Avant-Garde Europe in War: Wyndham Lewis, the Vorticist Shakespeare and the Timon of Athens Portfolio

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between Wyndham Lewis’s Vorticism movement and Shakespeare, focusing on Lewis’s appropriation of Shakespeare’s play Timon of Athens and its impact on Vorticism’s visual aesthetics. In analysing Wyndham Lewis’s avant-garde approach, this article contrasts it with other artistic movements of the time —namely, Futurism and Cubism— and explores Lewis’s interest in the “automaton” and the “machine”, and how this fascination is linked to his reading of Shakespeare and his views on World War I. Overall, the paper demonstrates how Shakespeare’s work played a significant role in the development of Vorticism’s unique aesthetic vision during a time of great social and political upheaval.