Favorite Literary Movement

     The American literature we have read and studied this year has been, to me, more interesting than appealing. I know that seems a little contradictory, but it's true. I found the progression of writing fascinating, the changes and tweaks from movement to movement intriguing. I was impressed with the writers' mastery of capturing their time period, as well as creating a definitive style. So congrats, Hawthorne, Franklin, Thoreau, London, I applaud you. But I wouldn't buy your books.
     That's the thing. While reading, I enjoyed the fact that I was picking up on how and why the authors wrote their prose, but I didn't particularly enjoy the actual book. Okay, okay, Huck Finn was decent, but I'm not so keen on the whole realism movement. So where does that leave me for this blog post?
     Though I'm not overwhelmingly obsessed with one particular literary movement, I think I have to declare Modernism as the winner. Why? Gatsby captured my heart. It didn't hit me until I was finished with the book and confirming my suspicions about symbolism and all that jazz via Shmoop. I realized that Fitzgerald was a literary genius and Gatsby was this never ending puzzle of hidden meaning and commentary and importance. The night before the Gatsby test, all I wanted to do was read the whole book again -- it was kind of like the feeling you get when someone points out some tiny detail in a movie that you didn't notice and your first instinct is to go watch it again from start to finish.
     I'll admit that I wasn't crazy about The Old Man and the Sea, but I appreciated how Hemingway could convey such huge ideas into such simplistic writing. That's truly what I like about Modernism: hidden meaning. It makes literature more interesting, more challenging. Another plus is that Modernism was at its height around my favorite historical time period, with World War I, World War II, and all that good stuff.
     So there you have it. Modernism takes the cake. But if and when Harry Potterism is created, I'm updating this blog post immediately.