How did society's attitudes change during the Modern Era?

• A. People no longer trusted the beliefs and values of the world and saw very little to praise or accept.
• B. Society grew more skeptical of institutions and values.
• C. Leaders claimed progress would erase conflict and social upheaval.
• D. Literary works returned to ornate, idealized depictions of life.

Answer: (A)

During the Modern Era, writers and readers increasingly embraced disillusionment and a loss of faith in traditional beliefs and values. This shift mirrors a world rocked by war, rapid modernization, and the fragmentation of meaning, where old certainties about religion, politics, and social norms no longer seemed trustworthy. The attitude described—people no longer trusting the beliefs and values of the world and finding little to praise or accept—captures that broad, pervasive sense of skepticism and alienation that characterizes modernist thought: the sense that meaning must be challenged, probed, or even abandoned rather than accepted on faith.

Context helps: after World War I, many people questioned the narratives that had long supported progress and civilization, and literature reflected intimate, fractured perspectives, experimentation with form, and a focus on the inner life over grand, optimistic stories. While skepticism of institutions and values is part of this, the most encompassing expression is the general erosion of faith in the world’s beliefs. The other options either imply a more optimistic or traditional stance, or point to tastes from earlier periods (ornate, idealized depictions), which modernist literature intentionally moved away from.