美国文学essay questions

1.Give a brief discussion of Henry James‟ literary achievement.

1)International theme: James‟s novels are always set against a larger international background, usually between America and Europe

2) Psychological realism: James‟s realism is characterized by his psychological approach to his subject matter. His fictional world is concerned with the inner world of human beings. He is generally regarded as the forerunner of the 20th century “stream-of-consciousness” novels and the founder of psychological rea lism.

3) His language is highly refined and insightful; he is the most expert of stylist of his time

4) Narrative point of view: moving away from authorial omniscience, making the characters reveal themselves

5) Literary criticism: “The Art of Fiction”. The theme of “The Art of Fiction” clearly indicates that the aim of the novel is to present life, also advocates the freedom of the artist to write about anything that concerns him. James‟s language is elaborate and refined with lengthy psychological analyses.

2. Analyze the artistic features of Earnest Hemingway‟s novels.

Hemingway‟s artistic features can be concluded into 3 parts:

a. colloquial

b. understatement

c. ice-berg analogy

Typical of this “iceberg” analogy is Hemingway‟s style. He deals with a limited range of characters in quite similar circumstances and measures them against unvarying code, known as “grace under pressure”. Besides, Hemingway develops the style of colloquialism initiated by Mark Twain. According to Hemingway, good literary writing should be able to make reader feel the emotion of the characters directly and the best way to produce the effect is to set down exactly every particular kind of feeling without any authorial comment Hemingway develops the style of colloquialism initiated by Mark Twain. The accents and mannerisms of human speech are so well presented that the characters are full of flesh and blood and the use of

short, simple and conventional words and sentence have an effect of clearness, terseness and great care. Through seemingly simple and natural, his style is polished and controlled, suggestive and connotative.

3. Give a brief discussion of Whitman‟s style and language.

Style: Whitman is one of the representative poets in America. He employed brand-new means in his poetry and has made radical changes in the form of poetry by choosing free verse as his medium of expression, which is a kind of poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme. W hitman‟s poetic style is marked by the use of the poetic “I” and the images in his poems are unconventional.

Language: He uses oral English and the words he uses are relatively simple and crude, which formed many honest and undistorted images of different aspects of America of the day. Usually, parallelism and phonetic recurrence are used at the beginning of the lines. The poetic lines are simple and prose-like, varying in length, which allows him to express his ideas freely. He also applies oral English in his free verse to make it an effective way to express freely the feelings of common people.

4. Why is Fitzgerald regarded as spokesman of the “Jazz Age”?

Fitzgerald was a representative figure of the 1920s. He never failed to remain detached and foresee the tragedy of the “Dollar Decade”. His works mirror the exciting age in almost every way and his fictional world is the best embodiment of the spirit of the Jazz Age.

Through the glittering world of his fiction run the themes of moral waste and decay and necessity of personal responsibility. The Great Gatsby, a book about the Jazz Age, is a case study in people‟s pursuit of an elusive American Dream. It is also a powerful criticism of American society. Thus he is often acclaimed literary spokesman of the Jazz Age.

5. Comment on the writing style of William Faulkner.

1) William Faulkner is one of the greatest American novelists. As a Nobel Prize