Modernity and Its Discontents

One might say that the topic of modernity is what’s wrong with modernity. The fact that the word infests the titles and subtitles of so many books helps explain the morbid sense of humor I’ve detected among the poorer variety of urban booksellers. “The modernity section is in the back,” he will say if you ask, in tones evocative of the “hoary cripple, with malicious eye,” in Browning’s “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came.” Or, then again, the topic might be compared to a giant balloon waiting for the latest windbag to come along, inflate it, climb on board, and sail away towards Swift’s Laputa. Or, yet again, one can address the topic in a spirit of conversation, hoping for sympathetic readers to help complete one’s fragmented efforts, for it will be obvious to anyone who reads the following essay that I am not a systematic thinker. My thoughts on the subject are presented in the form of seven theses, with commentary subjoined.