"I Carry Your Heart," "Somewhere I Have Never Travelled," and "Anyone Lived in a Pretty How Town": How Cummings presents love as a social force in his modernist context Anonymous 11th Grade

e.e. cummings’ idiosyncrasy can largely be attributed to his situation in the modernist United States as he lived through World War I, World War II and the Great Depression. His works largely divulged a need for love within society to resolve its disparities, often arguing that such love can act as a force driving purpose and social escapism. Specifically, cummings’ text, “somewhere i have never travelled”, displays the great personal autonomy gained through the activation of love. Then, in “anyone lived in a pretty how town” conveys the way in which this autonomy from love can be used to escape didactic society. However, e.e. cummings reminds his audience that such escapism can be amplified through the perfection of love, even if society can never be repaired and equitable. Ultimately, the ubiquity of love can transcend modernist social constraints in a manner that does not break down such constraints, but rather allows an individual to subvert them. In this way individuals can escape the world's nihilism through love's secrecy.

e.e. cummings reflects on the great degree of personal autonomy gained through the activation of love throughout “somewhere i have never travelled.” In the first stanza, he utilises the synaesthesia, “...