Daniel the Writer

As my frequent readers know I am obsessed with the tradition and legacy of postmodernism. After reading about Murakami’s IQ84 on Slate, it occurred to me that much of today’s writing done uses the awareness and self-exploration of postmodernism, but without any of its refractory nature.

Metamodernism sounds like memoir, and much of it is in fact.

It treats the everyday experiences of first-worlders as new phenomena. It puts entertainment ahead of instruction. And it focuses on moving plot constantly forward, building to an often melodramatic epiphany. The mythos of the self is undone and recreated through self-exploration. Instead of looking at characters from way, way up above, as though we are all-knowing gods, we start by looking at them as equals, learn about their faults to look down on them, and wind up looking up at them because they have learned about themselves.

The confessional nature of this art adds to the effect of this anatomy of the consciousness. By exposing their weaknesses, they make themselves more human, and better relate to the reader. Instead of begging the reader to follow meandering plots, or read all the footnotes, this art is more approachable.

Open City, In the Light of What We Know, Outline–all work similarly to Shakespeare’s comedies: they will rely on coincidence to tie up plot (despite credibility), explore the most basic emotions (those involving love and hate), and remind us that we’re all related through the universality of common experience. Metamodernism begins with a new mythos of the self.