Primordial Modernism: Animals, Ideas, transition (1927-1938)

• Tests the concept of ‘primordial’ modernism as a tributary of primitivism, Jungian thought, and fraught nationalisms
• Provides readings of Eugene Jolas’s creative and critical works that place him centre-stage in modernist studies
• Moves between unpublished archival material, reception studies, and readings of overlooked authors
• Considers a wide range of modernist authors and artists as befitting to such a rich document
• Touches on contemporary scientific discourse as an aspect of animal studies

This adventurous study focuses on experimental animal writing in the major interwar journal transition (1927–1938), which contains a striking recurrence of metaphors around the most basic forms of life. Amoebas, fish, lizards, birds – some of the ‘lowest’ and ‘oldest’ creatures on earth often emerge at the very places authors seek expressions for the ‘newest’ and the ‘highest’ in art. Discussing works by James Joyce, Henry Miller, Gottfried Benn, Eugene Jolas, Kay Boyle, Bryher, Paul Éluard and more, Cathryn Setz investigates this paradox and provides a new understanding of transition’s contribution to twentieth-century periodical culture.