英语专业四八级美文学要点

I. The Colonial Period (the early 17th and 18th century)
• 1. Puritanism: idealism and opportunism
• 2. Benjamin Franklin本杰明·富兰克林 : • → “The Autobiography of Benjamin
For romantics, the feelings, intuitions and emotions were more important than reason and common sense.
They stressed the close relationship between man and nature; They emphasized individualism and affirmed the inner life of
bishops→ escaped to the new world, create a new
radise
• → advocate highly religious and moral principles.
• → American Puritanism was one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thought and American literature.
Flowering time before American Civil War
1830-1860
Declining time after American Civil War
1865-1875
Representative figures of the time:
Pre-romanticism:
Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper库珀
Post-romanticism:
Novelists: Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville
Poets: Henry Wadesworth Longfellow, Edgar Allan Poe, Walt Whitman Emily Dickinson
the self.
Washington Irving (1783-1859) 华盛顿·欧文
早期浪漫主义小说家 A History of New York纽约的历史-----美国人写的第
一部诙谐文学杰作； The Sketch Book见闻札记 →①The Legend of Sleepy Hollow睡谷的传说-----使 之成为美国第一个获得国际声誉的作家 → ② Rip Van Winkle
America蒸蒸日上的美洲
• American Puritanism
• Puritans → The early settlers • ☆ founding fathers of the America nation • ☆To purify the rituals and lessen the authority of
Chapter Two American Romanticism and
New England Literature
Logic Thread
American Romanticism
Pre-romanticism 1770s-1830s
Post-romanticism (New England
Transcendentalism)
There is American Puritanism as a cultural heritage to consider.
(2) foreign influence – Romantic movement in European countries
American Romanticism
Romanticism was a rebellion against the objectivity of rationalism.
Franklin”自传 → Poor Richard’s Almanac穷查理历书
• (containing witty maxims for achieving wealth as a result of hard work and thrift)
3.Philip Freneau (poem)菲利普·弗伦诺 The Rising Glory of
Essayists: Ralph Waldo Emerson, --Nature Henry David Thoreau
American Romanticism
The romantic period stretches from the end of the eighteenth century through the outbreak of the Civil War (1790-1865).
Introduction to American literature
• 1.The Colonial Period • 2.The Romantic Period (the
first half of 19th century) • 3.The Age of Realism and Naturalism • 4.The Period around WWI • 5.The Modern Period
1. Background (1) Political background and economic development
Territorial Expansion
Industrial Growth
The Civil War
The “newness” of Americans as a nation is in connection with American Romanticism. → optimism and hope among the people