美国文学论文

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关于美国文学的论文

关于美国文学的论文美国梦作为美国文学中一个永恒的主题，始终贯穿于美国文学之中。

下文是店铺为大家搜集整理的关于美国文学的论文的内容，欢迎大家阅读参考!美国文学的论文篇1浅析美国文学中的旅行与美国梦摘要: 对于美国人而言，上路旅行不仅是自由和美国梦的隐喻，而且是实现“显明的命定”(Manifest Destiny)的物质手段和方式。

本文以惠特曼的《草叶集》和克鲁亚克的《在路上》等作品为例，说明旅行以及过路仪式表现了典型的美国经验，表达了对美国梦的追寻、实现和传播，成为美国文化传统的重要组成部分。

关键词: 旅行;美国梦;《草叶集》;《在路上》一道路将人们从一地引向另一地，它是不同地点彼此沟通的不可或缺的桥梁。

原本各自独立、互不关联的两地因而被连接起来，产生互动，拥有了更加丰盈的生命。

几乎所有的文化都赋予道路以特别的价值，对之倾注了连绵不断的情感。

在美国，道路四通八达，如同一张网把人们的日常生活联系起来，而由于美国人生性“不安分”，不愿久居一地，加上酷爱户外活动，上路旅行便成了美国生活的一种实现方式，同时也成为美国文化的一大隐喻。

这一隐喻对于美国有着特别的意义，因为美国毕竟是由旅行者创建的：当初，清教徒远离家国，跨越大西洋来到这片陌生的土地;后来，他们从偏居美利坚东北一隅的新英格兰逐步西进，扩展畛域，奠定今日美国之格局。

毫不夸张地说，道路在美国的建立和发展过程中建立了不朽的功勋。

此外，美国幅员辽阔、地域广袤，加上经济繁荣，汽车工业发达，美国成为举世闻名的车轮上的国家。

出于工作和生活的需要，美国人花费不少的时间“在路上”，驱车出行几乎成为他们的必需。

旅行不仅是指从出发地到目的地的跨越，而且常被视为对某种历程的经历，例如，它可以象征性地指代个人的成长，或者是对某种信仰(如宗教信仰)的追寻。

穿越全美、尤其是跨越大片未开发地区的旅行，是勇气和冒险精神的体现，这种对未知领域的探索伴随着美国向西部的扩张而被放大甚至神化。

关于文学论文美国文学论文：美国文学中的代表性意识流小说研究

关于文学论文美国文学论文：美国文学中的代表性意识流小说研究摘要：意识流小说是典型的心理小说，人物的意识流动成为小说的绝对主体。

美国文学中的意识流小说代表人物有亨利·詹姆斯和威廉·福克纳等等。

他们在自己的代表作中将意识流手法发挥得淋漓尽致，并以此来探索文学表现的新方法，为小说艺术的表现力开辟了新的途径，而且取得了突出的成绩，成为公认的美国文学大师。

关键词：美国文学；意识流；心理；小说一、引言“意识流”一词是心理学家威廉·詹姆士提出来的，指人的思想或感觉的持续流动。

后来文学评论者借用该词形容现代小说中模仿这一过程的创作流派。

美国文学中的意识流小说代表人物有亨利·詹姆斯和威廉·福克纳等。

詹姆斯在小说中通常选一个有洞察力的人物，从他的角度来叙述，以他的意识为“中心意识”，再选几个配角，像许多镜子一般从各个角度反照出叙述者的思想情绪。

二、詹姆士与意识流小说亨利·詹姆斯是美国文学中意识流小说的开创者，他出身高贵、深受欧洲文化影响，是描写上层资产阶级精神面貌的代表作家。

他的风格高雅、细致，讲究表现形式，并开创了心理分析小说的先河，他的作品，尤其是后期作品如《鸽翼》(1902)，不厌其详地发掘人物“最幽微、最朦胧的”思想与感觉，把“太空中跳动的脉搏”转化为形象。

詹姆斯认为，小说创作不应停留在对客观事物的表面摹写上，而应追寻生活的内在真实。

这种内在真实就是生活现象在人们内心深处引发的变化多端、不可名状、难以界说的内在精神。

詹姆斯的代表作品《一个美国人》(1877)、《黛西·米勒》(1879)和《贵妇人的画像》(1881)就已经预示着现代小说专写主观意识的气氛：“着眼点”(point of view)和“视角”(angle of vision)，他们正是一部部实践了作者描绘内在真实的艺术主张的作品。

《黛西·米勒》突破传统小说的套路，没有情节，没有环境，也没有结局，作者只抓住人物瞬间的没有行动的印象感觉和沉思冥想，将我们引入人物的精神世界。

美国文学史论文

美国文学史课程论文A Brief Summary of the Historyof American Literature From Romanticism to Postmodernism姓名：叶红立学号：2011212831班级：2011级3班分数：2013年12月21日IntroductionAmerican is a multi-national country because of its history. Just like a big container, it puts in various kinds of elements. When different cultures mixed together, that can not only be co-existed but also form a sharp contrast, which makes American literature has a flavor of distinct and various aesthetic feeling.The history of America 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 realize that they need national literature strongly, and American literature began to develop. Romantics emphasized individualism and intuition. 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. The Civil War was a watershed in the history, after which American literature entered a period of full blooming. Influenced by the Civil War, the American society was in a turbulent situation. The writings about local life, critical realism, unveiling the dark side of the society and yearning for nature were increased. After the First World War, Americans were at a loss postwar, and the Modern American literature and Postmodern American literature began.This passage will have a further discussion on this period by dividing them into several parts: Romanticism, Realism, Naturalism, Modernism and Post-modernism.1.Romanticism PeriodRomanticism is a movement of the 18th and 19th centuries that marked the reaction in literature, philosophy, art, religion, and politics against the neoclassicism and formal orthodoxy of the preceding period. And the American Romantic period stretched from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War.Romantic Period is one of the most important periods in the history of American literature. When Americans were constructing their country, they also began to realize their differences from their European counterparts. They began to hope to see an entirely different literature model which expressed American cultures. Great writers of that period captured on their pages the enthusiasm and the optimism of that dream.There were plenty of good historical reasons why literature was so prominent during that period. Politically the time was ripe. After the 1812 war against England, the United States was finally free. Economically America had never been wealthier, but the Industrial Revolution and the nation’s change in status from a small, agricultural country to a major commercial and industrial power led to a massive impulse towards rapid urbanization. Culturally American own value emerged. There were American publishers and copyright laws to protect the writers from having their works printed. And also there were readers eager to expand their minds.American Romanticism shares many characteristics with British Romanticism. It was greatly inspired by Wordsworth’s poetic encounter with nature in The Prelude. However, developing as it did, Romanticism in America exhibited features of its own. It was mainly in the American romantic writers’ works. 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 ofHuckleberry Finn. With the growth of American national consciousness, American character types speaking local dialects appeared in poetry and fiction with increasing frequency. Then the American Puritanism as a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values and American Romanticism. One of the performances is the fact that American romantic writers tended more to moralize than their English and European counterparts. Here are going to introduce two representative writers and their works:Washington Irving(1783-1859) was the first American storyteller to be internationally recognized as a man of letters and the first great prose stylist of American romanticism, and his familiar style was destined to provide a model for the prevailing prose narrative of the future. His first book A History of New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty (1809), written under the name of Diedrich Knickerbocker, was a great success and won him wide popularity. He is best known for his The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon,Gent (1819-1820), especially in which two short stories Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow have become American classics. Later he wrote works of history and biographies, such as The History of Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (1828), A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada and The Alhambra(1832). After that, he spent the rest of his life living a life of leisure and comfort, and writing The Life of Goldsmith (1840) and a five-volume Life of Washington (1855-1859). He died in 1859.James Fennimore Cooper (1789-1851) is respectfully remembered as a master of adventurous narrative and as the creator of an American hero-myth. According to a charming legend, Cooper’s first novel Precaution(1820) was a response to his wife’s challenge to improve on the current British society fiction, and the failure of this work turned him to historical novels. Later, The Spy, a tale of the Revolution he wrote, became a great success in America and Europe. In 1823, Cooper published The Pioneers (1823), which together with other 4 novels The Deer slayer (1841), The Last of the Mohicans(1826), The Pathfinder(1840) and The Prairie(1827) became his well-known Leather-stocking Tales. Cooper went on to write over thirty novels,including exciting adventures of the sea like The Pilot. Cooper created the American historical novel using authentic American subject.2.Realism PeriodAs the economy developed, the nation witnessed an incredible expansion, among which the most influential one was westward expansion. The conquest of the new territories opened new horizons, but the country was also torn by the risk of internal division, which led to American Civil War.By the end of the Civil War a new nation had been born, and it was to demand and receive a new literature less idealistic and more practical, less exalted and more earthy, less consciously artistic and more honest than produced in the age when the American dream had glowed with greatest intensity and American writers had created a great literary period by capturing on their pages the enthusiasm and the optimism of that dream. Gradually, the Romanticism era in the United States was surpassed by another entirely different age.At about 1900s, American literature came to another entirely different age—the age of Realism. 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 mainly concerned with the commonplaces of everyday life among the middle and lower classes.American realism was the outcome of the Civil War from all the aspects of politics, economy and culture. Politically the Civil War affected both the social and the value system of the country. America had transformed itself into an industrialized and commercialized society. The war also brought some obvious changes to the American economy. It had stimulated the technological development, and new methods of organization and management were tested to adapt to industrial modernization on a large scale. As far as the culture was concerned, the harsh realities of life as well as the disillusion of heroism resulting from the dark memories of the Civil War had set the nation against the romance.As a new literature, Realism emerged for an age. Under the influence of the Civil War and industrialization, Realism surely formed its own features. Realism aims at the description of the actualities of the life and free from subjective prejudice,idealism or romantic color. The writings are about local life, critical realism and unveiling the dark side of the society, and focuses on commonness of the common people, settings and events. Mark Twain is one of the representatives.Mark Twain (1835-1910) was the true father of American literature. He was an American humorist, lecturer, essayist, and author. His primary works are The Innocents Abroad, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Prince and the Pauper, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court. He intentionally deviates from classical genteel and tends to use local dialects, colloquial language, even Black English, slang, clipped structures and ungrammatical sentences. He was a combination of realism with romanticism. His works combine American folk humor and serious literature, characterize a local culture, elements such as speech, customs, and more peculiar to one particular place. The physical settings, and people’s behavior and thoughts are different from the other places.There are many other great writers in this period, such as William Dean Howells, Henry James, O. Henry, and so on. They have made great contribution to the world’s literature.3.Naturalism PeriodAfter the Civil War, it seemed that overnight the rapid industrialization of American society changed an agrarian nation into an industrial giant. As the westward expansion continued to push the frontier nearer the Pacific coast, the settlers found themselves subject to the ruthless manipulation of forces including the railroad, as can been seen in Frank Norris’wheat novels. The rapid social changes caused by industrialization brought serious social problems. While the captains of industry piled up huge personal fortunes, the ordinary man became the victim of industrialization. The harsh reality of the industrialization period changed man’s understanding about himself and the world in which he lived in. Living in a cold, indifferent, and essentially godless world, man was completely thrown upon himself for survival. During this special period, the literary naturalism was transplanted from France to the United States and became a very important literary movement in America.Naturalism was a literary movement of the late 19th century that yielded influence on the twentieth. It was an extension of Realism, a reaction against the restrictions inherent in the realistic emphasis on the ordinary, as naturalists insisted that the extraordinary is real, too.Naturalism, with its new techniques and new ways of writing, appealed to the imagination of the younger generation like Crane, Norris, and Theodore Dreiser. They tore the mask of gentility to pieces and wrote about the helplessness of man, his insignificance in a cold world, and his lack of dignity in face of the crushing forces of environment and heredity. They reported truthfully and objectively, with a passion for scientific accuracy and an overwhelming accumulation of factual detail. They painted life as it was lived in the slums, and were accused of telling just the hideous side of it. In naturalistic literature, man is always subject to the law of nature, which may not only be indifferent but also hostile. Therefore, gloom and despair characterize American literature of this period.American literary naturalists dismissed the validity of comforting moral truths. They attempted to achieve extreme economic classes who were determined by theirenvironment and heredity. In presenting the extremes of life, the naturalists sometimes displayed an affinity to the sensationalism of early romanticism, but unlike their romantic predecessors, the naturalism emphasized that the world was amoral, that men and women had no free will, that lives were controlled by heredity and environment, that the destiny of humanity was misery in life and oblivion in death. The pessimism and deterministic ideas of naturalism pervaded the works of such American writers as Stephen Crane, Frank Norris, Jack London and Theodore Dreiser.Crane’s Maggie: A Girl of the Streets is the first American naturalism work. Norris’s McTeague is the manifesto of American naturalism. Dreiser’s Sister Carrie is the work in which naturalism attained maturity. These writers’ detailed description of the lives of the downtrodden and the abnormal, their frank treatment of human passion and sexuality, and their portrayal of men and women overwhelmed by blind forces of nature still exert a powerful influence on modern writers.Without satisfying people’s needs and refl ecting social conditions, Naturalism the same as Realism no longer stood on the historical stage. Although naturalist literature described the world with sometimes brutal realism, it sometimes also aimed at bettering the world through social reform. This combination of grim reality and desire for improvements is typical of America as it moved into the twentieth century, and paved the way to modernism.4.Modernism PeriodIn the year of 1914, the World War I broke out. World War I produced great misfortune to all human beings, but brought big fortune to Americans. Since the war was not fought on the American soil, by the second decade of the 20th century, the United States had become the most powerful industrialized nation in the world, outstripping Britain and Germany in terms of industrial production. After the war there was an economic boom and a deceptive affluence. American entered the era of big industry and big technology, a mechanized age that deprived individuals of their sense of identity. Along with the changes in the material landscape came the changes in the non-material system of belief and behavior. The war destroyed not only the lives of many promising young men, but also the early innocent beliefs of a whole generation, casting them into an age of disorientation, alienation and dissent. At the beginning of the 1930s, the economic crisis in America left a mark in the literary creations of this period. In addition, in Europe, there had been a big flush of new theories and new ideas in both social and natural sciences, as well as in the field of art which played an indispensable role in the conversion of American ideologies. The era of 1914 to 1945, marked by tremendous social upheaval and economic and political transformation, gave gave rise to modernism.Modernism originated at the end of the 19th century. It was a complex and diverse international movement in all creative arts: painting, novel, poem and play. It spread worldwide, particularly in the years following World War I. Towards the 1920s, these trends converged into a mighty torrent of modernist movement, which swept across the whole Europe and America. Modernist literature in America reached its peak in the 1920s up to the 1940s when this period ended.Literature of this period struggled to understand the new and diverse responses to the advent of modernity. Some writers celebrated the changes; others lamented the loss of old ways of being. Some imagined future utopias; others searched for new forms to speak of the new realities.The most recognizable "modernist" figures i n fiction are “the Lost Generation.”They were permanent expatriates living in Europe such as Gertrude Stein, F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway. The Lost Generation writers all gained prominence in 20th century literature. Their innovations challenged assumptions about writing and expression, and paved the way for subsequent generations of writers. Ernest Hemingway once took part in the First Would War, so many of his works deal with war or injury, and nearly all of them examined the nature of courage. By suffering from the violent of war, he felt that he was cut off from all his old beliefs and assumptions about life. He thought “The War had broken America`s culture and traditions, and separated it from its toots”. The works he wrote—The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Old Man and the Sea—inferred the state of mind, and they became the representatives of the feeling of this generation.Along with the greatest figures in “the Lost Generation” are famous poets such as Ezra Pound, Thomas Stearns Eliot, William Carlos Williams, and Robert Frost. African Americans also made significant contributions to the American modernist movement. Ezra Pound, T. S. Eliot and E. E. Cummings are three poets who opened the way to modern poetry. Ezra Pound started the “Imagist” movement, and his The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock has been called the first masterpiece of modernism. The Waste Land of T. S. Eliot particularly comments on the inhumanity and decadence of large modern cities.5.Postmodernism PeriodThe period after World War II has witnessed great changes of the United Stated of America in many aspects. The war, on the one hand, provided the base for the country to grow into a dominating superpower both in the western world and in international affairs on the global scale; on the other hand, it brought about tension and crisis within the country. Because the politics of America were influenced by two great fears. First, there was the fear of the Bomb; many Americans were sure there would be a war with the Soviet Union using atomic bombs. Also, in the late forties and early fifties, fear of Communism became a national sickness. Against such background emerges and develops the postmodernism in the 1970s.Postmodernism is regarded as a term encompassing all the new critical theories since the late 1960s. It is, accordingly, more reflective about what is subject, truth, metaphor, and human. Postmodernism is a literary experimentation focused mostly on fiction in the United States from the mid-1960s till about 1975. It became aligned with Post-structuralism and deconstruction between 1975 and 1985. Postmodernism became a general term for the cultural logic in post-industrialist society or the late stage of capitalism that is service-oriented and information-oriented.Post-modernism seems to grow or emerge from Modernism. Post-modernism involves not only a continuation, sometimes carried to an extreme, of the counter traditional experiments of modernism, but also diverse attempts to break away from modernist forms which had, inevitably, become in their turn conventional, as well as to overthrow the elitism of modernist “high art” by recourse to the models of “mass art”. In this regard, Postmodernism is a movement against Modernism.Postmodernism as a new development of literature was believed to be nothing, this group of postmodernists created some new rules for the game. For them, existentialist angst should not be what defines literature; instead literary imagination shows a virtual geography.The term of Post-modernism is in fact not an inclusive description of all literature since the 1950s or 1960s, but is applied selectively to those works in widereference to fiction. Firstly, war novels become an important genre after World War II, represented by Norman Mailer. Mailer’s The Naked and the Dead has been held as the masterpiece of its category. James Jones’ best novel From Here to Eternity is a powerful story of army life in Hawaii just before the attack on the Pearl Harbour. Secondly, metafiction as Chris Baldick puts it, is “more especially a kind of fiction that openly comments on its own fictional status.” A notable modern example i s John Fowles’ The French Lieutenant’s Woman, John Barth’s The Floating Opera, Barthelme’s Snow White, etc.EpilogueRomantic period stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War. Then the Civil War brought the Romantic Period to an end. The Age of Realism and Naturalism came into existence, which were against the lie of romanticism. The period between World War I and World War II 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. Since 1945, the United States of America experienced some successive social, political and racial upheavals. Against such background emerged and developed the postmodernism.American literature has gone though the progress of development over 200 years. It is characterized by the distinct individualism, which is optimistic, free and always creative. The living American literature has been providing potent thinking headsprings for the writers past and nowadays, and it will continue reanimating the talents to bequeath and enrich the tradition of American literature, of which deserved to be proud.Bibliography1.Malcolm Bradbury, Richard Ruland, Published in Penguin Books 1992, AmericanLiterature From Puritanism to Postmodernism2.李权文，王卓，华中师范大学出版社2010年8月第一版，《美国文学史》3.王守仁，《<新编美国文学史>简介》。

美国文学论文原创全英文版《美国三部曲》的主题

邯郸学院本科毕业论文题目析《“美国”三部曲》的主题思想—以《赚大钱》为例学生 ***学号20100120021005指导教师 ****教授年级 2010级专业英语（师范类）二级学院外国语学院*******外国语学院2014年5月B.A. ThesisOn the Themes of U. S. A. —A Case Study ofThe Big MoneyByXie WenpingSupervisor: Professor. Sun HongyanA Thesis Submitted to School of Foreign LanguagesOf Handan College in Partial FulfillmentOf the Requirement for the DegreeOf Bachelor of ArtsHandan, ChinaMay, 2014郑重声明本人的毕业论文是在指导教师孙红艳的指导下独立撰写完成的。

如有剽窃、抄袭、造假等违反学术道德、学术规范和侵权的行为，本人愿意承担由此产生的各种后果，直至法律责任，并愿意通过网络接受公众的监督。

特此郑重声明。

毕业论文作者：年月日AcknowledgementsIt is really a laborious task to accomplish this B.A. thesis. A lot of people have offered me friendly support and help in the process of writing the thesis. I would like to express my heart felt gratitude to all the respectable professors who have taught and helped me in my undergraduate study and given me much nourishment and inspiration for further study.Special thanks go to my supervisor, Professor Sun Hongyan. She has been available at all times with helpful advice and a helping hand throughout my whole writing process of the thesis. Her erudition and strictness as supervisors, kindness and consideration and tolerance as friends make my study here more meaningful. She teaches me not merely how to conduct research on literature but also how to be an upright person.I would like to express my heart-felt thanks to my family and my dear friends whose encouragement always helps me to carry on.Many thanks to all!AbstractJohn Dos Passos is a member of the extraordinary literary generation. His novel , U. S. A. Trilogy , which is John Dos Passos’s masterpiece, mirrors the dark side of America and revals the essence of the society, marking a higher level of John Dos Passos’s artistic achievements.This thesis tends to explore the themes of U. S. A. Trilogy from three chapters. Chapter one deliberates the theme—the pursuit of money, which is mainly formed by Charley’s pursuit of money and Moorehouse’s pursuit of money. Chapter two elaborates the theme—the protest against the society from two angles—Savage’s p rotest and Mary’s protest.Chapter three investigates the theme—the compromise on the destiny including Charley’s compromise on career and spirit and Margo’s compromise on dream and life.In conclusion, in U. S. A. Trilogy, employing the unique narrative art, John Dos Passos creates insightful themes—the pursuit of money, the protest against the society and the compromise on the destiny. Themes reflect the distorted effects of capitalism on the American people, which is of great realistic significance in modern society. Consequently, U. S. A. Trilogy enlightens that people should be brave, hard-working and hopeful so as to fabricate a more harmonious society.Key Words: John Dos Passos money protest compromise摘要约翰•多斯•帕索斯，是一位美国杰出的的文学家。

美国文学毕业论文

美国文学毕业论文美国文学记录了美国人民不断探索、向西拓展、追求幸福的历程,艺术地再现了美国200多年的发展历史,并在不同时期以不同的表现形式表现出来。

下文是店铺为大家搜集整理的关于美国文学毕业论文的内容，欢迎大家阅读参考!美国文学毕业论文篇1浅析美国文学中的美国梦摘要：美国梦是美国文学中贯穿始终的主题。

不同历史时期美国文学中的美国梦有着不同的表现，如殖民时期的开拓致富梦、建国后的自由民主梦、内战后的扩张发迷梦，而到一战后传统美国梦开始出现迷茫与失落、二战后则走向了绝望与反叛。

关键词：美国文学;美国梦;本质;资产阶级美国文学从诞生到现在虽然只有200多年的历史，却产生了一大批对世界文学有着巨大影响的作品，在这些作品当中美国梦是一个贯穿始终的主题。

美国梦是目前国内人文社会学科的一个研究热点。

本文试图从论述美国文学中美国梦的演变过程人手，研究其变化的原因及在文学中的表现，进而揭示其本质。

一、美国梦产生的历史背景美国梦的产生有其特定的历史背景。

自从哥伦布发现新大陆之后，欧洲人就梦想着到这块土地上去掠夺财富，开拓疆域。

英国清教徒更梦想着到这里来建立起新的耶路撒冷—上帝在人间的王国。

而当时的士著印第安人尚未建立国家，整个“新大陆”都是“无主土地”，无边无际、任人开垦和占有的无限土地带来了无限的机会，许多在旧世界中不可想象的事情在这里发生了。

如果说得天独厚的自然条件是美国梦形成的基础，那么《独立宣言》的发表便使美国梦有了思想依据。

《独立宣言》不仅宣布了人“生而平等”，还将追求幸福规定为不可剥夺的天赋人权。

在欧洲旧大陆的封建等级制度下，灰姑娘只是童话里的人物，而在美国，白手起家“从破衣烂衫到腰缠万贯”的大亨则比比皆是。

在一个尚未定型的国度中，尚未定型的年代里，只要抓住机会，梦想就会实理。

于是，在美国文学中，美国梦也就成了一个贯穿始终的主题。

二、不同历史时期的美国梦一部文学史也可以说是一部美国梦的历史，有着200多年历史的美国文学记录了不同时期美国人的梦想。

[美国文学的论文]美国文学论文选题

[美国文学的论文]美国文学论文选题美国文学的论文篇1浅析禅文化在美国文学中的渗透和发展一、渗透阶段：从爱默生到狄金森，异曲同工的超验主义和禅爱默生及其同伴梭罗是美国第一代热爱佛学的人物。

早在1820年爱默生的日记中多次提到印度宗教思想，他熟读《薄伽梵歌》，并且向朋友们推荐。

1844年在其主办的刊物《日晷》上发表了《法华经》的译文，这是美国第一部佛教经典译作。

作为美国文化的精神领袖，爱默生终其一生想摆脱欧洲的文化束缚，因此，他转向古老的东方文化以寻求帮助，中国儒家思想和印度哲学成为其超验主义学说的重要源头。

爱默生的超验主义有许多内容与禅宗思想不谋而合，如万物一统、活在当下、热爱自然、自立、修身等精神。

①禅宗完全摆脱了外来偶像崇拜和繁琐教义的束缚，爱默生也竭力推动美国的文化独立和个性的解放。

百丈禅师说：“日日是好日”，爱默生宣称：“如果我们能始终‘活在当下’，我们应该受到祝福，我们懂得利用每一降在我们身上之事……”②受爱默生影响，狄金森写了五百多首描写自然、探讨自然与人的关系的诗篇(约占她全部诗作的三分之一)。

除此之外，她的诗歌主题多是对死亡的独特理解、对自身的反省、对内心直觉的描述，甚至对“无我”之境、对“空”的领悟。

梭罗、惠特曼的作品也或多或少有禅的影子。

二、借鉴阶段：从庞德到史蒂文斯，从禅诗到诗禅19世纪末禅宗被介绍到西方之前美国文坛对禅的关注从对中国古典诗歌和日本俳句的关注中开始了。

唐代诗人接受禅学影响，导致了在一定程度诗的禅化。

禅诗在唐朝达到高峰，流传到日本后又与日本文化相结合形成了具有日本特色的俳句，这两种诗歌形式都成为禅的重要传播媒介，尤其在20世纪初意象主义诗歌运动的上升时期，大量的意象和简洁的俳句手法成了意象派诗人们借鉴的首选。

以意象派的压轴之作、庞德的《在地铁站内》{1}为例：这些面孔在人群中幽灵般地显现：湿漉漉的黑树枝上朵朵花瓣。

意象主义诗歌运动对以后的英美诗歌创作走向产生了深远的影响，它把禅的人生态度和处理题材的方式植入了西方诗歌。

美国文学史简述五篇范文

美国文学史简述五篇范文第一篇：美国文学史简述A Short Summary of the History of American LiteratureIn American Literature, Colonial and Revolutionary period, American Romanticism, The Realistic Period and American Modernism are the four important periods.During 17C and 18C is the American colonial and Revolutionary Period.Puritanism is the main school of this period, which is the practices and belief of puritans.The American puritans accept the doctrine and practice of predestination, original sin and total depravity, and limited atonement through a special infusion of grace from God.But due to the grim struggle for living in the new continent, they become more and more practical.American Puritanism is so much a part of the national atmosphere rather than a set of tenets.Jonathan Edwards was one of the great writers of the Puritanism, his works include The Freedom of the Will, The Nature of True Virtue and so on.Philip Freneau is “a poet of the American Revol ution” and “the father of American Poetry”.The Rising Glory of American and The Wild Honey Suckle are his famous works.Puritanism gradually declined at the end of 18C.As a result of the impact of European Literary Romanticism, there rapidly came into being the rise of romanticism in American.The American romanticism flourished from 1815 to 1865, which advocated importance to individual dignity and value, and they shared some characteristics— moral enthusiasm, individuality and intuitive perception.Transcendentalism, which appeared after 1830, marked the maturity of American Romanticism and the first Renaissance in the American literary history.It laid emphasis onspirit, individual and nature.Washington Irving is a writer of this period, who has been called “the father of American Literature”.He wins the international fame for The Sketch Book, which marked the beginning of American Romanticism.Ralph Waldo Emerson is the New England Transcendentalist.Nature, his famous work, is regarded as the “manifesto of Am erican Transcendentalism”.American industrialization was one of the important factors of the development of American Realistic Literature, which was the beginning of what Mark Twain called “The Gilded Age” from 1865 to 1914.American Realism came as a reaction against the lie of romanticism and sentimentalism.It turned from an emphasis on the faithful rendering of the ordinary, a slice of life as it is really lived.It expresses the common place and the low, and it offers an objective rather than an idealistic view of human nature and human experience.A realistic writer is more objective than subjective, more descriptive than symbolic.Realists looked for truth in any place.William Dean Howells is the champion of realism.He writes about the rising middle class and the way they live.The Rise of Silas Lapham, his masterpiece, is a fine example of the American realism.Mark Twain is a great literary artist and social critic.He writes about the story of the low class and is famous for his colloquial style and localism.The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn is his famous fiction, which has been regarded as one of the greatest books of western literature and western civilization.After the WWI, some young writers wondered pointlessly and restlessly, while at the same time the y were called the “Lost Generation”.Then, there came into being the modernism from 1914 to 1945, it is used to show the literary art possessing outstanding characteristics in conception, feeling, form and style after the WWI.It meanscutting off history and a sense of despair and loss.It refused to accept the traditional ideological influences.F.Scott Fitzgerald is widely regarded as one of the 20th century’s greatest writers.This Side of Paradise is his first novel, it became immensely popular for the simple reason that it caught the tone of the age.Ernest Hemingway is the famous writer of this period.He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea.A Farewell to Arms is his masterpiece in which the author deals with the war directly.This is what I want to say about the history of American literature.第二篇：美国文学史梗概美国文学史梗概一、殖民地时代和美国建国初期最早来自这片新大陆的欧洲移民主要是定居在新英格兰的清教徒和马萨诸塞的罗马天主教徒，二者虽然在教义上有很多不同之处，但他们都信奉加尔文主义：人生在世只是为了受苦受难，而他们唯一的希望是争做上帝的“选民”，死后进天国，相信“原罪”。

美国文学论文(汤姆索亚历险记)

An Analysis of the Artistic Language Characteristics inThe Adventures of Tom SawyerPublished in 1876, The Adventure of Tom Sawyer has earned high reputation as one of the best-loved tales in American literature.The novel, which tells of the exciting adventures of a typical boy named Tom Sawyer and his friends during the mid-nineteenth century, is not as simple as a children’s book. On the one hand, regardless of time changing and the differences of cultures, the adventures of Tom Sawyer are still intriguing and delightful, for the unique charms that hits the basic instincts of nearly all young people. On the other hand, the author Mark Twain wrote in the preface to the first edition that "Although my book is intended mainly for the entertainment of boys and girls, part of my plan has been to pleasantly remind adults of what they once were themselves, and what they felt and thought." Thus, it is obviously that by reading this book, the adult readers could also look back on his or her own childhood with fond reminiscences. Above all, the novel is a combination of the past and the present, of the entertainment and education function for children, and at the same time, of the well-remembered events from childhood told in such a way as to evoke remembrances in the adult mind. Besides, allowing for Mark Twain’s conventions of writing styles, the novel, exploring questions of freedom and responsibility, retains vitality and humor between the lines, applies slangy expressions, which are full of local characteristics, and last but not least sets some symbolic plots. This thesis is going to make an analysis on the artistic language characteristics in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, helping the readers to appreciate the novel in a better way.1.The Language Characteristic of Humor and SatireMark Twain is, as always, the satirist and commentator on the foibles of human nature. As the authorial commentator, Twain often steps in and comments on the absurdity of human nature. Not surprisingly, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer relies heavily on satire and humor to make a observation on human nature, as well as the picture of lives at that time, ultimately producing a satire of altogether two aspects: the hypocritical regions and obsolete school education. Thus this thesis determines to analyse the characteristics of humor and satire in the book by the above two aspects.1.1The Humor and Satire of the Hypocritical RegionsIn The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Tom Sawyer is a mischievous boy who yearns for the carefree lives and exhibits many admirable character traits such as generosity and goodness in spite of his pranks. The unrestrained character of Tom contrasts favorably with the meaningless and hypocritical regulations in regions. In the novel, Aunt Polly, who is responsible for nurturing Tom, always stops Tom from having a meal without praying. Readers may find it both funny and satirical that Tom can’t wait to dine while aunt Polly takes it seriously out of religious restraint. In addition, Mr. Dobbins, the schoolmaster, who seems to be deeply religious, but actually is sanctimonious. Each day, Mr. Dobbins would take a book out of the desk and be absorbed in it at times when no classes were reciting. Every boy and girl has a theory about the nature of the book. One day, Becky Thatcher has a chance to uncover the mystery-- “She came at once upon a handsomely engraved and colored frontispiece--a human figure, stark naked.” Thus, Mr. Dobbins turns out to be a hypocrite, which reinforces the wry sense of humor on the religion. Besides, in the novel, the kids will be rewarded with some tickets of different colors by reciting the passages of Scripture. According to the rules by the school, “each blue ticket was pay for two verses of recitation. Ten blue tickets equalled a red one, and could be exchanged for it; ten red tickets equalled a yellow one; for ten yellow tickets the superintendent gave a very plainly bound Bible to the pupil.” Tom couldn’t recite Bible at all, however, he gets the tickets by exchanging his playthings with the classmates and finally gets the prize of a Bible. There’s no doubt that it is totally a joke, which is another ridiculous case concerned with black humor and the satire on the religion.1.2The Humor and Satire of the Obsolete School EducationTom Sawyer is undoubtedly the representative student who is antagonistic towards the obsolete school education. Therefore, he is quite a rebellious boy who despises the so-called excellent students and doesn’t recite the passages of Bible in accordance with regulations of the school, who dares to participate in an adventure despite the rules, for he actually looks down on the laws made by the adult. What’s more, he and his friends are brave enough to make a mischief as a retribution on theschoolmaster, who always lashes pupils just in order to make a good showing on “Examination” day. All these things show Tom’s challenge to the unreasonable school education even the whole society. By the attitudes and acts of Tom Sawyer, Mark Twain aims to criticize the education at that time which tried to preach but of no practical use at all. Twain criticizes the adult attitudes and behaviors throughout the novel. That is part of the conflict: the maturation of a youth into adulthood conflicting with the disapproval of the adult behaviors that exist. It is this double vision of humor and satire that raises the novel above the level of a boy's adventure story.2.The Language Characteristic of Applying Slang and Absorbing ExpressionsAccording to the dictionary, slang is defined as a casual type of language that is playful or trendy. Funny American slang words consist both of coined words and phrases and of new or extended meanings attached to established terms. Slang tends to develop from the attempt to find fresh and vigorous, colorful, pungent, or humorous expression. In order to make the story recreational and readable, The Adventure of Tom Sawyer applies much slang, which not only contributes to enhance the entertainment of the book, but also full of local colors, helping the readers to learn about the American culture.In chapter one, when aunt Polly wants to catch Tom but fails, she says: “ Old fools is the biggest fools there is.” and “ Can’t learn an old dog new tricks, as the saying is.” Here, the slang about old fools and old dog makes the image of aunt Polly more vivid. Then, in self-examination, aunt Polly uses slang once again. In the book, it goes: “Spare the rod and spile the child, as the Good Book says. I’m a laying up sin and suffering for us both, I know.” and “Well-a-well, man that is born of woman is of few days and full of trouble, as the Scripture says, and I reckon it’s so.” Hence, it can be concluded that aunt Polly cares and loves him, paying much attention on him. The slang here becomes comfort and enlightenment to aunt Polly.Besides, in chapter 5, Tom feels extremely bored with the sermon so he gets a large black beetle out. Suddenly, a vagrant poodle dog comes by. Then about the reaction of the poodle dog, Mark Twain has used many absorbing expressions, which is typically child language: “ The poodle dog spied the beetle; the drooping tail liftedand wagged. He surveyed the prize; walked around it; smelt at it from a safe distance; walked around it gain; grew bolder, and took a close smell......” Here, the most extraordinary word is “prize”, a metaphorical term, which is lively enough to show the overwhelming superiority of the poodle dog.The reason why Mark Twain has a preference for using much slang and many absorbing expressions in his work is associated with his earlier experience, when he was working with the people at the bottom of the society. Day by day, year by year, his wording is more expressive and suitable for all ages. As the old saying goes: “Art comes from life and goes beyond it.” The slang contributes to the literature value of The Adventure of Tom Sawyer and makes it charming and classical forever.3.The Language Characteristic of Setting Some Symbolic PlotsWhether or not one has read the novel, many of the characters--Tom himself, Becky Thatcher, Huck Finn, Injun Joe, and Aunt Polly--have become the classical images of American literature. Likewise, many plots are familiar and have become a part of the American cultural heritage: it is true that there are many seemingly extraneous scenes; nevertheless, each scene has its symbolic meaning, contributing to building a broad picture of the lives of these youths. In the broadest sense, the novel concentrates basically on Tom's--and to a lesser degree, Huck's--development from carefree childish behavior to one that is filled with mature. Furthermore, the primary adventure--which features the murder the boys witness and its aftermath--provides a single event that begins in the graveyard and runs throughout the plot of lesser adventures. The appeal of the novel lies mostly in Twain's ability to capture--or re-capture--universal experiences and dreams and fears of childhood. Twain captures the essence of childhood, with all its excitement, fear, and mischievousness.Twain does not confine himself to telling a simple children's story. To some extent, the novel is a combination of the past and the present, of the well-remembered events from childhood told in such a way as to tell us the maturation of a boy into a real man.4. ConclusionThe Adventures of Tom Sawyer, as the novel which remains one of the mostpopular and famous works of American literature, its story and characters have achieved folk hero status in the American popular imagination. Twain's reading audience loved this novel and its young hero, and the friendship of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn is one of the most celebrated in American literature, built on imaginative adventures, shared superstitions, and loyalty that rises above social convention. After analyzing the artistic characteristics of language of the novel, we could easily know that by the humor and satire, much slang, many absorbing expressions and the arrangement of the symbolic plots, Mark Twain wants to explore the inner world of the child and tell us how a boy ultimately grows up and becomes an adult who can still has his belief and can maintain the pureness in heart. Attracting in the content, profound in the meaning and mastered in language, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer can brighten the childhood of kids all around the world.Bibliography:[1] 马克·吐温.汤姆索亚历险记[M].刘光源译. 江苏:江苏译林出版社, 2019.[2] 王云霞. 永远的童年：童心·童趣·童真——谈《汤姆索亚历险记》[J].南都学坛, 2014(4): 61-62[3]李丽萍.《汤姆索亚历险记》的语言魅力[J]. 考试周刊, 2008(6): 8-14.。

美国文学选读论文

The Symbolism in the Scarlet Letter任彬英语二班03100221 Scarlet Letter is a very influential novel in American history, even in the whole world. I have read this novel in different life periods, and each time I can get different feelings and inspirations. Since it was published in 1850s, numerous writers and critics have ever commented on this masterpiece and get penetrating ideas. Therefore I’d like to view this novel in my own perspective. I will analysis the use of symbolism and its unique effects of the Scarlet Letter in my paper.1. The brief introduction of author and plotAt first, we can’t ignore the great author, Nathaniel Hawthorne. He is an American novelist and short story writer. Much of Hawthorne's writing centers on New England, many works featuring moral aspects with a Puritan inspiration. His fiction works are considered part of the Romantic Movement and, more specifically, Dark romanticism. His themes often center on the inherent evil and sin of humanity, and his works often have moral messages and deep psychological complexity.From the writing style of Hawthorne we can find that the Scarlet Letter can be said his masterpiece. The story happened in 17th-century in Boston, Massachusetts. Hester Prynne, our leading role who conceives a daughter through an adulterous affair. At that time it was a great sin and couldn’t be accepted by Puritan residents. So she was forced to wear a scarlet “A” on her bosom as a sign of shame. She and her daught er’s father Dimmesdale was revenged by Hester’s long-lost husband. But at last Hester use her kind heart and enthusiasm save the struggling soul of her lover and win a new life of repentance and dignity.2. The use of symbolism and its effects2.1The Scarlet LetterThe most obvious symbol in this novel must be the Scarlet Letter. And it’s also the most complex symbol. At first it means adultery. Then it means able. Its meaning then becomes indefinite. It is eventually looked on as a symbol of strength. The townspeople regard it as an object of scorn. Hester regards it as a constantreminder of her sin. Outsiders see it as a novelty and some Native Americans presume it's a distinguishing mark for someone of status. This change is significant. It shows growth in the characters, and the community in which they live.The letter "A", worn on Hester's bosom, is a symbol of her adultery against Roger Chillingworth. This is the puritan way of treating her as a criminal, for the crime of adultery. This letter is meant to be worn in shame, and to make Hester feel unwanted. At this time, Hester shows great courage. Many people in her position will have fled Boston, and seek a place where no one knows of her great sin. Hester chooses to stay though, which shows a lot of strength and integrity.But later, the scarlet letter "A" changes its meaning into being able, angel and admirable. The townspeople who condemned her now believe the scarlet letter to stand for her ability to her beautiful needlework and for her unselfish assistance to the poor and sick. Hester is a strong admirable woman who goes through more emotional torture that most people go through in a lifetime. The change of the meaning “A” can let us clearly know the ridiculous and cruel side of some aspects in Puritan culture. The society is changing and the social norms against humanity will finally be obsolete by era.2.2PearlOne of the outstanding characteristics of Hawthorne’s novel is that the characters’ names all have their specific meanings. But the name of Hester’s daughter, Pearl, leave me great impression. Pearl is one of the most complex and misunderstood symbols in the book. Pearl serves as moral in this novel. The moral she is meant to teach is that Hester and Dimmesdale should fully commits their sin and then take responsibility for their sin. She is really a constant mental and physical reminder to Hester of what she has done wrong. At last, Pearl's role as the living scarlet letter is over, and Dimmesdale, who finally takes responsibility for his sin, has also learned the moral, which she is meant to teach.2.3The objectsIn The Scarlet Letter, most of the objects that are described have many symbolic meanings. The most usual symbols appeared in the novel maybe the contrastbetween light and darkness. They represent the most common battle of all time, good versus evil. There are some dark scenes, such as the dark forest and gloomy weather represent the sin and characters’ fear, while the light things may represent hope, love and redemption.Another important symbol is the prison which Hester had ever stayed. The prison represents several different symbols. It is a symbol for the Puritanical severity of law. The description of the prison indicates that it is old, rusted, yet strong with an "iron-clamped oaken door." This represents the rigorous enforcement of laws and the inability to break free of them. Hester is the person who has the courage to break them. She had succeeded even though bear great pain.Rose bush is also a significant symbol in this work. The rose bush is a symbol of passion. As will later become obvious, Hester Prynne's sin is one of passion. It is only in the forest wilderness where the Puritans' laws fail to have any force. We have discussed that Pearl brought redemption for Hester and Dimmesdale. Pearl is thus comparable to the blossoms on the rosebush. The rose may serve as a "moral blossom" in the story is therefore actually saying that Hester's child will serve to provide the moral of the story.2.4What the symbols bring to this novelSymbolism is a traditional artistic form; it also is a major feature of Romanticism. As a famous writer of romanticism, Hawthorne is skillful at the using of symbolism in his works. Over the centuries, numerous people have astonished and confused at the use of symbols in Hawthorne. Different people may have different ideas about the same symbol. As they explore the deep meaning of these symbols, they will get a better knowledge of the themes that author wanted to express. They will know more about the background of that era. Therefore we can say the various usage of symbolism in The Scarlet Letter makes the novel a work of the world.3. ConclusionThe use of symbolism plays an important role in the Scarlet Letter, which makes it a world famous masterpiece and has attracted hundreds of thousands readers over the centuries. Symbolism brings us plenty of imagines; at the same time makesus connect the fable story with reality, and attach realistic meaning to this novel. Hawthorne’s use of symbolism in Scarlet Letter is worthwhile being learned by all the people.。

美国文学期末论文

美国文学期末论文( 2011届 )题目：女权主义批评视角下的《小伙子布朗》人物__浅析学院：外国语学院专业：英语学生姓名：方梦婧学号： 08090204指导教师：江玉娇职称：教授合作导师：职称：完成时间：2011年 1 月成绩：OutlineAbstract (3)摘要 (3)1. Introduction (4)1.1 Nathaniel Hawthorne (4)1.2 Young Goodman Brown (4)2. Background2.1 Puritan background (5)2.2 The role of Puritan women (5)3. Analysis of characters (5)3.1 Young Goodman Brown (5)3.2 Faith (6)3.3 The old fellow-traveler .............................................................. 错误!未定义书签。

3.4 Goody Cloyse............................................................................. 错误!未定义书签。

4. Conclusion (7)Work cited (8)Feminist Criticism PerspectiveFang MengjingAbstract:Feminist Criticism, broadly defined, examines how literature and other productions reinforce or undermine the oppression of women. It developed on the basis of women’s liberation movement. It is the concern of feminists critics to probe the marginalization of women in economic, political, social and psychology terms. Feminism represents one of the most significant social and aesthetic revolutions of modern times.From a feminist point of view, Young Goodman Brown, which was universally acclaimed as one of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s best short stories and revealed the themes of the reality of sin, the secret sin as well as the hypocrisy of Puritanism and all human kinds, presents Hawthorne’s particular portraits of women go against the prevailing literary sexism of his day.Key words: Faith,feminism, Puritanism, character analysis女权主义批评视角下的《小伙子布朗》人物浅析方梦婧摘要：女权主义批评，概括地说，是检验文学和其他作品如何影响女性所受压迫的批评方法。

美国文学论文《了不起的盖茨比》的文体特征

美国文学论文《了不起的盖茨比》的文体特征Table of ContentAbstract in English (2)Abstract in Chinese (3)1. Introduction............................................................................ . (4)2. Unique Narrative Skills (5)2.1 The Angle of Description (5)2.2 Sequence of Narration (6)3. Usage of Rhetorical Devices ........................................................... .. (8)4. The Effect of Symbolism (9)5. Conclusion...................................... . (11)Bibliography...................................... . (12)AbstractThe Great Gatsby, written by the famous writer F. Scott. Fitzgerald in the 1920’s，deals with the bankruptcy of the American Dream，which is high1ighted by the disillusionment of the Gatsby's personal dream due to the clashes between his romantic vision of life and the relentless reality. It is said that the content of the novel is merely telling a story about a man being infatuated with a faithless lady; however, its appeal bringing to the readers never end with the loss of love. The author describes Daisy, with whom Gatsby was deep in love, as the American Dream－pursuing after wealth material life. This paper analyzes the stylistic features of The Great Gatsby from the aspect of narrative skills and artistic effect.Key words: Gatsby, narrative skill, symbolism, American Dream摘要《了不起的盖茨比》是20 世纪20 年代美国著名作家菲茨杰拉德的经典作品，讲述盖茨比个人梦想的破灭－对爱情的向往和残酷现实之间的强烈冲突，向读者诉说了一场美国梦的破灭。

美国文学论文

美国文学论文美国文学是一门丰富多彩的学科，涵盖了从殖民地时期到现代的各种文学作品。

这门学科的研究内容包括但不限于小说、诗歌、戏剧和散文等文学形式。

在殖民地时期，美国文学主要以宗教、探索和殖民为主题。

这些作品强调对新大陆的探索和殖民定居者与原住民之间的冲突。

其中著名的作品包括威廉·布莱德福德的《普利茅斯艘女性纪实》和马丁·洛瑞德·金的《普尔加托里的传奇》。

随着美国的独立，美国文学开始呈现出不同的风格和主题。

浪漫主义成为19世纪美国文学的主导思潮，作家们开始追求个人情感和自然的表达。

鲁道夫·狄克斯、华盛顿·欧文和爱德加·爱伦·坡都是这一时期的重要作家。

20世纪是美国文学的鼎盛时期，许多现代作家的作品至今仍然被广泛研究和阅读。

欧内斯特·海明威、威廉·福克纳和弗兰兹·卡夫卡等作家的作品反映了两次世界大战对人类生活的冲击。

而艾米丽·狄金森、罗伯特·弗罗斯特和T.S.艾略特的诗歌作品被誉为现代诗歌的经典之作。

此外，美国文学还展现了多种文化和身份的交织。

非裔美国文学（如托妮·莫里森的作品）和拉丁裔美国文学（如桑德拉·西斯涅罗斯的作品）代表了美国不同族裔的声音和经历。

从以上简要介绍中可以看出，美国文学的论文课题可以是多种多样的。

文学的主题、风格、文化背景和历史背景都可以成为研究的焦点。

此外，理论研究、文学与社会等方面也是研究的热点。

总之，美国文学的论文研究可以通过对不同时期和不同类型的作品进行深入分析，揭示作品背后的主题和意义。

美国文学论文

美国文学论文美国文学是世界上最年轻的文学之一,从其诞生之时起,就因其尖锐的批判性、持续的独创性和精彩的多元性而独树一帜。

下面是店铺为大家整理的美国文学论文，供大家参考。

美国文学论文范文一：Analysis of the main character Ahab in Moby Dick摘要:«白鲸»讲述了饱经风霜的亚哈船长与他的仇敌白鲸之间惊心动魄的故事，亚哈身上体现了令人敬佩的正义品质:百折不挠、英勇无畏、经验丰富，同时还具有令人恐惧的邪恶力量:偏执、自私、专横。

他集正义与邪恶与一身，具有鲜明的双重性。

关键词:正义;邪恶;性格双重性Abstract:«Moby Dick» tells us a thrilling tale between Captain Ahab and his enemy whale called Moby Dick.Ahab's character is amphibious. On one hand,he is indomitable、brave and experienced. On the other hand, he is bigoted, selfish and presuming.Key words: justice; evil; character's amphibiousness«Moby Dick» written by Herman Melville is regarded as the first American prose epic. It's an encyclopedia of everything, history, philosophy, religion, etc. But it is first a Shakespearean tragedy of man fighting again overwhelming odds in an indifferent and even hostile universe.The story goes roughly as follows. Ishmael, feeling depressed, seeks escape by going out to sea on the whaling ship, Pequod. The captain is Ahab, the man with one leg. Moby Dick, the white whale, had sheared off his leg on the most as a reward for anyone who sights thewhale first. The Pequod marked a good catch of whales but Ahab refuses to turn back until he has killed his enemy. Eventually,the white whale appears, and the Pequod begins its doomed fight with it. On the first day the whale overturns a boat; On the second, it swamps another. When the third day comes, Ahab and his crew manage to plunge a harpoon into it, but the whale carries the Pequod along with it to its doom. All on board the whaler get drowned, except one, Ishmael, who survives to tell the tale. From the story, we can see that captain Ahab is a hero who dares to fight though he failed at last. Ahab is Byronic hero, a man with consuming desire to take revenge against the whale which has crippled him. He is brave. Though he knows that it has difficulty in killing whale, he never gives up. He thinks that man can make the world for himself and he tries his best to kill the whale. Although he fails at last, his spiritual is respectable and we should also be indomitable.We know that Ahab's character is amphibious, and we now more focus on the bleak view. As the author is negative, the story is full of tragedy, including the ending.Captain Ahab is a typical Melvillean “isolato”, and a typical Bartleby whose lips are set ever for an “I prefer not to”. He cuts himself off from his wife and kid, and stays away most of the time from his crew. He hates Moby Dick which is an embodiment of nature. He is angry because his pride is wounded. After the loss of his leg in his encounter with the white whale, he seems to hold God responsible for the presence of evil in the universe. Thus his anger assumes the proportions of a cosmis nature. In his egocentric obsession. He loves his sanity, and humanity and becomes a devilish creature rushing headlong toward his doom.Captain Ahab believed in his own power, he is too much of a self-reliant individual to be a good human being. His selfhood must be asserted at the expense of all else: lives may be sacrificed,and nature may be sacrificed, and nature may have to be vanquished in order that he may do what he wills. Ahab is ,to be more exact, a victim of solipsism, His tragedy stemming in the main from extreme individualism, selfish will, a spirit too much withdrawn to itself to warrant salvation.In conclusion, we should observe the two sides of the Captain's character. We need be brave and confident. We have to remind that man is in society, and we can't live without society. We should respect the nature.美国文学论文范文二：The review about the Literature of RomanticismⅠ. BackgroundFrom the early 1800s to the civil war，American was a land of paradoxes, a land stirred by spiritual dreams and shaped by the realities of a growing materialism. the United States had begun to change into an industrial cause society, technology would bring vast material benefits and cause overwhelming social disorders. Americans had sought new liberties and new ideas in life and art, but conflicts of their society had culminated in a bloody civil war. In the first half of the nineteenth century the proportion of Americans who labored on farms declined as increasing members left the land to work in urban businesses and factories. New York became American’s largest city, supplanting Boston and Philadelphia as the economic and cultural capital of the nation. Though the first half of the century the pursuit of simplicity, utility, and perfection remained an American characteristic.In the years preceding the Civil War relatively few volumes of imaginative literature were published in the United States. Most book were almanacs, schoolbooks, self-help manuals, or workson religion, medicine, or the law. Fewer than a dozen volumes of poetry were published annually. Fiction was a prime component of ladies’ magazines. Novels were increasingly popular, especially historical romances written by Europeans, most notably by “the monarch and master of modern fiction,” Sir Walter Scott. But as the century progressed, native American writers won increasing national and international fame. Washington Irving’s Sketch Book (1819-1820)became the first work by an American writer to win financial success on both sides of the Atlantic.Ⅱ. The definition of RomanticismRomanticism is a movement prevailing the 19th century in Western World in literature. art music and philosophy beginning as a reaction and protest against the bondage of rules and customs of neo-classicism. It was marked and is always marked by a story reaction .It returned to nature and plain humanity for material. It brought about a renewed interest in medieval literature. It was also marked by sympathy for poor people and thus a deep understanding toward common people. It was a movement expression of indivdual orignality and different poets realized their variety.A dream of golden age is established against stern realities .Imagination is the key point.Ⅲ. The Characteristic s of the Romantic LiteratureThe main trends of thought of the literature of romanticism is Romanticism, Transcendentation, Anti-slavery. Transcendentation as a moral philosophy, transcendentalism was neither logical nor systematized. It exalted feeling over reason, individual expression over the restraints of law and custom. They believed in the transcendence of the “Oversoul”, an all-pervading power for goodness from which all things come and of which all things are a part.Romanticism, attitude or intellectual orientation that characterized many works of literature, painting, music, architecture, criticism, and historiography in Western civilization over a period from the late 18th to the mid-19th century. Romanticism canbe seen as a rejection of the precepts of order, calm, harmony, balance, idealization, and rationality that typified Classicism in general and late 18th-century Neoclassicism in particular. It was also to some extent a reaction against the Enlightenment and against 18th-century rationalism and physical materialism in general. Romanticism emphasized the individual, the subjective, the irrational, the imaginative, the personal, the spontaneous, the emotional, the visionary, and the transcendental.Among the characteristic attitudes of Romanticism were the following: a deepened appreciation of the beauties of nature; a general exaltation of emotion over reason and of the senses over intellect; a turning in upon the self and a heightened examination of human personality and its moods and mental potentialities; a preoccupation with the genius, the hero, and the exceptional figure in general, and a focus on his passions and inner struggles;a new view of the artist as a supremely individual creator, whose creative spirit is more important than strict adherence to formal rules and traditional procedures; an emphasis upon imagination as a gateway to transcendent experience and spiritual truth; an obsessive interest in folk culture, national and ethnic cultural origins, and the medieval era; and a predilection for the exotic, the remote, the mysterious, the weird, the occult, the monstrous, the diseased, and even the satanic.Ⅳ. Main writer and masterpieceⅰ.Washington Irving(1783-1851)He was the Father of American Imaginative Literature; the Father of American Short Stories. He was the first great prose stylist of American romanticism familiar style.The apparent ease of his writing is not simply that of the gifted amateur; it results from his purposeful identification of his whole personality with what he wrote. He was urbane and worldly, yet humorous and gentle, his great and graceful style combine with American roots shaped his independent literary personality. He was the first great belletrist, writing always for pleasure, and to produce pleasure. In 1819-1820 ,his Sketch Book appeared the first modern short stories and the first great American juvenile literature to write good history and biography as literary entertainment. The most story of his Sketch Book is The Legend of Sleep Hollow and Rip Van Winkle. He introduced the familiar essay to America. His best-known stories awakened an interest in the life of American regions. In 1819, A History of New York by Diedrich Knickerbocker a rollicking burlesque of a current serious history of the early Dutch settlers, has become a classic of humor.Bracebridge Hall followed in 1822;then he first went to Germany in pursuit of an interest in German romanticism, which flavored the Tales of Traveller(1824), in Paris he with John Howard Payne wrote the brilliant social comedy Charles the Second or The Merry Monarch. A History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus(1828); A Chronicle of the Conquest of Grandada(1829); Voyages and Discoveries of the Companions of Columbus(1831) ; a famous volume of stories and sketches—The Alhambra(1832) and Legends of the Conquest of Spain (1835) and so on.ⅱ. James Fenimore Cooper(1789-1851)He was the first important American novelist began his literary career on a dare. In 1821,The Spy was successful, it was a rousing tale about espionage against the British during the Revolutionary War .Cooper launched two kinds of immensely popular stories: the sea adventure tale, and the frontier saga. The Pilot is the best of his many sea romances(1824). He wrote the first official history of the U.S. Navy in 1839. His frontier stories Leather Stocking T ales including five novels: The Deerslayer; The Last of the Mohicans, The Pathfinder, The Pioneers, The Prairie. Allan Nevins calls these five novels the nearest approach yet to an American epic. with a vast group of supporting characters, virtuous or villainous, Cooper made the American conscious of his past, and made the European conscious of American. And the Textbooks works is The Last of The Mohicans.ⅲ.Edgar Allan Poe(1809-1849)Poe was born in Boston. He was the Father of Modern Short Stories; the Father of Detective Story; and the Father of Psychoanalytic Critism. He was the jingle man. He won a contest with his story “Ms. Found in a Bottle” .Then he got a job as editor with the Southern Literary Messenger in 1833. He showed his true talents as an editor, a poet, a literary critic, and a writer of fiction. And he also issued The Fall of the House of Usher. In 1840, His first collection of short stories Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque. The Raven was published as the title poem of a collection in 1845. In Europe, he was hailed as a pioneer in poetic and fictional techniques. His influence was especially strong on many French writers. The most famous works were To Helen; The Rav en; Annabel Lee; The Fall of the House of Usher. ⅳ. Ralph Waldo Emerson(1803-1882)He was responsible for bringing Transcendentalism to New England and was recognized throughout his life as the leader of the movement. He believed above all in individualism, independence of mind and self-reliance. He admired courage, he was not afraid of changing or clashing ideas. Like many original minds, he was often several jumps ahead of what his followers thought was his position or philosophy. He was one of the most influential American thinkers, yet he had no elaborate, formal system of thought and he never attempted to create one. Emerson believed above all in individualism, independence of mind, and self-reliance. In 1836,he issued the first book Nature , which met with a mild reception. However , two speeches in the next two years, The American Scholar and The Divinity School Address ,made him famous. Many of his lectures were later distilled into his famous Essays. Among his most important works are Representative Men (1850)and English Traits (1856).His Poem appeared in 1847. In his day, Emerson’s poems were criticized for their lack of form and polish. In recent years, hover, his poetry has received high praise.His harsh rhythms and striking images appeal to many modern readers as artful techniques. His prose style is sometimes as highly individual as his poetry. Many of his essays were put together from his journal entries, speeches, and random notes, and they are often somewhat disorganized. Yet his skill in polishing each sentence into a striking thought makes his writing memorable. One of his great statements was in The American Scholar. That title is now carried by one of the finest magazines in American. Oliver Wendell Holmes called the speech “our intellectua l Declaration of Independence”. He is the world ’s eye. He is the world’s heart.ⅴ. Henry David Thoreau(1817-1862)He was Emerson’s truest disciple, who put into practice many of Emerson’s theories. Walden, the superb book came out of his two-year’s reside nce at Walden Pond. He explained many of the beliefs that led him to try this kind of life. He thought it better for a man to work one day a week and the rest of the week could be devoted to thought. For Thoreau, as for Emerson, self-reliance and independence of mind ranked above all each should find out his own way of living. In 1849, From his experience in jail came his famous essay” Civil Disobedience”, which stated Thoreau’s belief that no man should violate his conscience at the command of a government. His famous book is Walden Where I Lived, and What I Lived For.ⅵ. Nathaniel Hawthorne(1804-1864)The House of the Seven Gables deals with the effects of a curse, and though the tale itself is fiction, the germ of the story sprang from the author’s family history. Hawthorne gathered his material by observing and listening to others whose talk was filled with New England Lore, legend, and superstition. His famous book is The Scarlet Letter.Hawthorne’s unique gift was for the creation of strongly symbolic s tories which touch the deepest roots of man’s moral nature. The finest example is the recreation of Puritan Boston, “The Scarlet Letter”. In this novel each word, image, and event works toward a single effect. It is a complex story of guilt, its effects upon various persons, and how deliverance is obtained for some of them. His ability to create vivid and symbolic images that embody great moral questions appear strongly in his short stories. It was Hawthorne’s ability to make a story exist in its own right but at the same time appear as a moral symbol.Hawthorne shares with Edgar Allan Poe the distinction of advancing the art of the short story, giving to the form qualities that are uniquely American. To Hawthorne and Melville, however, the telling of a tale was a way of inquiring into the meaning of life. His stories also have The Blithedale Romance(1852); splendid stories called Mosses from an Old Manse(1846); The Marble Faun(1860)ⅶ. Herman Melville(1819-1891)Moby Dick, a tremendous chronicle of a whaling voyage in pursuit of a seemingly supernatural white whale. The book is steeped in symbolism, another strong appeal to readers of his century. In 1846, Typee became known as the “man who lived among cannibals”. The book was basically factual but was no dou bt elaborated somewhat and built up from Melville’s reading as well as his experience. Equally successful was a sequel, Omoo(1847),about his adventures on Tahiti and other island. Later Melville based Bedburn(1849) on his first voyage to England, and White-Jacket(1850) on his brief career in the navy. He drew upon his naval experience again for Billy Budd(1891).He has two other philosophical novels Mardi, Pierre. two celebrated short novels Benito Cereno and Billy Budd. The story uses a ship as symbol of society and searchingly examines the problems of good and evil. Ahab’s ship was like a world inminiature with characters from all walks of life.ⅷ. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow(1807-1882)Longfellow was born in Portland, Maine, on February 27,1807 and died on March 24,1882 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the most beloved American poet of his time. His main books are Longfellow’s first collection of poems entitled Voices of the Night(1838); Hyperion” the prose romance(1839) ;Ballads and other Poems(1841); Poems on Slavery(1842); Evangeline(1847); Song of Hiawath(1855); The Courtship of Miles Standish(1858)After his death, he became the only American to be honored with a bust in the Poet’s corner of Westminster Abbey. The gentleness, sweetness, and purity for which his poetry was popular during his lifetime.Ⅴ.SummaryFrom the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of he Civil War. It started with the publication of Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book and ended with Whitman’s Leaves of Grass. It is also called “the American Renaissance”. The desire for an escape from society and a return to nature became a permanent convention of American literature. The American Puritanism as a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values. Besides, a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of original sin and the mystery of evil marked the works of Hawthorne，Melville and a host of lesser writers. The most clearly defined Romantic literary movement in this period is New England Transcendentalism. This Transcendentalist group includes two of the most significant writers America has produced so far， Emerson and his young friend, Henry David Thoreau, whose writing has a strong impact on American literature. Basically, Transcendentalism has been defined philoso phically as “the recognition in man of the capacity of knowing truth intuitively, or of attaining knowledge transcending the reach of the senses.” Emerson once proclaimed in a speech, “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of you own mind.” Other concepts that accompanied Transcendentalism include the idea that nature is ennobling and the idea that the individual isdivine and, therefore, self-reliant. It ranges from the comic fables of Washington Irving to the Gothic tales of Edgar Allen Poe, from the frontier adventures of James Fenimore Cooper to the narrative quests of Herman Melville, from the psychological romances of Nathaniel Hawthorne to the social realism of Rebecca Harding.American romantic literature by western romantic literature influence.19 century, the rapid development of American capitalism, the national consciousness and patriotic enthusiasm, to get rid of the English literature of bondage, pay attention to the human spirit and the pursuit of freedom to create a fill transcendence, thus the romantic literature began to flourish.Bibliography:1. 王长荣. 《现代美国小说史》.上海：外语教育出版社，1992.2. 邵锦娣，白劲鹏. An Introduction to Literature. 上海：上海外语教育出版社，20013. 隋刚.《美国文学旧作新读》. 北京：外文出版社，1998.。

美国文学学期论文参考范文

美国文学学期论文参考范文美国文学的历史虽然不长,但却发展得非常迅速,也涌现出许多杰出的作家,因此美国文学发展中的每个阶段都留下了不少传世经典之作。

下文是店铺为大家搜集整理的关于美国文学学期论文参考范文的内容，欢迎大家阅读参考!美国文学学期论文参考范文篇1浅论当代美国女性文学的特点一、前言美国作为发展速度最快的发达国家，除了在经济、科技和军事领域有突出的建树，在文学领域也取得了不俗的成绩。

考虑到美国属于移民国家的特性，在多文化交流和冲突下，美国女性文学取得了快速的发展，并涌现出一大批风格独特、独树一帜的女性作家，所创作的作品也在美国本土以及世界范围内广为流传。

从美国女性文学的发展来看，美国女性文学的大发展，是文化交流的结果，也是移民文化与美国本土文化相结合后诞生的又一种新文化。

所以，对当地美国女性文学的特点进行分析，有助于了解美国女性文学中所倡导的价值观，对于了解美国文化很有必要。

二、当代美国女性文学的分类经过了解发现，当代美国女性文学取得突出成就的作家，都是具有移民背景的女性作家，按照移民背景分类，当代美国女性文学主要可以分成以下几类：1、亚裔作家创作的美国女性文学。

在美国女性文学的创作队伍中，亚裔作家是重要的创作力量，其中华裔作家更是以独特的视角及东方文化的魅力，提高了女性文学的创作质量，使美国女性文学在整体水平上有较大的提升。

目前亚裔作家最杰出的要属华裔获奖作家汤婷婷、唐恩美和印度裔女作家巴拉蒂·玛克姬等人。

这几位知名作家创作的作品不但在美国文学史上获得了重要奖项，同时推动了美国文学的快速发展，使美国文学更加多元化。

2、黑人女作家创作的美国女性文学。

从美国女性文学的发展史上看，黑人女作家是重要的创作力量。

基于美国种族歧视的社会背景，黑人女作家的数量较少，并且创作的作品主要以关注美国文化发展和种族歧视有关，同时也细致的刻画了美国社会黑人群体生活的人生百态，对研究美国黑人发展史和美国文化具有积极的借鉴意义。

美国文学学期论文

美国文学学期论文推荐文章关于当前语言文字学界几个问题的思考热度：最新汉语言文学专业本科毕业论文热度：有关语言学课程的论文范文热度：乡土文学论文参考范文热度：有关伤痕文学论文热度：美国文学的历史不长，但发展较快，20世纪以来，在世界上的影响越来越大。

下文是店铺为大家搜集整理的关于美国文学学期论文的内容，欢迎大家阅读参考!美国文学学期论文篇1浅论华裔美国文学中的中国人物形象摘要：华裔美国人是美国人中一个特殊的群体，华裔美国文学同样是一个介于中国文学和美国文学之间的特殊的文学现象。

本文通过分析华裔美国文学中的中国人物形象，来研究华裔美国文学中关于中国文学和美国文学的交融和结合。

希望对推动中美两国文学的交融起到一定的积极作用。

关键词：华裔美国文学人物形象关公一引言正如华裔美国人兼具中国人和美国人双重性格一样，华裔美国文学同样跨越了中国文学和美国文学各自的人物性格和审美情趣。

在华裔文学历史上，许多华裔作家通过对原有的中国文学中的经典人物进行改写，添加了更易于美国人接受的故事情节，从而使得中国的文学形象树立在美国文学和美国人心中。

这些在华裔美国文学中出现的中国文学人物形象既体现了中国文化被世界所认可的艰难历程，也肯定了华裔作家在促进中美文学融合所作的艰苦努力。

二关公“关公”是一位在中国家喻户晓的大英雄，他的忠义，他的传奇被人们通过戏剧、评说、小说等形式代代相传。

正因如此，在华裔文学中，“关公”作为中国人物的主要形象被用于恢复中国式英雄的文学构建中。

“关公”的忠勇为华裔作家提供了广阔的写作空间，其代表的男性气质正是华裔作家构建华裔英雄主义作品的不二选择。

早在林语堂的《唐人街》里就有了关于关公的典型描述：“关公是中国历史上最著名的一位将军，是一位真正意义上的战神，他永远保护那些同他一样刚正、善良的人，惩罚那些虚伪、邪恶的人。

”赵健秀的《甘加丁之路》(1994)同样把关公定位为忠义、勇敢、正直的代表，认为关公是中国伟大品质的集中表现。

美国文学论文 death of a salesman

The Symbology in Death of a SalesmanAbstract: Death of a Salesman is one of Arthur Miller’s masterpieces. It is a drama.It is not only the plot attracts the readers a lot, but also the employment of large amount of symbols makes the drama more successful. This essay briefly analyses the symbolic meanings of seeds, stockings, diamonds and some other symbols in the aim to better understand the theme of failure and the tragic result of the novel.Key words: Death of a Salesman, symbols, seeds, stockings, flute, diamonds1. IntroductionArthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman is the origin of modern tragedy; indeed, the story concentrated Willy Loman who is struggling to his dream but cannot make his life succeed. In order to make this play a successful and accepted tragedy, numerous and clearly defined examples of symbolism are used-the seeds, stockings, diamonds, and so forth. These symbols gave the play a depth that allowed it to reach its audiences on a more personal level. All of these make the character in the drama human enough for the audience to share their emotion, to see that character’s life in our own lives or the lives of those we know.2. The definition of symbolAccording to “Ci Hai”, a symbol is a physical entity that represents ideas and emotions. The purpose of a symbol is to communicate meaning. For example, a red octagon may be a symbol for "STOP". A red rose symbolizes love and compassion. Symbolism is a technique, employed by a large number of playwrights, in which an object or a metaphor is described having meaning and implications beyond its apparent meaning. (Todorov, 2005:162) That’s to say, in the literature, authors like to use specific entities to express their abstract feelings so that the theme and the characters can be showed more vividly.3. Symbols employed in Death of a Salesman3.1 Object symbolsActually, many playwrights are fond of using symbolism to express their ideas, especially using the objects to implicate the true feelings. In Death of a Salesman, Miller uses cars, stockings, diamonds, seeds, etc. to represent different implications sothat the theme can be strengthened.3.1.1 CarsCar represents individual mobility, freedom and social status in American. However, Miller uses it in a negative and ironic manner. At the very beginning of the play Willy comes home exhausted. His exhaustion with driving symbolizes his tiredness from life. The car is going out of control. The car represents power, movement forward, acceleration and mobility - all of which are symbols in Willy's life of hopelessness, decay, and despair. It should therefore come as no surprise that Willy consider this vehicle as an instrument with which to kill himself. When Willy drives his car out of the house into darkness and death, this symbolism gets its final intensity in the climax of the play.Willy: “I’m tired to death. I couldn’t make it. I just couldn’t make it, Linda.”Linda: “where were you all day? You look terrible.”Willy: (after a pause) “I suddenly couldn’t drive any more. The car kept goin g off onto the shoulder, y’know.”Linda: (helpful) “Oh. Maybe it was the steering again. I don’t think Angelo knows the Studebaker.”Willy: “N o, it’s me, it’s me. Suddenly I realize I’m goin’ sixty miles an hour and I don’t remember the last five minutes. I’m- I can’t seemto- keep my mind to it.” (Miller, 1999:8-10)3.1.2 StockingsStockings appear in a number of contexts in Death of a Salesman. To a certain extent, new stockings importantly represent Willy’s pride in being financially successful. Mostly, it can be regarded as the symbol of insincere love of Willy for his wife Linda and Willy’s guilt.Linda: “There’s nothing to make up, dear. You’re doing fine, betterthan-”Willy: “What’s that?”Linda: “Just mending my s tockings. They’re so expensive…”Wi lly: “I won’t have you mending stockings in my house, now throwthem out.” (Miller, 1999:86)Willy gives new stockings to the woman as a present while his wife has mend for her old stockings. Biff’s outburst at discovering Willy with The Woman: “You --you gave her Mama’s stockings!” (Miller, 1999:314) makes the stockings in Willy’s mind as a symbol of his betrayal. This event put Willy in guilt regarding his attitude towards his wife and son. When Linda is mending the hole in the stockings at home, Willy nervous and he react in a sudden:“Will you stop mending stockings? At least while I am in the house. It gets me nervous. I can’t tell you. Please.” (Miller,1999:184)3.1.3 DiamondsThe diamonds which made Ben rich are a symbol of concrete wealth in Death of a Salesman. Unlike sales in which Willy has nothing tangible to show for his work, the diamonds represent pure, unadulterated material achievement. The diamonds are also seen as a "get-rich-quick" scheme that is the solution to all troubles. Correlatively, diamonds, the discovery of which made Ben a fortune, symbolize Willy’s failure as a salesman. When Willy is considering killing himself, he hears Ben telling him that, "the jungle is dark but full of diamonds."3.1.4 SeedsThe seeds that Willy insists on buying and planting are an important symbol in the play. Generally, seeds are regarded as hope. In the story, they are the symbols of Willy’s sons-Biff and Happy. Also, it represents Willy’ hope to his son’s future. Willy is uncertain about how to raise his sons and worries that, like his own father, he will be unable to provide for them. When Willy says, "Nothing’s planted. I don’t have a thing in the ground" after both his sons abandon him in Act 2.W e have a feeling he’s really talking about his sons and their future.By planting vegetable seeds, he is attempting to begin anew.He is close to suicide but realizes that he must leave something "real" behind for his sons. The planting of the seeds is symbolic of Willy's desire to grow big and tall.3.1.5 Music of fluteThe sound of flute that drifts through the play subtly supports the meaning of the play. It is the only object that can link Willy with his father and with the natural world. The elder Loman made flutes, and was apparently able to make a good living bysimply traveling around the country and selling them. Willy’s choice to be a salesman decides him underused talent for building things with his hands. Willy's father was not a disillusioned person. But, Willy, who leads his life in illusions and remained unaware of realities of life and never dare to solve know the mysteries of leading a successful life. Thus, it can be inferred that the flute is a symbol of reality.3.2 Character symbol-Willy LomanWilly, as a symbolic character, symbolizes the common and low men (an American everyman) leading an unsuccessful life while living in a successful nation of America. This means that Willy’s problems are much less personal dilemma than they are public issues. In a small thread Willy is reflecting the dilemma of a public man of America.Many people saw their own lives in Willy Loman, the victim of broken dreams.4. ConclusionMiller had ever said: “If a person's tragedy is caused by his desperate request for a fair evaluation, thus, the destruction he suffers reveals the defects or evil in his society.” With the help of a large number of symbols in the tale, the readers can more clearly understand the tragic of the center character—Willy. Furthermore, many symbols deepen the drama’s theme about the broken of “American Dream”, such as music of flute, diamonds and seeds. Willy's obsession to fantasy and his failure also reveal the flaws of “American Dream” in a way. Since symbolism is a technique by using an object or a metaphor to describe the meaning and implications beyond its apparent meaning, Death of a Salesman with vivid symbols makes readers to know better that day dreaming means nothing, only a dream relates to the real life may come true one day.Works cited[1] 托多罗夫（Todorov，Tzvean）著，王国卿译. 象征理论[M]. 北京：商务印书馆，2005.[2]（美）米勒（Miller, Arthur）著，刘凡群译. 推销员之死：哈佛蓝星双语名著导读[M]. 天津：天津科技翻译出版公司，2003.[3] 米勒（Miller, A.）著，英若诚译. 推销员之死：英汉对照. 北京：中国对外翻译出版公司，1999.。

美国文学方向的论文

美国文学方向的论文试论美国文学的文学价值【摘要】众所周知，美国是个大熔炉，孕育出来的美国文学自然也是多元素。

尝试简单论述一下多元素美国文学所体现的文学价值。

主要围绕从宗教色彩到世俗色彩的变化，美国梦的出现和发展以及自由民主思想等三个文学价值作简要阐述。

【关键词】美国文学;宗教;世俗;美国梦;自由民主思想“我们要用自己的双脚走路;我们要用自己的双手劳动;我们要讲出自己的思想”——1837年，爱默生在全美大学生联谊会上演讲了《美国学者》，并作出如此的呼吁。

《美国学者》被誉为“美国思想上的独立宣言”America’s Declaration of IntellectualIndependence。

像其他国家的文学发展一样，在爱默生和惠特曼等杰出作家的共同不懈努力下，美国本土逐渐孕育出了美国特色的文学。

正如惠特曼在《草叶集》中体现的一个统一的大美国思想般，大熔炉式的美国造就了多元素的美国文学——美式文学在经历不同的历史阶段中，不断发展创新，走向独立和成熟，成为世界文化中一朵绚丽的奇葩。

那么，当我们的思想畅游于美国文学之时，究竟能激荡出怎样的文学价值呢?随着历史的游历，一路走来，时代目睹了美国文学从宗教色彩到世俗色彩的变化;世界见证了美国梦在其文学中的出现和发展;我们还一直感受着自由民主思想在美国文学中的体现。

一、从宗教色彩到世俗色彩的变化由于种种历史和社会原因，美国早期的文学作品被抹上了浓厚的宗教色彩，世俗色彩甚浅。

长期以来，英国实行殖民掠夺政策，横征暴敛，军政高压，并且利用宗教来禁锢殖民地人们的思想和文化。

特别在清教徒占优势的新英格兰等地，人们的主要文化生活是每个礼拜日去教堂听取牧师的布道。

而且在当时的北美，文化水平较高的是宗教人士。

18世纪40年代，新英格兰地区还出现了被称为“大觉醒”的宗教运动。

于是，当时产生了大量的宗教文学作品，主要以宗教诗篇的形式出现。

在众多作家的作品中都体现出浓厚的宗教思想——例如著名女诗人AnneBradstreet在诗作“Some Verses on the Burning of Our House”中，提出了自己的主张：当跟富裕的天堂之家进行对比时，世俗财富不过是“dunghillmists粪堆上的雾气”。

美国文学史期末论文终极版

美国文学史期末论文终极版Contents摘要 (1)Abstract (1)Chapter 1 American Romanticism(1810--1865) (2)1.Background reasons (2)1.1 Politically this period was ripe (2)1.2 Economically American had never been wealthier (2)1.3 Culturally American own value emerged (2)2.Basic features and styles (2)2.1 Expressiveness (2)2.2 Imagination (2)2.3 Worship of nature (2)2.4 Simplicity (3)2.5 Cultural nationalism (3)2.6 Liberty,freedom,democracy and individualism (3)3.Influence (3)Chapter 2 American Realism(1865--1914) (3)1. Background changes (3)1.1 Politics (4)1.2 Economics (4)1.3 Cultural and social changes (4)2. Basic features and styles (4)2.1 Truthful description of the actualities of the real life and material (4)2.2 Focus on ordinariness (4)3. Three dominant figures (4)4. Influence (5)Chapter 3 American Naturalism(1890--1914) (5)1. Background information (5)1.1 Cultural and Social Background (5)1.2 Religion and theoretical basis (5)2. Major ideas and features of Naturalism (5)2.1 Determinism (5)2.2 World: godless, indifferent, hostile (6)2.3 Style: scientific objectivity (6)2.4 Subjects and themes (6)3. A representative work that show the ideas and features above (6)3. Influence (6)Chapter 4 American Modernism(1914--1945) (6)1. Background information (6)1.1 Politics (6)1.2 Economy (7)1.3 Cultural and social background (7)2. Characteristics and features of Modernism (7)3. Major genres and a representative of each one (7)3.1 Modern poetry——Ezra Pound (7)3.2 Modern fiction——Ernest Hemingway (7)4. Influence (8)Chapter 5 American Postmodernism(1914--1945) (8)1. Background information (8)1.1 Politics (8)1.2 Economics (8)1.3 Social and international background (8)2. Characteristics and major features (8)2.1 Experimental writing techniques (8)2.3 Irony, playfulness and black humor (9)3.Influence (9)Bibliographies (9)摘要具有自身特点的新文学的出现，是一个国家真正形成的标志。

美国文学论文(汤姆索亚历险记)

美国文学毕业论文

美国文学毕业论文美国文学：探索美国社会与人性的镜子导论美国文学作为一种独特的文化现象，以其多样性和独创性而备受瞩目。

其作品不仅仅是文学作品，更是对美国社会与人性的深刻反思。

本文将探讨美国文学的特点、主题以及其对社会和人性的影响。

一、美国文学的特点美国文学的特点在于其多元性和包容性。

美国作为一个移民国家，文学作品中融合了各种不同的文化、种族和背景。

从早期的美洲原住民文学到现代的移民文学，美国文学展现了不同群体的声音和经历。

此外，美国文学还以其独立性和创新性而著称。

美国作家们敢于挑战传统文学规范，追求个人风格和独特的创作方式。

例如，华尔登·桑德森的小说《追风筝的人》以其独特的叙事风格和主题深受读者喜爱。

二、美国文学的主题1. 美国梦美国文学中最为重要和常见的主题之一就是“美国梦”。

这一主题探讨了每个人都可以通过努力和奋斗实现自己的梦想的信念。

弗朗西斯·斯科特·菲茨杰拉德的《了不起的盖茨比》就是一个典型的例子，通过描绘主人公盖茨比追求美国梦的故事，探讨了现实与幻想之间的冲突。

2. 种族与身份美国文学中经常涉及到种族与身份的问题。

这是因为美国社会的多元性和种族关系的复杂性。

例如，托尼·莫里森的小说《亲爱的》通过讲述一个黑人女孩的成长故事，揭示了种族歧视对个人身份和自我认同的影响。

3. 社会批判美国文学也经常用作对社会问题的批判。

作家们通过揭示社会不公正、阶级差距和权力滥用等问题，引发读者的思考和反思。

乔治·奥威尔的小说《1984》就是一个典型的例子，通过描述一个极权主义社会的恐怖景象，警示人们对权力的警惕。

三、美国文学对社会和人性的影响美国文学作为一面镜子，反映了美国社会和人性的方方面面。

它不仅仅是一种娱乐形式，更是一种思想的启发和社会变革的推动力。

首先，美国文学通过揭示社会问题和不公正，引起公众的关注和讨论。

例如，哈珀·李的小说《杀死一只知更鸟》通过描述一个种族歧视的故事，促使人们反思和改变对待不同种族的态度。

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The great Gatsby姓名杨琴学号***********专业英语（师范）8班2016年6月The great GatsbyAbstractThe Great Gatsby is one of the most popular works of F.Scott Fitzgerald it strongly criticizes the rich’s priority for materialism and the loss of morality of the United States in 1920s. By the way, the inspiration comes from his life. In order to make readers understood better, he elaborately arranges each section, showing us the bright plot. At the same time, he uses symbolism to make his work more active, such as green means the hope and dream, the broken of Gatsby’s dream means the broken of American’s. It is a mirror of that era. The aim to write this article is to indicate the inevitable tragedy and evaporation of the American dream.Key words: The Great Gatsby American dream symbolism tragedyAuthorWhat I want to say is not about the author's life, which Baidu has too much exposition; but the author’s experience which is not included in it. The most important thing is that the author writes this great book is based on his own life experiences. The author just was like Gatsby , fell in love with a pretty woman who he cannot worthy of her; fell in love with a daughter of rich who is not belongs to his world; fell in love with a gold girl who loves material over love itself. But he is better than Gatsby, because at the end of the story he married with her after published< this side of paradise > and made success. Married, everything what he had done is to provide a luxurious life to her and every story which he had written, included in all the common objective of characters, is to make his wife happy and give her a life like the upper class. Gatsby, however, is different from him.ContentHere, we'll have to talk about the content of the book. The story is told by a bystander –Nick—a poor young man who was the first time to went to New York, doing the most extraordinary work – a bill broker in bond business. He rented a small house in West Egg which directly stands opposite in his cousin Daisy’s house. In the first visit, he met his beloved people—Jordan Baker. And on the back of home, he met the legendary Gatsby by chance, who was reaching his fingers to touch green light from the opposite side shore in the dark, lonely.There are many kinds of stories about him, such as he was a legend of nobility, had a very prominent position, joined the army and awarded a lot of medals, killed people. But no one really knew him; no one was able to confirm whether the legend was right or not. What attracted Nike most was the noise of Gatsby’s villa. Nike thought which one can be so rich. But soon, Nick became a member of party, for he became the first one to receive an invitation from the luxurious party. Then he came to realize the purpose is not for anything else, but Daisy. Five years ago, when they first catch sight with each other, fall in love. Daisy was his first but last love. But he was poor, she was a gold girl. She was not willing to follow him and live a life of poverty. Before married to Tom, she resolutely destroyed the letter he wrote. While Tom was not a good people who loved promiscuous sex relations outside. It is not to say he didn’t like family or Daisy. But in his mind, it’s a symbol of gentleman in upper class.In such a complex relationship, Nick met Gatsby’s anticipation and helped him to see his sweetheart Daisy, but he behaved as helpless as a child in the first meeting after about five years later.After an initially awkward reunion, Gatsby and Daisy reestablish their connection.Their love rekindled,they begin an affair. He hoped they could be together forever. However, these are his personal thoughts.All of these dreams broken after Tom grew increasingly suspicious of his wife’s relationship with Gatsby.He is deeply outraged by the thought that his wife co uld be unfaithful to him.Tom announces to his wife that Gatsby is a criminal—his fortune comes from bootlegging alcohol and other illegal activities.Daisy realizes that h er allegiance is to Tom. On the way back, Daisy driven Gatsby‘s car to run over and killed Tom's mistress—Myrtle. Tom knew the whole story, but he pushed all things to Gatsby.Later, everything was becoming sarcastic. In order to protect Daisy, Gatsby took all responsibilities and begged Nick not telling anyone truth. To protect Daisy’s safety at any time, he stayed in front of her home, but Tom and daisy were secretly packing up, readying to leave here tomorrow morning. More irony, what Gatsby had been waited was not Daisy's phone, but the death of himself, and after him death no one but Nike came to attended his funeral. The story is end. Nike began to disgust the surrounding, he end his relationship with Jordan and moved to the Mideast. Gatsby’s dream of daisy was corrupted by money and dishonesty the American dream of happiness and individualism has disintegrated into the mere pursuit of wealth. Though Gatsby had made it come true, Nick’s dream was the same like Gatsby’s and America dream, broken.America dreamNick, Gatsby and Tom and Daisy all were intended to realize their dreams from the west to the east, for the pursuit of money, fame, success and stimulus. Daisy wouldn’t marry a penniless man, she and Tom's life must be made of a luxurious house, polo and travel. Gatsby had only to earn large sums of money through various illegal means, admitted to a seaside villa, he just had confidence to win Daisy back -his "American Dream".He did not hesitate to spend huge sums of money to host a party at home every night for attracting Daisy's attention. He exhausted all his intelligent wisdom to cater for Daisy, even at the expense of sacrificing his life. However, Daisy is no longer a pure and simple girl at the beginning of him met, but afull of money and hedonism lady. Eventually, Gatsby's dream of love failed to achieve, at the same time, sacrificed his life.Symbolism of greenThe book had told much times the green light. When the dark approaching, Gatsby stayed at the shore, reached his fingers to touch the distant green light. What’s the green means? In Gatsby‘s eyes, green is a color of nature, representing hope and dream.When he was seventeen,Gatsby wore a shabby green sweater,presenting an o ptimistic and hopeful image;then he fell in love with Daisy deeply,however,Gatsby was too poor to marry her.Daisy immediately married with a rich man—Tom. Gatsby struggled hardly to escape from the bottom of society. But, he is not for the luxurious and material comforts,but for the pure love.At the end of story, there also refers green again. Here the symbolism of the green night is American’s enthusiastic and reckless pursuit for the illusory American dream.In Gatsby’s eyes, Daisy is his hope,goals and dream of love just like the green light. Because of the leading of the green light, he made it and became a rich man. However, the green light not only contributed him but also destroyed him.ConclusionThe Great Gatsby is a tragedy in the view of the whole story, and it is also the tragedy of the times—Jazz Age. It is a mapping. In the colonial period, the pursuit of individualism-- to obtain what you want by self-reliance-- is the most important thing. That is to say, at that time, regardless of your background, race and religion, as long as you work hard, you can succeed in material. In that times, Gatsby and Wolfshiemgot together to sale unauthorized liquor, participated in the stock business and eventually became a veritable millionaire, all which help him upper into the society. In such an era, human relationship became less important. Just like Daisy married Tom for luxurious life; After Gatsby death, no one but Nike came to his funeral. It is really the sorrow of the era.References1.Fitzgerald,F.S.(1993).The Great Gatsby Wordsworth Editions Limited.2.Mizener Arthur. The Far Side of Paradise: A Biography of F. Scott Fitzgerald.Boston: The Riverside Press, 1965.3.Albee,E.(1961).The American Dream4. William Goldurst. F. Scott Fitzgerald and his Contemporaries[M ]. New York: the World Pub. Co. 19635.张瑞华.《了不起的盖茨比》的象征意义[J].外国文学研究,1999,(2).6.杜永新.美国梦的幻灭:盖茨比形象的历史与文化解读[J].外语教学,2002,(6).7.肖明文,(2006.03),盖茨比与他的美国梦—菲茨杰拉德《了不起的盖茨比》，《新余高专学报》8.唐建清，《了不起的盖茨比》译林出版社9.玑衡《毁掉菲兹杰拉德的女人》《读者》。

美国文学论文

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