Takeaways - Modernism, Communism, and Me

This is going to sound perhaps a little like one of those beginning of the year "what I did last summer" responses. Only for me this would be "what I learned about modernism this fall."  So here goes - some overall takeaways from Marshall Berman's All That Is Solid Melts Into Air.

First off - in the modern world, nothing lasts forever.  Hence the title of the book, right?  Whether it be values, beliefs, institutions, buildings, concepts, systems, fashions, governments, ideologies, artistic movements, companies, vehicles, or technologies, nothing lasts forever.  Take it as you will, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, unless you are really really attached to the old thing that is being phased out. 

As an example, take communism in the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc countries.  For those in power who drank the Marx and Leninist Kool-Aid, communism was an ideology that seemed so ultimately modern in its scope and goal to include every individual in the shared glory and wealth of the state. What it failed to take into account, and what contributed to the fall, was the idea of the power of the individual - the modern individual is driven toward freedom of choice (some 1984 connections can be made here), the communist system severely limited this desire by its very nature - all decisions were for the good of the motherland. The individual (although "taken care of" economically) is left without agency or choice.  So a system that ideologically seemed "fair" in its conception, was ultimately doomed because of the modern drive of the individuals within it.

There's an irony at work here, because Berman notes Karl Marx's Communist Manifesto as the archetype of modernism:

...Marx lays out the polarities that will shape and animate the culture of modernism in the century to come: the theme of insatiable desires and drives, permanent revolution, infinite development, perpetual creation and renewal in every sphere of life; and its radical antithesis, the theme of nihilism, insatiable destruction, the shattering and swallowing up of life, the heart of darkness, the horror. (102)

Ignoring the Apocalypse Now reference in that last line, the idea of creation and destruction is clearly synonymous with thesis and antithesis resulting in something new (synthesis).  That "something new" represents what we might call progress, or more colloquially, "cleaning house" to throw away what's no longer useful in favor of that which seemingly works "better."

Another key idea of modernism I picked up is that individuals are both subject to the machinations of their world while being the very agents that construct it. This was the concept I found most paradoxical, yet liberating. First, I tend to be nostalgic and have a natural inclination toward the past, some phased out technologies and pastimes are attractive to my aesthetic sensibilities and outside interests: vinyl records and stamp collecting. Also, I have a love-hate relationship with particular technologies like cell phones and automobile accessories.  So it hit home that sometimes I feel a little overwhelmed and repulsed by the technologies around us, but I also utilize many of these same technological tools (blogger.com for example) to strive for higher levels of understanding and possibility.  The self-agency to pursue our interests, our choices, is really the calling card of modernism.  The modern world has its influence and power - but as moderns ourselves, we act in this world of our own volition, which opens doors to endless possibilities.

A Poem and a Palace - Predestined Destruction?

I am going to cover a couple of different topics in this blog.  Before that, I confess that All That Is Solid Melts Into Air is not quite what I imagined it to be, but I am trudging through just the same to try to connect with the ideas Marshall Berman is offering.  This probably is the case also with more than a couple student-chosen books. Hopefully some value can still gained and conveyed in these short reflections.

This statue emerges through the violent floodwaters
as a symbol of Peter the Great's vision for his city.

So one interesting strategy of Berman's is to trace aspects of modernity and its development through the literary texts of the time.  As the text is fairly Eurocentric, the great cities of the continent and their artists are featured in parallel.  Such is the case for St. Petersburg, Russia and Alexamder Pushkin.  Specifically, Pushkin's poem "The Bronze Horseman" which is subtitled, "A Petersburg Tale." Berman cites this poem as the quintessential story of the inception of modernity in the form of the city: "Petersburg itself is the product of thought - it is, as Dostoevsky's Underground Man will remark, 'the most abstract and premeditated city in the world'" (183).  There is great beauty and possibility in the city as it rises from the landscape:

Where once a humble Finnish lad – / Poor foster-child in Nature’s keeping – / Alone upon the low banks had / Oft cast his time-worn nets when reaping / The waters’ hidden harvest, – now / Great towers and palaces endow / The bustling banks with grace and splendour;

The hero is a commoner named Yevgeny, who stands in wonder of the city yet seems to be a product of it.  He is in love with a woman Parasha and would like to marry her. Nice enough, until THE FLOOD! Yevgeny surveys the damage:

Here a house was gone: / Uprooted; here debris lay scattered / About; here still stood, mauled and battered, / Some crippled houses. All around, / As if upon a battleground, / Lay corpses. 

So, all that was solid (again) melts into air - the city of dreams and certainty (and I am giving a VERY brief account here) seems doomed from the outset.  The flood of 1824 portrayed in the poem was one of THREE in St. Petersburg's history (1725 and 1924 as well).  So, is the quest for modernity destined to end up in destruction?  Is the destruction part of the process for even more advanced development?

One additional piece from Berman.  Apparently Russians who were trumpeting the advancements of their cities like St. Petersburg had some real modernist envy when it came to London's Crystal Palace. Once again it is Dostoevsky who is in wonder: "Must not one accept this as the ultimate truth, and become silent forever? This is all so triumphant, majestic and proud it takes your breath away . . . you feel that something final has taken place here, taken place and ended" (236). That "something final" is where Dostoevsky was wrong. As destruction is a theme of modernism, so was the Crystal Palace destroyed in fire.

I can't help but make some connections to the comics world.  In Watchmen, Dr. Manhattan creates an enormous timepiece / airship / palace that seems perfect is every possible way.  That is until his former companion Laurie throws a perfume bottle at it.  Was it built to last? Is it a symbol that all that is built eventually comes to ruin?  It is no coincidence that the poem "Ozymandias" is also evoked in Watchmen, as "Nothing beside remains" from his once "mighty works."

This:

Then this:

Robert Moses - Creating a Modern NYC

The modern city / urban center is definitely one of the most visible and obvious developments of modern life.  In the United States, one immediately thinks of the development of the "Big Three" cities, two of which lie on opposite coasts and the other in the center of the country. New York, Los Angeles, and Chicago.  This entry will take a critical look at New York City and one of its most famous developers, Robert Moses.

As the title of the book is All That Is Solid Melts Into Air, Marshall Bermann keeps coming back to this quote to define one of the most important aspects of modernism. The idea is that nothing is permanent - institutions, ideas, buildings, cultures, and beliefs - none of these have intrinsic staying power in the wake of advancement.  Mankind builds. Mankind enjoys the fruits of his labor.  Mankind finds that what he built is obsolete or tired.  Mankind destroys.  Mankind builds again.

New York City in the 1930s was already a modern city.  Unlike Chicago, which had the benefit of growing during the 1800s so it could have some sort of plan (Burnham's Boulevards, Lakefront development, not to mention the rebuilding opportunity The Great Fire presented), New York tore down itself and rebuilt many times over since its founding in the 1600s.  As New York emerges as The Great American City (sorry Chicago!) over the years, it found itself also reinventing itself for the modern age.  Take the rapid transit system - New York City has 245 miles of subway line.  Not a close second is Washington D.C. with 117 miles of subway line. Since the subway line was largely built below ground (NYC does have its share of elevated track also), its impact on specific neighborhoods and communities was marginal.  This is not true with one of Robert Moses's earlier projects, the Cross-Bronx Expressway.

I've established that one of the tenets of modernism is to destroy old forms and build some newer, better form in its place.  The destruction should make sense, as long as something better takes its place. However, what if that destruction has "collateral damage" such as a neighborhood or a community? Such was the case with the ill-fated Cross-Bronx Expressway.  The author remembers the Art Deco buildings on beautiful boulevards being destroyed to make way for the project:

As I saw one of the loveliest of these buildings being wrecked for the road, I felt a grief that, I can see now, is endemic to modern life. So often the price of ongoing and expanding modernity is the destruction not merely of "traditional" and "pre-modern" institutions and environments but - and here is the real tragedy - of everything most vital and beautiful in the modern world itself. Here in the Bronx, thanks to Robert Moses, the modernity of the urban boulevard was being condemned as obsolete, and blown to pieces, by the modernity of the interstate highway. (295)

 It wasn't just buildings that were destroyed.  The Cross-Bronx Expressway split the borough into two separate halves.  The South Bronx was created, along with all the problems of blight and economic ruin as the project separated businesses from their customers, churches from their parishoners, neighbors from their neighbors. While eminent domain now connected New Jersey to Queens, the project forced many established families in the Bronx to move and businesses in the Bronx to relocate or shut down. The Bronx hasn't been the same since.

Robert Moses, troublingly, had the public good in mind as he strong-armed projects through (some very much to the benefit of NYC - Flushing Park, for instance). What he didn't consider was the human factor of his projects - what they would do long-term to the communities they effected, in the name of modernism.

Berman, Marshall. All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity. New York, New York: Penguin Books, 1988.

This is the Modern World

When I think of the word "modern," my mind immediately gravitates to two deeply-rooted personal cultural touchstones.  One of these touchstones is a pop song: "Modern World" by The Jam. Basically this song is running on a loop in my mind as I write this . . . "What kind of a fool do you think I am? / You think I know nothing of the modern world? / All my life has been the same / I've learned to live by hate and pain / It's my inspiration drive" - then to cool guitar riff.  In its time (1977), the music of The Jam and other power pop or punk bands coming out of England was indeed an expression of modernism - the idea that "they had the power to change the world that is changing them, to make their way through the maelstrom and make it their own" (Berman 16). The theme carries through in reaction to the commercialization of the music industry and subsequent watering down and homogenization of originality and artistry.

The other "modern" touchstone I envision in my mind's eye is the Godfrey Reggio film Powaqquatsi. I remember seeing this with a group of high school friends at the Dundee Theater in Omaha - not really a great date film, but one that left a definite impression on me.  The film focuses on the how the elements of modernism - industry, technology, communications, world economy, etc. - impose themselves on the people and cultures in developing nations.  The film is JUST images and music (superb Philip Glass soundtrack by the way). The image that sticks with me is also the movie poster: a boy walking toward the camera on a dirt road with a huge truck bearing down on him from behind.  The boy pays no attention to the truck, keeping an even steady pace toward the camera, even as the behemoth passes, obliterating the boy in a cloud of dust.  It's a spot-on visual metaphor for how modernism's more destructive side - devouring cultures that may be innocently oblivious to the changes around them.

Now to the book, Marshall Berman's All That Is Solid Melts Into Air. I am drawn to this text by an idea that modern life acts much like a parasite - sucking the lifeblood out of unsuspecting hosts while gaining in strength and size.  We get caught up in its many manifestations: "the industrialization of production...immense demographic upheavals, severing millions of people from their ancestral habits...rapid and often cataclysmic urban growth" (16) just to name a few. This development, gone unchecked, has its cost. Berman's chapter on "The Tragedy of Development" delves into the phenomenon:

...the process of development has spread, often at a frantic pace, into the most remote, isolated, and backward sectors of advanced societies. It has transformed innumerable pastures and cornfields into chemical plants, corporate headquarters, suburban shopping centers-- How many orange groves are left in California's Orange County?  It has transformed thousands of urban neighborhoods into freeways and parking lots, or into World Trade Centers and Peachtree Plazas, or into abandoned, burnt-out wilderness... (78)

Tragedy indeed!  These more concrete (pun intended) expressions of modernity hold my attention more than the philosophical and political.  Berman begins his discussion by tracing the roots of modernism mainly to Rousseau and Marx - so will be getting a heavy dose of why/how the rise of the bourgeoisie correlates with the rise of modernist ideals.  The title of the book actually comes from Marx: "All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and men at last are forced to face with sober senses the real conditions of their lives and their relations with their fellow men" (Berman 89). It seems that with modernism comes an awareness that may not always be pleasant - the reality of "the real conditions of our lives" may reveal servitude, shallowness, vapid frivolity, and futility in the presence of corporate power structures and addictive media.  That's really why I'm reading the book, to get a better sense of what is the driving force behind all that is modern, and why we both embrace it and shrink from it.

Berman, Marshall. All That Is Solid Melts Into Air: The Experience of Modernity. New York, New York: Penguin Books, 1988.