Latter American literature

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美国文学史——精选推荐

Abstract: America's history of literature began with the swarming in of immigrants with different background and cultures. After that, American literature had been greatly influenced by the European culture for a long period. It was not until America's independence, did Americans realized that they need national literature strongly, and American literature began to developed. The Civil War was a watershed in the history, after which American literature entered a period of full blooming. Romantics, which emphasized individualism and intuition and Tnscendentalism represented by Emerson came out into being. This was an exciting period in the history of American literature. Like the flowers of spring, there were suddenly many different kinds of writing at the same time. They have given depth and strength to American literature, and accelerated the forming of High Romantics. But due to the influence of Civil War, the American society was in a turbulent situation. The writings about local life, critical realism and unveiling the dark side of the society were increased. After The First World War, Americans were at a loss postwar, and the Modern American literature began. My piece of paper is written in chronological order as these periods developed in order to have a clear outline of its progress. Keywords: National Literature, Romanism, Transcendentalism, Local Color, Realism, Modern literature 摘要：从殖民地时期起，欧洲殖民者和清教徒翻开了美国⽂学史的第⼀页。

what is American literature 什么是美国文学

Literature is fictional

Fiction: the prose that tell a story (fairy tells, short stories, and novels) that set them apart from the context of life Invented material: imaginative e.g. Harry Porter Stylized material: artistic control: through the play of language, selection of details, inclusion of metaphor, irony and imagery: compare: how does a newspaper report and a poet would describe the same event?
What is American Literature

Literature produced in American English by the people living in the United States excluding American expatriates or literature produced in other languages by minorities in the United States such as Native American Literature in Indian Language Primarily about American history, society, life, and people (American Experience)

American literature 美国文学

American literatureThough American literature does n’t have a quite long history, it developes extremely fast and has an important role to play in world literature. It’s the literature that others heed and that can stand up for itself. However where did it start? Some people hold the view that it starts from the colonial period, but I think the real American literature start from the war for independence.It’s true that many colonies contributed to the forming of American civilization, however the first United States was for the most part English, sustained by English traditions, ruled by English laws, supported by English commerce. At that time its civilization and culture are mostly the shadow of English, so it is not the really sense of American literatureWhat’s more, the literature in the colonial period is not American literature because it was the personal literature, it was the work written by immigrants from England. There are two points can support this opinion. Firstly, on the contents. The content of writings at that time were about their voyage to the new land, about adapting themselves to unfamiliar climates and crops, about dealing with Indians and so on. Secondly, on the forms. Most of the works, published an that time were travel accounts, religions writings, and local histories, as a matter of fact, these literature were also regard as imitation of English literature.However, in the period of the war for independence, American thought and writing were shaped by the rationalism, it has it’s o wn forms and content, and not all influenced by English because in this period there emerged many patriotic poems, ballads and essays. Which shows the vigorous, fearless fighting spirits of a new nation. And it’s these works that encourage the nation to go forward and prepare the way for the achievement of the next several period.To sum up, the literature start from the war for independence is the true American literature, that is the national literation.。

American Literature1 美国文学

Puritan thoughts: based on Calvin. Puritanism: a branch of Protestant originated in Geneva, then came to Scotland, to England, and then to American esp. to the New England with the immigrates. Aim: purify the religious doctrines or worship ceremony, looking for a new Garden of Eden.
著名的哈佛大学（美国最早的私立大学之一，有先有哈佛，后有美利坚之说。历史上，哈佛大学的毕业生中共有六位曾当选为美国总统。
美国麻省理工学院（Massachusetts Institute of Technology，MIT） 1865年创建于波士顿，1961年迁到现在所在的坎布里奇。位于马萨诸塞州（Massachusetts）的剑桥（Cambridge）。
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American Literature
Gao Han

Table of Contents
Part ⅠThe Eearly American Literature (1620-1770) Part Ⅱ The Age of Romanticism (1770-1875) Part Ⅲ The Age of Realism and Naturalism (1875-1914) Part Ⅳ The Twentieth Century American Literature (1014-2000)
7. Puritan attitudes
Their attitudes toward work: Work itself is a good in addition to what it achieves; Time saved by efficiency or good fortune should be spent in doing further work. Their attitudes toward joy and laughter: as symptoms of sin.

1 History of American Literature 美国文学史英语简介

Brief Introduction of the American Literature History
1. The Colonial Period (1607-End of the 18th C) 2. The Romantic Period (19th C-1865) 3. The Age of Realism (1865-1918) 4. The Modern Period (1918-1945) 5. The Postwar Period (1945- )
regarded as one of the American authors writing in the Modernist tradition of the 1920s)
The Modern Period (19181945)
The 1920s African American literature (Harlem Renaissance) Langston Hughes The 1930s Left or socialist-oriented writers: John Dos Passos and John Steinbeck
Henry David Thoreau Walt Whitman Emily Dickinson Edgar Allan Poe Nathaniel Hawthorne Herman Melville
The Age of Realism (18651918)
William Dean Howells Mark Twain (The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn;
Frank Norris
Dreiser
(McTeagaue,

美国文学American Literature-An Overview

6. Imagism:
❖Ezra Pound：In a Station of the Metro ❖William Carlos Wilentury:
1) Robert Frost The Road Not Taken, Stopping by Woods on a
Purpose of this course:
1.Widen your scope of knowledge: literature is a mirror, when you look into it, you can find the reflected social, economic and religious life; it is also a window, if we open the window, we can see the beautiful scenery, and learn the native language.
❖Walt Whitman: Song of Myself
❖Emily Dickinson: one of the greatest poetess of American, a great writer of great power and beauty. Her poems are hard to understand and deep in thought.
Ⅳ. How do we study literature?
1. Analytical Approach 2. Connect the work with yourself 3. Develop hypotheses as you read 4. Write as you read 5. Learn from the interpretations of others 6. Analyze works of literature

American_ Literature(美国文学)

His work: ➢ 1. realism: detective stories – logical,
brilliant, rational ➢ 2. romanticism – irrationalism, mystery,
violence, criminality, death, passion
Colonial Period
➢ Periods of Am. Literature vary a lot ➢ It´s impossible to give exact dates ➢ The first literature started to appear after
founding of the first settlement at Jamestown in 1607 ➢ It continuoud till the outbreak of the Revolution
➢ son of a poor actress (drastic death) ➢ his father alcoholic ➢ He was taken by his guardian Mr. Allan ➢ Studied West Point – kicked out ➢ Marriage with 13 year-old cousin ➢ She died of TB ten years later – despair,
symbol of doubts and longing
➢ The Golden Bug ➢ The Pit and the Pendulum ➢ The Black Cat ➢ The Murders in the Rue Morgue ➢ The Fall of the House of Usher

American literature

The Autobiography ( 1771-1790) The Way to Wealth (1774) Poor Richard’s Almanac (1732-1758)
Ⅱ.The Romantic Period(1790-1865)
The Romantic Period ,one of the most important periods in the history of American literature ,also called “the American Renaissance”, stretches from the end of 18th century through the outbreak of the Civil War. During this period , American writings continued to follow the form and style of British literature, and most of them placed an emphasis on the free expressions of emotions. American romanticism exhibited from the very outset distinct features of its own in spite of the strong British influences. Early American Romanticism was best represented by Washington Irving and James Fennimore Cooper in their fiction.
James Fennimore Cooper (17891851)

american literature(背诵)

Definition1、Psychological Realism is the realistic writing that probes deeply into the complexities of character’s thoughts and motivations. It places more than the usual amount of emphasis on interior characterization and on the motives, and internal action which springs from external action. In Psychological Realism, character and characterization are more than usually important. 心理现实主义是一种深入探究人物思想和动机复杂性的现实主义写作。

它比以往更强调内部特征和动机，以及来自外部行动的内部行动。

在心理现实主义中，性格和人物塑造比通常更重要。

2、Imagism is a literary movement launched by British and American poets early in the 20th century that advocated the use of free verse, common speech patterns, and clear concrete images as a reaction to Victorian sentimentalism. 意象主义是20世纪早期由英美诗人发起的一场文学运动，主张使用自由诗歌、共同的语言模式和清晰的具体形象，作为对维多利亚时代感伤主义的反应。

3、Black Humor is the use of morbid and the absurd for darkly comic purposes in modern fiction and drama. It is used to express the absurdity, insensitivity, paradox, and cruelty of the modern world. Ordinary characters or situations are usually exaggerated far beyond the limits of normal satire or irony. 黑色幽默是在现代小说和戏剧中使用病态和荒谬的黑色喜剧目的。

American Literature 1

American Literature
Part Four
Modern American Literature
(1910--)
Chapter 7
American literature after WWI
7.2
Sherwood Anderson
(1876-1941)
Sherwood Anderson
Points of View
The stories abandoned traditional ideas of plot and story-telling in order simply to expose the characters who were repressed and frustrated by intolerable social and industrial systems.
II. Literary Works
II. Literary Works
Poor White (1920) --a novel contrasted the harsh, dehumanizing advances of industrialization with the old, disappearing harmony of the countryside
I. Life and Career
born in the countryside of Ohio, in the Middle West --one of seven children of a poor laborer who eventually abandoned his family.
I. Life and Career
While he wrote literature in his spare time, he was encouraged by the leaders of Chicago’s literary movement.

《英美文学选读》模拟试题(4)答案

《英美文学选读》模拟试题(四)一、Multiple Choice1.Romance, which uses narrative verse or prose to tell stories of _______ adventures or other heroic deeds, is a popular literary form in the medieval period.A. ChristianB. knightlyC. GreekD. primitive2.The tragedy of Dr. Faustus, the protagonist in Christopher Marlowe’s The Tragic History of Dr. Faustus, is the very face that _______.A. man is confined to timeB. he tried to join Africa to SpainC. he became a man without soul after he sold itD. he conjured up Helen, the lady who was the very course of the Trojan War Marlowe’s Dr. Faustus The Passionate Sheperd to His Love3.Which of the following historical events does not directly help to stimulate the rising of the Renaissance Movements?A. The rediscovery of ancient Greek and Roman culture.B. The new discoveries in geography and astrology.C. The Glorious revolution.D. The religious reformation and the economic expansion.4.Literature of Neoclassicism is different from that of Romanticism in that _______.A .the former celebrates reason, rationality, order and instruction while the latter sees literature as an expression of an individual’s feelings and experiencesB. the former is heavily religious but the latter secularC. the former is an intellectual movement the purpose of which is to arouse the middle class for political rights while the latter is concerned with the personal cultivation.D. the former advocates the "return to nature" whereas the latter turns to the ancient Greek and Roman writers for its models5.“And we will sit upon the rocks,/Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks,/By shallow rivers to whose falls/Melodious birds sing madrigals.” The above lines are probably taken from _______.A.Spensers The Faerie QueeneB.John Donnes “The Sun Rising”C.Shakespeares “Sonnet 18”D.Marlowes “The Passionate Shepherd to His Love”6.You may have meet the term "Yahoo" on internet, but you may also have met it in English literature .It is found in _______.A. John Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s ProgressB. Samuel Johnson’s The Vanity of Human WishesC. Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s TravelsD. Henry Fielding’s tom Jones7.The ture subject of John Donnes poem,“The Sun Rising,” is to _______.A.attack the sun as an unruly servantB.give compliments to the mistress and her power of beautyC.criticize the suns intrusion into the lovers private lifeD. lecture the sun on where true royalty and riches lie.8."Surface", "Sneerwell", "Backbite", and "Candour" are most likely the names of the characters in _______.A. Shaw’s Mrs Warren’s ProfessionB. Sheridan’s The School for ScandalC. Shakespeare’s Love’s Labour’s LostD. Christopher Marlowe’s Dr.Faustus9.The Houyhnhnms depicted by Jonathan Swift in Gullivers Travels are _______.A.horses that are endowed with reasonB.pigmies that are endowed with admirable qualitiesC.giants that are superior in wisdomD.hairy,wild, low and despicable creatures, who resemble human beings not only in appearance but also in some other ways.10.What does Wordsworth’s poem "The Solitary Reaper" tell us about Romanticist?A. To romanticists, poetry is an expression of an individual’s feelings and experiences no matter how fragmentary and momentary these feelings and experiences are.B. Romanticist take delight only in sound effect, the theme of a work is not their concern.C. Romanticist are not patient people; they would leave before the revelation of the theme.D. Poetry should present the apparent and tangible.11.The phrase 搕o urge people to abide by Christian doctrines and to seek salvation through constant struggles with their own weaknesses and all kinds of social evils?may well sum up the implied meaning of _______.A. Gullivers TravelsB. The Rape of the LockC. Robinson CrusoeD. The pilgrims Progress12. Prometheus Unbound is Shelley’s greatest achievement. Prometheus, according to the Greek mythology, was chained by Zeus on Mount Caucasus and suffered the vulture’s feeding on his liver for _______.A. planning a revolt to dethrone GodB. misinterpreting God’s decree to reconcile man and natureC. prophesying the arrival of spring in a winter seasonD. stealing the fire from heaven and giving it to man13.Which of the following is taken from John Keats’ “Ode on a Grecian Urn”?A.“I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!”B.“They are both gone up to the church to pary.”C.“Earth has not anything to show more fair.”D.“Beauty is truth, truth beauty”.14."My Last Duchess" is a poem that best exemplifier Robert Browning’s _______.A. sensitive ear for the sounds of the English languageB. excellent choice of wordsC. mastering of the metrical devicesD. use of the dramatic monologue15.“Ode o na Grecian Urn”shows the contrast between the _______ of art and the _______ of human passion.A.glory …uglinessB.permanence…transienceC.transience…sordidnessD.glory…permanence16.Tess of the D’Urbervilles, one of Thomas Hardy’s best known novels, portrays man as _______.A. being hereditarily either good or badB. being self-sufficientC. having no control over his own fateD. still retaining his own faith in a world of confusion17.The typical feature of Robet Brownings poetry is the _______.A.bitter satirerger-than-life caricaturetinized dictionD.dramatic monologue18.The term tone in literature means _______.A. sound effect such as rhyme and metrical deviceB. the pitch of a word used to determine its meaning in the given contextC. the manner of expression to indicate the speaker’s attitude towards the subjectD. a shade of colour to reflect the change of the light19._______ is the first important governess novel in the English literary history.A.Jane EyreB.EmmaC.Wuthering HeightsD.Middlemarch20.In which of the following poems by William Butler Yeats did you find the allusion to Helen and the TrojanWar?A. "Sailing to Byzantium"B. " Leda and the Swan"C. "The Lake Isle if Innisfree".D. " Sown by the Sally Garden"21._______ is considered to be the best-known English dramatist since Shakespeare, and his representative works are plays inspired by social criticism.A.Richard SheridanB.Oliver GoldsmithC.Oscar WildeD.Bernard Shaw22.James Joyce is the author of all the following novels except _______.A. DublinersB. Jude the Obscure --HardyC. A Portrait of the Artist as a Young ManD. Ulysses内容简介托马斯·哈代（1840-1928），英国小说大师，著名诗人。

美国文学三个重要时期

Three main periods and their characteristics of American Literature The development of American literature can be divided into: I the Early American Literature; II the Age of American Romanticism and Transcendentalism; III the Age of Realism and Naturalism; IV Twentieth-century Literature---Modernism and Postmodernism. The following are the three main periods and their characteristics of American literature.1.The Age of American RomanticismThe period 1820s-1865 in American Literature is commonly identified as the Romantic Period in America. After the establishment of the Federal Government of 1789, American entered a new age. Its population was considerably added to by the influx of immigration. The American pioneers pushed the frontier further west beyond the Mississippi. Before 1860, the United States began to change into an industrial and urban society. The rapid growth of population, the westward expansion and the spread of industrialism produced something of an economic boom and a tremendous sense of optimism and hope among the people. The writers of this period produced works of originality and excellence that helped shape the ideas, ideals, and literary aims of many American writers. Writers of the American Romantic Period include Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Emily Dickinson, and Walt Whitman.Romantic Period is one of the most important periods in the history of American literature. It was an age of westward expansion, of the increasing gravity of the slavery question, of an intensification of the spirit of embattled sectionalism in the South, and of a powerful impulse to reform in the North. In literature it was America’s first great creative period, a full flowering of the romantic impulse on American soil. The characteristics of American RomanticismAlthough greatly influenced by their English counterparts, the American romantic writers revealed unique characteristics of their own in their works and they grew on the native lands. For examp1e，the American national experience of"pioneering into the west" proved to be a rich source of material for American writers to draw upon. They celebrated America's landscape with its virgin forests, meadows, groves, endless prairies, streams, and vast oceans. The wilderness came to function almost as a dramatic character that symbolized moral 1aw. The desire for an escape from society and a return to nature became a permanent convention of American literature. Such a desire is particularly evident in Cooper’s Leather Stocking Tales, in Thoreau's Walden and，later, in Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. With the growth of American national consciousness, American character types speaking local dialects appeared in poetry and fiction with increasing frequency. (4)Then the American Puritanism as a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values and American Romanticism. One of the manifestations is the fact that American romantic writers tended more to moralize than their English and European counterparts.Besides, a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of origina1 sin and the mystery of evil marked the works of Hawthorne, Melville and a host of lesser writers.Later，American literature came to Transcendentalism Period which emphasized individualism, self-reliance, and rejection of tradition authority. It was actually greatly influenced by romanticism. American Romanticism culminated around the 1840s in what has come to be known as “New England Transcendentalism” or “American Renaissance” (1836-1855). The Transcendentalist movement, embodied by essayists Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, was a reaction against 18th century Rationalism, and closely linked to the Romantic Movement.In general, Transcendentalism was a liberal philosophy favoring nature over formal religious structure, individual insight over dogma, and humane instinct over social convention. American Transcendental Romantics pushed radical individualism to the extreme. American writers—then or later —often saw themselves as lonely explorers outside society and convention. There was a trust in the individual, democracy, possibility of continued change for the better, a need to see beyond what is before our eyes, and to see a deeper significance, a transcendentreality. Nature conceived of not as a machine but as an organism, symbol and analogue of the mind. For the Romantic American writer, nothing was a given. Literary and social conventions, far from being helpful, were dangerous. There was tremendous pressure to discover an authentic literary form, content, and voice.The romantic period of American literature stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War. The Civil War brought the Romantic Period to an end. The age of Realism came into existence.2. The age of RealismIf you study American literature, you’d better learn more about Realism. The period ranging from 1865 to 1914 has been referred to as the Age of Realism in the history of Unite States, which is actually a movement or tendency that dominated the spirit of American literature, especially American fiction from the 1850s onwards. In art and literature, Realism refers to an attempt to describe human behavior and surroundings or to represent figures exactly as they act or appear in life. Realism entered American literature after the Civil War, when the American society provided rich soil for the rise and development of Realism. William Dean Howells defined realism as “nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material”. Realists searched for the social and human nature more directly. In part, Realism was a reaction against the Romantic emphasis on the strange, idealistic, and long-ago and far-away. It has been chiefly concerned with the commonplaces of everyday life among the middle and lower classes where character is a product of social factors and environment is the integral element in the dramatic complications.Literature Features in Realism PeriodThe major form of literature produced in this era was realistic fiction.Unlike romantic fiction, realistic fiction aims to represent life as it really is and make the reader believe that the characters actually might exist and the situations might actually happen. In order to have this effect on the reader, realistic fiction focuses on the ordinary and commonplace. The major writers of the Realistic Period include William Dean Howells, Mark Twain, Henry James, Bret Harte, and Kate Chopin.The Ameri can authors lumped together as “realists” seem to have some features in common: “verisimilitude of detail derived from observation,” the effort to approach the norm of experience—a reliance on the representative in plot, setting, and character, and to offer an objective rather than an idealized view of human nature and experience. They insisted on accurate documentation, sociological insight, and avoidance of poetic diction and idealization. Local colorism as a trend first made its presence felt in the late 1860s and early 70s. Local colorist concerned themselves with presenting and interpreting the local character of their regions. The tended to idealize and glorify, but they never forgot to keep an eye on the truthful color of local life.As a literary movement, realism came in the latter half of the nineteenth century as a reaction against “the lie” of romanticism and sentimentalism. It expressed the concern for the world of experience, of the commonplace, and for the familiar and low.Naturalism i s a term of literary history, primarily a French movement in prose fiction and the drama during the final third of the 19th century. The emergence of Naturalism does not mark a radical break with Realism, rather a logical extension of it. Broadly speaking, Naturalism is characterized by a refusal to idealize experience and by the persuasion that human life is strictly subjected to natural laws. The Naturalists shared with the earlier Realists the conviction that everyday life of the middle and lower classes of their own day provided subjects worthy of serious literary treatment. Emphasis was laid on the influence of the material and economic environment on behavior，on the determining effects of physical and hereditary factors in forming the individual’s temperament. In popular use, the term naturalism is sometimes used to mean fiction that exaggerates the techniques of realism, sacrificing prose style and depth of characterization for an exhaustive description of the external, observable world. Naturalism is a more deliberate kind of realism, usually involves a view of human beings as a passive victims of natural forces and social environment. 3. The Age of ModernismBetween 1914 and 1939, American Literature entered into a phase which is stillreferred to as "The Beginnings of Modern Literature". The large cultural wave of Modernism, which emerged in Europe, and then spread to the United States in the early years of the 20th century, expressed a sense of modern life through art as a sharp break from the past. As modern machinery had changed the pace, atmosphere, and appearance of daily life in the early 20th century, so many artists and writers, with varying degrees of success, reinvented traditional artistic forms and tried to find radically new ones—an aesthetic echo of what people had come to call “the machine age.” During that period, a large number of artists and literary movements are totally different from those of the 19th-century’s, in style, form and content. Modern psychology has a profound impact on the early 20th-century’s literature.American Modernism was a complex and diverse international literary movement, originating at about the end of the 19th century and reaching its maturity in the mid 20th. Based on different social realities and influenced by different ideas and thoughts, Modernism has been made up of many facets—symbolism, surrealism, expressionism, existentialism, stream of consciousness, Black Humor, the Theatre of the Absurd, and other minor trends.The literary features of ModernismCompared with earlier writings, especially those of the 19th century, modern American writings are notable for what thy omit—the explanations, interpretations, connections, and summaries. A typical modern work will seem to begin arbitrarily, to advance without explanation, and to end with resolution. The book is no longer a record of sequence and coherence but a juxtaposition of the past and the present, of the history and the memory, or a book. Like their British counterparts, the American Modernists experimented with subject matter, form, and style and produced achievements in all literary genres.The American Modernist Period also produced many other writers that are considered to be writers of Modernist Period Subclasses. For example, F. Scott Fitzgerald is considered a writer of The Jazz Age, Langston Hughes and W.E.B. DuBois writers of The Harlem Renaissance, and Gertrude Stein, T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and Ernest Hemingway writers of the Lost Generation.The Great Depression marked the end of the American Modernist Period, and writers such as William Faulkner, John Steinbeck, and Eugene O'Neill dealt with the social and political issues of the time in their literary works.ConclusionRomantic period stretches from the end of the 18th century through the outbreak of the Civil War. Later American literature came to Transcendentalism Period which emphasized individualism, self-reliance, and rejection of tradition authority. The Civil War brought the Romantic Period to an end. The Age of Realism came into existence, which was against “the lie of romanticism and sentimentalism”. Th e period between 1910 and 1930 is referred to as the era of Modernism. During that period, a large number of artists and literary movements are totally different from those of the 19th-century’s, in style, form and content.。

大学生英语作文范文【三篇】

【导语】学习英语贵在坚持，找到适合自己的方法，多运用多温故。

以下“大学生英语作文范文【三篇】”由整理发布，欢迎阅读参考！更多相关讯息请关注！【篇一】About two months ago, it has been announced that this year’s winner of Nobel Prize in literature was Alice Munro, she is from Canada, and she is famous for her short stories. Alice Munro’s winning for Nobel Prize gives her great reputation, but at the same time, people start to be more interesting in Canadian literature.大概两个月以前，据消息宣布，今年的诺贝尔文学奖的获得者是爱丽丝•门罗，她是来自加拿大的，以她的短篇小说闻名。

爱丽丝•门罗获得诺贝尔文学奖给她带来的巨大的名声，同时，人们也开始对加拿大文学更加感兴趣。

When we talk about world literature, the first thing comes out in our mind is British literature, then the American literature. They are the main literature in the world; thewinner of Nobel Prize in literature often belongs to them.However, as the world gets globalized, the winner is no longer limited in British and America, India and China begin to join the winner club. At this time, the club has more members, Canada also joins in.当我们说到世界文学的时候，头脑中立刻闪现出来的是英国文学，然后是美国文学。

1.American-Literature

American LiteratureLiteratureWhat is literature?•Literature has been the high skills of writing with imagination since the 19th century.•Types of literature:FictionPoetryDramaEssayMajor Literary SchoolsI. Classicism and neoclassicism•Advocation of rationalism(Reason should be above everything else.)Samuel Johnson, Alexander PopeII. Romanticism•Opposition to neoclassicism•Emphasis on emotion, imagination and intuition.William Wordsworth, Shelley, Byron…III. Realism•Focus on common lives of the average people•And unromantic observation of human experiences.Dickens, Bronte, Austen…IV. Modernism•Synonym of revolution against traditional art.•Emphasis on instinct and subconsciousness.The Spirit of American Literature★(the thread throughout American literature)★Individualism★•Personal ability•Hard work leads to success.Compared with the spirit of Chinese literatureConfucianism•ModerateTo attack human pride, avoid extremes and keep human desires within appropriate reason and order.Introduction•American literature may be the youngest national literatures in the world. Its real history, if calculating from the end of the revolutionary war, is only about 200 years or more. Within such a short period, American literature swiftly developed, began to receive international recognition, and has had a great effect upon world literature.•I. Literature of the Colonial Period (1607—1776)★•II. Literature of Reason and Revolution (1776--1820)★•III. Romanticism (1820--1860)★•IV. Rise of Realism (1860--1914)★•V. Modern Period (1914--)★1.Literature of the Colonial Period殖民统治时期文学(1607-1776)From my years young in days of youth,God did make known to me His Truth,And call’d me from my native placeFor to enjoy the Means of Grace.In wilderness He did me guide,William Bradford•God teaches me and guides me to a right wayI. Historical Background•Settlement★The result of religious motives and mercantile motives•Puritanism★•Puritan thoughts: ★predestination (God decides everything before things occur) ★Original sin (Human beings were born to be evil.)★Puritan values:Hard work, thrift, and piety.•Individualism and American DreamII. Features of Literature•The first American literature was neither American nor real literature. ★•Types of WritingDiary, history, journal, letter, narrative…•It was the work mainly of immigrants from England.★•It was not in the form of poetry, essay or fiction, but the mixture of travel accounts and religious writings.★III. Writers•John Smith★•As the first Amercan writer★He is a British soldier of fortune,and strictly speakly speaking,was not litirature at all.A Ture Relation Of Such Occurences and Accidents of Note as Hath Happened in Virginia was a long report recording what he saw and heard in the New World, which he sent back to England and was printed in 1608 whitout his knowledge.•Anne Bradstreet and Edward Taylor★(English immigrants)•The work of the two writers rose to the level of real poetry.★2.The Age of Reason and Revolution理性与革命时期文学(1776--1820)I. Historical Background•The Age of Revolution•The Age of ReasonThe Age of Revolution★American Revolution of Independence (1776--1783)★•Britain’s suppression on America in economy and politics•Revolt against BritainThe Age of Reason★Enlightenment•Intellectual movement in Europe (1660’s—1780’s)★•Humanism: the equality and freedom among men(to stimulate Americans to strive for the establishment of their independent and democratic nation)•Rationalism: reason and orderII. Features of Literature•Utilitarian tendency(Nothing is good or beautiful but in the measure that is useful.)•Clear, concise and powerful expression•Essay as a prominent partIII. Writers and WorksEssayists•Thomas Paine: Common Sense★(to make Americans see the necessity to have an independent nation of their own)•Thomas Jefferson: Declaration of Independence★(to inspire his contemporaries)•Benjamin Franklin本杰明.富兰克林: Autobiography★Poor Richard’s Alman ac★Poet•Philip Freneau飞利浦.费瑞诺: To the Memory of the Brave Americans★The Wild Honeysuckle★Benjamin Franklin本杰明.富兰克林(1706 – 1790)Identity•He’s a writer.•He’s a scientist.•He’s a businessman.•He’s a politician.•He’s an inventor.•He’s the most v ersatile and enligh-tened man of his generation•Born on Milk Street in Boston, Massachusetts from a very large family.•At the age of 12, apprenticed to be a newspaper printer in Boston.•In 1729, already owned his own printing shop and published the newspaper Pennsylvania Gazette《宾夕法尼亚报》.•In 1732, offered his Poor Richard’s Almanac《格言历书》.★•From 1771 to 1790, wrote his Autobiography《自传》.★•Being one of those who drafted articles leading to the Declaration of Independence. •Served to draft the constitution, which was finally adopted in 1789.Literary term•Autobiography:- A written account of one’s own life.- Autobiographical writing as a literary genre.•It is significant: (1) it is a classic of its kind in American literature; (2) it indicates the fact that Franklin was the spokesman of American enlightenment. •Franklin embodied the transition from Puritan piety, and idealism to the more secular and utilitarian values of the American enlighten-ment.Significance of Franklin’s Autobiography•Franklin’s autobiograph y remains one of the classics of its kind. It shows Franklin as a man of versatile energy and new ideas, a man who represented American.enlightenment and the fulfillment of American dream.It is a humorous and fascinating record of an old man’s reflection s on his rise from a poor boy to a rich and famous personage through self-examination, self-reliance, and self improvementPhilip Freneau飞利浦.费瑞诺(1752—1832)I. LifePoet of the American Revolution★•Involvement in the War, and brutal treatment by British in 1780•Political satires•Patriotic revolutionary versesFather of American Poetry★•Return to nature after political position•Love of rural life•Beauty and perfection of natureRomantic Attitudes★(浪漫主义先驱)II.Features of poemsClassification of two categories•Poems on American RevolutionHatred toward the British colonistsResentment toward slavery•Poems of natural beautySubject matter: American landscape and imagesTo avoid imitation of English poetsIII. Works•To the Memory of the Brave Americans《纪念英勇的美国人》★•The Wild Honey Suckle《野金银花》★3.American Romanticism美国浪漫主义时期文学(1820-1860)(From the end of the 18th century through the outbreak of the civil war)★Feature of American Romanticism was both imitative and indepandent.★Imitative:English and European Romanticists★Independent:Emersn and Whitman★Romanticism →romantic →romance•Romanticremote from the real life•Romancestory about the adventure and love of knights•Romanticismthe revival of romancePrecondition of Romanticism•IntellectuallyReaction against enlightenment•PoliticallyInspired by French revolution•SociallyGuided by progressive causes•EmotionallyEmphasis on the value of individual•focus on the individual’s expression of emotion and imagination“All good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”• a heightened interest in natureAmerican RomanticismThe First Renaissance of American LiteratureI. BackgroundDevelopment of politics, economy and culture•Expansion of the West•Rise of industrialism•Transmission of literature•Progressive and developing societyRomantic movement in European countriesEsp. in BritainII. Features of American Romanticism•American puritanism as a cultural heritage•American romanticism was both imitative and independent•It presented a new experience;the exotic landscape, the frontier life and the westward expansionSection I Early Romanticismi. W. Irving华盛顿.欧文★Popularize romanticism in American•The Sketch Book《见闻札记》（the first work to win financial success on both sides of the Atlantic）★•Legend of Sleepy Hollow《睡谷传说》★•Rip V an Winkle《瑞凡.凡.温克尔》★ii. J.F. Cooper库伯•Leatherstocking Tales《皮袜子故事集》(the American national experience of adventure into the West)★•The spy《间谍》★iii. W.C. Bryant布莱恩特•To A Waterfowl《致水鸟》★Section II. Summit of Romanticism—American TranscendentalismI. Appearance: Nature by Emerson in 1836★II. Focus on intuition and oversoul:nature—the symbol of spiriti. R. W. Emerson爱默生★•Nature《论自然》★ii. H. D. Thoreau梭罗★•Walden《瓦尔登湖》★•Civil Disobedience《论公民之不服从》★Section III. Late Romanticismi. N. Hawthorne霍桑★•The Scarlet Letter《红字》★ii. H. Melville赫尔曼.梅尔维尔★•Moby Dick《白鲸》★•Typee《泰比》★iii. E. A. Poe库泊★•Annabel Lee《安娜贝尔.李》★iv. H. W. Longfellow★• A Psalm of Life, Song of Hiawatha★v. W. Whitman★•The Leaves of Grass《草叶集》vi. E. Dickinson★Edgar Allan Poe 爱伦.坡•Famous American poet, short-story writer and critic★•Father of modern short story★•Father of detective story and story of horror ★I. Life (1809—1849)•Death of his parents•Break with his foster father(gambling and drinking)•Work as an editor•Marriage to his cousin•Poverty, little reputation in his life timeLife Story•Born in Boston in 1809, Poe was orphaned at the age of two.•Poe was adopted by John Allan.•Poe ran away from home, due to his gambling and drinking debts.•Poe had to make a living by writing or editing some magazines•Poe married his 13-year old cousin. Her early death may have inspired his writing.•Poe died in poverty and with little reputation.•An artist with literary genius, indulging himself in a bohemian life style.II.Position in Literary History•The most controversial figure in the history of American literature•The unique importance of Poe as a great writer of fiction, a poet of first rank, and a critic of insight•The position among the greatest writers of the world.Writing Features•Poe’s writing style is traditional.•Poe is not easy to read, just because of his ability to make good use of implications.•The object of poetry is pleasure, not truth.III. WorksPoetry•The Raven《乌鸦》★•To Helen《致海伦》★•Annabel Lee《安拉贝尔.丽》★The poem is a mourning song for the death of his wife.Poe did not use her real name, nor did he use the real background.★Short Story•The Fall of the House of Usher《厄舍房屋倒塌记》★Nathaniel Hhawthorne霍桑(1804-1864)I. LifeThree important things in his life:•Puritan family background•Study in Bowdoin College•Publication of The Scarlet LetterLife Story•Hawthorne was born in Salem Massachusetts. (His ancestors were men of prominence in the Puritan theocracy of seventeenth-century New England. ) •His relatives financed his education at Bowdoin College.•Among his classmates were many of the important literary and political figures of the day.•The Scarlet Letter represents the height of Hawthorne's literary geniusII. WorksFours novels:The Scarlet Letter (his masterpiece)《红字》★The House of the Seven Gables《七个尖角阁的房子》★The Blithedale Romance: experience of transcendentalists experiment. 《福谷传奇》★The Marble Faun: evil educates. 《大理石雕像》★Two collections of short stories:❖Twice-Told Tales 《故事重述》★❖Mosses form an Old Manse 《古宅青苔》★Features of his worksSetting Puritan New EnglandThemes Evil & sinIdea Dark view toward human beingsTechnique symbolismHawthorne as a Literary Artist•First professional writer•Hawthorne displayed a love for allegory and symbol.•His writing is representative of 19th century.The Scarlet Letter•Hester sin★•Chillingworth(Hester’s husband) evil★•Dimmesda le(Hester’s lover) sin★•Pearl(Hester and Dimmesdale’s child)★•What does A in The Scarlet Letter symbolize?★Adultlery--------Ability-----------Angel★Walt Whitman华特.惠特曼1. Representative work:Leaves of Grass — first genuine epic poem★2. Free verse — the poetic style he devised★3. InfluenceContemporary American poetry, whatever school or form, bears witness to his great influence.Free Versea poem without regular rhymes and metersO Captain! My Captain!Emily Dickinson 艾米丽.迪金森1. Liferecluse—to separate herself from the world at the age of 23single in her lifeunhappy love affairdeath of her teacher, lover, father before her2. Themes: based on her own experiences, joys and sorrows(1) nature – kind and cruel (300 poems)★(2) love – suffering and frustration caused by love （120 poems)★Alter? When the hills doFalter? When the sunQuestion if his gloryBe the perfect one.……I will of you! (729)(3) death (About one third of the total collection of her poems deal with death.)★— desire for death★— moment of death★— death and immortality★MY life closed twice before its close;It yet remains to seeIf Immortality unveilA third event to me,So huge, so hopeless to conceive,As these that twice befell.Parting is all we know of heaven,And all we need of hell. (1732)3. Style(1) poems without titles.★(2) severe economy of expression.★(3) capital letters, dash – emphasis.★(4) short poems, mainly two stanzas.★She is one of the most innovative poets of 19th-century American literature.Because I Could Not Stop for Death4.Realism现实主义时期(1860--1914)The rise of realism and the decline of romanticismI. Historical Background•Civil War (1861--1865)★•Capitalism—freedom and democracyDevelopment of society before 1880Financial crisis—unrest society after 1880II. Features of LiteratureTwo literary streams★•Realism (1860--1880)★Truthful description of lifeObjective rather than idealizedTone: hopeful and optimistic★•Naturalism (1880--1914)★Theory of Darwinism: survival of the fittestFocus on environment and humanTone: hopeless and gloomy★III. Writers and Works•Three giants: M. Twain, H. James and W. D. Howells★Writers of realism•W.D.Howells:The Rise of Silas Lapham★•Mrs. Stowe: Uncle Tom’s Cabin★•Mark Twain: the true father of American literature★representation of local colour★The Adventures of Tom Sawyer(1883)★The Adventures of Huckle Finn(1884)★•O. Henry: founder of American short story★The Cop and the Anthem★•Henry James: psychological novels★The Art of fiction★Writers of Naturalism•Jack London: The Sea Wolf★The Call of the Wild★•Stephen Crane:The Red Badge Courage(his most successful work)★•Theodore Dreiser: Sister Carrie★An American Tragedy(the most successful one)★5.The Modern Period现代主义时期(1914-- )Literature during WWI and WWII (1914--1945)★•Section I: Literature in the 1920’sI. IntroductionA flowering period of American literatureThe Second Renaissance of American literature★II. Background★1. The first world war:★•Economically: great wealth, economic boom, highly-consuming society •Spiritually: fragmentation2. Freud’s theory (psychology)★3. Emigration (to Asia)★•the influence of Japanese and Chinese culture and literatureIII. Literary Schools★1. Imagism (poets)★•Representatives: E. Pound, T. S. Eliot,R. Frost2. Lost Generation (novelists)★• E. Hemingway, F. Scott. Fitzgerald3. Southern Literature★•W. FaulknerSection II: Literature in the 1930’sI. Background•Great Depression (1929)II. The Main Stream•Left-oriented•J. SteinbeckImagism•Image 意象意―意识，abstract ideas象―世间物象，concrete objectseg:圆月―思家之情longing for home•Imagismto use concrete objects to express abstract ideas •Symbolism•Symbol ― imageto compress a very complex idea into an imageeg: rose, springlove, life•(Both writers and readers know what the symbol represents.)eg: A in Scarlet Letteradultery, ability, angel•(Symbols created by writers to convey particular meanings.) Three Principles of ImagismI. Direct treatment of objectsII. Free verseIII. Economy of expressionsImages in Chinese and western literature•Strong will : pine, plum,oak•Love :peach blossom rosePurity: lotus lily•In Chinese the sound of bell, 梅、兰、竹、菊•In English paradise, snake, west wind, nightingale, daffodil E. Pound 庞德•He spearheaded the new school of poetry: Imagist Movement★•Imagism’s founder★I. Life•to emigrate to Asian and study Japanese literatureII. Works•Cantos (a collection of poems)In a Station of the Metro★T. S. Eliot (1888 - 1965) 艾略特I. Life“A royalist in politics, a classicist in literature, and an Anglo-Catholic in religion”• a royalist: the change of his nationalityAmerican to English• a classicist: poetic theory, the use of allusion•an Anglo-Catholic: religious conversion to ChristianityII. Works1. Poems•The Waste Land《荒原》including 5 parts, has been called the first masterpiece of modernism in English★•Four Quartets《四个四重奏》(he found the way out and believed only God couldsave people)★2. Critical Essays•The Sacred Wood《圣林》(New Criticism)★3. Plays•Images in his worksthe waste land, water, firestory of king Fish, rain and river, burning and purifying ―death and rebirth Robert Frost 弗洛斯特Lost Generation❖The Lost Generation:The Lost Generation is a term used to describe a group of American intellectuals, poets, artists and writers fled to France in the post WWI years to reject the values of American materialism and to seek the bohemian lifestyle in Paris.His Poems1)After Apple-Picking《摘罢苹果》★2)Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening 《雪夜林边驻足》★3)The Road Not Taken 《没有选择的路》★F. Scott Fitzgerald 菲茨杰拉德(1890 - 1940)His masterpiece：The Great Gatsby《伟大的盖茨比》★Ernest Hemingway (1899 -1961)I. Biography:⏹Born in Illinois, the son of a country doctor, Hemingway worked as a reporter in 1917.⏹During World War I, he served as a driver for the American Red Cross in Italy.⏹During the Spanish Civil War, Hemingway served as a correspondent.⏹He fought in World War II and then settled in Cuba in 1945.In 1954, Hemingway was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature (The Old Man and the Sea).⏹In 1961, depressed, and ill with cancer, he shot himself.Literary achievementsNovels:The Sun Also Rises (1926) With the publication of it, he was recognized as the spokesman of the “lost generation” .★A Farewell to Arms (1929) tells of a tragic wartime love affair between an ambulance driver and an English nurse. ★For Whom the Bell Tolls(1940) in detailing an incident in the war, argues for human brotherhood. ★The Old Man and the Sea(1952) celebrates the courage of an aged Cuban fisherman, Santiago. ★Story collections:In Our Time (1925) 《在我们的时代》Men without Women(1927)《没有女人的男人》Winner Take Nothing (1933) 《胜者无所得》The Lost Generation❖The Lost Generation:The Lost Generation is a term used to describe a group of American intellectuals, poets, artists and writers fled to France in the post WWI years to reject the values of American materialism and to seek the bohemian lifestyle in Paris. without a meaningful future to fall on, they were lost in disillusionment.Main Character:Santiago: The hero of the story. He is an old Cuban fisherman who is a perfectionist when it comes to fishing. Despite his precise methods, he has no luck at sea. Santiago wants to be unique: a greater and stranger person than his peers out at sea. He is alone, except for the company of Manolin. He is determined to catch one big fish.Writing Style:Hemingway’s fiction usually focuses on people living essential, dangerous lives—soldiers, fishermen, athletes, bullfighters—who meet the pain and difficulty of their existence with courage.His celebrated literary style is direct, terse, and often monotonous, yet particularly suited to his elemental subject matter.His language is characterized by features including: economy of expression, short sentences and paragraphs, vigorous and positive language, and deliberate avoidance of gorgeous adjectives, and etc.⏹Hemingway’s Iceberg TheoryEugene O’Neill 尤金.奥尼尔( 1888 – 1953)⏹“American Shakespeare”⏹Born in a Broadway hotel in New York City, a son of a famous and popular actor.⏹He came in close contact with the outcasts of society and tasted the bitterness of life.⏹In 1920 his first full-length play, Beyond the Horizon, was professionally produced on Broadway and won the Pulitzer Prize.⏹His major work Long Day’s Journey into Night 《长夜慢慢路迢迢》(1956).⏹Four Pulitzer Prizes (1920, 1922, 1928, 1957) and the Nobel Prize in 1936 show his achievement and influence at home and abroad.Joseph Heller (1923 – 1999)⏹New York author who served in the air force in World War II.⏹Received an A. B. from New York University, an M.A. from Columbia, studied at Oxford, and taught briefly before writing Catch-22 (1961) 《第二十二条军规》.What is Catch-22?If the men are really crazy, then they will want to fly the missions, regardless of whether or not they want to be killed. If they do not want to fly the missions, then they are sane and must fly them.。

美国文学

American Puritanism is a two-faceted tradition of religious idealism and levelheaded common sense.•The Autobiography and its influence on later American literature: It is Puritan because it is a record of self-examination and self-improvement. The Puritans, as a type, were very much given to self-analysis. Because they believe in predestination, the Puritans and Calvinists constantly examined their conscience to ascertain for themselves how much more they should do to ensure salvation. Reading The Autobiography, one sees an old man, serene and cool, casting a backward glance, looking intensely into his past life and, pen in hand, carefully noting down his experience as if in this way, he could communicate with God. The meticulous chart of thirteen virtues he set for himself to cultivate to combat the tempting vices, the stupendous effort he made to improve his own person, the belief that God helps those who help themselves and that very calling is a service to God---all these indicate that Franklin intensely Puritan.Then the book is also illustration of the Puritan ethic that, in order to get on in the world, one has to be industrious, frugal, and prudent.The Autobiography is also an eloquent elucidation of the fact that Franklin was spokesman for the new order of 18th –century enlightenment, and that he represented in America all its ideas, that man is basically god and free by nature, endowed by God with certain inalienable rights of liberty and the pursuit of happinessTypical among the virtues he listed for himself to acquire is “order”, a predominant notion of the Age of Enlightenment, the watchword of the 18th century, as best exemplified in the balanced symmetrical and rigidly formal heroic couplets of Alexander Pope and his school. The whole book is an impressive record of a man trying to be of value to mankind. Creating as it does the image of a boy’s rise from rags to riches, the book demonstrates Franklin’s confident belief that the new world of America was a land of opportunities which might be met through hard work and wise management, and that one of tolerable abilities will work great changes and accomplish great affairs among mankind.Thus through telling a success story of self-reliance, the book celebrates the fulfillment of the American dream. The spirit of self-reliance, originating from Puritan ethics, bloomed in the next century into Emerson’s transcendentalist infinitude of the private individual and the dream, adding more to itself in the age of Jackson, went through different phases of frustration, and evaporated, it seems, in the tragic failure of the great Gatsby, a veritable image of a latter-day Franklin.•Franklin was supremely human.He knew humanity’s foibles and deficiencies, but he was convinced, as his Autobiography shows, that man is good and capable of becoming better, and that, although men and institutions are often corrupt, they might be improved. Had this belief failed to triumph over the doctrine of people like Jonathan Edwards, the American Revolution would have been impossible.•The style of the book Puritan simplicity, directness, and concisionThe plainness of its style, the homeliness of imagery, the simplicity of diction, syntax, and expression are some of the salient features we cannot mistake.•The lucidity of the narrative, the absence of ornaments in wording and of complex, involved structures in syntax, and the Puritan abhorrence of paradox are graphicallydemonstrated her and in the whole of the book. It is true that, in style, the first part written as a letter to his son is best；however, its easy, leisurely and reminiscent kind of style becomes overburdened with moral consideration in the rest of book as he was persuaded by his friends that he should write his memoirs for the benefit of posterity.But taken as a whole, it is safe to say that the book is an exemplary illustration of the American style of writing.••。

美国文学三个重要时期

1.The Age of American RomanticismThe period 1820s-1865 in American Literature is commonly identified as the Romantic Period in America. After the establishment of the Federal Government of 1789, American entered a new age. Its population was considerably added to by the influx of immigration. The American pioneers pushed the frontier further west beyond the Mississippi. Before 1860, the United States began to change into an industrial and urban society. The rapid growth of population, the westward expansion and the spread of industrialism produced something of an economic boom and a tremendous sense of optimism and hope among the people. The writers of this period produced works of originality and excellence that helped shape the ideas, ideals, and literary aims of many American writers. Writers of the American Romantic Period include Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Emily Dickinson, and Walt Whitman.Romantic Period is one of the most important periods in the history of American literature. It was an age of westward expansion, of the increasing gravity of the slavery question, of an intensification of the spirit of embattled sectionalism in the South, a nd of a powerful impulse to reform in the North. In literature it was America’s first great creative period, a full flowering of the romantic impulse on American soil. The characteristics of American RomanticismAlthough greatly influenced by their English counterparts, the American romantic writers revealed unique characteristics of their own in their works and they grew on the native lands. For examp1e，the American national experience of "pioneering into the west" proved to be a rich source of material for American writers to draw upon. They celebrated America's landscape with its virgin forests, meadows, groves, endless prairies, streams, and vast oceans. The wilderness came to function almost as a dramatic character that symbolized moral 1aw. The desire for an escape from society and a return to nature became a permanent convention of American literature. Such a desire is particularly evident in Cooper’s LeatherStocking Tales, in Thoreau's Walden and，later, in Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. With the growth of American national consciousness, American character types speaking local dialects appeared in poetry and fiction with increasing frequency. (4)Then the American Puritanism as a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values and American Romanticism. One of the manifestations is the fact that American romantic writers tended more to moralize than their English and European counterparts.Besides, a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of origina1 sin and the mystery of evil marked the works of Hawthorne, Melville and a host of lesser writers.Later，American literature came to Transcendentalism Period which emphasized individualism, self-reliance, and rejection of tradition authority. It was actually greatly influenced by romanticism. American Romanticism culminated around the 1840s in what has come to be known as “New England Transcendentalism” or “American Renaissance” (1836-1855). The Transcendentalist movement, embodied by essayists Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, was a reaction against 18th century Rationalism, and closely linked to the Romantic Movement.In general, Transcendentalism was a liberal philosophy favoring nature over formal religious structure, individual insight over dogma, and humane instinct over social convention. American Transcendental Romantics pushed radical individualism to the extreme. American writers—then or later —often saw themselves as lonely explorers outside society and convention. There was a trust in the individual, democracy, possibility of continued change for the better, a need to see beyond what is before our eyes, and to see a deeper significance, a transcendent reality. Nature conceived of not as a machine but as an organism, symbol and analogue of the mind. For the Romantic American writer, nothing was a given. Literary and social conventions, far from being helpful, were dangerous. There was tremendous pressure to discover an authentic literary form, content, and voice.The romantic period of American literature stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War. The Civil War brought the RomanticPeriod to an end. The age of Realism came into existence.2. The age of RealismIf you study American literature, you’d better learn more about Realism. The period ranging from 1865 to 1914 has been referred to as the Age of Realism in the history of Unite States, which is actually a movement or tendency that dominated the spirit of American literature, especially American fiction from the 1850s onwards. In art and literature, Realism refers to an attempt to describe human behavior and surroundings or to represent figures exactly as they act or appear in life. Realism entered American literature after the Civil War, when the American society provided rich soil for the rise and development of Realism. William Dean Howells defined realism as “nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material”. Realists searched for the social and human nature more directly. In part, Realism was a reaction against the Romantic emphasis on the strange, idealistic, and long-ago and far-away. It has been chiefly concerned with the commonplaces of everyday life among the middle and lower classes where character is a product of social factors and environment is the integral element in the dramatic complications.Literature Features in Realism PeriodThe major form of literature produced in this era was realistic fiction.Unlike romantic fiction, realistic fiction aims to represent life as it really is and make the reader believe that the characters actually might exist and the situations might actually happen. In order to have this effect on the reader, realistic fiction focuses on the ordinary and commonplace. The major writers of the Realistic Period include William Dean Howells, Mark Twain, Henry James, Bret Harte, and Kate Chopin.The American authors lumped together as “realists” seem to have some features in common: “verisimilitude of detail derived from observation,” the effort to approach the norm of experience—a reliance on the representative in plot, setting, and character, and to offer an objective rather than an idealized view of human nature and experience. They insisted on accurate documentation, sociological insight, and avoidance of poetic diction and idealization. Local colorism as a trend first made itspresence felt in the late 1860s and early 70s. Local colorist concerned themselves with presenting and interpreting the local character of their regions. The tended to idealize and glorify, but they never forgot to keep an eye on the truthful color of local life.As a literary movement, realism came in the latter half of the nineteenth century as a reaction against “the lie” of romanticism and sentimentalism. It expressed the concern for the world of experience, of the commonplace, and for the familiar and low.Naturalism i s a term of literary history, primarily a French movement in prose fiction and the drama during the final third of the 19th century. The emergence of Naturalism does not mark a radical break with Realism, rather a logical extension of it. Broadly speaking, Naturalism is characterized by a refusal to idealize experience and by the persuasion that human life is strictly subjected to natural laws. The Naturalists shared with the earlier Realists the conviction that everyday life of the middle and lower classes of their own day provided subjects worthy of serious literary treatment. Emphasis was laid on the influence of the material and economic environment on behavior，on the determining effects of physical and hereditary factors in forming the individual’s temperament. In popular use, the term naturalism is sometimes used to mean fiction that exaggerates the techniques of realism, sacrificing prose style and depth of characterization for an exhaustive description of the external, observable world. Naturalism is a more deliberate kind of realism, usually involves a view of human beings as a passive victims of natural forces and social environment.3. The Age of ModernismBetween 1914 and 1939, American Literature entered into a phase which is still referred to as "The Beginnings of Modern Literature". The large cultural wave of Modernism, which emerged in Europe, and then spread to the United States in the early years of the 20th century, expressed a sense of modern life through art as a sharp break from the past. As modern machinery had changed the pace, atmosphere, and appearance of daily life in the early 20th century, so many artists and writers, with varying degrees of success, reinvented traditional artistic forms and tried to findradically new ones—an aesthetic echo of what people had come to call “the machine age.” During that period, a large number of artists and literary movements are totally different from those of the 19th-century’s, in style, form and content. Modern psychology has a profound impact on the early 20th-century’s literature.American Modernism was a complex and diverse international literary movement, originating at about the end of the 19th century and reaching its maturity in the mid 20th. Based on different social realities and influenced by different ideas and thoughts, Modernism has been made up of many facets—symbolism, surrealism, expressionism, existentialism, stream of consciousness, Black Humor, the Theatre of the Absurd, and other minor trends.The literary features of ModernismCompared with earlier writings, especially those of the 19th century, modern American writings are notable for what thy omit—the explanations, interpretations, connections, and summaries. A typical modern work will seem to begin arbitrarily, to advance without explanation, and to end with resolution. The book is no longer a record of sequence and coherence but a juxtaposition of the past and the present, of the history and the memory, or a book. Like their British counterparts, the American Modernists experimented with subject matter, form, and style and produced achievements in all literary genres.The American Modernist Period also produced many other writers that are considered to be writers of Modernist Period Subclasses. For example, F. Scott Fitzgerald is considered a writer of The Jazz Age, Langston Hughes and W.E.B. DuBois writers of The Harlem Renaissance, and Gertrude Stein, T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and Ernest Hemingway writers of the Lost Generation.The Great Depression marked the end of the American Modernist Period, and writers such as William Faulkner, John Steinbeck, and Eugene O'Neill dealt with the social and political issues of the time in their literary works.ConclusionRomantic period stretches from the end of the 18th century through the outbreakof the Civil War. Later American literature came to Transcendentalism Period which emphasized individualism, self-reliance, and rejection of tradition authority. The Civil War brought the Romantic Period to an end. The Age of Realism came into existence, which was against “the lie of romanticism and sentimentalism”. The period between 1910 and 1930 is referred to as the era of Modernism. During that period, a large number of artists and literary movements are totally different from those of the 19th-century’s, in style, form and content.。

American_Literature

Transcendalism
美国浪漫主义文学运动足能标炳的是新英格兰的超验主义运动。该运动开始于19世纪30年代的新英格兰的先验主义俱乐部。本来,这个超验主义只是对新英格兰人提出来的。它是针对波士顿的唯一神教派的冷淡古板的理性主义而提的。而后来逐渐影响到全国, 特别是在高级知识分子和文学界人士当中影响颇大。超验主义文学的主要代表是爱默生(Emerson)和梭罗 (Henry Davd Thoreau),他们的作品对美国文学产生了很大影响。超验主义"承认人类具有本能了解或认识真理的能力,能够超过感官获取知识"。爱默生曾说:"只有人心灵的尊严才是最神圣的。"超验主义还认为自然是高尚的,个人是神圣的,因此人必须自助。
The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is
won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and
I Heard a Fly Buzz – When I died我死时听到了苍蝇的嗡嗡声
Mine – by the Right of the White Election我的丈夫——选择如意情人的权利
Wild Nights –39;m nobody! Who are you?
The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.见闻札记
A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada征服格拉纳达

Latter American literature

美国文学史——精选推荐

what is American literature 什么是美国文学

American literature 美国文学

American Literature1 美国文学

1 History of American Literature 美国文学史 英语简介

美国文学American Literature-An Overview

American_ Literature(美国文学)

American literature

american literature(背诵)

American Literature 1

《英美文学选读》模拟试题(4)答案

美国文学三个重要时期

大学生英语作文范文【三篇】

1.American-Literature

美国文学

美国文学三个重要时期

American_Literature

1 History of American Literature 美国文学史英语简介