Contemporary Literature

 Contemporary Literature generally refers to literary works written from the late 20th century (c. 1970s) to the present. It reflects modern realities—globalization, technology, identity, conflict, and rapid social change.

What Is Contemporary Literature?

Literature that:

• Engages with current social, political, and cultural issues

• Experiments with form, language, and narrative

• Represents diverse voices (gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality)

Major Themes

• Identity & selfhood

• Migration & diaspora

• Gender, feminism & LGBTQ+ issues

• War, terrorism & trauma

• Globalization & capitalism

• Technology, media & alienation

• Climate & environmental crisis

 Major Contemporary Writers (Global)

🇺🇸 American

• Toni Morrison – Beloved

• Don DeLillo – White Noise

• Cormac McCarthy – The Road

• Jhumpa Lahiri – Interpreter of Maladies

British

• Ian McEwan – Atonement

• Zadie Smith – White Teeth

• Kazuo Ishiguro – Never Let Me Go

• Martin Amis – Money

🇮🇳 Indian / South Asian

• Arundhati Roy – The God of Small Things

• Amitav Ghosh – The Shadow Lines

• Salman Rushdie – Midnight’s Children

• Jhumpa Lahiri – The Namesake

 African

• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie – Half of a Yellow Sun

• J. M. Coetzee – Disgrace

• Ben Okri – The Famished Road

Contemporary Poetry

• Seamus Heaney

• Carol Ann Duffy

• Maya Angelou

• Ocean Vuong

• Warsan Shire

Contemporary Drama

• Harold Pinter – The Birthday Party

• Tom Stoppard – Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

• Caryl Churchill – Top Girls

• Wole Soyinka – Death and the King’s Horseman

Key Characteristics

• Non-linear narratives

• Metafiction & unreliable narrators

• Blending of genres

• Focus on marginalized voices

• Open endings

Contemporary vs Modern Literature

Modern	Contemporary
1900–1950s	1970s–present
Alienation, fragmentation	Global & identity-focused
Woolf, Joyce	Morrison, Smith