美国文学讲义参考版

美国文学课件1（word版）

Ⅰ。Introduction

Writings in which expression and form, in connection with ideas and concerns of universal and apparently permanent interest, are essential features. The term is correctly reserved for prose and verse of acknowledged excellence, the value of which lies in its intense, personal, and superb expression of life in its varied meanings.

II。 What is literature? 1. Encyclopedia Britannica

A body of written works, often applied to those imaginative works of poetry and prose distinguished by the intentions (ideas the author intends to express) of their authors and the excellence of their execution (style and techniques). 2. Dictionary of Literary Terms--H. Shaw

Writings in which expression and form, in connection with ideas and concerns of universal and apparently permanent interest, are essential features. The term is correctly reserved for prose and verse of acknowledged excellence, the value of which lies in its intense, personal, and superb expression of life in its varied meanings. III. Classification of Literature Language form: Prose and Verse

Genre: Poetry, fiction, short story, drama, nonfiction VI. Factors in Literature

Text, Author, Reader, and Context 1. Text: a literary work or part of it

Theme: The central and dominating idea in a literary work. Style: the characteristics of a literary section that concern form of expression rather than the thought conveyed

& a lot of others, such as rhyme, meter, imagery, etc. 2) Importance of Ideology and People’s Way of Life

Ideology is the body of doctrine, myth, tradition and symbol that represents the beliefs and attitudes of an individual, group, class, etc. A. Ideology and Literary Themes B. Ideology and Literary Forms 3. Author

Ralph W Emerson, Nathennial Hawthorne 4. Reader

Reader-response Theory

Colonial Period

A Brief Outline of American Literature

I Colonial Period

(Early 17th –the End of 18th Century)

Puritan Writings / Jonathan Edwards, Benjamin Franklin / Thomas Paine, Philip Freneau

II Romanticism (Early to Mid 19th Century) Washington Irving / James Cooper, William Bryant / Henry Longfellow, Ralph Emerson / Henry Thoreau,

Nathaniel Hawthorne / Herman Melville, Walter Whitman / Emily Dickinson

III Realism (Mid 19th –Early 20th Century) Mark Twain / Harriet Stowe, William Dean Howells / O Henry, Jack London / Theodore Dreiser, Henry James / Sherwood Anderson IV Modernism (Early—Mid 20th Century) Ezra Pound / T. S. Eliot / Wallace Stevens, Robert Frost / Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald,

Eugene O’Neill / William Faulkner V Postwar Literature

J. D. Salinger / John Updike / Allen Ginsberg, Katherine Anne Porter / Saul Bellow, Isaac B. Singer

Toni Morrison / John Barth

Puritan Writings I Puritanism

The beliefs and practices of the Puritans, a small but influential religious group devoted to the teachings of John Calvin; they stressed strict rules of personal and public behavior and practiced their beliefs in England and the New World during the seventeenth century. 1. Calvinism

A system of Christian interpretation initiated by John Calvin. It emphasizes predestination and salvation. Calvinism teaches:

1) Total depravity: that man is touched by sin in all parts of his being: body, soul, mind, and emotions,

2) Unconditional Election: that God’s favor to Man is completely by God’s free choice and has nothing to do with Man. It is completely undeserved by Man and is not based on anything God sees in man 3) Limited atonement: that Christ did not bear the sins of every individual who ever lived, but instead only bore the sins of those who

were elected into salvation

4) Irresistible grace: that God's call to someone for salvation cannot be resisted,

5) Perseverance of the saints: that it is not possible to lose one's salvation

2. Puritans and Puritanism Puritans

Believe: 1) An Almighty and Wrathful (angry) God 2) The Original Sin

Every person was guilty of sin because of Adam’s disobedience in the Garden of Eden.

3) Double Predestination—total depravity of the most and the salvation of the selected few

God would elect or predestine a limited number of persons to be saved and did this solely out of his mercy.

Puritans regarded themselves as God’s chosen people, and lived in piety, sobriety, discipline, and thrifty. They would exam themselves daily to see whether their hearts were truly set on Christ. They came to America for the sake of religious freedom. They thought that the church of England had been corrupted, and they wished to restore simplicity to church services and the authority of the Bible. They were persecuted by the Church of England and came to America to establish a commonwealth in the New World 3 Its Influence over Literature

1) Metaphysical Perception and Symbolism

Metaphysician thinks that what we see is just things’ appearances, there’s a reality behind them.

Medieval metaphysicians believe that God is the most real of all things, and that God is the prime mover of all motions in the world. This peculiar perception of the world greatly influenced the works of puritan writers. To them, the phenomenal world is nothing but a symbol of God

I heard the merry grasshopper then sing, The black-clad cricket bear a second part;

They kept one tune and played on the same string, Seeming to glory in their little art.

Small creatures abject thus their voices raise, And in their kind resound their Maker’s praise, Whilst I, as mute, can warble forth no higher lays?

warble –sing ; lay—ballad or poem

2) Optimism—Garden of Eden and American Dream

The puritans dreamed of building a new Garden of Eden in the New World, and regarded America as their Promised Land. This kind of optimism developed into Emerson’s Transcendentalism and later on into American Dream, a promise that any man can fully actualize oneself through hardworking. II Jonathan Edwards

A famous puritan pastor, one of the greatest preachers and churchmen in American history, and an essayist III American Enlightenment 1) The Causes

The development of science and global expansion of trade. 2) The Content:

a. Embracing human reason while rejecting mysticism; turning to science and reason instead of mysticism and superstition for an understanding of the world.

b. Embracing infinite perfectibility of man while rejecting total depravity and predestination. People started to believe that man is capable of improving themselves, and that man’s good or evil traits resulted from environmental conditioning.

c. Embracing a deistic God while rejecting a mystical God. They believe that god created and governs man and universe by means of the laws of nature.

IV The Independence War & Thomas Paine The Great Commoner of Mankind Common Sense, The American Crisis

Benjamin Franklin I A Jack of All Trades

Outstanding as a tradesman, citizen, scientist, statesman, essayist, diplomat, political revolutionary.

Born in Boston on January 17, 1706, he was the tenth son of soap maker

The Pennsylvania Gazette

In 1729, Benjamin Franklin bought a newspaper, the Pennsylvania Gazette. Franklin not only printed the paper, but often contributed pieces to the paper under aliases. His newspaper soon became the most successful in the colonies. II Major Works:

1) Poor Richard’s Almanac

An annual collection of proverbs, such as ―A penny saved is a penny earned.‖

―Early to bed, and early to rise, makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.‖

2) The Autobiography

Probably the first of its kind in literature III Significance of The Autobiography

1. Practical Individualism Which Helped Shaping the Nation’s Identity A record of self-discipline, self-examination, self-reliance and self-improvement

A myth of fulfilling American Dream through hard working 2. Spirit of the Enlightenment

Confidence in human progress, that man is good, and capable of becoming better 3. Stylistic Features:

Simplicity of diction, syntax, and expression Good-natured irony

Philip Freneau I Life

―Poet of the Revolution\" and the \"Father of American Poetry\" II Major Works:

1. ―The Wild Honey Suckle‖ 2. ―The Indian Burying Ground III Thematic Concern: 1. Death and Transience

2. A celebrant of ―lovely fancy‖ (imagination) 3. Craving for nature and freedom IV Style:

Neoclassical with Romantic Spirit

Some Terms Concerning Poetry 1. Foot (音步)

Foot is a rhythmic unit, a specific combination of stressed and unstressed syllables.

There are five kinds of regular feet in English poetry: iamb (抑扬格), trochee (扬抑格), anapest (抑抑格), dactyl (扬抑抑格) and spondee (扬扬格). 2. Meter

Meter is a regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. There are monometer (单音步), dimeter (双音步), trimeter (三步), tetrameter (四步), pentameter (五步), etc. 3. Rhyme (韵脚)

Rhyme is the repetition of sounds in two or more words or phrases that usually appear close to each other in a poem.

There are end rime (尾韵), internal rime (行内韵), alliteration (头韵), full/perfect rime (全韵), and imperfect rime (半韵).

Big Bad Ben

In the playground he pushes, pinches and pulls people, He’s always naughty and nasty – not nice to know. He bounces boys back and forth And burps and belches at bell-time!

4. Rime scheme is a regular pattern of rime. 5. Stanza (诗节)

Stanza is a structural division of a poem, consisting of a series of verse lines which usually comprise a recurring pattern of meter and rhyme.

The two-line stanza is called the couplet, the best-known being the heroic couplet written in iambic pentameter with an end rhyme. The four-line stanza is called quatrain, which is the most popular of all stanzaic forms. Sonnet

V ―The Wild Honey Suckle‖

iambic tetrameter

1. What is the main characteristic of the honey suckle emphasized in the first tow stanzas?

Delicate, fragile, elegant, and secluded

2. Which of the following words describes the tone in stanza I and II? In Stanza III and IV?

Restful, angry, exuberant (繁茂的), philosophical

3. In the last stanza, and particularly last two lines, the poet suggests a relationship between the life of the flower and that of human beings. Explain the relationship.

4. Using soft consonants (辅音), sounds like gentle sigh.

Romantic Period I Romanticism 1. The Cause

A reaction against classicism and neoclassicism, against rationalism and fixed genres, and a desire to escape from society . 2. The Sources:

folk expression (Robert Burns),

the remote past (Scott/ Hawthorn), Gothic architecture (Poe), an unarranged nature, the ballad (Thomas Percy), etc. 3. Romanticism as a Literary Attitude

1) Emphasizing the imaginative and emotional as opposed to the rational –an appeal to the heart rather than the head. They consider imagination (instead of reason and rules) as the source of truth.

2) emphasizing nature as the source of their inspiration and materials 3) Emphasizing individual as opposed to social convention and tradition

4) Emphasizing freedom in literary forms as opposed to the strict limits of neoclassicism

4. Subject Matter: things remote in time and place Nature (Poetry), History(fiction), Myth, etc. 5. Style: 1) Gothic

A style in literature characterized by gloomy settings, violent or grotesque action, and a mood of decay, degeneration, and decadence. It sought to arouse in the readers a sense of the remote , the supernatural, and the terrifying by describing castles and landscapes illuminated by moonlight and haunted by specters. 2) Symbol and Symbolism

Symbol is sth used for, or regarded as, representing sth else. More specifically, a symbol is a word, phrase, or other expression having a complex of associated meaning.

In this sense, a symbol is viewed as having values different from those of whatever is being symbolized,

e.g. rose is a symbol of love; Moby-Dick a symbol of evil.

Symbolism is the practice of representing objects or ideas by symbols or of giving things symbolic character and meaning.

John Bunyan built his work The Pilgrim’s Progress on symbolism: Christian and his servant Faithful’s adventure is used as a symbol to represent man’s progress through life to heaven. Other examples: The Scarlet Letter 3) Blank Verse:

Unrhymed iambic pentameter; Blank: the absence of rhyme. 4) Free Verse

the verse that lacks regular meter and line length, but relies on natural rhythms. Free verse is ―free from‖ fixed metrical patterns but does reveal the cadences that result from alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables. To the States

To the States or any one of them, or any city of the States, Resist much, obey little,

Once unquestioning obedience, once fully enslaved, Once fully enslaved, no nation, state, city of this earth, ever afterward resumes its liberty.

Washington Irving I. Major Works 1. Short Stories:

The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gents (The Sketch Books《见闻札记》) including the famous ―The legend of Sleepy Hollow‖ and ―Rip Van Winkle‖

2. History and Biography:

The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus The Life of George Washington ―Rip Van Winkle‖ Summary

A hen-pecked Rip Van Winkle wanders off with his dog Wolf into the Catskill mountains for some peace and quiet only to discover a group of strange characters playing nine-pins and drinking a even stranger brew. Despite warnings not to try the drink, Rip sneaks a taste and falls into a deep sleep.

Upon waking Rip discovers Wolf has wandered off and thinks someone has played a prank on him when he finds a rusted out weapon at his side instead of his own rifle.

Wandering back into the village Rip Van Winkle is shocked to realize he no longer recognizes anyone and that things seem unfamiliar.

Suspicions are arosed that Rip may be a Tory spy loyal to the crown since his knowledge of current affairs and politics is sadly lacking. He manages to establish his identity after being recognized by both his daughter and Peter Vanderdonk, the most ancient inhabitant of the village.

Still incredulous of Rip's explanation for his twenty-year absence, the villagers allow Rip to return home with his daughter and live in peace.

William C. Bryant I. Major Works

1. ―Thanatopsis‖ (view of death) 2. ―To a Waterfowl‖

3. Translations of Iliad & Odyssey

A great editor, and one of the first major American poets II. Thematic Concern

Some concepts of romanticism are reflected in his poetry, such as: 1. The physical world is subject to decline and decay.

2. The belief that while everything changes and dies, God, the Absolute, remains immortal;

3. the belief that the natural world provides a key to the human

world—that humanity is fulfilled through the life cycle of birth growth, decay and death. III Style

1. Using blank verse, lofty diction, and inverted syntax

2. Fond of using archaic words such as thou, shalt, etc. to convey a serious and philosophic tone 3. inversion To A Waterfowl

―The most perfect brief poem in the language‖ —Matthew Arnold Arranged in alternating rhymed quatrains Theme:

Expressing both the poet’s grateful view, at the close of a day of self-doubt and despair, of a solitary bird on the horizon, and his sense of a divine power guiding and protecting everything in nature.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow I The Life

He was the best love of American poet in his life time. Longfellow, along with his contemporaries Halmes Russell Lowell, Oliver Homes, and John Greenleaf Whittier, became known as one of the Fireside Poets—a group of Romantics who entertained the American public with poems about patriotism, nature and family.

He was almost universally extolled in his lifetime, and is the only American to be honored with a bust in the Poet’s Corner of Westminster Abbey. II. Major Works 1. ―A Psalm of Life‖

2. ―The Song of Hiawatha‖ (an American epic) 3. ―Evangeline‖ 4. ―My Lost Youth‖

5. Translation of Dante’s Divine Comedy III Thematic Concern: 1. Legend and Folklore

2. Careful avoidance of the real, controversial world about him (except for Poems on Slavery) 3. Commonplace ideas IV. Style:

1. Famous for his clear, felicitous, melodic expression 2. Indebtedness to foreign models ―Hiawatha to Finish ―Kalevala‖

―The Wreck of the Hesperus‖ to the ballad ―Sir Patric Spens‖ ―My Lost Youth‖ to a Lapland song

James Fenimore Cooper I. Major Works: Leatherstocking Tales: 1. The Deerslayer

2. The Last of the Mohicans 3. The Pathfinder 4. The Pioneers 5. The Prarie

With a Central Figure—Natty Bumpoo II Subject Matter:

The Sea Adventure Tales: The Pilot

The Frontier Saga: The LeatherStocking Tales III Achievements

The one who launched the frontier theme or the Western tradition in America literature.

Some of his plots have become formula in popular literature. For Example:

―A Rescue‖ makes up of a brave and faultless hero, the loyal Indian companion, the encounter with physical danger, physical danger as a test of prowess, and the hairbreadth rescue. Transcendentalism

\"We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds...A nation of men will for the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which also inspires all men.\"

—Ralph Emerson

I Transcendentalism

An unsystematic moral philosophy popular in New England during the 1830s, an offshoot and a late and localized manifestation of the Romantic Movement II Source:

Transcendentalists took their ideas from Unitarianism, the romantic literatures of Europe, neo-Platonism, German idealist philosophy, and from Oriental mysticism (Hindu Vedantism 印度教吠檀多派) III Major Beliefs

1. As romanticism, it upheld the goodness of humanity, the glories of nature, and the importance of free individual expression. 2. The existence of an all-pervading unitary spiritual power—the Over-Soul—the absolute good, from which all things come and of which all things are a part.

3. Man is inherently good, and evil does not exist. As the ultimate

spiritual force, the Over-Soul encompasses all existence and

reconciles all the opposing forces in the world. Evil is but the opposite of good, and is powerless to effect anything. Every evil deed is offset by a corresponding good one. You may not see that good pervades all your experiences, but all the forces in the world flow forever in the direction of the good.

4. The ideal of life is the union of man with the Over-Soul. The perceptions of our senses are often illusory and misleading, the union of man with the Over-Soul enables man to transcend this world, and discover the essential reality of the spiritual universe. IV Narcissism and Group Narcissism 1. NARCISSISM

Narcissism is named after the ancient Greek myth of Narcissus, a handsome Greek youth who rejected the desperate advances of the nymph Echo. In punishment of his cruelty, he was doomed to fall in love with his own reflection in a pool of water. Unable to consummate his love, he pined away and changed into the flower that bears his name. （Narcissus 水仙花）It is estimated that 0.7-1% of the general population suffer from NPD. 2. Symptoms

The onset of narcissism is in infancy, childhood and early

adolescence. It is commonly attributed to childhood abuse and trauma inflicted by parents, authority figures, or even peers. Narcissistic Supply is outside attention - usually positive (adulation, affirmation, fame, celebrity) - used by the narcissist to regulate his labile sense of self-worth.

Narcissists are either \"cerebral\" (derive their narcissistic supply from their intelligence or academic achievements) - or \"somatic\" (derive their narcissistic supply from their physique, exercise, physical or sexual prowess and romantic or physical \"conquests\").

The classic narcissist is self-confident, the compensatory narcissist covers up in his haughty behavior for a deep-seated deficit in self-esteem, and the inverted type is a co-dependent who caters to the emotional needs of a classic narcissist.

Feels grandiose and self-important (e.g., exaggerates

accomplishments, talents, skills, contacts, and personality traits to the point of lying, demands to be recognized as superior without commensurate achievements) Is obsessed with fantasies of unlimited success, fame, fearsome power or omnipotence, unequalled brilliance (the cerebral narcissist), bodily beauty or sexual performance (the somatic narcissist), or ideal, everlasting, all-conquering love or passion;

Firmly convinced that he or she is unique and, being special, can only be understood by, should only be treated by, or associate with, other special or unique, or high-status people (or institutions); Requires excessive admiration, adulation, attention and affirmation - or, failing that, wishes to be feared and to be notorious (Narcissistic Supply); Feels entitled. Demands automatic and full compliance with his or her unreasonable expectations for special and favorable priority treatment;

Firmly convinced that he or she is unique and, being special, can only be understood by, should only be treated by, or associate with, other special or unique, or high-status people (or institutions);

Requires excessive admiration, adulation, attention and

affirmation - or, failing that, wishes to be feared and to be notorious (Narcissistic Supply);

Feels entitled. Demands automatic and full compliance with his or her unreasonable expectations for special and favorable priority treatment;

Fromm writes in 'The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness' :

...most people aren't conscious of their own narcissism, only those expressions of it that doesn't give them away. So, for instance, they might feel an incomparable admiration of their parents, or their own children, and they have no problem in expressing such feelings since this would generally be deemed positively, as reverence for the parents, or affection for the child, or loyalty.

But if they were to express their feelings for their own person in terms like \"I am the most wonderful person on earth\of all\vain, but also a bit crack-brained\"

The strategy of providing for one's own narcissism by way of reflection in another 'ideal person', is well-known in studies of personal narcissism. 3. Group Narcissism

In group narcissism we see a parallel phenomenon: an

unquestioning loyalty and admiration for the group and its ideals and an intense fervor in the persecution of any person who questions the authority of the overarching ideals of the group.

Fromm explains, the \"individual alone could at least have some doubts about the correctness of his own narcissistic self-image, provided that he isn't very ill. A member of the group has no such

doubts since his narcissism is shared by the group

So here we see the reason why narcissistic individuals show a tendency to gather together in groups: it works as protection and amplification of their own narcissism.

One would expect the narcissist to be 'above' such social conformity, but, actually, this often represents a stepping up of his pathology. It is also gratifying to the weak, untalented, narcissist since he becomes a giant by belonging to this group.

In historical times, the narcissistic group had clearly less survival value, due to the bad adaptation to reality and the repression of independent thinking.Historical culture had a remedy against narcissism: they adopted an unassuming view of the human

personality, and set it against the backdrop of all the powerful spirits of nature to whom man must bow down. This created a healthy and modest ego that kept within its own confines. In today's society this is gone, so narcissism is clearly on the increase.

Also gone is the natural dangers posed to the narcissistic group. In our rich world such people have no problems surviving, they don't really need to be adapted to reality.

Henry David Thoreau I Life

Walden Pond / Concord Jail II Major Works 1. Walden

2. ―Civil Disobedience‖

Nathaniel Hawthorne I Life

Early Death of his Father / Self-seclusion of his Mother Bowdoin College—Longfellow—Franklin Pierce /

Brook Farm—‖diseased action‖—Dost you think it a praiseworthy matter that I have spent five golden months in providing food for cows and horses? Dearest, it is not so II Major Works 1. The Scarlet Letter 2. The House of the Seven Gables

3. The Blithedale Romance 4. The Marble Faun 5. Twice-Told Tales 6. Snow Image and Other Stories

II. Thematic Concerns 1. Morality

The Scarlet Letter deals with man’s moral growth and degeneration

―Young Goodman Brown‖ wants to prove that everyone possesses some evil secrets in his heart.

Three elements may help to explain this phenomenon: 1) The Puritan Tradition

2) His Ancestors’ involvement in the persecutions of the Quakers and the Salem Witchcraft Trial

3) The Ferment of Transcendentalism 2. Dark View of Human Nature:

―great power of blackness‖—―Ghastly, ghastly.‖—It sent Sophia to bed with a grievous headache.

Evil as well as good impulses were native to every human heart and must be combated afresh by every man and woman in every generation.

One had to work and strive against temptation in order to win salvation. There could be no magic carriage which would enable one to reach heaven without toil or trouble.

It is only through evil that maturity and tragic grandeur are possible to man. A Dialectical View 3. Sin and Its Effects IV Stylistic Features 1. Ambiguity

example: The young woman was tall, with a figure of perfect elegance, on a large scale…She was lady-like, too, after the manner of the feminine gentility of those days; …And never had Hester Prynne appeared more lady-like…

Had there been a Papist among the crowd of Puritans, he might have seen in this beautiful woman, so picturesque in her attire and mien, and with the infant at bosom, an object to remind him of the image of Divine Maternity.

Hawthorne himself once admitted, ―I am not quite sure that I entirely comprehend my own meaning in some of these blasted allegories.‖

―Melville wrought more than he realized, but Hawthorne was highly conscious artist who knew exactly what he was doing.‖

Therefore, Hawthorne’s ambiguity is purposely intended. It is perhaps because he found it the only way to tell the story objectively, or to express a complex of meanings. 2. Symbolism

1) the scarlet letter ―A‖—Adultery, Able, Angle 2) Symbolic Meaning of the Four Characters: Hester—Revealed Sin Dimmesdale—Concealed Sin Chillingworth—Unpardonable Sin Pearl—the Living Sin

3) Rosebush—Nature’s Flexibility, Beauty, and Consolation; Darkness—Concealment of Sin, etc. 3. Supernatural

The Scarlet Letter A / snow-child in ―Snow Image‖ 4. Psycho-analysis

Edger Allan Poe I Life

Orphan—step father—University of Virginia—West

Point—editor—mental problems—young cousin—died at 40 II Major Works

eminent in poetry, short story, and literary criticism 1. Poetry

―The Raven‖, ―To Helen‖, ―Annabel Lee‖

2. Short Story

―The Fall of the House of Usher‖ / ―Ligeia‖ ―The Black Cat‖ / ―The Cask of Amontillado‖ A Collection: Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque 3. Criticism

The Poetic Principle

The Philosophy of Composition III Short Story

1. Thematic Concerns

1) The Gothic—Violence and Death

The idea of a protagonist having a struggle with a terrible, surreal person or force is a metaphor for an individual's struggle with repressed emotions or thoughts.

Personifying the repressed idea or feeling gives strength to it and shows how one, if caught unaware, is overcome with the forbidden desire.

2) Disintegrated personality and the destruction force of man’s impulses or desires when repressed

Most of the terror or violence result from abnormality of human minds.

His heroes usually lives on an obsession, the fragments of the past.

When this impulse fails to be satisfied, the blind force of the unconscious self may lead to violent behaviors on others or self-destruction.

The Freudian Psyche—Id, Ego, Superego

The Id is the source of instinctive energy. As the region of the passions and instincts, it is unmoral and illogical.

The Ego is our coherent organization of metal life. Its functions are to watch the external world for the best times and occasions to allow harmless gratification of the urges of the id. Though control the Id, the ego never really succeeds in suppressing its urges.

The Super-ego acts as the censoring agency controlling the action of the individuals. It’s almost the same as conscience. 3) A Sense of Doom—Pessimistic Nihilism

Most of his heroes clearly sense the impending doom but cannot stop it themselves.

This probably results form his personal agony as he had fits of metal depression from time to time, and even attempted suicide. When some critics ridiculed him for imitating the German Gothic terror, he replied ―my terror is not from Germany but of the soul‖. 2. Style 1) Brevity

All tales should be short enough to be read in one sitting 2) Unity of Effect or Atmosphere

An author should make everything in the story help produce the one and single effect. The materials are constructed in a fashion which would hold the reader’s interest to the final sentence. 3) Striking Outcomes or Conclusion

example: Berenice / The Cask of Amontillado IV Poetry

1. Creating the beauty (of some strangeness) not of nature to block out the ugly real world he hates and fears 2. Intense Emotion 3. Melodious Sound V Influence

1. A Controversial Figure:

Emerson—‖jingle man‖ / Henry James—The enthusiasm for Poe was ―the mark of a decidedly primitive stage of reflection‖.

Annabel Lee

The death, then, of a beautiful woman is, unquestionably, the most poetical topic in the world—and equally is it beyond doubt that the lips

best suited for such a topic are those of a bereaved lover.

Moby-Dick I life

Born into a wealthy family-bankruptcy-left school at

15-sailor-successful writer-Moby-Dick-a writer of failure-Inspector of Customs-revival in 1920s II Major Works 1. Moby-Dick 2.Benito Cereno 3. Billy Budd

4. Sea Adventure Stories: Typee, Omoo, Mardi, White-Jacket, Pierre, etc.

III Moby-Dick

1. Intertangled Themes: 1) Man’s Contest with Nature

2) The Confrontation of Evil and Innocence 3) The Conflict between Faith and Doubt 2. Complexity of Forms 1) Symbolism

2) Combination of a Variety of Form, including

the psychological and picaresque novel; sea story and allegory; Satire; lyric; Cervantian romance; humor, etc. 3) Grand, Dry, Analytical, and Expository Prose New England Renaissance

New England: Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rod Island, Connecticut

Also known as American Renaissance, refers to the cautural awakening of the mid 19th century aroused by Unitarianism and Transcendentalism.

Representatives: Emerson, Thoreau, Fireside Poets, Hawthorne, and Stowe (Poe , Melville, and Whitman).

Walt Whitman I Life

Little education-typesetter-teacher-journalist-poet Turning Point—Emerson’s Essays

He said many years later, ― I was simmering, simmering, simmering; Emerson brought me to the boil.‖ II Major Work

Leaves of Grass—the first collection of truly modern poetry First Edition 1855—Final 12

In ―Song of My Self‖, he explained that the title is an emblem of

universality, fertility, and the theme of death-and-resurrection. Whitman believes that mystery of the universe exists in the commonplace, to contemplate the ubiquitous grass is to begin exploration of all life, all being. So grass is a symbol for the totality of the universe.

III Thematic Concerns

Realistic in Details but Idealistic and Romantic in Spirit 1. One Great America

Fast Expanding with enormous prosperity, a country that will soar beyond all mans’s previous achievement

He fully realized it is a most brutal, most corrupted period in American history, but it was the basic and potential ideality of America that he extolled. 2. Democracy

Termed his verse ―an epic of Democracy‖, ―the song of a great composite democratic individual‖, Whitman is a egalitarian who opposed any tyranny and discrimination. 3. Individualism

For Whitman the highest praise of democracy was its opportunity for the fullest development of the self. 4. Brotherhood

His time was characterized by the unchecked greed, the ruthless competition, the total indifference to any social obligations or to the health of society as a whole.

So he fervently celebrated brotherhood to reconcile his plea for individualism with the necessity of social order. 5. Industry and Labor

He took delight in machines. For him, the rapid pace of industrial development symbolized eternal renewal and inevitable advancement. IV Style 1. Free Verse

1) It breaks loose the restraint of traditional rhythm pattern, depends on natural speech rhythms, seeks the harmony between the rhythm and the feelings conveyed.

2) Preference for trochaic rhythm; reliance on the poetic devices of inversion, alliteration; syntactic and verbal repetitive rhythm; intense symbolism, etc. 2. Major Images: water—life

trees—a phallic symbol, also symbolized the great wilderness birds—outward thrust, the escape from the mundane

the city—the greatest concentration of brotherhood and creativity I Hear America Singing

\"I Hear America Singing\" presents an image of America that America would like to believe true—an image of proud and healthy individualists engaged in productive and happy labor.

The \"varied carols\" by people from all walks of life reflect a genuine joy in the day’s creative labor that makes up the essence of the American dream or myth.

It is surprising that in such a brief poem so much of Whitman’s total concept of modern man could be implied.

Emily Dickinson(1830-1886) I life

Massachusetts—sociable and popular until high school—female collage—Puritanism—a spinster—two men—a young lawyer—a married minister—seclusion—nearly 1,800 poems—7 published

―When a little Girl, had a friend, who taught me Immortality—but venturing too near, himself—he never returned…Then I found one more—but he was not contented I be his scholar—so he left the Land.‖ II Major Works

The Complete Poems (1955)

258 ―There is a certain slant of Light‖ 280 ―I heard a Funeral, in my Brain‖

465 ―I heard a Fly buzz—when I died—‖ etc. III Thematic Concerns

1. Intense Personal Reaction & Ambivalent attitude (refusal to accept the customary view or expression)

2. Death—Conflicting Views of Immortality

―The Only News I Know‖—confidently proclaims immortality ―If you were coming—in the Fall‖—uncertainty 3. Nature—an Unpredictable and Two-faced Nature

Nature remains a mystery to human beings. Sometimes it is comforting and delightful, but sometimes quite impersonal and even destructive.

4. Psyche or the Inner Life Three Stages:

1) A Passion of Profound Disturbance—‖Wild Nights‖ 2) Peace in quiet and honorable renunciation 3) An Elevated Soul—Platonic wedding of souls IV Stylistic Features

1. Extremely Concentrated and Short (most less than 12 lines) 2. Compactness and Concision in Elliptical Tightly-packed and

Dazzlingly Suggestive Constructions

3. Common Hymn Meter (four-line iambic stanzas riming abab) 4. Extraordinary Originality in Diction, the Use of Metaphors, Assonance(类韵) and other Figures of Speech Defamiliarization

Jack London (1876-1916) I Life

Born in San Francisco—not of

marriage—astrologer—spiritualist—stepfather—miserable mother—oyster pirate—fish patrol—sailor—high school—writer—American dream came true—socialism—frustration—early death II Major Works 1. Martin Eden 2. The Call of the Wild

3. The Sea Wolf 4. The Iron Heal III Thematic Concerns

1. Superman Philosophy—the triumph of the strongest individuals—Nietzsche

2. Disillusionment of American Dream—The autobiographical novel Martin Eden (1909) depicts the inner stresses of the American dream as London experienced them during his meteoric rise from obscure poverty to wealth and fame.

His writing makes him rich and well-known, but Eden realizes that the woman he loves cares only for his money and fame.

His despair over her inability to love causes him to lose faith in human nature. He also suffers from class alienation, for he no longer belongs to the working class, while he rejects the materialistic values of the wealthy whom he worked so hard to join.

O Henry (Sidney Porter 1862-1910) Crowd-pleasing Romanist His Formula:

Exposition: tickles the reader and arouses interest; Rising Action: creates an obvious expectance;

Conclusion: concocts a surprise ending, and the astonished reader now realized that this is actually reasonable outcome of little hints buried in the text

His writing is full of false assurance that there are excitement and joy loom under the depressing surface of everyday life.