南开大学 外国语学院 美国文学 现实主义

The Age of Realism现实主义文学时期美国内战促使现实主义的产生：⏹The year 1865is considered as an important year in the shift fromRomanticism （浪漫主义）to Realism （现实主义）in American literature．Realism had always existed in literature，but yet not until the late nineteenth century did realism dominate in American Literature．The American society after the Civil W ar(1861—1865) provided rich soil for the rise and development of Realism．⏹The Civil W ar was a turning point in American history．It broughtAmerica’s great change from an agrarian （农业的）to an industrial society．The principal issue of the war was the conflict between industry and capitalist dermocracy （民主）in the North and agriculture and slavery in the South．The war ended with the overwhelming triumph of industrialism over agrarianism. The W ar brought many great changes to every aspect of American people.⏹The Civil W ar destroyed the romantic concept of war. In the eyes ofromanticists，wars were always glorious, grand，and noble encounters，something heroic. However, the amazing number of dead soldiers made it hard for people to have a noble vision of mankind any more. Therefore, Mark Twain once described man as “the only animal who indulged in one after another of the atrocity （凶恶，残暴）of war．” This statement is a representative attitude of the post-Civil War writers in America．To them，there is nothing romantic about war．⏹Moreover, the Civil W ar also changed American people’s views on values,morality and religion．Before the Civil War，the puritan ethic （清教的价值观）was the dominant morality in America．Puritans believed in the principles of evil and“salvation”. They considered perseverance （坚持不懈），stark （全然的）simplicity，and strenuous （艰苦，繁重的）good works as virtue，and regarded idleness，drunkenness and sexual immorality as depravity （堕落）.⏹However，materialism had shaken the religious conviction of the Puritans.Stimulated by materialism，people were eager to pursue money and enjoyed the pleasures of life．They became dubious about human nature and God’s benevolence （仁慈）. The Civil W ar marked a deterioration （恶化）of American moral values．⏹Another important effect of the Civil War was American industrializationand urbanization （城市化）with its accompanying social diseases．With the war, there was an explosive growth of business and industry．⏹This growth is symbolically shown in the rapid development of therailroad．The 35,000 miles of railroad track of 1865 increased to about2,000,000 miles by the end of the century．The improvements in industrial technology and transportation provided theincentive （刺激）and capacity for large-scale agriculture，manufacturing，and mining．With the development of industry，more and more factoriesappeared，and urbanization was required and facilitated by industrialization．⏹Nevertheless, industrialization and the urbanization were accompanied by theincalculable sufferings of the laboring people．Being attracted by higher pay, many farmers flocked （蜂拥至）to the industrialized cities．Therefore, in the cities there were an oversupply of labor，which kept wages down and allowed the industrialists to offer workers adverse （恶劣）working conditions．⏹Wealth was more than ever in the possession of the few ---- bankers andindustrialists ----with the poor poorer and the rich richer．It was the beginning of what Mark Twain called“The Gilded Age（镀金时代）”，an age of extremes（充满极端和对立的时代）of decline and progress，of poverty and dazzling wealth，of gloom and buoyant （持续上涨的）hope．⏹The post-Civil War years were a period of great plunder （掠夺）andexploitation，of greedy materialism and political corruption．⏹All the accompanying social diseases，especially slum （贫民窟）conditions，child labor，poverty，crime，and labor strikes became reflected in American literature.⏹The above political，social and moral changes have influenced Americanwriters in both theme and technique．After the Civil War，there appeared a new generation of writers who were dissatisfied with the optimistic ideas of the Romanticists and showed a great interest in the realities of life.现实主义：⏹These realist writers sought to portray American life as it reallywas.They insist that the ordinary and the local were as suitable for artistic portrayal as the magnificent and the remote.They tried their best to create a new kind of literature that was completely realistic．⏹Realism first appeared in the United States in literature with local, anamalgam （混合物）of romantic plots and realistic description of things immediately observable：the dialects，customs，sights，and sounds of regional America.⏹We can see this in the true-to-life descriptions of Bret Harte，William DeanHowells, Hamlin Garland，and Mark Twain．Bret Harte is the first American writer of local color to achieve wide popularity．He presents stories about western mining town involving colorful gamblers，outlaws，and scandalous （丑恶可耻的）women⏹Thereafter editors ever sensitive to public taste （大众的阅读兴趣）demandedsuch works，and writers including Harte, Harriet Beecher Stowe，and Mark Twain provided regional stories and tales of the lives of America’s Westerners，Southerners，and Easterns．⏹Local-color fictions reached its peak of popularity in the 1880s，but by theturn of the century it has begun to decline as its limited resources were exhausted and as its most popular writers grew tediously repetitious or turned to other literary modes.⏹Realism is a direct contrast to Romanticism．⏹As a movement，American Realism started during the Civil War period andevolved in the second half of the 19th century．⏹American Realism has realistically-flawed （有缺陷的）heroes instead ofthe idealized characters in Romanticis m．⏹The writers of the Realism tried to represent life with their writings．Theirsettings often include factories and slums，and their characters areordinary people such as poor workers，businessmen，vagrants （流浪者），swindlers，（诈骗者）and even prostitutes．⏹The realists tend to be highly selective in their choice of material，focusingupon what seems real to middle-class readers。