Modernism: Freud's Influence on Fitzgerald and Hemingway

In his book Modernism Peter Childs goes through the many different forms or writing: romance, realism, modernism and postmodernism. He goes on to state that modernism has challenged the dominance of realism and then by postmodernism each offering new representations of reality and of the world. Childs states that modernism is a way to express or communicate the topic or subject of human subjectivity in a manner that makes them more "real than realism." (Childs, 3) Perhaps a better, or at least another way to think of modernism, is the writers take a "plunge" for the reader into a complicated world of "mental landscapes" that are difficult to interpret and then are presented guides by the writer to better understand the meanings and limitations of these worlds.

Sigmund Freud is perhaps the best-known psychoanalyst the world has ever had. His influence has been seen through the writings of several well-known authors as well. Freud's writing and thoughts embody the very core of Modernism views. "Freud is the one figure who all reviews of Modernism privilege, and yet his work's impact has to be understood within the general increased level of inquiry at the turn of the century into the workings of the mind and its relation to society." (Childs, 48) His influence on the symbols, characters and in particular the role gender plays on two classic literature novels F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises is evident and this paper will showcase these findings.