European Moderists

The European modernists challenged the stereotypical poetry of Europe in the late eighteen hundreds and in the nineteen hundreds. Earlier poetry Modernists poetry was at its height in the early nineteen hundreds, before the modernist period was the infamous impressionist period which was marked by its great artists such as Monet and his water lily paintings. The impressionists captured the truth of their surroundings; they wrote and painted what they saw in nature. The modernists used the influence of nature and their surroundings and created art and poetry that reflect the influence of nature on the self and the human condition.

In the case of the poetry of Pessoa he experimented with expressing the influence of his surrounding on his identity, how sound, motion, and color effect mood. Many of Pessoa’s poems have a definite sense of motion and of distance from both ideal memories and from the physical. Pessoa writes about remembering his lover and his distance from her now that they are apart. Rilke’s work has a definite connection to his environment, Rilke connects the abstract to what his speakers are currently experiencing and observing. Cavafy reflects upon how in written human history people have changed very little, Cavafy reveals the connection between us all.

My initial response to these poems was interest, I enjoy understanding the context the narrators of the poems are speaking from, understanding the connection between the visual and emotion is essential for my understanding. Existential dilemmas are fine, but I would like to know what triggered the dilemma if I am going to have any sympathy. Pessoa kind of confused me.