Modernity: a brief history

Background

Last summer it occurred to me that—despite having delivered 2 series of talks on modern literature—I’ve never adequately defined what I mean by the modern or by modernity. So this brief series of talks is meant to fill that gap. My starting point is that the modern or modernity doesn’t primarily designate a particular historical period. Instead, I would argue, it’s a concept that itself has a history, for which the French Revolution (as with so much else) marks a beginning.

All 3 Modernity talks were held at Beijing University in October 2018. I’m grateful to Mao Liang for the invitation to deliver these, and to those who mediated at the individual talks: Mao Liang, Na Hai, and Wang Wanlin. Much of the prep work that made it all possible was done by Brook Liu (Liu Shui), whose constant helpfulness in all kinds of ways during my visits to Beijing University over the years I now sorely miss. Sophie Suo rendered much assistance as well. All the PowerPoint material was prepared by Zhang Bo, to whom I’m grateful for this + much else. Zhao Meiyuan was my very capable tech assistant at the talks—to her, my thanks as well. On Heine (an author relatively new to me) I got much valuable help from Jeffrey Sammons. For the website presentation, Tina Stenger, as always, was indispensable. And Cara Ryan made everything both here & in China much, much easier.