Literary Giants: Wells, Forster, Yeats, and Synge

Modern Literary Visionaries

H.G. Wells: Science, Progress, and Utopia

A new faith was still needed, and H.G. Wells found one in what may be called Liberalism: the belief that humanity's future lies on Earth, not in heaven, and that, with scientific and social progress, an earthly paradise could eventually be built. Wells is one of the great figures of modern literature.

His works, including The Time Machine, The First Men in the Moon, The War of the Worlds, The Invisible Man, When the Sleeper Awakes, and The Food of the Gods, are concerned not merely with telling strange and entertaining stories, but with demonstrating that, through science, everything is theoretically possible.

Wells sometimes described himself as a "utopiographer." He was always planning worlds in which science had achieved its ultimate victories over religion and superstition, in which reason reigned, and in which everyone was healthy, clean, happy, and enlightened.

E.M. Forster: Connecting Humanity and Society

Edward M. Forster was an English novelist, short story writer, essayist, and librettist. He is best known for his ironic and well-plotted novels examining class difference and hypocrisy in early 20th-century British society.

Forster's humanistic impulse towards understanding and sympathy may be aptly summed up in the epigraph to his 1910 novel, Howards End: "Only connect."

His famous works include:

• A Room with a View
• Maurice
• A Passage to India

The Irish Literary Renaissance

William Butler Yeats: From Celtic Twilight to Personal Mythology

William Butler Yeats's early work is full of Irish melancholy, breathing the spirit of the Celtic Twilight. Exquisite music, the evocation of Irish myth and landscape, and a quality of eerie mystery are to be found in his earlier volumes. However, in later life, the inspiration and form of his work changed radically.

Yeats forged his own philosophy, made a personal mythology, and wrote a rough, terse verse, often avoiding true rhyme. This style was capable of expressing abstruse ideas or of speaking stark home truths about life, religion, and love.

John M. Synge: Playwright of the Western World

John M. Synge was an Irish playwright, poet, prose writer, and collector of folklore. He was one of the co-founders of the Abbey Theatre.

He is best known for his play The Playboy of the Western World, which caused riots during its opening run at the Abbey Theatre.

Synge suffered from Hodgkin's disease, a form of cancer untreatable at the time. He died just weeks before his 38th birthday, while trying to complete his last play, The Last Black Supper.