to the edges of early twentieth-century culture. This Companion complicates this understanding by furnishing students and academic researchers with more nuanced and probing assessments of the intersections and tensions between religion, myth and creativity during this half century of geopolitical ferment. It addresses the variety and specificity of modernist spiritualities as well as the intricately textured and shifting standpoints that modernist figures have occupied in relation to theological traditions, practices, creeds and institutions. What emerges is a multi-textured account of modernism’s deep-rooted concern with the historical and established forms of religion, as well as new engagements with ‘occulture’ and indigenous traditions. In short, the Companion supplies a lively and original exploration of the aesthetic, publishing, technological and philosophical trends that shape debates about spirituality, community and self from the 1890s to the 1940s and beyond.