Postmodernism

The long-awaited third part of my trilogy of classes on contemporary literature is now also available online. Both my appearance and voice show signs that the quarantaine (and teaching in the presence of two young children) is beginning to take its toll. But having made a start, I think it's better to soldier on. In this lecture, I discuss a second important movement, postmodernism. Postmodern narratives tend to question our experience of the reality in which we live. We can find manifestations of this tendency not only in philosophical prose such as W. G. Sebald's ​Austerlitz, but also in popular genres such as the adventures of Tintin or a computer games such as the Stanley Parable. In this lecture, we trace the emergence of these complex works to the acceleration of globalisation after WWII.