In July of 1883, an average middle-class Jewish family in an average suburb of Prague (then in Austria) ushered into the average world a new creature: Franz Kafka. He would never forgive them for this unnatural act of torture. Franz kept his neurosis quietly to himself throughout his childhood, r

Absurd, Anxiety, Dreamy, Dystopic, Existentialist literature, Hallucinatory, Hypnotic, Intense, Modernist literature, Neurotic, Profane

T. S. Eliot looked out on the landscape of the modern world after World War I and saw a place of disillusionment, shattered community, and lost spirituality. His poems describe the greyness of this sterile terrain and summon the traditions of the past -- both literary and religious -- to transcend t

Bloomsbury, Death, Elegant, Existentialist literature, Melancholy, Modernist literature, Modernist poetry, The lost generation

French critic and novelist Simone de Beauvoir reinvented the feminist debate with her shocking text, "The Second Sex" (1953), which has become a theoretical bible for those interested in Existentialist and Marxist analysis of women's societal subservience. Since the arrival of Postmodernism at the ce

Existentialist literature, Existentialist theory, Feminism, Feminist, Pioneering, Smart, Social revolution, Women's literature

Classical, Epic theater, Existentialist literature, Expressionist theater, Neurotic, Political, Sardonic