The United States of America Unit 19Literature & Men of LettersThe United States of AmericaUniversity of International Business and Economics PressThink about these questions before we start:v1. What about the poetry writing in the early American literature?v2. What are the forms of American Gothic?v3. Why did the development of the self become a major theme for Romantic writers? Warming-up Activities University of International Business and Economics PressContents 19th Century Since 20th Century Before 19th Century University of International Business and Economics PressvColonial Literature, 16071776vDominant Genres and Literary FormsWiththeexceptionofthenovel,colonialAmericaproducedliteratureinallthegenresthatwerethenpopularinEngland. Before 19th Century University of International Business and Economics PressvDominant Genres and Literary FormsHistoriesBiographicalandautobiographicalwriting,includingjournalsanddiariesDramaBelletristicessays Dominant Genres and Literary FormsUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvJohn Winthrop (12 January 1587/8 26 March 1649) was a wealthy English Puritan lawyer and one of the leading figures in the founding of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the first major settlement in New England after Plymouth Colony. Winthrop led the first large wave of migrants from England in 1630, and served as governor for 12 of the colonys first 20 years of existence. His writings and vision of the colony as a Puritan city upon a hill dominated New England colonial development, influencing the government and religion of neighboring colonies. Dominant WritersUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvJohn Cotton (December 29, 1585 December 23, 1652) was an English clergyman and colonist. He was a principal figure among the New England Puritan ministers, who also included Thomas Hooker, Increase Mather (who became his son-in-law), John Davenport, and Thomas Shepard and John Norton, who wrote his first biography. Cotton was the grandfather of Cotton Mather, who was named after him. Dominant WritersUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvThomas Hooker (July 5, 1586 July 7, 1647) was a prominent Puritan colonial leader, who founded the Colony of Connecticut after dissenting with Puritan leaders in Massachusetts. He was known as an outstanding speaker and a leader of universal Christian suffrage. Dominant WritersUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvIncrease Mather (June 21, 1639 August 23, 1723) was a major figure in the early history of the Massachusetts Bay Colony and Province of Massachusetts Bay (now the Commonwealth of Massachusetts). He was a Puritan minister who was involved with the government of the colony, the administration of Harvard College, and most notoriously, the Salem witch trials. He was the son of Richard Mather, and the father of Cotton Mather, both influential Puritan ministers. Dominant WritersUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvMercy Otis Warren (September 24,1728 October 19, 1814) was a political writer and propagandist of the American Revolution. During the years before the American Revolution, Warren published poems and plays that attacked royal authority in Massachusetts and urged colonists to resist British infringements on colonial rights and liberties. Dominant WritersUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvThomas Paine (January 29, 1737 (NS February 9, 1737) June 8, 1809) was an English-American political activist, author, political theorist and revolutionary. As the author of two highly influential pamphlets at the start of the American Revolution, he became one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. Dominant WritersUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvEarly American Literature, 17761820vDominant Genres and Literary FormsPoetryNonfiction: Autobiography, Letters, EssaysNovelsSentimental FictionPicaresque Fiction Gothic Fiction Before 19th Century University of International Business and Economics PressvThe Connecticut WitsvOriginally the Connecticut Wits, this group formed in the late eighteenth century as a literary society at Yale College and then assumed a new name, the Hartford Wits. Their writings satirized an outmoded curriculum and, more significantly, society and the politics of the mid-1780s. Their dissatisfaction with the Articles of Confederation appeared in the “The Anarchiad” (17861787), written by David Humphreys, Joel Barlow, John Trumbull, and Lemuel Hopkins. In satirizing democratic society, this mock-epic promoted the federal union delineated by the 1787 Federal Convention at Philadelphia. PoetryUniversity of International Business and Economics PressJohnTrumbullDavidHumphreysJoelBarlowUniversity of International Business and Economics PressvNonfiction in a variety of forms was very popular throughout the period. Biographies and autobiographies of famous people and less-famous people whose lives were considered exemplary in some way were popular, as were their letters. Nonfiction: Autobiography, Letters, EssaysUniversity of International Business and Economics PressSentimental Fiction NovelsSusanna Rowson,neHaswell(17621824)wasaBritish-Americannovelist,poet,playwright,religiouswriter,stageactressandeducator.University of International Business and Economics PressPicaresque FictionRoyall Tyler(June18,1757August26,1826),AmericanjuristandplaywrightwhowroteThe Contrastin1787andpublishedThe Algerine Captivein1797. Picaresque Fiction University of International Business and Economics PressGothic Fiction Gothic Fiction InAmerica,GothicnovelistssometimessettheirnovelsinEuropeinordertohaveagoodreasontoincludesuchgothictrappingsasacastle;inothercases,theycreatedfantasticscenariostolocatethesesettingsintheUnitedStates.University of International Business and Economics Press 19th Century Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865 Realism and Regionalism, 18651914123University of International Business and Economics Press1. Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865RomanticismTheRomanticMovementarrivedintheUnitedStatesaround1820,coincidingwiththenationsdiscoveryofitsdistinctiveartisticvoice.University of International Business and Economics Press1. Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865vTranscendentalismTheTranscendentalistmovementwasareactionagainst18th-centuryrationalismandamanifestationofthegeneralhumanitariantrendof19th-centurythought.ThemovementwasbasedonafundamentalbeliefintheunityoftheworldandGod.University of International Business and Economics Press1. Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865vThe Brahmin PoetsIntheirtime,theBostonBrahmins(asthepatrician,Harvard-educatedclasscametobecalled)suppliedthemostrespectedandgenuinelycultivatedliteraryarbitersoftheUnitedStates.Whitman,Melville,Thoreau,andPoeUniversity of International Business and Economics Press1. Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865Two ReformersabolitionistJohnGreenleafWhittierandfeministandsocialreformerMargaretFullerUniversity of International Business and Economics Press1. Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865vThe RomancevHawthorne, Melville, and PoeUniversity of International Business and Economics Press1. Romanticism and Transcendentalism, 18201865vWomen Writers and ReformersvHarriet Beecher StoweHarriet Beecher Stowe(June14,1811July1,1896)wasanAmericanabolitionistandauthor.HernovelUncle Toms Cabin(1852)wasadepictionoflifeforAfrican-Americansunderslavery;itreachedmillionsasanovelandplay,andbecameinfluentialintheUnitedStatesandUnitedKingdom.Itenergizedanti-slaveryforcesintheAmericanNorth,whileprovokingwidespreadangerintheSouth.University of International Business and Economics Press2. Realism and Regionalism, 18651914Thesewritersamongthem,MarkTwain,HenryJames,WilliamDeanHowells,SarahOrneJewett,MaryWilkinsFreeman,andJohnWilliamDeForestchosenottoallegorizeorsentimentalizeorsensationalizeexperienceintheirfiction,preferringinsteadtorepresenttheworldasobjectivelyaspossible.University of International Business and Economics PressRealism and RegionalismvMarkTwain,HenryJames,WilliamDeanHowells,SarahOrneJewett,MaryWilkinsFreeman,andJohnWilliamDeForestUniversity of International Business and Economics PressIII Since 20th Century American Modernism, 191419451Postwar Literature, 194519702Contemporary Literature, 1970 to Present3University of International Business and Economics Press1. American Modernism, 19141945vDominant Genres and Literary FormsAllliterarygenresthrivedduringtheyearsbetweentheworldwars,buttheachievementsofthenovelistswere,arguably,themostimpressive.Withsuchawide-openmarket,theshortstoryflourished.Likethenovelandtheshortstory,AmericanpoetrywasinvigoratedafterWorldWarI.IndramathetoweringfigurewhotransformedamoribundAmericantheaterwasEugeneONeill.University of International Business and Economics PressMovements and SchoolsThe School of ImagismvModernismvImagismvObjectivismvThe Harlem Renaissance, also known as the Negro Renaissance and the New Negro Movement (Claude McKay, Jean Toomer, Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Arna Bontemps, Nella Larsen, Wallace Thurman, and Zora Neale Hurston)University of International Business and Economics PressMain writersWilliamFaulknerErnestHemingwayRobertFrostEugeneONeillUniversity of International Business and Economics Press2. Postwar Literature, 19451970vDominant Genres and Literary FormsPostmodernismTheBeatmovementUniversity of International Business and Economics PressMain WritersAllen GinsbergWilliam S. BurroughsArthur MillerTennessee WilliamsUniversity of International Business and Economics Press3. Contemporary Literature, 1970 to Presentvpostconfessional, vpostfeminist, vpostracial, vpostcolonial, vpoststructural, vPostmodernist, and even vpost-Postmodernist . University of International Business and Economics Press3. Contemporary Literature, 1970 to PresentvThe novel continues to be popular, with writers such as John Barth, Joyce Carol Oates, Philip Roth, and John Updike, who were working in previous decades, still making important contributions after 1970. vThe short story has enjoyed a resurgence in this period.vAmerican poetry in this period is produced by a more diverse group of poets in terms of class, gender, race, ethnicity, and sexuality than in earlier times.vDrama since 1970 has benefited from the birth of Off Broadway in the 1950s and Off Off Broadway and the expansion of regional theaters in the 1960s.The United States of America