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Published December 5, 2025 | Version v1
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The turn of the 20th-21st centuries as a transitional historical and literary epoch: evolution of artistic paradigms from modernism to metamodernism

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  • 1. Kyrgyz State University named after I. Arabaev, Bishkek, Kyrgyz Republic

Description

The purpose of this study was to identify and describe the evolution of artistic paradigms from modernism through postmodernism to metamodernism as a historical and literary process of formative shifts at the turn of the century. The research methodology was based on a complex synthesis of historical and poetic analysis, comparative narratology, discourse criticism, and cultural studies approaches, tested on a representative corpus of texts by James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, Franz Kafka, Umberto Eco, Don DeLillo, Thomas Pynchon, David Mitchell, Hanya Yanagihara, and Ocean Vuong. The study found that Modernism redefined the canon through fragmentation and mythopoetic experimentation, Postmodernism institutionalised intertextuality and irony, and Metamodernism restored ethical and emotional depth through the principle of oscillation. Analysing the dynamics of the forms revealed that the autofiction, the hybrid essay memoir, and the metanovel became mediators of a new literary responsibility.

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