关于英美文学重点名词解释汇总

American PuritanismPuritanism is the practices and beliefs of the Puritans. The Puritans were originally members of a division of the Protestant Church, who came into existence in the reigns Queen Elizabeth and King JamesⅠ. The first settlers who became the founding fathers of the American nation were quite a few of them Puritans.Characteristics of Local Color1. Settings are frequently remote and inaccessible2. Characters may become character types, sometimes quaint or stereotypical.3. The narrator is typically an educated observer from the world beyond4. Stories may revolve around the community and its rituals.5. An antipathy to change and a nostalgia for an always-past golden ageDarwinismSocial Darwinism is a belief that societies and individual human beings compete in a struggle for existence in which natural selection results in “struggle of the fittest.” Social Darwinists base their beliefs on theories of evolution developed by British naturalist Charles Darwin. Social Darwinists typicall y deny that they advocate a “law of jungle.” But most propose arguments that justify imbalances of power between individuals, races, and nations, because they consider some more fit to survive than others. The theory had produced a big impact on Naturalism.Emersonian TranscendentalismEmersonian Transcendentalism is actually a philosophical school which absorbed some ideological concerns of American Puritanism and European Romanticism, with its focus on the intuitive knowledge of human beings to grasp the absolute in the universe and the divinity of man. In his essays, Emerson put forward his philosophy of the over-soul, the importance of the Individual, and Nature.ExpressionismExpressionism is used to describe the works of art and literature in which the representation of reality is distorted to communicate an inner vision, transforming nature rather than imitating it. In literature it is often considered a revolt against realism and naturalism, a seeking to achieve a psychological or spiritual reality rather than to record external events.Hawthorne's view of Puritanism: Hawthorne's view of man and human history originates, to a great extent, in Puritanism. He was not a Puritan himself, but he had Puritan ancestors who played an important role in his life and works. He believed that "the wrong doing of one generation lives into the successive ones," and often wondered if he might have inherited some of their guilt. Local ColorismPost-Civil War America was large and diverse enough to sense its own local differences. Regional voices had emerged. “ local colorism” is a unique variation of American literary realism. Generally, the works by local colorists are concerned with the life of a small, well--defined region or province.NaturalismIn literature, the term refers to the theory that literary composition should aim at a detached, scientific objectivity in the treatment of natural man. The movement is an outgrowth of l9th–century scientific thought, following in general the biological determinism of Darw in’s theory, or the economic determinism of Karl Marx.New England TranscendentalismNew England Transcendentalism is the most clearly defined Romantic literary movement in this period. It was started in the area around Concord, Mass. by a group of intellectual and the literary men of the United States such as Emerson, Henry David Thoreau who were members of an informal club, i. e. the Transcendental Club in New England in the l830s.The transcendentalists reacted against the cold, rigid rationalism of Unitarianism in Boston. They adhered to an idealistic system of thought based on a belief in the essential unity of all creation , the innate goodness of man, and the supremacy of insight over logic and experience for the revelation of the deepest truths.RealismIn 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.The Gilded AgeIt refers to the period of gross materialism and blatant political corruption in the U.S. history during the l870s that gave rise to important novels of social and political criticism. The period takes its name from the earliest of these, The Gilded Age(l873), written by Mark Twain in collaboration with Charles Dudley Warner.The Imagist MovementLed by the American poet Ezra Pound, Imagist Movement is a poetic movement that flourished in the U.S. and England between l909-l9l7. It advances modernism in arts which concentrates on reforming the medium of poetry as opposed to Romanticism, especially Tennyson's worldliness and high-flown language in poetry.The Jazz Age: It refers to the l920s, a time marked by frivolity（轻薄，轻率）, carelessness, hedonism（快乐主义）and excitement in the life of the flaming youth. Fitzgerald is largely responsible for the term and many of his literary works portray it. The Jazz Age is brought vividly to life in The Great Gatsby.The Lost GenerationIt refers to, in general, the post-World WarⅠgeneration, but specifically a group of expatriate disillusioned intellectuals and artists, who experimented on new modes of thought and expression by rebelling against former ideals and values and replacing them only by despair or a cynical hedonism.The Beat GenerationAlso called Beat Movement, it is an American social and literary movement originating in the l950s. Beat Generation writings expressed profound dissatisfaction with contemporary American society and endorsed an alternative set of values. They rejected traditional forms and advocated personal release, purification, and illumination through the heightened sensory awareness.The Scarlet LetterHawthorne's remarkable sense of the Puritan past, his understanding of the colonial history in New England, his apparent preoccupation with the moral issues of sin and guilt, and his keen psychological analysis of people are brought to full display in his masterpiece The Scarlet Letter. The Romantic PeriodThe Romantic Period, one of the most important periods in the history of American literature, stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War. It started with the publication of Washington Irving's The Sketch Book and ended with Whitman's Leaves of Grass. Whitman's democratic idealsWhitman's democratic ideas govern his poetry-writing. In his famous poetry, openness, freedom, and above all, individualism (the belief that the rights and freedom of individual people are most important) are all that concerned him. Whitman brings the hard-working farmers and laborers into American literature ,attack the slavery system and racial discrimination.In this book he also extols nature ,democracy, labor and creation ,and sings of man's dignity and equality, and of the brightest future of mankind. Whitman believed that poetry could play a vital part in the process of creating a new nation. It could enable Americans to celebrate their release from the Old World and the colonial rule. And it could also help them understand their new status and to define themselves in the new world of possibilities.The themes in Whitman's poetryHis poetry is filled with optimistic expectation and enthusiasm about new things and new epoch. Whitman believed that poetry could play a vital part in the process of creating a new nation. It could enable Americans to celebrate their release from the Old World and the colonial rule. And it could also help them understand their new status and to define themselves in the new world of possibilities. Hence, the abundance of themes in his poetry voices freshness.（1）He shows concern for the whole hard-working people and the burgeoning life of cities. To Whitman, the fast growth of industry and wealth in cities indicated a lively future of the nation, despite the crowded, noisy, and squalid conditions and the slackness in morality. (2) He advocates the realization of the individual value. Most of the poems in Leaves of Grass sing of the "en-masse" and the self as well.(3) Pursuit of love and happiness is approved of repeatedly and affectionately in his lines. Sexual love, a rather taboo topic of the time, is displayed candidly as something adorable. The individual person and his desires must be respected.(4) Some of Whitman's poems are politically committed. Before and during the Civil War, Whitman expressed much mourning for thesufferings of the young lives in the battlefield and showed a determination to carry on the fighting dauntlessly until the final victory, as in poems like "Cavalry Crossing a Ford." Later, he wrote down a great many poems to air his sorrow over the death of Lincoln, and one of the famous is "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd."leaves of grass(l) the title :It is significant that Whitman entitled his book Leaves of Grass . He said that where there is earth, where there is water, there is grass. Grass, the most common thing with the greatest vitality, is an image of the poet himself, a symbol of the then rising American nation and an embodiment of his ideals about democracy and freedom.(2) theme and the poet's essential purpose(a) theme:In this giant work, openness, freedom, and above all, individualism (the belief that the rights and freedom of individual people are most important) are all that concerned him. Whitman brings the hard-working farmers and laborers into American literature, attack the slavery system and racial discrimination. In this book he also extols nature, democracy, labor and creation ,and sings of man's dignity and equality, and of the brightest future of mankind .Most of the poems in Leaves of Grass sing of the "en-masse" and theself as well.(b) the poet's essential purpose His aim was nothing less than to express some new poetical feelings and to initiate a poetic tradition in which difference should be recognized. The genuine participation of a poet in a common cultural effort was, according to Whitman, to behave as a supreme individualist; however, the poet's essential purpose was to identify his ego with the world, and more specifically with the democratic "en-masse" of America, which is established in the opening lines of "Song of Myself".style and language(l) Whitman's poetic style is marked, first of all, by the use of the poetic "I." Whitman becomes all those people in his poems and yet still remains "Walt Whitman", hence a discovery of the self in the other with such an identification. In such a manner, Whitman invites his readers to participate in the process of sympathetic identification.(2) Whitman is also radically innovative in terms of the form of his poetry. He adopted "free verse," that is, poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme. A looser and more open-ended syntactical structure is frequently favored. Lines and sentences of different lengths are left lying side by side just as things are, undisturbed and separate.There are few compound sentences to draw objects and experiences into a system of hierarchy. Whitman was the first American to use free verse extensively. By means of "free verse," Whitman turned the poem into an open field, an area of vital possibility where the reader can allow his own imagination to play.(3) Whitman is conversational and casual, in the fluid, expansive, and unstructured style of talking. However, there is a strong sense of the poems being rhythmical. The reader can feel the rhythm of Whitman's thought and cadences of his feeling. Parallelism and phonetic recurrence at the beginning of the lines also contribute to the musicality of his poems.(4) Whitman's language Contrary to the rhetoric of traditional poetry, Whitman's is relatively simple and even rather crude.(a) Most of the pictures he painted with words are honest, undistorted images of different aspects of America of the day. The particularity about these images is that they are unconventional in the way they break down the social division based on religion, gender, class, and race. One of the most often-used methods in Whitman's poems is to make colors and images fleet past the mind's eye of the reader.(b) Another characteristic in Whitman's language is his strong tendency to use oral English.(c) Whitman's vocabulary is amazing. He would use powerful, colorful, as well as rarely-used words, words of foreign origin and sometimes even wrong words. Walt Whitman has proved a great figure in the literary history of the United States because he embodies a new ideal, a new world and a new life-style, and his influence over the following generations is significant and incredible.现代主义What is Expressionism？Expressionism is used to describe the works of art and literature in which the representation of reality is distorted to communicate an inner vision, transforming nature rather than imitating it. In literature it is often considered a revolt against realism and naturalism, a seeking to achieve a psychological or spiritual reality rather than to record external events. In drama, the expressionist work was characterized by a bizarre distortion of reality.Expressionist writers' concern was withgeneral truths rather than with particular situations, hence they explored in their plays the predicaments（困境）of representative symbolic types rather than of fully developed individualized characters.The Imagist MovementLed by the American poet Ezra Pound, Imagist Movement is a poetic movement that flourished in the U.S. and England between l909-l9l7. It advances modernism in arts which concentrates on reforming the medium of poetry as opposed to Romanticism, especially Tennyson's worldliness and high-flown language in poetry.Pound endorsed three main principles as guidelines for Imagism, including direct treatment of poetic subjects, elimination of merely ornamental or superfluous words, and rhythmical composition should be composed with the phrasing of music, not a metronome. The primary Imagist objective is to avoid rhetoric and moralizing, to stick closely to the object or experience being described, and to move from explicit generalization. The leading poets are Ezra Pound, Wallace Stevens, wrence, etc.The Jazz Age: It refers to the l920s, a time marked by frivolity（轻薄，轻率）, carelessness, hedonism（快乐主义）and excitement in the life of the flaming youth.Fitzgerald and the American Dream:(l) Fitzgerald's fictions often deal with the bankruptcy of the American Dream, which is highlighted by the disillusionment of the protagonists' personal dreams due to the clashes between their romantic vision of life and the sordid reality. American Dream is a popular belief that people can achieve success, whether it is wealth, fame or love through honest hard working in a new world of liberty, equality, chances and promises. Yet in the l920s, the American Dream was bankrupt in the sense that the wealthy people were spiritually disorientated（迷惑的）and morally corrupted. The fact that the rich people turned to be more indifferent and careless brought forth the disillusionment of American Dream.A great number of his stories started with the basic situation in which a rising young man of the middle class is in love with thedaughter of a very rich family. The young man is not attracted by the fortune in itself; he is not seeking money so much as what money can bring to him; and he loves the girl not so much as he loves what the girl symbolizes. Money is only a convenient and inadequate symbol for what he dreams of earning, and love merely a vehicle that can transport him to a magic world of eternal happiness. The man's real dream, as Malcolm Cowley suggested, is that of achieving a new status and a new essence, of rising to a loftier place in the mysterious hierarchy of human worth.【此文档部分内容来源于网络，如有侵权请告知删除，本文档可自行编辑和修改内容，感谢您的支持！】。