The Blast of Modernity: Positioning Osbert Sitwell's Before the Bombardment

Osbert Sitwell's Before the Bombardment responds to a destructive event in modern British history: the shelling of Scarborough in December 1914 by units of the German Battle Fleet. However, the text's response to modernity is ambiguous. In one perspective it engages with concerns that preoccupy leading Modernists, such as Woolf, Eliot and Pound. In another perspective it looks back to the 19th century novel and the writings of Thomas Hardy. The ambiguity is reflected by the structure of the text. The bulk of the book, a Preface and twenty-six chapters, is set in Edwardian England; it is only the brief Epilogue that describes the shelling. Like Virginia Woolf, Osbert Sitwell sees the Victorian and Edwardian periods as constrictive in their cosiness, deserving of satire and sarcasm. Unlike Woolf, there is simultaneously a nostalgic undertone and an inability to find a potential for liberation in the destruction of Edwardian complacency. Consequently, it is a hard text to position in the Modernist movement but a fascinating text that uncovers the limitations as well as achievements of Modernism.