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20th & 21st Century Literature

The secularization of culture happened as soon as Adam was thrown from the Garden for eating forbidden fruit. He had sinned, and cut off from direct union with God human civilization became a largely irreligious affair—Christians have been trying ever since to increase their influence in the arts, politics, academics and the popular sphere.

To hear a lot of modern apologists, however, you'd think the shift away from historical Christianity to worldly attitudes was recent. Some look back as far as the Enlightenment, some as little as thirty or forty years ago, showing how political and moral trends evidence the departure. For them, the real bad guys are Charles Darwin, Friedrich Nietzsche, Jean-Paul Sartre, sometimes even Soren Kierkegaard (one of the really great Christian writers of the last 200 years).

While those outside the Christian tradition could perhaps be forgiven such shortsightedness (intent on tracing Modern Progress as they are), for Christians to share these views is unforgivable. Western civilization can be traced to ancient Greece, and before that to Egypt, two of the most pagan and corrupt cultures of all time. The ideas popular now have their roots in the philosophies of Plato, Aristotle, Zeno, Democritus and Thales.

Every modern philosophy has a Classical era corollary, if not its direct match at least the primitive form of the current idea. Anaximander suggested men evolved from animals 2500 years before Charlie Darwin was born; Heraclitus posited rudimentary postmodern philosophy two millennia before the advent of modernism; Diogenes was a nihilist before the nation of Russia existed, and about 300 years before Christ.

The best way to understand 20th century literature is not as a brand-new canon promoting recent anti-Christian thought, but as a body of work manifesting the newest iterations of secular philosophy and Christian responses. Great writers of the past, from Shelley and Robert Louis Stevenson to Rabelais and George Eliot, were fully as secular (even atheistic) as any Hemingway, Camus or Douglas Adams of the last 100 years.

Just as secular—and in many instances, just as brilliant. While there's more bad writing available than ever before as a result of the democratization of publishing, for every Stephanie Meyer there's at least one Faulkner or Annie Dillard. The novel came into its own in the 20th century as writers understood its limitations. Good writers have something universal to say about humanity, avoiding merely regional or too-specific interests.

Not all of it is "fun" reading—some of the best writers like Kafka, Thomas Mann and Solzhenitsyn can be hard to get through, though they can also write riveting passages of elegant prose. Others are a joy to read, like Steinbeck, G.K. Chesterton and George Bernard Shaw, combining a talent for poetic narrative and humor reminiscent of Dickens and Twain.

Like the ideas it embraces, the purpose of 20th century literature remains the same as the literature of any other era: to examine life, to celebrate it, to understand it better, and to connect readers with each other and with new ideas. Of course you'll want to be aware when you're reading secular authors and examine their work closely, but the same is true of Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography or Virgil's Aeneid.

Most of all, enjoy these books. The best of them explore deep and important ideas, but the best of them are also great artistic achievements, not mere dissertations but independent organisms alive and dangerous and beautiful. For all the technology and machines of our modern age, good literature is still organic, and the ability to enjoy it comes from an unmapped region of the soul where every Kerouac, Cather and Marquez had to go for their masterpieces.

Review by C. Hollis Crossman
C. Hollis Crossman used to be a child. Now he's a husband and father who loves church, good food, and weird stuff. He might be a mythical creature, but he's definitely not a centaur. Read more of his reviews here.
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Age of Innocence
by Edith Wharton
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
1921 Pulitzer Prize winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
All the King's Men
by Robert Penn Warren, edited and afterword by Noel Polk
from Mariner Books
for Adult
1947 Pulitzer Prize
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$10.00 (1 in stock)
Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay
by Michael Chabon
from Picador
for Adult
2001 Pulitzer Prize winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
50th Anniversary Edition from Signet Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$9.99
Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
Reprint from Plume Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
Centennial from Plume Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00 (1 in stock)
Band of Angels
by Robert Penn Warren
from Louisiana State University Press
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Bell Jar
by Sylvia Plath
from Harper Perennial
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Beloved
by Toni Morrison
from Vintage Classics
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$3.00 (1 in stock)
Blood Meridian
by Cormac McCarthy
1st edition from Vintage Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Bridge of San Luis Rey
by Thornton Wilder
from HarperCollins
for 9th-Adult
1928 Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$15.99
Caine Mutiny
by Herman Wouk
from Back Bay Books
for 10th-Adult
1952 Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
Cannery Row
by John Steinbeck
from Penguin Putnam
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00
Canticle for Leibowitz
by Walter M. Miller
from HarperCollins
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.99
Catch-22
by Joseph Heller
50th Anniversary Edition from Simon and Schuster
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
Chosen
by Chaim Potok
from Simon and Schuster
Realistic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Cloudsplitter
by Russell Banks
from Harper Perennial
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Common Life
Mitford Series Book 6
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Death Comes for the Archbishop
by Willa Cather
from Vintage Classics
Realistic Fiction for 9th-12th grade
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00
Earth Abides
by George R. Stewart
from Harper Voyager
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
East of Eden
by John Steinbeck
Revised from Penguin Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.00
Egg and I
by Betty MacDonald
from HarperCollins
Biography for 8th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$15.99
Enchantment
by Orson Scott Card
1st edition from Del Rey
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Endless Knot
Song of Albion #3
by Stephen R. Lawhead
2nd edition from Thomas Nelson Publishers
Celtic Fantasy for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00
Farewell to Arms
by Ernest Hemingway
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$15.00
Finale
by Calvin Miller
from InterVarsity Press
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
For Whom the Bell Tolls
by Ernest Hemingway
from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
Fountainhead
by Ayn Rand
Reissue from Tonatiuh International Inc.
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Giant
by Edna Ferber
from Harper Perennial
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.99
Gift of Asher Lev
by Chaim Potok
from Ballantine Books
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Gilead
by Marilynne Robinson
from Picador
for 10th-Adult
2005 Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Go Down, Moses
by William Faulkner
from Vintage Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$13.95
Good Earth
by Pearl S. Buck
from Washington Square Press
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.99
Grapes of Wrath
by John Steinbeck
from Penguin Classics
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Grapes of Wrath
by John Steinbeck
from Penguin Books
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Great Gatsby
by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Reissue from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 9th-12th grade
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Grendel
by John Gardner
from Vintage Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.95 $8.00 (1 in stock)
Gringos
by Charles Portis
1st edition from Overlook Press
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$15.95
Hannah Coulter
by Wendell Berry
from Counterpoint, LLC
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.95
Home to Holly Springs
by Jan Karon
1st edition from Viking Press
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Hood
The King Raven Trilogy Book 1
by Stephen R. Lawhead
First Edition from Thomas Nelson Publishers
for 8th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
Hours
by Michael Cunningham
First Edition
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
House Made of Dawn
by N. Scott Momaday
from Harper Perennial
for Adult
1969 Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
House on Mango Street
by Sandra Cisneros
from Vintage Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$11.95 $4.00 (1 in stock)
Invisible Heart
by Russell Roberts
from MIT Press
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$27.95 $8.00 (2 in stock)
Invisible Man
by Ralph Ellison
2nd edition from Vintage Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00
Invisible Man
by Ralph Ellison
from Quality Paperback Book Club
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Joy Luck Club
by Amy Tan
Later Printing
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Jungle, The
Norton Critical Editions
by Upton Sinclair
Norton Critical Edition from W. W. Norton and Co.
Social Commentary for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$15.00 (1 in stock)
Killing Mister Watson
by Peter Matthiessen
from Vintage Classics
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Kite Runner
by Khaled Hosseini
from Riverhead Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00 $10.00 (1 in stock)
Lancelot: A Novel
by Walker Percy
1st edition from Picador
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$19.00
Late George Apley
by John P. Marquand
from Time Inc.
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Lathe of Heaven
by Ursula K. Le Guin
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Life of Pi
by Yann Martel
from Harvest Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.00 (1 in stock)
Life of Pi
by Yann Martel
from Canon Gate
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$7.00 (1 in stock)
Light in the Window
Mitford Series Book 2
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Lolita
by Vladimir Nabokov
from Vintage Classics
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Lonesome Dove: A Novel
by Larry McMurtry
from Simon and Schuster
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$23.00
Lord of Light
by Roger Zelazny
from HarperCollins
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$13.99
Magnificent Ambersons
by Booth Tarkington
from Modern Library
for 10th-Adult
1919 Pulitzer Prize
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Main Street
by Sinclair Lewis
from Dover Publications
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.00 (1 in stock)
Maltese Falcon
by Dashiell Hammett
from Vintage Classics
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00
March
by Geraldine Brooks
from Penguin Putnam
for Adult
2006 Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Matterhorn
by Karl Marlantes
Reprint from Hickory Grove Press
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Middlesex
by Jeffrey Eugenides
Reprint from Picador
for 11th-Adult
Pulitzer Prize Winner
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
My Antonia
by Willa Cather
from Mariner Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.99
My Name is Asher Lev
by Chaim Potok
from Anchor Books
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.95
Mysterious Affair at Styles
A Hercule Poirot Mystery #1
by Agatha Christie
from William Morrow & Company
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
New Song
Mitford Series Book 5
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
No Less Than Victory
by Jeff Shaara
1st edition from Ballantine Books
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
O Pioneers
by Willa Cather
from Dover Publications
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$2.50 (1 in stock)
Octopus
by Frank Norris
from Dover Publications
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.95
Of Mice and Men
by John Steinbeck
from Penguin Putnam
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$12.00
Old Man and the Sea
by Ernest Hemingway
from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$13.99
Old Man and the Sea
by Ernest Hemingway
Hemingway Library Edition from Charles Scribner's Sons
Realistic Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Olive Kitteridge
by Elizabeth Strout
from Random House
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
On the Road
by Jack Kerouac
from Penguin Putnam
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Out to Canaan
Mitford Series Book 4
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
Adult Fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Ox-Bow Incident
by Walter Van Tilburg Clark
Reissue from Modern Library
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$3.50 (1 in stock)
Peace Like a River
by Leif Enger
from Atlantic Monthly Press
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Penrod
by Booth Tarkington
from Penguin Classics
Realistic Fiction for 7th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
by Seth Grahame-Smith, Jane Austen
from Quirk Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Promise
by Chaim Potok
from Anchor Books
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$8.00 (1 in stock)
Rabble in Arms
by Kenneth Roberts
from Down East Books
for 7th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.95
Riders of the Purple Sage
by Zane Grey
from Dover Publications
Westerns for 8th-Adult
in Action & Adventure Stories (Location: FIC-ADV)
$6.00
Riders of the Purple Sage
by Zane Grey
from Penguin Books
Westerns for 8th-Adult
in Action & Adventure Stories (Location: FIC-ADV)
Riders of the Purple Sage
by Zane Grey
from Oxford University
Westerns for 8th-Adult
in Action & Adventure Stories (Location: FIC-ADV)
$3.00 (1 in stock)
Rising Tide
by Jeff Shaara
from Ballantine Books
Historical Non-fiction for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Scarlet
The King Raven Trilogy Book 2
by Stephen R. Lawhead
from Thomas Nelson Publishers
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$18.99
Second Book of the Dun Cow: Lamentations
by Walter Wangerin
from Diversion Publications
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$13.99
Second Coming
by Walker Percy
from Picador
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Separate Peace
by John Knowles
from Charles Scribner's Sons
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$16.00 $8.50 (4 in stock)
Shepherds Abiding
Mitford Years Book 8
by Jan Karon
from Penguin Putnam
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$4.00 (1 in stock)
Sherlock Holmes and the Red Demon
by Larry Millett
from Penguin Classics
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Shipping News
by E. Annie Proulx
1st edition from Charles Scribner's Sons
for Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$6.00 (1 in stock)
Singer Trilogy - Boxed Set
by Calvin Miller
Reprint from InterVarsity Press
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
Slaughterhouse-Five
by Kurt Vonnegut
Reissue from Dial Press
for 11th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.00
Something Wicked This Way Comes
by Ray Bradbury
from Simon and Schuster
for 10th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$17.99
Song
by Calvin Miller
from InterVarsity Press
for 9th-Adult
in 20th & 21st Century Literature (Location: LIT7-20)
$1.50 (1 in stock)
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