Postmodernity is said to be a culture of fragmentary sensations, eclectic nostalgia, disposable simulacra, and promiscuous superficiality, in which the traditionally valued qualities of depth, coherence, meaning, originality, and authenticity are evacuated or dissolved amid the random swirl of empty signals.
“To see a strange outlandish fowl,
A quaint baboon, an ape, an owl,
A dancing bear, a giant’s bone,
A foolish engine move alone,
A morris-dance, a puppet-play,
Mad Tom to sing a roundelay,
A woman dancing on a rope,
Bull-baiting also at the Hope,
A rhymer’s jest, a juggler’s cheats,
A tumbler showing cunning feats,
Or players acting on the stage—
There goes the bounty of our age:
But unto any pious notion,
There’s little coin and less devotion.”
Henry Farley | “The Voice of Ardent Zeal Speaks from the Lollard’s Tower of St. Paul’s”