Modern life example

Modern Life Depicted in Literature

Depending on a person’s views, way of life, and other factors, modern life can be depicted in a variety of ways. For instance, Hanta has learned new things in the tale “Too Loud a Solitude” by Hrabal, which can be viewed as his contemporary way of life. He relays much of his thought from the book in his description using surreal and metaphorical language as he muses and remembers the bizarre knowledge he gathered over time. (Hrabal 23). In “The Street of Crocodiles,” Bruno Schulz also includes short tales that examine contemporary topics like town life and its challenges. In the stories, the city is portrayed as a significant character with its rich and poor neighborhood, its labyrinth-like streets, and the commercialization of the streets. The two books analyze modern life in different ways through use of symbols, motifs, and various themes that express how people view modernization.

Hanta’s Work and the Quest for Knowledge

Modern life and modernization involves trying to destroy older habits, materials, as well as living a satisfying life by individuals. For instance, in Hrabal’s work, for the thirty-five years Hanta has compacted paper into sly parcels, and before he compacts a bunch, he notes down the critical quotations from the papers. His work is not only a destruction process but rather a respectful way of disposing of the books that have piled up in the basement. The whole Royal Prussian Library, Goethe and Schiller in Moroccan, and the works of philosophical and religious masters go through Hanta’s hands (Hrabal 37). He reads each book and gathers information from them, which can be considered as his way of modern life. Knowledge is important in the modern society and by destroying the old book; Hanta is paving way for new aspects of life in the modern society. The library indicates the quest for knowledge and technology, which are vital tools for modernization. The story depicts the social and political universe of Hanta’s time, which forms the characteristics of modern life. All through the 1970s and 80s in Czechoslovakia, education was not celebrated as much as it has a celebratory connotation in current modern America since many types of information were considered dangerous. Whole humanities departments vanished from the most regarded colleges including Prague’s Charles University during communism. Human sciences departments that involved anthropology and sociology were subversive, as it was considered wrong to examine the perception of the ordinary citizens in America through human psychology. Higher education was made available to the politically compliant fellows in the state, which is a depiction of the modern society where most governments view their oppositions as enemies with all developments barred from their regions.

Town Life and its Challenges

Urbanization and concentration of people in cities as well as other aspect of town life characterize modern life. In “The Street of Crocodiles” tells a story of town life for the main character and the difficulties he faces. It is a collection of short stories in a small city called Galicia, which is the current Ukraine. Bruno employs juxtaposition of reality, fantasy and metaphor in the literature to explore various themes in his life, the characters in the city he finds himself in and his family as well (Schulz, Foer, and Goldfarb 3). It is not a tale about the father, nor is it truly a tale about the storyteller’s town; but the town is the main character in the story. In the book, the difference between reality and the mundane sometimes overwhelms the voice of the narrative, which is a vital symbol in the literature since the mundane is not sufficient to comprehend the real things in human being’s life (Schulz et al.19). In these stories, the imaginaries make the city, emotions, and characters more complicated and with much more meaning. Modern life seems quite complicated as people try to improve their living standards. The majority of the stories relates to the life of the boy’s father called Jacob who is illustrated losing a battle against insanity. Jacob is distanced from his family by the shame of his erratic behavior, paranoia, and fear. Bruno Schulz admires his dad and regrets about the way he lost his father (Schulz et al. 79). He is a fascinating and exciting character with an interest in breeding birds, which he wants to turn into monsters according to the existence philosophy.

The Destruction of Information and Modern Government Control

The explosion of The New York Times is a metaphor, a demonstration of the destruction of information. Destruction of books and that of men’s places in the society is not enough to destroy the educated man’s mind activities. In the current society, the authority may use their arms of power to silence those opposing them, but despite everything, the information in the minds of an ordinary citizen cannot be altered since to eradicate a thought, the regime would have destroy the human heads and not books. In spite of the fact that Hrabal was not a politician, it is a radical articulation to obviously recognize the unprofitability of the endeavors of the political regime to kill free and open thoughts through media control and books destruction. Modern government’s wants to control everything including the media, a strategy aimed at ensuring that the sensitive information that may repute their image is not relayed to the public domain. The motif of obsolete is very clear in the “Too loud a Solitude” such as the case of the protagonist who spend his youth working on the same machine. The destruction of books depicts the destruction of old practices and adoption of a new way of modern life. Rats are symbolically used to portray the conflict between the Communist and Democrats. Citizens are controlled by the two government forces as Hanta is bound up to the mice “My life is so tightly bound up with these mice” (Hrabal 15). As Europe is trying to modernize, it faces several challenges due to the opposing government forces. Other aspects of modern life include dancing, lodges, and obsolescence of his job to pave way for more innovative ways. In the “Streets of Crocodiles”, the author uses a metaphor by claiming that the city has both the old and new sections, and the new sections have pseudo-Americanism while its shops are filled with stigma for some class of citizens. This depicts a kind of life in the modern society where the rich and the poor occupy different social ranks and enjoy different privileges.

Modern Life and its Degeneration

The two books give tales about modern day life, its degeneration depending on the success of cheap value and commercialism. “The Street of Crocodiles” by Bruno Schulz also contains short stories exploring aspects of modern life such as town life and the struggles associated with it. In the stories, the city is a significant character with its rich and poor neighborhood, its labyrinth-like streets, and the commercialization of the streets. Hanta has compacted paper into sly parcels, and before he compacts a bunch, he notes down the critical quotations from the papers. The world today is influenced by technological innovations, art, and globalization and is different from how it is portrayed in the books.

Works Cited

Hrabal, Bohumil. Too loud a solitude.Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 1992.

Schulz, Bruno, Jonathan SafranFoer, and David Goldfarb. The Street of Crocodiles and Other Stories.Penguin Classics, 2008.