The article discusses theoretical issues and prerequisites of the modernist trend, which influenced the development of literature and art. The main factor influencing the emergence of literary modernism is global change in the historical and social life of human development. Features of European culture and art are considered in the context of literature and art space. The relationship between historical and social factors and factors causing new discoveries in literature and art is revealed. The world of the late 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century was full of new discoveries. Looking at this stage of human development from today's height, we will see that in the twentieth century it underwent multifaceted and radical changes. It began in the European literature of novelty, and also in the Kazakh literature. New and valuable domestic works appeared and the" Golden Fund "of Kazakh literature was replenished with valuable works of Kazakh writers.