常耀信《美国文学简史》笔记和考研真题详解(安德森 斯坦 刘易斯 凯瑟 沃尔夫)【圣才出品】

第16章安德森•斯坦•刘易斯•凯瑟•沃尔夫
16.1 复习笔记
I. Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941)（舍伍德·安德森）
1. Life（生平）
Sherwood Anderson was in born in Ohio. When he was thirty-six, he was already a successful businessman with a happy family. But he suffered a nervous breakdown and felt that he could be servant to words only. So he acted the manager by day and writing novels at night. One day in the middle of a dictation, he stopped and left his office, never to return. He was found wandering about in a confused condition and was sent to a hospital. Thus he said farewell to the business world and began his literary career.
舍伍德·安德森出生于俄亥俄州。

36岁时他已经事业成功，家庭幸福。

但是他总觉内心不安，着迷于文学创作。

故后来白天从事经营事业，晚上时间写作。

一天，他在默写时，突然停下来离开了办公室，然后再也没有回来。

人们发现他精神混乱、四处游荡，并把他送到了医院。

之后，他永远地告别了商界，并开始了他的文学生涯。

2. Literary contributions（文学贡献）
(1) Thematically Anderson had the courage to explore new material for fiction:
the psychological and emotional aspect of American small-town life, with emphasis chiefly on lower-class figures, the unsuccessful, the depraved, and the inarticulate. Winsburg, Ohio, which becomes an American classic, is a good illustration.
(2) Technically, Anderson was a highly original writer. He depended on inspiration in his creative endeavor. He observed human grotesqueness and eccentricity from a Freudian psychological point of view and tried to reveal the abnormal states of mind in a more or less accurate way.
(3) Anderson was probably the first writer since Mark Twain to write in the colloquial style. He regarded the vernacular as an honest medium and developed a style the major features of which included clarity, directness, and a deceptive simplicity. This style influenced Hemingway and Faulkner.
(1) 在主题方面，安德森勇于挖掘小说创作的新素材，即美国小镇生活中的心理和情感层面。

他着重关注底层人物，诸如失败者、堕落者和不善表达的人等。

他的经典作品《小城畸人》就是很好的例证。

(2) 技巧方面，安德森是原创性的作家，他依靠灵感进行创作。

他从佛洛依德心理分析的角度观察人类的怪诞行为，从而试图准确地揭示人物反常的心理状况。

(3) 安德森是继马克·吐温之后运用口头语言进行创作的首位作家。

他认为日常用语是一种可靠的媒介。

他的写作风格以清晰，直接和貌似简单著称。

这种风格对后来的海明威和福克纳产生了很大影响。

3. Major works（主要作品）
Windy McPherson’s Son《饶舌的迈克逊的儿子》
Marching Men《前进中的人们》
Winesburg, Ohio《小城畸人》
The Triumph of the Egg《鸡蛋的胜利》
Horses and Men《马和人》
Death in the Woods《林中之死》
Poor White《穷白人》
Many Marriages《许多婚姻》
Dark Laughter《暗笑》
Kit Brandon《吉特·布兰登》
A Story-Teller’s Story《讲故事人的故事》
Tar: A Midwest Childhood《中西部的童年》
“Hands”《双手》
“Paper Pills”《纸团》
“Mother”《母亲》
“I Want to Know Why”《我想知道为什么》
II. Gertrude Stein (1874-1946)（格特鲁德·斯坦）
Gertrude Stein’s claim to fame in literature is attributed to her writings as well as to her personality as a patron of art and literature.
格特鲁德·斯坦在文学史上出名一是因为她的作品，二是因为她是艺术和文学的赞助人。

1. Life（生平）
Gertrude Stein came from a well-to-do family and was able to live comfortably on her inheritance in Paris most of her adult life. She graduated from Radcliffe College, Massachusetts where she managed to impress her writing instructor with her unusual power of abstract thought, and took courses in psychology which were offered by William James, brother of Henry James, the novelist. All her life she kept writing, and was a well-known writer of over fifty books. She lectured on her theories at Cambridge and Oxford Universities, and did a lecture tour in her own country in 1934.
格特鲁德·斯坦生于富贵之家。

依靠继承的遗产她得以在巴黎过着舒适的生活。

她毕业于拉德克利夫学院，大学时其惊人的抽象思维给写作老师留下很深的印象。

她还听过小说家亨利·詹姆斯的哥哥威廉姆·詹姆斯开设的心理课程。

她终生笔耕不缀，共著有50余部作品。

她经常在剑桥大学和牛津大学举办讲座阐述她的文学理论。

1934年她回美国做了一次巡回演讲。

2. Literary contributions（文学贡献）
Stein did quite a few things that have ensured her niche in the American literary pantheon.
(1) For one thing she was very sensitive to the temper of her time and its subtleties of change. She felt that life after World WarIwas no longer the same as in the pre-war period, and the modes of representing it in the arts and in literature should change accordingly. Thus she helped usher in the new, modern period.
(2) Another thing for which she has been noted is her literary theory and
practice. Her literary theories are best expounded in her How to Write. Her writing exhibits its unmistakable experimental daring and modernity.
斯坦做过的几件事情足以让她在美国文学史上留名。

(1) 她思想敏锐，意识到了时代趋势和微妙的变化。

她认为一战后的生活与战前不一样了，因此艺术和文学在表现生活的方式上也应作出相应的改变。

她在引领新的文学现代时期上做出了很多贡献。

(2) 另一件值得称道的是她的文学理论与实践。

她的文学理论在其作品《写作指南》上得到了很好地阐释。

她的作品显示出其勇于尝试的精神和现代性。

3. Major works（主要作品）
Three lives《三个女人》
“The Good Anna”《好人安娜》
“The Gentle Lena”《温和的丽娜》
“Melanctha”《米兰克莎》
Tender Buttons《温柔的纽扣》
The Making of Americans《美国人的成长》
How to Write《写作指南》
Four Saints in Three Acts《三幕剧里的四仙人.》
The Autobiography of Alice b. Toklas《爱丽丝· B. 托克拉斯的自传》
“Sacred Emily”《神圣的艾米莉》
“Picasso”《毕加索》
III. Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951)（辛克莱·刘易斯）
1. Life（生平）
Sinclair Lewis was the first American author to win the Nobel Prize for literature. Born into a middle-class family in Sauk Center, Minnesota, Lewis was to place that class under ruthless satire, and at the same time to affirm its best virtues. He began writing when still in college. After graduation from Yale, he knocked about for a number of years. All the time he tried to write novels and get them published. From 1912 to 1919 he was able to published five novels, but it was not until the summer of 1920 when his sixth book, Main Street, came out that he became a famous man. For the next ten years the rise of Lewis was meteoric. He managed to acquire an international reputation which led straight to the Nobel Prize. Thus within some twenty years Lewis climbed to the summit of his career. Thereafter, however, it was a steady slide downhill. He has been called the worst important writer in American Literature.
辛克莱·刘易斯是第一位获得诺贝尔文学奖的美国作家。

他出生在明尼苏达州索克中心镇一个中产阶级家庭。

刘易斯一生都在对这个阶级进行无情的讽刺，同时又肯定它的某些美德。

他在大学时便开始写作。

他从耶鲁大学毕业以后，闯荡了一些年，然而他一直努力写作并试图发表小说。

从1912年到1919年，他共发表了五部小说，直到1920年夏天他的第六部小说《大街》问世，他才得以闻名天下。

此后十年间，刘易斯平步青云。

他开始享誉欧洲，并与1930年获得诺贝尔奖。

他在20年间爬到了文学生涯的顶峰。

然而，在那以后，他就开始走下坡路。

现在他被称作美国文学史上最差劲的重要作家。