美国文学笔记2
◆Henry Longfellow
I. Life
?born in in Portland, Maine (Unitarian)
?After graduating from Bowdoin College, Longfellow studied modern languages in Europe for three years, then returned to Bowdoin to teach them.
?a devoted husband and father, with a keen feeling for the pleasures of home, but his marriages ended in sadness and tragedy.
?took a position at Harvard in 1836
?began courting Frances "Fanny" Appleton,the daughter of a wealthy Boston industrialist
?In 1854, Longfellow decided to quit teaching to devote all his time to poetry.
II. Works
Voices of the Night, Ballads and Other Poems, Evangeline, Hiawatha, and The Courtship of Miles Standish and Other Poems
Theme: a spirit of optimism and faith in the goodness of life
III. Writing style
gentleness, sweetness, and purity
His writings belong to the milder aspects of the Romantic Movement.
His work untouched the religious and social struggles.
IV. Contributions
bringing European culture to the U.S.
did much to popularize American folk themes abroad
V. Appreciation of A Psalm of Life
1st Stanza: If your soul is not keen，if it is dead, you will not sense the true feature or charm of the world.
2nd Stanza: Life is full of flesh and blood, beauty, charms, and meanings. We need to be enthusiastic towards life. It is not a course from birth to death; it has meanings and goals to strive for. It should be enriched.
3rd Stanza: We should not be stopped by temporary joy or sorrow. We should enhance and improve ourselves continuously.
4th Stanza: we are just on the way to death, even though we are courageous or brave.
5th Stanza: Do not live passively, we should live in dignity and live actively.
6th Stanza: Don’t rely too much on the future, and not be obsessed by
the past. Stick to your ideal fast, hold belief in your heart under the guidance of God.
7th Stanza: We can be great.
8th Stanza: What we have done or left behind us may cheer up and stimulate those lonely and frustrated fighters. What we do is of significance.
9th Stanza: We should begin (take action) now, with courage and confidence, to work hard and be patient.
◆Walt Whitman
I. Life
?born in the family of a carpenter, on Long Island, New York
?six years of education in public schools, and then became an office boy
?changed several jobs—printer, wandering school-teacher
?fond of literature and music
?gave up all regular emplo yment, and started off on ―a leisurely journey and working expedition‖ (democratic partisanship) ?During the Civil War in 1863 Whitman went to Washington and began attending on wounded soldiers until the end of the War.
?In 1873, Whitman had paralytic stroke.
?Though he was attacked in his lifetime for his offensive subject matter of sexuality and for his unconventional style, Walt Whitman has proved a great figure in the literary history of the United States because he embodies a new ideal, a new world and a new life style. II. Works
Leaves of Grass (openness, freedom, and above all, individualism ) Themes:
a. He shows concern for the whole hard-working people and the burgeoning life of cities.
b. The realization of the individual value also found a tough position in Whitman’s poems in a particular way.
c. Some of Whitman’s poems are politically committe
d.
Ⅲ. Contributions
Whitman’s poetic style is marked, first of all, by the use of the poetic “I”.
Whitman is also innovative in the form of his poetry. What he prefers for his new subject and new poetic feelings is “free verse,‖ that is, poetry without a fixed beat or regular thyme scheme.
Parallelism and phonetic recurrence(the repetition of words and
phrases at the beginning of the line, in the middle or at the end) at the beginning of the lines also contribute to the musicality of his poems.
The Literature of Modernism
Ⅰ.Historical Background
?Theories: Marxism and Darwinism
?Freud: father of psychoanalysis
Id, Super-ego and Ego
Oedipus Complex
?Nietzsche:
The core Christianity-----God is dead.
of western----- Platonism (rationality) -----has devaluated itself.
︱
culture irrational philosophy
?Einstein: the theory of relativity
?World War I, II: material prosperity and spiritual wasteland
II. General Observation
1. advanced form of Realism:
more complex and more diversified
2. Realism →What…?
Modernism →How…?
(language: constitutive of reality)
3. characteristics: a. Perspectivism
b. Psychoanalysis
c. Open-endedness and fragmentation
III. Rep. Writers
Ezra Pound
1. Life
?brought up in Pennsylvania;
?genius: nine languages before graduating from university;
?left for Venice in 1908;
?went to London: befriended William Yeats;
?left for Paris: joined a salon run by an American woman writer Gertrude Stein;
?WWII: working for the Italian government; anti-Semitism and pro-Fascism
?brought back to America, accused of treason, but declared insane
2. Works
?Poems: The Cantos
?Criticisms:Make It New,Literary Essays…
?Translations: The Translations of Ezra Pound and Confucius
3. Writing Style
image
use of myth and personae
dense with personal, literary and historical allusions,but at the expense of syntax and summary statement
4. The Imagist Movement
flourished from 1909 to 1917 and involved quite a number of British and American writers and poets
three main principles:
a. direct treatment of poetic subjects
b. elimination of merely ornamental or superfluous words
c. rhythmical composition in the sequence of the musical phrase
Ezra Pound: a leading spokesman of the Imagist movement
5. Appreciation of “In a Station of the Metro”
?human faces (synecdoche): the elegance and beauty of human life, as well as its transience
? a dark, wet bough: human mortality as a whole - we are all dying.
?apparition:both presence and absence; a spiritual, mystical significance, but one that we can never be sure of
III. Rep. Writers
◆Robert Frost
1. Life
?childhood in the Far West and then New Hampshire;
?graduated from high school as valedictorian and then studied in Dartmouth College and Harvard University (left because of his tuberculosis);
?moved to a farm in Derry, New Hampshire and supported himself by various means;
?sailed for England (A Boy’s Will made a hit);
?North of Boston, returned and chose to live on his own farm;
?the Pulitzer Prize winner on four occasions; the United States Senate passed resolutions honoring his birthday; at 87 read his poem “The Gift Outright” at the inauguration of President John F. Kennedy
2. Works
? A Boy's Will
?North of Boston(―Mending Wall‖)
?Mountain Interval (―The Road Not Taken‖)
?New Hampshire--- 1st Pulitzer Prize (―Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening‖)
?Collected Poems an d A Further Range --- 2nd and 3rd Pulitzer Prizes ? A Witness Tree( ―The Gift Outright‖) --- fourth Pulitzer Prize
3. Writing Style
regional poet: New England
learning from the tradition
simple from, but profound ideas
4. Appreciation of “The Road not Taken”
Major themes:
a. choice
b. individualism
c. challenge
Which is the road not taken?
“Sigh” can indicate relief or happiness, or it can indicate regret or sorrow.
5. Appreciation of “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”
Figures of Speech:
a. Alliteration
b. Hyperbole: “To watch his woods fill up with snow‖
c. Metaphor:―He gives his harness bells a shake, To ask if there is some mistake.‖
d. Personification/Metaphor: ―My little horse must think it queer‖
Theme: social obligation
III. Rep. Writers
◆T. S. Eliot
1. Life
?born at St. Louis, Missouri, USA;
?educated at Smith Academy and then Harvard (philosophy and logic);
studied literature and philosophy in France, Germany and at Oxford, England;
?interested in Elizabethan literature, the Italian Renaissance and Indian mystical philosophy of Buddhism; French symbolist poetry;
?became a naturalized British citizen in 1927 and identified as Anglo-Catholic, proclaiming himself ―classicist in literature, royalist in politics, and anglo-catholic in religion‖;
?first unhappy marriage with Vivienne High-Wood, a Cambridge governess; second marriage with Esmé Valerie Fletcher;
?the Nobel Prize and the Order of Merit in 1948;
?on the second anniversary of his death, commemorated by the
installation of a large stone in the floor of Poets' Corner in London's Westminster Abbey
2. Works
?Poetry: The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, The Waste Land, The Hollow Men, Ash-Wednesday, Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats and Four Quartets
?Plays: Sweeney Agonistes, Murder in the Cathedral, The Rock , The Family Reunion, The Cocktail Party, The Confidential Clerk, and The Elder Statesman;
?Literary Criticism: the school of New Criticism
―Tradition and the Individual Talent‖;
3. Writing Style
disconnected images and symbols;
learned quotations and allusions;
interaction between the past, the present, and the future;
4. Appreciation of the Waste Land
Theme: the spiritual crisis (breakup) of a modern civilization in which human life has lost its meaning, significance and purpose 433 lines long; not logically constructed or connected;
Secti on I, “The Burial of the Dead,” deals chiefly with the theme of death in life.
Section II, “A Game of Chess,” gives a rather concrete illustration of the sterile situation.
Section III, “The Fire Sermon,” expresses a painfully elegiac feeling by juxtaposing the vulgarity and shallowness of the modern with the beauty and simplicity of the past.
In Section IV, “Death by Water,” the drowned Phoenician Sailor is an emblem of futile worriers over profit and loss, youth and age.
The title of Section V, “What the Thunder Said,”appears to be derived from an Indian myth, in which the supreme lord of the Creation speaks through the Thunder.
◆F. Scott Fitzgerald
1. Brief Introduction to The 1920s
?The Jazz Age, the Roaring Twenties, or
the ―Dollar Decade‖
?Jazz music: to rebel against the traditional culture of
previous generations
?marked by political ignorance and wild pursuit of material success
?a spiritual wasteland and a hint of moral decay
?Flappers: arrested for indecent exposure
2. Life
?admired his gentlemanly father who retained his upper-class manners; a little sensitive to the poor Irish beginnings on his mother’s side
?legacy from his grandfather provided him with an expensive education in private schools at Princeton
?army commission and spent fifteen months of service in the southern state of Alabama
?1920s: short stories and novels at a rapid speed
?1930s: decline–his reputation, his wealth, his health, and what’s more, Zelda had been sent to a mental institution due to some serious mental breakdowns
?died of a heart attack
3. Works
?Novels: This Side of Paradise
The Beautiful and Damned
Tender Is the Night
The Great Gatsby
The Last Tycoon (unfinished)
?Short fictions: Flappers and Philosophers
Tales of the Jazz Age
?Theme: bankruptcy of the American Dream
4. Writing Style
accurate dialogues, careful observation of mannerism, style, models and attitudes;
scenic method;
the device of having events observed by a “centr al consciousness”
5. Analysis of The Great Gatsby
Major Themes:
a. The Death of the American Dream
b. The Hollowness of the Upper class
c. What Money Can not Buy: Happiness
Symbols:
a. East Egg, Long Island: the long-established aristocrats,or “old mo ney” (corrupt and jaded)
b. West Egg, Long Island: the nouveaux riches, or“new money”(upstart outsiders by the East Egg crowd)
c. The Green Light:Gatsby’s dreams and what gives him the go-ahead to pursue them.
The Lost Generation
The "Lost Generation" is a term used to refer to the generation, actually a
group of young people, that came of age during World War I. Disillusioned with the way of life in America, they began to write and they wrote from their own experiences in the war. They were basically expatriates who left America and formed a community of writers and artists in Paris, involved with other European novelists and poets in their experimentation on new modes of thought and expression. These writers were later named by an American writer, Gertrude Stein, also an expatriate, ―The Lost Generation.‖ The term was popularized by Ernest Hemingway who used it as one of two contrasting epigraphs for his novel, The Sun Also Rises.This generation included distinguished artists such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, T. S. Eliot, and Earnest Hemingway.
Earnest Hemingway
1. Life
?a good son
?made good grades at school
?went hunting and fishing with his father
?served the First World War, the Second World War and the Spanish Civil War
?awarded the Pulitzer Prize and the Nobel Prize for literature
2. Works
?In Our Time (1925)
?The Sun Also Rises (1926)
?A Farewell to Arms (1929)
?For Whom the Bell Tolls (1940)
?The Old Man and the Sea (1952)
3. Writing Style
Iceberg Theory
The Code Hero (―grace under pressure‖; Loss becomes
dignity.)
Colloquialism
―Less is more.‖
being highly suggestive and connotative
4. Appreciation of The Old Man and the Sea
―But man is not made for defeat. A man can be destroyed but not defeated.‖
Character: Santiago
Themes:
a. Perseverance
b. Man vs. Nature
c. Quest
5. Appreciation of A Farewell to Arms
Based on his own experience: in Italy during WWII
Characters: Henry and Catherine
Theme:
a. The grim reality of war
b. The relationship between love and pain
Symbol:
Rain – a symbol of the inevitable disintegration of happiness in life
A farewell to war and a farewell to love
John Steinbeck
1. Works
?In Dubious Battle
?Of Mice and Men
?The Grapes of Wrath
2. Writing Style
regionalist: the Salinas Valley in central California and
the nearby Monterey coast
characters: simple, illiterate or even weak-minded but
essentially noble
dialogues connected by brief descriptive passages
3. Appreciation of The Grapes of Wrath
The Great Depression: out of work
Themes:
a. Love
b. Prejudice
c. Hope
William Faulkner
1. His life
?born in New Albany, Mississippi and raised in nearby Oxford
?left school in his teens and had no further education beyond a year as a special student at the University of Mississippi
?enlisted in the British Royal Flying Corps and was sent to Canada for training
?awarded the Noble Prize for literature
2. Works
?The Marble Faun (1924)
?The Sound and the Fury (1929)
?Light in August (1932)
?Go Down, Moses (1942)
?The Yoknapatawpha County series
3. Writing Style
created the Yoknapatawpha County series
broke up the chronology of his narrative by juxtaposing the past with the present
exploited the modern Stream-of-consciousness writing technique
good at presenting multiple points of view
used symbolism and mythological and biblical allusions
4. Appreciation of“A Rose for Emily”
Type of work: a short story of Gothic horror and tragedy
Gothic horror: a genre of fiction presenting dark, mysterious, terrifying events that take place in a gloomy or ghostly setting; deriving its name from the Gothic architectural style in Europe between the twelfth and sixteenth centuries; Southern Gothic
Tragedy: is a fictional genre about the downfall or ruination of the main character
Themes:
a. Psychological Bondage
b. Living in the Past
c. Death of the Old South
陶洁版_美国文学期末笔记
美国文学笔记 I. Colonial Period（殖民地时期）（约1607-1765） II. The Revolutionary period（革命时期) :( 1765-18世纪末）Benjamin Franklin（1706-1790） III.The Romantic period （浪漫主义时期）: （1800-1865）Edgar Allan Poe（1809-1849） Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) Henry Daivd Thoreau (1817-1862) Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) Herman Melville (1819-1891) Walt Whitman (1819~1892) Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) IV.The Realism and Naturalism（现实主义和自然主义) : （1865-1918） Mark Twain (1835-1910) Henry James (1843-1916) Stephen Crane (1881-1900) V. The Modern period (现代主义时期）: 1918-1945 F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) William Faulkner (1897-1962) Ernest Hemingway (1899—1961) Ezra Pound (1885—1972) Robert Frost（1847-1963） Eugene O’ Neil (1888-1953) VI. Contemporary literature（当代文学):（1945- ） I. Colonial Period（殖民地时期）（约1607-1765） II. The Revolutionary period（革命时期): (1765-18世纪末）Benjamin Franklin（1706-1790）： 1. Summary: One of the greatest founding fathers of the American Nation First great self-made man in America
美国文学重点的名词解释
New England Transcendentalism: Philosophically, Transcendentalism means the recognition in man of the capacity of knowing truth intuitively, or of attaining knowledge transcending the reach of the senses. New England Transcendentalism stress the importance of the Over-soul, the Individual and Nature. Other concepts that accompanied Transcendentalism include the idea that nature is enabling and the individual is divine and therefore, self-reliant. The leading figure of New England Transcendentalism is Emerson and Thoreau. American Romanticism: It is one of the most important periods in the history of American literature that stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War. Being a period of the great flowering of American literat ure, it is also called “the American Renaissance.” American romantic works emphasize the imaginative and emotional qualities of literature. Romanticists include such literary figures as Washington Irving, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, William Cullen Bryant, Henry Wordsworth Longfellow, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allen Poe, Herman Melville, Walt Whitman and some others. Free Verse: Poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme American Puritanism: The first settlers who came to America wer e called “Puritans”, so named after because they wished to “purify” the religious practice in the church. They established their own religious and moral principles as American Puritanism, which stressed predestination, original sin, total depravity, and li mited atonement from God’s grace. American Puritanism is one of the enduring influences in American thought and American literature. American Puritanism was greatly influenced by Calvinism. Symbolism: Symbolism is the practice of representing things by means of symbols or of attributing symbolic meanings or significance to objects, events, or relationships. American Literature: Literature refers to body of work which for whatever reason deserves to be preserved as part of the reproduction of meaning within a given culture. It mainly includes novel, drama, poetry, short stories, biography and some other forms. American Literature refers to literature written by Americans in English. Epic A long narrative poem telling about the deeds of a great hero and reflecting the values of the society from which it originated. Many epics were drawn from an oral tradition and were transmitted by song and recitation before they were written down. Analysis "To a Waterfowl" is written in iambic trimeter and iambic pentameter, consisting of eight stanzas of four lines. The poem represents early stages of American Romanticism through celebration of Nature and God's presence within Nature. Bryant is acknowledged as skillful at depicting American scenery but his natural details are often combined with a universal moral, as in "To a Waterfowl" Figures of speech alliteration metaphor anaphora personification:
美国文学史复习资料
美国文学史复习（colonialism) 第一部分殖民主义时期的文学 一、时期综述 1、清教徒采用的文学体裁：a、narratives 日记b、journals 游记 2、清教徒在美国的写作内容： 1）their voyage to the new land 2) Adapting themselves to unfamiliar climates and crops 3) About dealing with Indians 4) Guide to the new land, endless bounty, invitation to bold spirit 3、清教徒的思想： 1）puritan want to make up pure their religious beliefs and practices 净化信仰和行为方式 2) Wish to restore simplicity to church and the authority of the Bible to the theology. 重建教堂，提供简单服务，建立神圣地位 3）look upon themselves as chosen people, and it follow logically that anyone who challenged their way of life is opposing God's will and is not to be accepted. 认为自己是上帝选民，对他们的生活有异议就是反对上帝 4）puritan opposition to pleasure and the arts sometimes has been exaggerated. 反对对快乐和艺术的追求到了十分荒唐的地步5）religious teaching tended to emphasize the image of a wrathful God.强调上帝严厉的一面，忽视上帝仁慈的一面。 4、典型的清教徒：John Cotton & Roger William 他们的不同：John Cotton was much more concerned with authority than with democracy; William begins the history of religious toleration in America. 5、William的宗教观点：Toleration did not stem from a lack of religious convictions. Instead, it sprang from the idea that simply to be virtuous in conduct and devout in belief did not give anyone the right to force belief on others. He also felt that no political order or church system could identify itself directly with God. 行为上的德，信仰上的诚，并没有给任何人强迫别人该如何行事的权利。没有任何政治秩序和教会体制能够直接体现神本身的意旨。 6、英国最早移民到美国的诗人：Anne Bradstreet 7、在殖民时期最好的清教徒诗人：the best of Puritan poets is Edward Tayor. 学习指南： 1、Could you give a description of American Puritans? 关于美国清教徒的描绘 Like their brothers back in England, were idealists, believing that the church should be restored to the "purity" of the first-century church as established by Jesus Christ himself. To them religion was a matter of primary importance. They made it their chief business to see that man lived and thought and acted in a way which tended to the glory of God. They accepted the doctrine of predestination, original sin and total depravity, and limited atonement through a special infusion of grace from God, all that John Calvin, the great French theologian who lived in Geneva had preached. It was this kind of religious belief that they brought with them into the wildness. There they meaant to prove that were God's chosen people enjoying his blessings on this earth as in Heaven. 2、Hard work, thrift, piety and sobriety were the Puritan values that dominated much of the earliest American writing. 3、The work of two writers, Anne Bradstreet & Edward Taylor, rose to the level of real poetry.
常耀信美国文学知识点
Introduction 1. The Youngest National Literature 1781 (Independence War) --- 2012= about 200 years 2. Great achievement: 1930-1980, nine American writers won the Nobel Prize The Periods of American Literature 1.The colonial period (约1607 - 1765) 2. The period of enlightenment and Independence War (1765-1800) 3. The romantic period (1800 - 1865) 4. The realistic period (1865 - 1914) 5. The period of modernism (1914 - 1945) 6. The Contemporary Literature (1945 -) Chapter I Colonial America American Puritanism 1. The beliefs and practices characteristic of Puritans(most of whom were Calvinists who wished to purify the Church of England of its Catholic aspects) 2. Strictness and austerity in conduct and religion Puritans‘ religio us belief: Calvinism ◆John Calvin, the great French theologian. The principal concepts: 1) Original sin and total depravity. 2) Predestination 3) Salvation of selected few ◆ The Puritans carried with them to America a code of values, a philosophy of life, and a point of view, which, in time, took root in the New world and became what is known as American Puritanism. (p11) The Influence of Puritanism on American Literature 1) Idealism（optimism） 2) Symbolism 3) Simplicity in writing Significance of Puritanism With time passing it became a dominant factor in American life, one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thought and American Literature. To some extent it is a state of mind, a part of the national cultural atmosphere that the American breathes, rather than a set of tenets. Time: From the arrival of the first settlers in the early 17th century to the end of the 18th century Literary Features 1. Forms Personal literature in various forms --- diaries, histories, common books (札记)，journals, letters, travel books, sermons etc. 2. Content 1) practical matter-of-fact accounts of farming, hunting, travel, etc. designed to inform people ―at home‖ what life was like in the new world 2) highly theoretical discussions of religious questions. 3. Style In Style, English literary traditions were imitated and transplanted. Early writers in the colonial period John Smith, a captain, one of the founders of the colony of Jamestown, Virginia; the writer of A Description of New England. William Bradford, the first governor of the Plymouth Plantation, his writing: Of Plymouth Plantation (P16) John Winthrop, the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, In his famous speech A Model of Christian Charity ,he states that there was a agreement between God and his people of building a new Garden of Eden in the new world. (P17) Therefore let us choose life, 所以，让我们选择生活， that we and our seed 这样，我们和我们的后代， may live by obeying His 可以听从上帝的声音， voice and cleaving to Him, 须臾不离上帝， for He is our life and 因为，上帝是我们的生命， our prosperity. 我们的兴旺 1
陶洁《美国文学选读》(第3版)笔记和课后习题详解(第13单元 凯萨琳
第13单元凯萨琳?安?波特 13.1复习笔记 I.Introduction to author（作者简介） 1.Life（生平） Katherine Anne Porter(1890-1980)was born in Indian Greek,Texas.She began her life as a news reporter and sometimes as an actress and ballad https://www.360docs.net/doc/703984095.html,ter she stayed in Europe and Mexico which proved very valuable for her writing.She was basically a short-story writer.Her Collected Stories won her both a Pulitzer Prize and a National Book Award.She lectured at various universities and received honorary doctorates from various institutions.She was vice president of the National Institute of Arts and Letters from1950to1952. 凯萨琳·安·波特(1890—1980)出生于德克萨斯州印第安河市。她曾做过报社记者，演员和民谣歌手。后来她到过欧洲和墨西哥。这段经历对她日后的写作很有帮助。她主要是短篇小说家。她的《短篇小说集》获得了普利策奖和全国图书奖。她曾到许多大学做讲座，收到了许多机构授予的荣誉博士学位。从1950年到1952年她担任美国国家艺术与文学协会副主席。 2.Major Works（主要作品） The Flowering Judas(1930)《开花的紫荆树》 Pale Horse,Pale Rider(1939)《灰色骑士灰色马》
美国文学试题(2)
美国文学（本科）试题5 I. Complete each of the following statements with proper words or phrases and put your answers on the Answer Sheet. (20%, 1 point for each) 1. The first permanent English settlement in North America was established at Jamestown, Virginia in . 2. became the first American writer. 3. Hard work, thrift, piety and sobriety were the values that dominated much of the early American writing. 4. In American literature, the 18th century was an age of and Revolution. 5. Franklin’s best writing is found in his masterpiece . 6. On January 10, 1776, Thomas Paine’s famous pamphlet appeared. 7. The signing of symbolized the birth of an independent American nation. 8. The most outstanding poet in America of the 18th century was . 9. Washington Irving’s became the first work by an American writer to win international fame. 10. is the summit of American Romanticism. 11. With the publication of Emerson’s in 1836,American Romanticism reached its summit. 12. Hester Prynne is the heroine in Hawthorne’s novel . 13.Henry James’ major fictional theme is . 14. brought the Romantic period to an end. So the age of Realism came into existence. 15. The Poetic style invented by Whitman is now called . 16. “Because I could not stop for Death---” is written by . 17. The term The Gilded Age is given by to describe the post-civil war years. 18. Theodore Dreiser’s first novel is . 19. The leader of the literary movement Imagism is . 20. is the spokesman for Lost Generation. II. Each of the following statements below is followed by four alternative answers or completions. Choose the one that is the best in each case and put your answers on the Answer Sheet. (30%, 1 point for each) 1. The first American writer of local color to achieve wide popularity was . A. Bret Harte B. Mark Twain C. Henry James D. William Dean Howells 2. Which of the following is the masterpiece of Mark Twain? A. The Gilded Age B. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer C. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn D. Jumping Frog 3. Which writer has no naturalist tendency? A. Mark Twain B. Jack London C. Theodore Dreiser D. Frank Norris 4. Transcendentalist doctrines found their greatest literary advocates in and Thoreau. A. Jefferson B. Emerson C. Freneau D. Oversoul 5. Which of the following doesn’t belong to Dreiser’s “Trilogy of Desire”? A. The Financier B. The Titan C. The Stoic D. An American Tragedy
美国文学笔记
美文学美国部分——浪漫主义时期 Part two: American Literature Chapter 1 The Romantic Period浪漫主义时期 1. From the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of he Civil War. It started with the publication of Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book and ended with Whitman’s L eaves of Grass. It is also called “the American Renaissance”.浪漫主义时期开始于十八世纪末，到内战爆发为止，华盛顿.欧文出版的《见闻札记》标志着美国文学的开端，惠特曼的《草叶集》是浪漫主义时期文学的压卷之作。（也可称为“美国德文艺复兴”） 2. The desire for an escape from society and a return to nature became a permanent convention of American literature.对逃离社会，回归自然的渴求成为美国文学的一个永恒的话题。 3. The American Puritanism as a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values.美国清教作为一种文化遗产，对美国人的道德观念产生了很大的影响。 4. Besides, a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of original sin and the mystery of evil marked the works of Hawthorne, Melville and a host of lesser writers. 在霍桑，麦尔维尔以及其他一些小作家的作品种加尔文主义的原罪思想和罪恶的神秘性都得到了充分的表现。 5. The most clearly defined Romantic literary movement in this period is New England Transcendentalism.美国浪漫主义文学运动足能标炳的是新英格兰的超验主义运动。 6. This Transcendentalist group includes two of the most significant writers America has produced so far, Emerson and his young friend, Henry David Thoreau, whose writing has a strong impact on American literature.超验主义文学的主要代表是爱默生和梭罗，他们的作品对美国文学产生了很大的影响。 7. Basically, Transcendentalism has been defined philosophically as “the recognition in man of the capacity of knowing truth intuitively, or of attaining knowledge transcending the reach of the senses.”超验主义承认“人类具有本能了解或认识真理的能力，能够超过感官获取知识”。 8. Emerson once proclaimed in a speech, “Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of you own mind.” Other concepts that accompanied Transcendentalism include the idea that nature is ennobling and the idea that the individual is divine and, therefore, self-reliant.爱默生曾说过：“只有人心灵的尊严才是最神圣的”。超验主义还认为自然是高尚的，个人是神圣的，因此人必须自助。 9. It ranges from the comic fables of Washington Irving to the Gothic tales of Edgar Allen Poe, from the frontier adventures of James Fenimore Cooper to the narrative quests of Herman Melville, from the psychological romances of Nathaniel Hawthorne to the social realism of Rebecca Harding.美国浪漫主义时期的小说富有独创性，多样性，与华盛顿.欧文的喜剧性寓
美国文学重点名词解释
学习资料收集于网络，仅供参考 1. 2. 6.Transcendentalism: is literature，philosophical and literary movement that flourished in New England from about 1836 to1860. It originated among a small group of intellectuals who were reaching against the orthodoxy of Calvinism and the rationalism of the Unitarian Church, their own faith centering on the divinity of humanity and the natural world instead. Transcendentalism derived some of its basic idealistic concepts from romantic German philosophy, and from such English authors as Carlyle，Coleridge, and Wordsworth. The ideas of transcendentalism were most eloquently expressed by Ralph Waldo Emerson in such essays as Nature and Self-Reliance and by Henry David Thoreau in his book Walden. .Symbolism象征主义：It is the writing technique of using symbols. It's a literary movement that arose in France in the last half of the 19th century and that greatly influenced many English writer, particularly poets, of the 20th century. It enables poets to compress a very complex idea or set of ideas into one image or even one word. It's one of the most powerful devices that poets employ in creation. 8.American naturalism：this term was created by Emile Zola. Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory played an important role in naturalism. In the works off naturalism，characters were conceived as complex combinations of inherited attributes and habits conditioned by social and economic forces. At th century，the end of the 19this pessimistic form of realism appeared in america. Naturalism attempted to achieve extreme objectivity and frankness. Characters in the works of naturalism were dominated by their environment and heredity. Naturalism emphasized：the world was around；men had no free will；religious“truth”were illusory；the destiny of human beings was misery in life and oblivion in death. The dominant figures in naturalism were Stephen crane，Frank Norris, Jack London and Theodore Dreiser. 3.The lost generation: included the young English and American expatriates as well
美国文学史习题 (1)
I. Multiple choice. Please choose the best answer among the four items. (10 x 1’= 10’) 1. In American literature, the 18th century was the age of Enlightenment. ____ was the dominant. 2. The short story “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” is taken from Irving’s work named ____. 3. Which of the following is not the characteristic of American Romanticism? 4. The short story “Rip Van Winkle” reveals the __ attitude of its author.
5.Stylistically, Henry James’ fiction is characterized by ___. 6.Transcendentalist doctrines found their greatest literary advocates in ___ and Thoreau. 7.Which is regarded as the “Declaration of Intellectual Independence”? 8.____ is considered Mark Twain’s greatest achievement.
美国文学史及选读考研复习笔记6.
History And Anthology of American Literature （6） 附：作者及作品 一、殖民主义时期The Literature of Colonial America 1．船长约翰·史密斯Captain John Smith 《自殖民地第一次在弗吉尼亚垦荒以来发生的各种事件的真实介绍》 “A True Relation of Such Occurrences and Accidents of Note as Hath Happened in Virginia Since the First Planting of That Colony” 《弗吉尼亚地图，附：一个乡村的描述》 “A Map of Virginia: with a Description of the Country” 《弗吉尼亚通史》“General History of Virginia” 2．威廉·布拉德福德William Bradford 《普利茅斯开发历史》“The History of Plymouth Plantation”3．约翰·温思罗普John Winthrop 《新英格兰历史》“The History of New England” 4．罗杰·威廉姆斯Roger Williams 《开启美国语言的钥匙》”A Key into the Language of America” 或叫《美洲新英格兰部分土著居民语言指南》 Or “A Help to the Language of the Natives in That Part of America Called New England ” 5．安妮·布莱德斯特Anne Bradstreet 《在美洲诞生的第十个谬斯》 ”The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America” 二、理性和革命时期文学The Literature of Reason and Revolution 1。本杰明·富兰克林Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) ※《自传》“ The Autobiography ” 《穷人理查德的年鉴》“Poor Richard’s Almanac” 2。托马斯·佩因Thomas Paine (1737-1809) ※《美国危机》“The American Crisis” 《收税官的案子》“The Case of the Officers of the Excise”《常识》“Common Sense” 《人权》“Rights of Man” 《理性的时代》“The Age of Reason” 《土地公平》“Agrarian Justice” 3。托马斯·杰弗逊Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) ※《独立宣言》“The Declaration of I ndependence” 4。菲利浦·弗瑞诺Philip Freneau (1752-1832) ※《野忍冬花》“The Wild Honey Suckle” ※《印第安人的坟地》“The Indian Burying Ground” ※《致凯提·迪德》“To a Caty-Did” 《想象的力量》“The Power of Fancy” 《夜屋》“The House of Night” 《英国囚船》“The British Prison Ship” 《战争后期弗瑞诺主要诗歌集》 “The Poems of Philip Freneau Written Chiefly During the Late War” 《札记》“Miscellaneous Works” 三、浪漫主义文学The Literature of Romanticism 1。华盛顿·欧文Washington Irving (1783-1859) ※《作者自叙》“The Author’s Account of Himself” ※《睡谷传奇》“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” 《见闻札记》“Sketch Book” 《乔纳森·欧尔德斯泰尔》“Jonathan Oldstyle” 《纽约外史》“A History of New York” 《布雷斯布里奇庄园》“Bracebridge Hall” 《旅行者故事》“Tales of Traveller” 《查理二世》或《快乐君主》“Charles the Second” Or “The Merry Monarch” 《克里斯托弗·哥伦布生平及航海历史》 “A History of the Life and V oyages of Christopher Columbus” 《格拉纳达征服编年史》”A Chronicle of the Conquest of Grandada” 《哥伦布同伴航海及发现》 ”V oyages and Discoveries of the Companions of Columbus” 《阿尔罕布拉》“Alhambra” 《西班牙征服传说》“Legends of the Conquest of Spain” 《草原游记》“A Tour on the Prairies” 《阿斯托里亚》“Astoria” 《博纳维尔船长历险记》“The Adventures of Captain Bonneville” 《奥立弗·戈尔德史密斯》”Life of Oliver Goldsmith” 《乔治·华盛顿传》“Life of George Washington” 2．詹姆斯·芬尼莫·库珀James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) ※《最后的莫希干人》“The Last of the Mohicans” 《间谍》“The Spy” 《领航者》“The Pilot” 《美国海军》“U.S. Navy” 《皮袜子故事集》“Leather Stocking Tales” 包括《杀鹿者》、《探路人》”The Deerslayer”, ”The Pathfinder” 《最后的莫希干人》“The Last of the Mohicans” 《拓荒者》、《大草原》“The Pioneers”, “The Praire” 3。威廉·卡伦·布莱恩特William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) ※《死之思考》“Thanatopsis” ※《致水鸟》“To a Waterfowl” 4。埃德加·阿伦·坡Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) ※《给海伦》“To Helen” ※《乌鸦》“The Raven” ※《安娜贝尔·李》“Annabel Lee” ※《鄂榭府崩溃记》“The Fall of the House of Usher” 《金瓶子城的方德先生》“Ms. Found in a Bottle” 《述异集》“Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque” 5。拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) ※《论自然》“Nature” ※《论自助》“Self-Reliance” 《美国学者》“The American Scholar” 《神学院致辞》“The Divinity School Address” 《随笔集》“Essays” 《代表》“Representative Men” 《英国人》“English Traits” 《诗集》“Poems” 6。亨利·戴维·梭罗Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) ※《沃尔登我生活的地方我为何生活》 1