Analysis of 1984 By Orwell and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Phillip Dick (Essay Sample)

Literature Analysis
The diversity of approach, inclusion of symbolic elements from different social, academic, political and philosophical disciplines, evolution of new ideologies and their consequent incorporation in literature make it highly difficult to set right criteria in the context of judging the novel writing tradition of the 20th Century. Compared to the previous literary genres the novel writing tradition in the 20th Century incorporated traits of certain unprecedented changes that actually resulted in its diversity and unfathomable depth. The scope of 20th Century literature encompasses within its scope both modernist and postmodernist sensibilities. While generally the end of the First World War can be regarded as the commencement of the modernist tradition in literature, end of the Second World War marked initiation of the postmodernism. The writers of modernist tradition, after experiencing the radical shift from romantic traditions which also was further worsened by great devastation of the First World War, attempted to develop a holistic approach that they considered to be a matter of great importance to solve the prevailing problems. The postmodernists on the other hand adopted quite a different approach than that of the modernists and emphasized on the evaluation as well as analysis of the different aspects that construct life from in a fragmented manner. Irrespective of the fact that postmodernists derived a great deal of their inspiration from modernist traits of writing, however, their attempt to deal with subjects of novels in a fragmented and highly individualized manner developed the core of postmodernism. Such efforts not only helped in the genesis of different sub-genres in the 20th Century novel writing tradition but also helped readers to receive more accurate understanding of the social, cultural, political and philosophical scenario of the contemporary time. Thus, within scope of the paper attempts will be made to find out the best novel of 20th Century through analysis of 1984 by George Orwell and Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Phillip K. Dick. Within scope of the discussion adequate focus will also be provided in developing the criteria for evaluating these two novels by maintaining a close accord to art and aesthetics of modernist literature, development of popular literature and to which extent these two novels, respectively, have helped in understanding the forms of postmodern existence in a better way.