美国文学史笔记
美国文学史及选读2复习笔记
PartⅣThe Literature Of Realism现实主义文学1.美国国内战争Civil War 1861-1865.美国现实主义文学：他们寻找描写美国人真实生活的方法，他们声称平凡的、就近的事件同重大的、遥运的事件一样都是艺术创作的源泉they sought to portray American life as it really was,, insisting that the ordinary and local were as suitable for artistic portrayal as the magnificent and the remote.2.现实主义一词来源于法语realisme, 她是一种文学原则，她强调描写平凡的生活，强调其“真实性和现实性”。
Realism had originated in France as realisme, a literary doctrine that called for “reality and truth” in the depiction of ordinary life. “现实主义要求创作素材绝对真实，即不能夸张，也不能缩小”,William Dean Howells(豪厄斯) defined realism as “nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material”.他反对那些表现失意和绝望类苍白无力的小说，他强调现实主义作品要发掘出生活中微笑的一方面，因为美国人都坚信自己的国家是一个充满希望，什么奇迹都有可能发生的一个国家，作为文学也应该把这些特征表现出来he spoke out against the writing of a bleak fiction of failure and despair. He called for the treatment of the “Smiling aspects of life”as being the more “American”, insisting that American was truly a land of hope and of possibility that should be reflected in its literature.3.美国现实主义文学总体说来对生活的表面现象进行了乐观的处理，这是其局限，然而最伟大的现实伟大的现实主义大师亨利·詹姆斯、马克·吐温则摆脱了对十九世纪美国进行肤浅描写的局限，詹姆斯对他作品中的人物个性心理进行了深度探讨，他运用深厚的和复杂的写作方式对复杂的个人经历进行了揣摩。
美国文学史及选读复习笔记册
H i s t o r y A n d A n t h o l o g y o f A m e r i c a n L i t e r a t u r e(V o l u m eⅠⅡ)美国文学史及选读1、2PartⅠThe Literature of Colonial America殖民主义时期的文学1.17世纪早期English and European explorers开始登陆美洲。
在他们之前100多年Caribbean Islands, Mexico and other Parts of South America已被the Spanish占领。
2.17th早期English settlements in Virginia and Massachusetts(弗吉尼亚和马萨诸塞)开始了美国历史3.美国最早殖民者(earliest settlers)includedDutch ,Swedes ,Germans ,French ,Spaniards ,Italians and Portuguese (荷兰人，瑞典人，德国人，法国人，西班牙人，意大利人及葡萄牙人等)。
4.美国早期文学主要为the narratives and journals of these settlements采用in diaries and in journals(日记和日志)，他们写关于the land with dense forests and deep-blue lakes and rich soil.5.第一批美国永久居民：the first permanent English settlement in NorthAmerica was established at Jamestown,Virginia in 1607(北美弗吉尼亚詹姆斯顿)。
6.船长约翰·史密斯Captain John Smith他的作品(reports of exploration)17th早期出版，被认为是美国第一部真正意义上的文学作品in the early1600s,have been described as the first distinctly American literature written in English.他讲述了filled with themes, myths, images, scenes, character and events,吸引了朝圣者和清教徒前往lure the Pilgrims and the Puritans.7.美国第一位作家：1608年Captain John Smith写了封信《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”.8.他的第二本书1612年《弗吉尼亚地图，附：一个乡村的描述》“A Map of Virginia:with a Description of the Country”.9.他一共出版了八本书，其中有关于新英格兰的历史及描述。
美国文学史及选读复习笔记（1-2册）
美国文学史及选读复习笔记（1-2册）History And Anthology of American Literature (V olumeⅠⅡ)美国文学史及选读1、2PartⅠThe Literature of Colonial America殖民主义时期的文学1. 17世纪早期English and European explorers开始登陆美洲。
在他们之前100多年Caribbean Islands, Mexico and other Parts of South America已被the Spanish占领。
2. 17th早期English settlements in Virginia and Massachusetts(弗吉尼亚和马萨诸塞)开始了美国历史3. 美国最早殖民者(earliest settlers)included Dutch ,Swedes ,Germans ,French ,Spaniards ,Italians and Portuguese (荷兰人，瑞典人，德国人，法国人，西班牙人，意大利人及葡萄牙人等)。
4. 美国早期文学主要为the narratives and journals of these settlements采用in diaries and in journals(日记和日志)，他们写关于the land with dense forests and deep-blue lakes and rich soil.5. 第一批美国永久居民：the first permanent English settlement in North America was established at Jamestown,Virginia in 1607(北美弗吉尼亚詹姆斯顿)。
6. 船长约翰?史密斯Captain John Smith他的作品(reports of exploration)17th 早期出版，被认为是美国第一部真正意义上的文学作品in the early 1600s,have been described as the first distinctly American literature written in English.他讲述了filled with themes, myths, images, scenes, character and events,吸引了朝圣者和清教徒前往lure the Pilgrims and the Puritans.7. 美国第一位作家：1608年Captain John Smith写了封信《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”.8. 他的第二本书1612年《弗吉尼亚地图，附：一个乡村的描述》“A Map of Virginia: with a Description of the Country”.9. 他一共出版了八本书，其中有关于新英格兰的历史及描述。
美国文学简史笔记-常耀信-(重点参考)
A Concise History of American LiteratureWhat is literature?Literature is language artistically used to achieve identifiable literary qualities and to convey meaningful messages.Chapter 1 Colonial PeriodI.Background: Puritanism1.features of Puritanism(1)Predestination: God decided everything before things occurred.(2)Original sin: Human beings were born to be evil, and this original sin can be passed downfrom generation to generation.(3)Total depravity(4)Limited atonement: Only the “elect” can be saved.2.Influence(1) A group of good qualities –hard work, thrift, piety, sobriety (serious and thoughtful)influenced American literature.(2)It led to the everlasting myth. All literature is based on a myth – garden of Eden.(3)Symbolism: the American puritan’s metaphorical mode of perception was chieflyinstrumental in calling into being a literary symbolism which is distinctly American.(4)With regard to their writing, the style is fresh, simple and direct; the rhetoric is plain andhonest, not without a touch of nobility often traceable to the direct influence of the Bible. II.Overview of the literature1.types of writingdiaries, histories, journals, letters, travel books, autobiographies/biographies, sermons2.writers of colonial period(1)Anne Bradstreet(2)Edward Taylor(3)Roger Williams(4)John Woolman(5)Thomas Paine(6)Philip FreneauIII.Jonathan Edwards1.life2.works(1)The Freedom of the Will(2)The Great Doctrine of Original Sin Defended(3)The Nature of True Virtue3.ideas – pioneer of transcendentalism(1)The spirit of revivalism(2)Regeneration of man(3)God’s presence(4)Puritan idealismIV.Benjamin Franklin1.life2.works(1)Poor Richard’s Almanac(2)Autobiography3.contribution(1)He helped found the Pennsylvania Hospital and the American Philosophical Society.(2)He was called “the new Prometheus who had stolen fire (electricity in this cas e) fromheaven”.(3)Everything seems to meet in this one man –“Jack of all trades”. Herman Melville thusdescribed him “master of each and mastered by none”.Chapter 2 American RomanticismSection 1 Early Romantic PeriodWhat is Romanticism?●An approach from ancient Greek: Plato● A literary trend: 18c in Britain (1798~1832)●Schlegel Bros.I.Preview: Characteristics of romanticism1.subjectivity(1)feeling and emotions, finding truth(2)emphasis on imagination(3)emphasis on individualism –personal freedom, no hero worship, natural goodness ofhuman beings2.back to medieval, esp medieval folk literature(1)unrestrained by classical rules(2)full of imagination(3)colloquial language(4)freedom of imagination(5)genuine in feelings: answer their call for classics3.back to naturenature is “breathing living thing” (Rousseau)II.American Romanticism1.Background(1)Political background and economic development(2)Romantic movement in European countriesDerivative – foreign influence2.features(1)American romanticism was in essence the expression of “a real ne w experience andcontained “an alien quality” for the simple reason that “the spirit of the place” was radicallynew and alien.(2)There is American Puritanism as a cultural heritage to consider. American romantic authorstended more to moralize. Many American romantic writings intended to edify more thanthey entertained.(3)The “newness” of Americans as a nation is in connection with American Romanticism.(4)As a logical result of the foreign and native factors at work, American romanticism wasboth imitative and independent.III.Washington Irving1.several names attached to Irving(1)first American writer(2)the messenger sent from the new world to the old world(3)father of American literature2.life3.works(1) A History of New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty(2)The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. (He won a measure of internationalrecognition with the publication of this.)(3)The History of the Life and V oyages of Christopher Columbus(4) A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada(5)The Alhambra4.Literary career: two parts(1)1809~1832a.Subjects are either English or Europeanb.Conservative love for the antique(2)1832~1859: back to US5.style – beautiful(1)gentility, urbanity, pleasantness(2)avoiding moralizing – amusing and entertaining(3)enveloping stories in an atmosphere(4)vivid and true characters(5)humour – smiling while reading(6)musical languageIV.James Fenimore Cooper1.life2.works(1)Precaution (1820, his first novel, imitating Austen’s Pride and Prejudice)(2)The Spy (his second novel and great success)(3)Leatherstocking Tales (his masterpiece, a series of five novels)The Deerslayer, The Last of the Mohicans, The Pathfinder, The Pioneer, The Prairie3.point of viewthe theme of wilderness vs. civilization, freedom vs. law, order vs. change, aristocrat vs.democrat, natural rights vs. legal rights4.style(1)highly imaginative(2)good at inventing tales(3)good at landscape description(4)conservative(5)characterization wooden and lacking in probability(6)language and use of dialect not authentic5.literary achievementsHe created a myth about the formative period of the American nation. If the history of the United States is, in a sense, the process of the American settlers exploring and pushing the American frontier forever westward, then Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales effectively approximates the American national experience of adventure into the West. He turned the west and frontier as a useable past and he helped to introduce western tradition to American literature. Section 2 Summit of Romanticism – American TranscendentalismI.Background: four sources1.Unitarianism(1)Fatherhood of God(2)Brotherhood of men(3)Leadership of Jesus(4)Salvation by character (perfection of one’s character)(5)Continued progress of mankind(6)Divinity of mankind(7)Depravity of mankind2.Romantic IdealismCenter of the world is spirit, absolute spirit (Kant)3.Oriental mysticismCenter of the world is “oversoul”4.PuritanismEloquent expression in transcendentalismII.Appearance1836, “Nature” by EmersonIII.Features1.spirit/oversoul2.importance of individualism3.nature – symbol of spirit/Godgarment of the oversoul4.focus in intuition (irrationalism and subconsciousness)IV.Influence1.It served as an ethical guide to life for a young nation and brought about the idea that human canbe perfected by nature. It stressed religious tolerance, called to throw off shackles of customs and traditions and go forward to the development of a new and distinctly American culture.2.It advocated idealism that was great needed in a rapidly expanded economy where opportunityoften became opportunism, and the desire to “get on” obscured the moral necessity for rising to spiritual height.3.It helped to create the first American renaissance – one of the most prolific period in Americanliterature.V.Ralph Waldo Emerson1.life2.works(1)Nature(2)Two essays: The American Scholar, The Poet3.point of view(1)One major element of his philosophy is his firm belief in the transcendence of the“oversoul”.(2)He regards nature as the purest, and the most sanctifying moral influence on man, andadvocated a direct intuition of a spiritual and immanent God in nature.(3)If man depends upon himself, cultivates himself and brings out the divine in himself, he canhope to become better and even perfect. This is what Emerson means by “the infinitude ofman”.(4)Everyone should understand that he makes himself by making his world, and that he makesthe world by making himself.4.aesthetic ideas(1)He is a complete man, an eternal man.(2)True poetry and true art should ennoble.(3)The poet should express his thought in symbols.(4)As to theme, Emerson called upon American authors to celebrate America which was tohim a lone poem in itself.5.his influenceVI.Henry David Thoreau1.life2.works(1) A Week on the Concord and Merrimack River(2)Walden(3) A Plea for John Brown (an essay)3.point of view(1)He did not like the way a materialistic America was developing and was vehementlyoutspoken on the point.(2)He hated the human injustice as represented by the slavery system.(3)Like Emerson, but more than him, Thoreau saw nature as a genuine restorative, healthyinfluence on man’s spiritual well-being.(4)He has faith in the inner virtue and inward, spiritual grace of man.(5)He was very critical of modern civilization.(6)“Simplicity…simplify!”(7)He was sorely disgusted with “the inundations of the dirty institutions of men’s odd-fellowsociety”.(8)He has calm trust in the future and his ardent belief in a new generation of men.Section 3 Late RomanticismI.Nathaniel Hawthorne1.life2.works(1)Two collections of short stories: Twice-told Tales, Mosses from and Old Manse(2)The Scarlet Letter(3)The House of the Seven Gables(4)The Marble Faun3.point of view(1)Evil i s at the core of human life, “that blackness in Hawthorne”(2)Whenever there is sin, there is punishment. Sin or evil can be passed from generation togeneration (causality).(3)He is of the opinion that evil educates.(4)He has disgust in science.4.aesthetic ideas(1)He took a great interest in history and antiquity. To him these furnish the soil on which hismind grows to fruition.(2)He was convinced that romance was the predestined form of American narrative. To tell thetruth and satirize and yet not to offend: That was what Hawthorne had in mind to achieve.5.style – typical romantic writer(1)the use of symbols(2)revelation of characters’ psychology(3)the use of supernatural mixed with the actual(4)his stories are parable (parable inform) – to teach a lesson(5)use of ambiguity to keep the reader in the world of uncertainty – multiple point of viewII.Herman Melville1.life2.works(1)Typee(2)Omio(3)Mardi(4)Redburn(5)White Jacket(6)Moby Dick(7)Pierre(8)Billy Budd3.point of view(1)He never seems able to say an affirmative yes to life: His is the attitude of “EverlastingNay” (negative attitude towards life).(2)One of the major themes of his is alienation (far away from each other).Other themes: loneliness, suicidal individualism (individualism causing disaster and death),rejection and quest, confrontation of innocence and evil, doubts over the comforting 19cidea of progress4.style(1)Like Hawthorne, Melville manages to achieve the effect of ambiguity through employingthe technique of multiple view of his narratives.(2)He tends to write periodic chapters.(3)His rich rhythmical prose and his poetic power have been profusely commented upon andpraised.(4)His works are symbolic and metaphorical.(5)He includes many non-narrative chapters of factual background or description of what goeson board the ship or on the route (Moby Dick)Romantic PoetsI.Walt Whitman1.life2.work: Leaves of Grass (9 editions)(1)Song of Myself(2)There Was a Child Went Forth(3)Crossing Brooklyn Ferry(4)Democratic Vistas(5)Passage to India(6)Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking3.themes –“Catalogue of American and European thought”He had been influenced by many American and European thoughts: enlightenment, idealism, transcendentalism, science, evolution ideas, western frontier spirits, Jefferson’s individualism, Civil War Unionism, Orientalism.Major themes in his poems (almost everything):●equality of things and beings●divinity of everything●immanence of God●democracy●evolution of cosmos●multiplicity of nature●self-reliant spirit●death, beauty of death●expansion of America●brotherhood and social solidarity (unity of nations in the world)●pursuit of love and happiness4.style: “free verse”(1)no fixed rhyme or scheme(2)parallelism, a rhythm of thought(3)phonetic recurrence(4)the habit of using snapshots(5)the use of a certain pronoun “I”(6) a looser and more open-ended syntactic structure(7)use of conventional image(8)strong tendency to use oral English(9)vocabulary – powerful, colourful, rarely used words of foreign origins, some even wrong(10)sentences – catalogue technique: long list of names, long poem lines5.influence(1)His best work has become part of the common property of Western culture.(2)He took over Whitman’s vision of the poet-prophet and poet-teacher and recast it in a moresophisticated and Europeanized mood.(3)He has been compared to a mountain in American literary history.(4)Contemporary American poetry, whatever school or form, bears witness to his greatinfluence.II.Emily Dickenson1.life2.works(1)My Life Closed Twice before Its Close(2)Because I Can’t Stop for Death(3)I Heard a Fly Buzz – When I died(4)Mine – by the Right of the White Election(5)Wild Nights – Wild Nights3.themes: based on her own experiences/joys/sorrows(1)religion – doubt and belief about religious subjects(2)death and immortality(3)love – suffering and frustration caused by love(4)physical aspect of desire(5)nature – kind and cruel(6)free will and human responsibility4.style(1)poems without titles(2)severe economy of expression(3)directness, brevity(4)musical device to create cadence (rhythm)(5)capital letters – emphasis(6)short poems, mainly two stanzas(7)rhetoric techniques: personification – make some of abstract ideas vividparison: Whitman vs. Dickinson1.Similarities:(1)Thematically, they both extolled, in their different ways, an emergent America, itsexpansion, its individualism and its Americanness, their poetry being part of “AmericanRenaissance”.(2)Technically, they both added to the literary independence of the new nation by breakingfree of the convention of the iambic pentameter and exhibiting a freedom in form unknownbefore: they were pioneers in American poetry.2.differences:(1)Whitman seems to keep his eye on society at large; Dickinson explores the inner life of theindividual.(2)Whereas Whitman is “national” in his outlook, Dickinson is “regional”.(3)Dickinson has the “catalogue technique” (direct, simple style) which Whitman doesn’thave.Edgar Allen PoeI.LifeII.Works1.short stories(1)ratiocinative storiesa.Ms Found in a Bottleb.The Murders in the Rue Morguec.The Purloined Letter(2)Revenge, death and rebirtha.The Fall of the House of Usherb.Ligeiac.The Masque of the Red Death(3)Literary theorya.The Philosophy of Compositionb.The Poetic Principlec.Review of Hawthorne’s Twice-told TalesIII.Themes1.death –predominant theme in Poe’s writing“Poe is not interested in anything alive. Everything in Poe’s writings is dead.”2.disintegration (separation) of life3.horror4.negative thoughts of scienceIV.Aesthetic ideas1.The short stories should be of brevity, totality, single effect, compression and finality.2.The poems should be short, and the aim should be beauty, the tone melancholy. Poems shouldnot be of moralizing. He calls for pure poetry and stresses rhythm.V.Style – traditional, but not easy to readVI.Reputation: “the jingle man” (Emerson)VII.His influencesChapter 3 The Age of RealismI.Background: From Romanticism to Realism1.the three conflicts that reached breaking point in this period(1)industrialism vs. agrarian(2)culturely-measured east vs. newly-developed west(3)plantation gentility vs. commercial gentility2.1880’s urbanization: from free competition to monopoly capitalism3.the closing of American frontierII.Characteristics1.truthful description of life2.typical character under typical circumstance3.objective rather than idealized, close observation and investigation of life“Realistic writers are like scientists.”4.open-ending:Life is complex and cannot be fully understood. It leaves much room for readers to think by themselves.5.concerned with social and psychological problems, revealing the frustrations of characters in anenvironment of sordidness and depravityIII.Three Giants in Realistic Period1.William Dean Howells –“Dean of American Realism”(1)Realistic principlesa.Realism is “fidelity to experience and probability of motive”.b.The aim is “talk of some ordinary traits of American life”.c.Man in his natural and unaffected dullness was the object of Howells’s fictionalrepresentation.d.Realism is by no means mere photographic pictures of externals but includes a centralconcern with “motives” and psychological conflicts.e.He condemns novels of sentimentality and morbid self-sacrifice, and avoids such themes asillicit love.f.Authors should minimize plot and the artificial ordering of the sense of something“desultory, unfinished, imperfect”.g.Characters should have solidity of specification and be real.h.Interpreting sympathetically the “common feelings of commonplace people” was best suitedas a technique to express the spirit of America.i.He urged writers to winnow tradition and write in keeping with current humanitarian ideals.j.Truth is the highest beauty, but it includes the view that morality penetrates all things.k.With regard to literary criticism, Howells felt that the literary critic should not try to impose arbitrary or subjective evaluations on books but should follow the detached scientist inaccurate description, interpretation, and classification.(2)Worksa.The Rise of Silas Laphamb. A Chance Acquaintancec. A Modern Instance(3)Features of His Worksa.Optimistic toneb.Moral development/ethicscking of psychological depth2.Henry James(1)Life(2)Literary career: three stagesa.1865~1882: international theme●The American●Daisy Miller●The Portrait of a Ladyb.1882~1895: inter-personal relationships and some plays●Daisy Miller (play)c.1895~1900: novellas and tales dealing with childhood and adolescence, then back tointernational theme●The Turn of the Screw●When Maisie Knew●The Ambassadors●The Wings of the Dove●The Golden Bowl(3)Aesthetic ideasa.The aim of novel: represent lifemon, even ugly side of lifec.Social function of artd.Avoiding omniscient point of view(4)Point of viewa.Psychological analysis, forefather of stream of consciousnessb.Psychological realismc.Highly-refined language(5)Style –“stylist”nguage: highly-refined, polished, insightful, accurateb.Vocabulary: largec.Construction: complicated, intricate3.Mark Twain (see next section)Local Colorism1860s, 1870s~1890sI.Appearance1.uneven development in economy in America2.culture: flourishing of frontier literature, humourists3.magazines appeared to let writer publish their worksII.What is “Local Colour”?Tasks of local colourists: to write or present local characters of their regions in truthful depiction distinguished from others, usually a very small part of the world.Regional literature (similar, but larger in world)●Garland, Harte – the west●Eggleston – Indiana●Mrs Stowe●Jewett – Maine●Chopin – LouisianaIII.Mark Twain – Mississippi1.life2.works(1)The Gilded Age(2)“the two advantages”(3)Life on the Mississippi(4) A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court(5)The Man That Corrupted Hardleybug3.style(1)colloquial language, vernacular language, dialects(2)local colour(3)syntactic feature: sentences are simple, brief, sometimes ungrammatical(4)humour(5)tall tales (highly exaggerated)(6)social criticism (satire on the different ugly things in society)parison of the three “giants” of American Realism1.ThemeHowells – middle classJames – upper classTwain – lower class2.TechniqueHowells – smiling/genteel realismJames – psychological realismTwain – local colourism and colloquialismChapter 4 American NaturalismI.Background1.Darwin’s theory: “natural selection”2.Spenser’s idea: “social Darwinism”3.French Naturalism: ZoraII.Features1.environment and heredity2.scientific accuracy and a lot of details3.general tone: hopelessness, despair, gloom, ugly side of the societyIII.significanceIt prepares the way for the writing of 1920s’ “lost generation” and T. S. Eliot.IV.Theodore Dreiser1.life2.works(1)Sister Carrie(2)The trilogy: Financier, The Titan, The Stoic(3)Jennie Gerhardt(4)American Tragedy(5)The Genius3.point of view(1)He embraced social Darwinism – survival of the fittest. He learned to regard man as merelyan animal driven by greed and lust in a struggle for existence in which only the “fittest”, themost ruthless, survive.(2)Life is predatory, a “game” of the lecherous and heartless, a jungle struggle in which man,being “a waif and an interloper in Nature”, a “wisp in the wind of social forces”, is a merepawn in the general scheme of things, with no power whatever to assert his will.(3)No one is ethically free; everything is determined by a complex of internal chemisms andby the forces of social pressure.4.Sister Carrie(1)Plot(2)Analysis5.Style(1)Without good structure(2)Deficient characterization(3)Lack in imagination(4)Journalistic method(5)Techniques in paintingChapter 5 The Modern PeriodSection 1 The 1920sI.IntroductionThe 1920s is a flowering period of American literature. It is considered “the second renaissance” of American literature.The nicknames for this period:(1)Roaring 20s – comfort(2)Dollar Decade – rich(3)Jazz Age – Jazz musicII.Backgrounda)First World War –“a war to end all wars”(1)Economically: became rich from WWI. Economic boom: new inventions.Highly-consuming society.(2)Spiritually: dislocation, fragmentation.b)wide-spread contempt for law (looking down upon law)1.Freud’s theoryIII.Features of the literatureWriters: three groups(1)Participants(2)Expatriates(3)Bohemian (unconventional way of life) – on-lookersTwo areas:(1)Failure of communication of Americans(2)Failure of the American societyImagismI. BackgroundImagism was influenced by French symbolism, ancient Chinese poetry and Japanese literature “haiku”II. Development: three stages1.1908~1909: London, Hulme2.1912~1914: England -> America, Pound3.1914~1917: Amy LowellIII. W hat is an “image”?An image is defined by Pound as that which presents an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time, “a vortex or cluster of fused ideas” “endowed with energy”. The exact word must bring the effect of the object b efore the reader as it had presented itself to the poet’s mind at the time of writing. IV. Principles1.Direct treatment of the “thing”, whether subjective or objective;2.To use absolutely no word that does not contribute to the presentation;3.As regarding rhythm, to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in the sequence of ametronome.V. Significance1.It was a rebellion against the traditional poetics which failed to reflect the new life of the newcentury.2.It offered a new way of writing which was valid not only for the Imagist poets but for modernpoetry as a whole.3.The movement was a training school in which many great poets learned their first lessons in thepoetic art.4.It is this movement that helped to open the first pages of modern English and American poetry. VI. Ezra Pound1.life2.literary career3.works(1)Cathay(2)Cantos(3)Hugh Selwyn Mauberley4.point of view(1)Confident in Pound’s belief that the artist was morally and culturally the arbiter and the“saviour” of the race, he took it upon himself to purify the arts and became the primemover of a few experimental movements, the aim of which was to dump the old into thedustbin and bring forth something new.(2)To him life was sordid personal crushing oppression, and culture produced nothing but“intangible bondage”.(3)Pound sees in Chinese history and the doctrine of Confucius a source of strength andwisdom with which to counterpoint Western gloom and confusion.(4)He saw a chaotic world that wanted setting to rights, and a humanity, suffering fromspiritual death and cosmic injustice, that needed saving. He was for the most part of his lifetrying to offer Confucian philosophy as the one faith which could help to save the West.5.style: very difficult to readPound’s early poems are fresh and lyrical. The Cantos can be notoriously difficult in some sections, but delightfully beautiful in others. Few have made serious study of the long poem;fewer, if anyone at all, have had the courage to declare that they have conquered Pound; and many seem to agree that the Cantos is a monumental failure.6.ContributionHe has helped, through theory and practice, to chart out the course of modern poetry.7.The Cantos –“the intellectual diary since 1915”Features:(1)Language: intricate and obscure(2)Theme: complex subject matters(3)Form: no fixed framework, no central theme, no attention to poetic rulesVII. T. S. Eliot1.life2.works(1)poems●The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock●The Waste Land (epic)●Hollow Man●Ash Wednesday●Four Quarters(2)Plays●Murder in the Cathedral●Sweeney Agonistes●The Cocktail Party●The Confidential Clerk(3)Critical essays●The Sacred Wood●Essays on Style and Order●Elizabethan Essays●The Use of Poetry and The Use of Criticisms●After Strange Gods3.point of view(1)The modern society is futile and chaotic.(2)Only poets can create some order out of chaos.(3)The method to use is to compare the past and the present.4.Style(1)Fresh visual imagery, flexible tone and highly expressive rhythm(2)Difficult and disconnected images and symbols, quotations and allusions(3)Elliptical structures, strange juxtapositions, an absence of bridges5.The Waste Land: five parts(1)The Burial of the Dead(2) A Game of Chess(3)The Fire Sermon(4)Death by Water(5)What the Thunder SaidVIII. Robert Frost1.life2.point of view(1)All his life, Frost was concerned with constructions through p oetry. “a momentary stayagainst confusion”.(2)He understands the terror and tragedy in nature, but also its beauty.(3)Unlike the English romantic poets of 19th century, he didn’t believe that man could findharmony with nature. He believed that serenity came from working, usually amid naturalforces, which couldn’t be understood. He regarded work as “significant toil”.3.works – poemsthe first: A Boy’s Willcollections: North of Boston, Mountain Interval (mature), New Hampshire4.style/features of his poems(1)Most of his poems took New England as setting, and the subjects were chosen from dailylife of ordinary people, such as “mending wall”, “picking apples”.(2)He writes most often about landscape and people – the loneliness and poverty of isolatedfarmers, beauty, terror and tragedy in nature. He also describes some abnormal people, e.g.“deceptively simple”, “philosophical poet”.(3)Although he was popular during 1920s, he didn’t experiment like other modern poets. Heused conventional forms, plain language, traditional metre, and wrote in a pasturedtradition.IX. e. e. cummings。
童明《美国文学史》（增订版）笔记和课后习题（含考研真题）详解
我国各大院校一般都把国内外通用的权威教科书作为本科生和研究生学习专业课程的参考教材，这些教材甚至被很多考试（特别是硕士和博士入学考试）和培训项目作为指定参考书。
为了帮助读者更好地学习专业课，我们有针对性地编著了一套与国内外教材配套的复习资料，并提供配套的名师讲堂、电子书和题库。
《美国文学史》（增订版）（童明主编）一直被用作高等院校英语专业英美文学教材，被很多院校指定为英语专业考研必读书和学术研究参考书。
为了帮助读者更好地使用该教材，我们精心编著了它的配套辅导用书。
作为该教材的学习辅导书，全书遵循该教材的章目编排，共分27章，每章由三部分组成：第一部分为复习笔记（中英文对照），总结本章的重点难点；第二部分是课后习题详解，对该书的课后思考题进行了详细解答；第三部分是考研真题与典型题详解，精选名校经典考研真题及相关习题，并提供了详细的参考答案。
本书具有以下几个方面的特点：1．梳理章节脉络，归纳核心考点。
每章的复习笔记以该教材为主并结合其他教材对本章的重难点知识进行了整理，并参考了国内名校名师讲授该教材的课堂笔记，对核心考点进行了归纳总结。
2．中英双语对照，凸显难点要点。
本书章节笔记采用了中英文对照的形式，强化对重要难点知识的理解和运用。
3．解析课后习题，提供详尽答案。
本书对童明主编的《美国文学史》（增订版）每章的课后思考题均进行了详细的分析和解答，并对相关重要知识点进行了延伸和归纳。
4．精选考研真题，补充难点习题。
本书精选名校近年考研真题及相关习题，并提供答案和详解。
所选真题和习题基本体现了各个章节的考点和难点，但又不完全局限于教材内容，是对教材内容极好的补充。
第1部分 早期美国文学：殖民时期至1815年第1章 “新世界”的文学1.1 复习笔记1.2 课后习题详解1.3 考研真题和典型题详解第2章 殖民地时期的美国文学：1620—1763 2.1 复习笔记2.2 课后习题详解2.3 考研真题和典型题详解第3章 文学与美国革命：1764—18153.1 复习笔记3.2 课后习题详解3.3 考研真题和典型题详解第2部分 美国浪漫主义时期：1815—1865第4章 美国浪漫主义时期4.1 复习笔记4.2 课后习题详解4.3 考研真题和典型题详解第5章 早期浪漫主义5.1 复习笔记5.2 课后习题详解5.3 考研真题和典型题详解第6章 超验主义和符号表征6.1 复习笔记6.2 课后习题详解6.3 考研真题和典型题详解第7章 霍桑、麦尔维尔和坡7.1 复习笔记7.2 课后习题详解7.3 考研真题和典型题详解第8章 惠特曼和狄金森8.1 复习笔记8.2 课后习题详解8.3 考研真题和典型题详解第9章 文学分支：反对奴隶制的写作9.1 复习笔记9.2 课后习题详解9.3 考研真题和典型题详解第3部分 美国现实主义时期：1865—1914第10章 现实主义时期10.1 复习笔记10.2 课后习题详解10.3 考研真题和典型题详解第11章 地区和地方色彩写作11.1 复习笔记11.2 课后习题详解11.3 考研真题和典型题详解第12章 亨利·詹姆斯和威廉·迪恩·豪威尔斯12.1 复习笔记12.2 课后习题详解12.3 考研真题和典型题详解第13章 自然主义文学13.1 复习笔记13.2 课后习题详解13.3 考研真题和典型题详解第14章 女性作家书写“女性问题”14.1 复习笔记14.2 课后习题详解14.3 考研真题和典型题详解第4部分 美国现代主义时期：1914—1945第15章 美国现代主义15.1 复习笔记15.1 复习笔记15.2 课后习题详解15.3 考研真题和典型题详解第16章 现代主义的演变16.1 复习笔记16.2 课后习题详解16.3 考研真题和典型题详解第17章 欧洲的美国现代主义17.1 复习笔记17.2 课后习题详解17.3 考研真题和典型题详解第18章 两次世界大战间的现代小说18.1 复习笔记18.2 课后习题详解18.3 考研真题和典型题详解第19章 现代美国诗歌19.1 复习笔记19.2 课后习题详解19.3 考研真题和典型题详解第20章 非裔美国小说和现代主义20.1 复习笔记20.2 课后习题详解20.3 考研真题和典型题详解第5部分 多元化的美国文学：1945年至新千年第21章 新形势下的多元化文学21.1 复习笔记21.2 课后习题详解21.3 考研真题和典型题解析第22章 美国戏剧：三大剧作家22.1 复习笔记22.2 课后习题详解22.3 考研真题和典型题详解第23章 主要小说家：1945年至60年代23.1 复习笔记23.2 课后习题详解23.3 考研真题和典型题详解第24章 1945年以来的诗学倾向24.1 复习笔记24.2 课后习题详解24.3 考研真题和典型题详解第25章 20世纪60年代以来的小说发展状况25.1 复习笔记25.2 课后习题详解25.3 考研真题和典型题详解第26章 当代多民族文学和小说26.1 复习笔记26.2 课后习题详解26.3 考研真题和典型题详解第27章 美国文学的全球化：流散作家27.1 复习笔记27.2 课后习题详解27.3 考研真题和典型题详解第1部分 早期美国文学：殖民时期至1815年第1章 “新世界”的文学1.1 复习笔记Ⅰ. Discoveries of America（发现美洲大陆）Who discovered America?谁发现了美洲？1 The credit is often attributed to Christopher Columbus. Yet this argument is controversial.一种说法是哥伦布发现了美洲大陆。
美国文学史复习要点整理【手动】及美国文学简史笔记
美国文学史整理一、Colonial America 殖民时期1、New England：Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, andConnecticut.2、Doctrines of Puritanism清教American Puritanism stressed predestination（命运神定), original sin（原罪）, total depravity (彻底的堕落), and limited atonement (有限的赎罪)from God’s grace.3、Writing style：fresh, simple and direct and with a touch of nobility；the rhetoric is plain andhonest.4、Life style：hard work, thrift, piety, and sobriety.5、Main writer:①Thomas Paine 托马斯·潘恩work：Common Sense (1776) 《常识》American Crisis (1776-1783) 《美国危机》The Rights of Man《人权》The Age of Reason《理性时代》②Benjamin Franklin（本杰明·富兰克林）Poor Richard’s Almanac 《穷查理历书》Autobiography 《富兰克林自传》<clarity, good sense, and simplicity of the English essayists Joseph Addison and Richard Steele>③Thomas Jefferson 托马斯·杰弗逊Declaration of Independence (1776)《独立宣言》<simple and clear, powerful and graceful>二、American Romanticism (early period) 浪漫主义前期1、Characteristics：①A rebellion against the objectivity of rationalism.反对理性主义的客观性。
美国文学简史完全笔记
Chapter 3 The Age of Realism I. Background: From Romanticism to Realism 1.the three conflicts that reached breaking point in this period （1）industrialism vs. agrarian （2）culturely-measured east vs. newly-developed west （3）plantation gentility vs. commercial gentility 2.1880＊s urbanization: from free competition to monopoly capitalism 3.the closing of American frontier II. Characteristics 1.truthful description of life 2.typical character under typical circumstance 3.objective rather than idealized, close observation and investigation of life ※Realistic writers are like scientists.§ 4.open-ending: Life is complex and cannot be fully understood. It leaves much room for readers to think by themselves. 5.concerned with social and psychological problems, revealing the frustrations of characters in an environment of sordidness and depravity III. Three Giants in Realistic Period 1.William Dean Howells 每※Dean of American Realism§ （1）Realistic principles a. Realism is ※fidelity to experience and probability of motive§. b. The aim is ※talk of some ordinary traits of American life§. c. Man in his natural and unaffected dullness was the object of Howells＊s fictional representation. d. Realism is by no means mere photographic pictures of externals but includes a central concern with ※motives§ and psychological conflicts. e. He condemns novels of sentimentality and morbid self-sacrifice, and avoids such themes as illicit love. f. Authors should minimize plot and the artificial ordering of the sense of something ※desultory, unfinished, imperfect§. g. Characters should have solidity of specification and be real. h. Interpreting sympathetically the ※common feelings of commonplace people§ was best suited as a technique to express the spirit of America. i.He urged writers to winnow tradition and write in keeping with current humanitarian ideals. j.Truth is the highest beauty, but it includes the view that morality penetrates all things. k. With regard to literary criticism, Howells felt that the literary critic should not try to impose arbitrary or subjective evaluations on books but should follow the detached scientist in accurate description, interpretation, and classification. （2）Works a. The Rise of Silas Lapham b. A Chance Acquaintance c. A Modern Instance （3）Features of His Works a. Optimistic tone b. Moral development/ethics c. Lacking of psychological depth 2.Henry James （1）Life （2）Literary career: three stages a. 1865~1882: international theme l The American l Daisy Miller l The Portrait of a Lady b. 1882~1895: inter-personal relationships and some plays l Daisy Miller （play） c. 1895~1900: novellas and tales dealing with childhood and adolescence, then back to international theme l The Turn of the Screw l When Maisie Knew l The Ambassadors l The Wings of the Dove l The Golden Bowl （3）Aesthetic ideas a. The aim of novel: represent life b. Common, even ugly side of life c. Social function of art d. Avoiding omniscient point of view （4）Point of view a. Psychological analysis, forefather of stream of consciousness b. Psychological realism c. Highly-refined language （5）Style 每※stylist§ a. Language: highly-refined, polished, insightful, accurate b. Vocabulary: large c. Construction: complicated, intricate 3.Mark Twain （see next section） Local Colorism 1860s, 1870s~1890s I. Appearance 1.uneven development in economy in America 2.culture: flourishing of frontier literature, humourists 3.magazines appeared to let writer publish their works II. What is ※Local Colour§? Tasks of local colourists: to write or present local characters of their regions in truthful depiction distinguished from others, usually a very small part of the world. Regional literature （similar, but larger in world） lGarland, Harte 每 the west lEggleston 每 Indiana lMrs Stowe lJewett 每 Maine lChopin 每 Louisiana III. Mark Twain 每 Mississippi 1.life 2.works （1）The Gilded Age （2）※the two advantages§ （3）Life on the Mississippi （4）A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur＊s Court （5）The Man That Corrupted Hardleybug 3.style （1）colloquial language, vernacular language, dialects （2）local colour （3）syntactic feature: sentences are simple, brief, sometimes ungrammatical （4）humour （5）tall tales （highly exaggerated） （6）social criticism （satire on the different ugly things in society） IV. Comparison of the three ※giants§ of American Realism 1.Theme Howells 每 middle class James 每 upper class Twain 每 lower class 2.Technique Howells 每 smiling/genteel realism James 每 psychological realism Twain 每 local colourism and colloquialism。
美国文学笔记
美文学美国部分——浪漫主义时期Part two: American LiteratureChapter 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 Le aves 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。
常耀信美国文学简史重点笔记
常耀信美国文学简史重点笔记美国文学Part One Colonial America(17世纪早期到18世纪末）Part Two The Literature of Romanticism(19世纪上半叶）The frontier hero Andrew Jackson as the 7th President of the United States had brought an effective end to the “Virginia Dynasty” of American Presidents.The United States had begun to change into an industrial cause society, technology would bring vast material benefits and cause overwhelming social disorders.Romantics shared certain general characteristics: （选择题常考）moral enthusiasm, faith in the value of individualism and intuitive perception, and a presumption that the natural world was a source of goodness and man’s societies a source of corruption.Washington Irving华盛顿·欧文1783-1859He was the first great prose stylist of American romanticism familiar style.His “Sketch Book” appeared the first modern short stories and the first great American juvenile literature to write good history and biography as literary entertainment. He introduced the familiar essay to America “Jonathan Old style”, satires of New York. His major works include: The Author’s Account of Himself The Legend of Sleepy HollowJames Fenimore Cooper詹姆斯·芬尼莫·库珀1789-1851The first important American novelist began his literary career on a dare.“The Spy” was successful, it was a rousing tale about espionage against the British during the Revolutionary War.Cooper launched two kinds of immensely popular stories: the sea adventure tale, and the frontier saga.The Pilot” th e best of his many sea romances.His frontier stories “Leather Stocking Tales” including five novels: “The Deerslayer”; The Last of the Mohicans”, “The Pathfinder”, “The Pioneers”, “The Prairie”. Allan Nevins calls these five novels “the nearest approach y et to an American epic”.The Last of The MohicansHenry Wadsworth Longfellow亨利·沃兹沃思·朗费罗1807-1882In his prose romance “Outre-Mer”, he uses Finish folk meter in his celebration of American Indian Legends in “Hiawatha”. His greatest virtue is that he made po etry seem worth reading and worth writing. His works include:A Psalm of Life My Lost Youth Song of Hiawatha Voices of the Night William Cullen Bryant威廉·卡伦·布莱恩特1794-1878The stately poem called ” Thanatopsis” (Greek, meaning “view of death”) introduced the best poet to appear in American up to that time.“To a Waterfowl” is perhaps the peak of his work, “Most perfect brief poem in the language”.His most important later works are his translations of the “Iliad” and the “Odyssey” into English blank verse.As Irving had shown that American prose had come of age, so Bryant demonstrated to European readers that American poetry was ready to demand serious attention. He was the first American to gain the stature of a major poet.Part Three New England Transcendentalism（2015年川师大真题）New England Transcendentalism isregarded as the summit of American Romanticism. What do you know about Transcendentalism?Transcendentalism is a literature, philosophical and artistic movement that flourished in New England from about 1836 to 1860. It originated from a small group of intellectuals who were reacting against the orthodox of Calvinism and the rationalism of the Unitarian church, developing their own faith centering on the divinity of humanity and the natural world. The major features of New England Transcendentalism can be summarized as follows: First, the Transcendentalism placed emphasis on spirit, or the over soul, as the most important thing in the universe. Second, the Transcendentalism stressed the importance of the individual. Thirdly, the Transcendentalism offered a fresh perception of nature as symbolic of the spirit or god. New England Transcendentalism is the product of a combination of native American Puritanism and European Romanticism. The ideas of Transcendentalism were most eloquently expressed by Emerson in such essays asNature, and Self-Reliance and by Thoreau in his book Walden.Ralph Waldo Emerson 拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生1803-1882He was responsible for bringing Transcendentalism to New England and was recognized throughout his life as the leader of the movement, and he believed above all in individualism, independence of mind and self-reliance. He admired courage, he was not afraid of changing or clashing ideas. His works include:Nature The American Scholar The Divinity School Address Self-RelianceMany of his lectures were later distilled into his famous “Essays”. Among his most important works are “Representative Men” and “English Traits” .His “Poems”appeared in 1847.In his day, Emerson’s poems were criticized for the ir lack of form and polish. In recent years, however, his poetry has received high praise. His harsh rhythms and striking images appeal to many modern readers as artful techniques.His prose style is sometimes as highly individual as his poetry. Many of his essays were put together from his journal entries, speeches, and random notes, and they are often somewhat disorganized. Yet his skill in polishing each sentence into a striking thought makes his writing memorable.The American Scholar is called “our int ellectual Declaration of Independence”(选择题常考）Henry David Thoreau亨利·戴维·梭罗1817-1862He was Emerson’s truest disciple, who put into practice many of Emerson’s theories.The superb novel Walden is written by Thoreau,and was published in 1854.it came out of his two-year experiment lived at Walden.Thoreau explained many of the beliefs that led him to try this kind of life.He thought it better for a man to work one day a week and rest six,so that people could devote more time to thought.Thoreau maintained that this was purpose ,not a program for society .and in his book ,he think ,self-reliance and independence of mind ranked above all . From his experience in jail came his famous essay Civil Disobedience, which stated Thoreau’s belief that no man should violate h is conscience at the command of a government.Nathaniel Hawthorne纳撒尼尔·霍桑1804-1864“The House of the Seven Gables”deals with the effects of a curse, and though the tale itself is fiction, the germ of the story sprang from the author’s family history.Hawthorne gathered his material by observing and listening to others whose talk was filled with New England Lore, legend, and superstition. His works include:The Custom House The Blithedale Romance Mosses from an Old Manse The Marble Faun Young Goodman Brown The Scarlet LetterHawthorne’s unique gift was for the creation of strongly symbolic stories which touch the deepest roots of man’s moral nature. The finest example is the recreation of Puritan Boston, “The Scarlet Letter”. In this novel each word, image, and event works toward a single effect. It is a complex story of guilt, its effects upon various persons, and how deliverance is obtained for some of them.Hawthorne shares with Edgar Allan Poe the distinction of advancing the art of the short story, giving to the form qualities that are uniquely American. To Hawthorne and Melville, however, the telling of a tale was a way of inquiring into the meaning of life.（2014年川师大真题）What's symbolism? Please illustrate it with Nathaniel Hawthorne's works?In literature, symbolism was an aesthetic movement that encouraged writers to express their ideas, feelings and values by means of symbols or suggestions rather than by direct statements. It enables writers to compress a very complex idea or sets of ideas into image or even one word. Hawthorne is a master of symbolism. The symbol can be found everywhere in his writing. His masterpieces The Scarlet Letter and Young Good Man Brown provided the most convincing proof.In the Scarlet Letter, A is the biggest symbol of all. As a key to the whole novel, the letter takes on different layers of symbolic meaning as the plot develops. At first, it is a token of shame"Adultery", then it has been changed into "Able", and finally it signifies "Angel". People come up with different interpretations and they don't know which one is definite. The Scarlet Letter A is ambiguous and the ambiguity is one of the prominent characteristics of Hawthorne's art.In Young Goodman Brown, Hawthorne masterfully uses symbolism in presenting the theme. For example, the names of protagonists carry strong symbolic meanings. Brown is an extremely common name, which stands for everyone. That means the problem that Brown met is a universal one. His wife is Faith, who should be the most faithful one to him. However, the fact proves that even she possess some evil secrets that he doesn't know.Herman Melville赫尔曼·麦尔维尔1819-1891Moby Dick, a tremendous chronicle of a whaling voyage in pursuit of a seemingly supernatural white whale. The book is steeped in symbolism, another strong appeal to readers of his century. Melville had the rebellious struggle of Captain Ahab against the overwhelming ,mysterious vastness of the universe and its awesome ,sometimes merciless force （选择题常考）The fitting symbol for his the“gliding gre at demon of the seas of life,”the white whale .Ahab’s ship,the Requod ,was like a world in miniature ,with characters ranging from the observer and narrator Ishmael to the savage harpooners and the motley crew.Melville said this book had been“broiled in he ll-fire, referring to the turbulence of his own spirit from which the book sprang.Typee, became known as the “man who lived among cannibals”His works include:Omoo Mardi Billy Budd Moby DickBilly Budd a nd Moby Dick use a ship as symbol of society and searchingly examines the problems of good and evil.Aha b’s ship was like a world in miniature with characters from all walks of life.Walt Whitman沃尔特·惠特曼1819-1892O ne of the great innovators in American literature. In the cluster of poems he called “Leaves of Grass” he gave America its first genuine epic poem. The poetic style he devised is now called free verse-that is, poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme. Whitman thought that the voice of democracy should not be haltered by traditional forms of verse. Most of the poems in “Leaves of Grass” are about man and nature. However, a small number of very good poems deal with New York, the city that fascinated Whitman, and with the Civil War. In his poetry, Whitman combined the ideal of the democratic common man and that of the rugged individual. In his poetry, Whitman combined the ideal of the democratic common man and that of the rugged individual. He envisioned the poet as a hero, a savior and a prophet, one who leads the community by his expressions of the truth. His works include:Song of Myself I sit and Look Out Drum-Taps Beat! Beat! DrumsEmily Dickinson爱米丽·狄金森1830-1886She wrote her whimsical, darting verse with sublime indifference to any notion of being a democratic or popular poet. Her work illustrated the fact that one could take a single household and an inactive life, and make enchanting poetry out of it. She and her sister remained at home and did not marry. After 1862 she became a total recluse, not leaving her house nor seeing even close friends. Her later retirement from the world, though perhaps affected by an unhappy love affair, seems mainlyto have resulted from her own personality, from a desire to separate herself from the world. The range of her poetry suggests not her limited experiences but the power of her creativity and imagination.Emily, however, refused to revise her poems to fit the standards of others and took no interest in having them published; in fact she had only seven poems published during her lifetime.Emily Dick inson’s poetry c omes out in bursts. The poems are short, many of them being based on a single image or symbol. But within her little lyrics Miss Dickinson writes about some of the most important things in life. His works include:I taste a liquor never brewed Because I Could not Stop for Death A Bird Came Down the Walk-Edgar Allan Poe埃德加·阿伦·坡1809-1849He won a contest with his story “Ms. Found in a Bottle” .Then he got a job as editor with the “Southern Literary Messenger”. His first collection of short stories “Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque”.In Europe, he was hailed as a pioneer in poetic and fictional techniques. His influence was especially strong on many French writers. His works include:The Fall of the House of Usher To Helen The RavenPart Four The Age of Realism（19世纪下半叶）In the Civil War 1861-1865，they sought to portray American life as it really was,, insisting that the ordinary and local were as suitable for artistic portrayal as the magnificent and the remote.Realism had originated in France as real isme, a literary doctrine that called for “reality and truth” in the depiction of ordinary life. William Dean Howells defined realism as “nothingmore and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material”.（选择题常考）He spoke out against the writing of a bleak fiction of failure and despair. He called for the treatment of the “Smiling aspects of life” as being the more “American”, insisting that American was truly a land of hope and of possibility that should be reflected in its literature.The bu lk of Ameri ca’s literary realism was limited to optimistic treatment of the surface of life. Yet the greatest of America’s realists, Henry James and Mark Twain, moved well beyond a superficial portrayal of nineteenth-century America. James probed deeply into the individual psychology of his characters, writing in a rich and intricate style that supported his intense scrutiny of complex human experience. Mark Twain, breaking out of the narrow limits of local color fiction, described the breadth of American experience as no one had ever done before, or since.(预测问答题）Naturalism, a new and harsher realism. America’s literary naturalists dismissed the validity of comforting moral truths. They attempted to achieve extreme objectivity and frankness, presenting characters of low social and economic classed who were dominated by their environment and heredity, the naturalists emphasized that the world was amoral, that men and women had no free will, that their lives were controlled by heredity and the environment, that religious “truths” were illusory, that the destiny of humanity was misery in life and oblivion in death.Harriet Beecher Stowe哈丽雅特·比彻·斯托1811-1896She was born into a respectable family that was to become famous, her father Lyman was a renowned clergyman. The family was dominated by the father who ruled with the kind of wrathfulseverity that he imagined were the chief characteristics of the God he worshiped and feared. The boys were expected to become preachers, the girls to marry preachers. She is an anti-slavery writer. Her works include:Uncle Tom’s Cabin(问答题重点）Uncle Tom’s Cabin is the masterpiece of Harriet Beecher Stowe(an American realism novelist).The novel began serially in the National Era. When the novel did appear,however,it was an overnight success.It sold 350,000 copies during the first year,and since then has been published in some forty languages and has been read by millions of people around the world.The power of the novel unquestionably comes from the investment of the author’s sense of h er own suffering and oppression(as well as her determination to be free) in characters of Tom and his fellow slave Eliza,the protagonists of the book’s two main plots.Uncle Tom’s Cabin traces the trials, sufferings and human dignity of Uncle Tom, an old black slave. The novel helped tremendously Americans know more about the cruelty and inhumanity of slavery and hurried on a great war.HowellsHis major works include: A Modern Instance and The Rise of Silas Lapham.He writes about the rising middle class and the way they lived.Henry James亨利·詹姆斯1843-1916H e received the major part of his education at home, his family’s travels in Europe were another source of education for Henry. The American with its “international” theme of the traditionless American confronting the complexity of European life. D aisy Miller, which one American critic described as “an outrage to American girlhood” but which brought James his firstinternational fame. The Portrait of a Lady the finest example of James’s early work.Unli ke Howells James’s greatest influence was exerted not on his own age but on the one that followed. He had been attacked for criticizing his native land and for the narrow emotional and social range of his characters. And he had been ridiculed for the obscure and costive style of his final period, a style that was able to express the subtlest meanings but was based on the assumption that the reader was as well educated, as exquisitely attuned, and in as little hurry as the author. He helps to transform the novel from its alliances with journalism and romantic story-telling into an art form of penetrating analysis of individuals confronting society, chronicles of the psychological perceptions that James himself defined as the highest form of experience.Local Colorism(预测问答题）Generally speaking, the writings of local colorists are concerned with the life of a small, well-defined region or province. The characteristic setting is the isolated small town. 2) Local colorists were consciously nostalgic historians of a vanishing way of life, recorders of a present that faded before their eyes. Yet for all their sentimentality, they dedicated themselves to minutely accurate descriptions of the life of their regions, they worked from personal experience to record the facts of a local environment and suggested that the native life was shaped by the curious conditions of the local. 3) major local colorists is Mark Twain.Mark Twain 马克·吐温1835-1910H is formal education ended soon after his father’s death in 1847, when he bec ame a printer’s apprentice. From 1853, hetraveled widely, as a journeyman printer, in the eastern states and in the west, he met Horace Bixby, the captain of the boat, and turned to a career on the river. He left the Mississippi at the outbreak of the Civil War, and became, in swift succession, and army volunteer, a gold-prospector in Nevada, a timber speculator and a journalist.W hile working for the Virginia City Territorial Enterprise, he adopted the pseudonym “Mark Twain”, the way of a boatman taking soundings, and meaning two fathoms, i.e. twelve feet. His works include: Jumping Frog Innocents Abroad The Adventures of Tom Sawyer Adventures of Huckleberry FinnHe pointed towards his uneasy acceptance of the values of nineteenth-century American society, he wrote three works expressing his acute pessimism. From that time until his death, he maintained a bitter skepticism, relieved at times by outraged commentary on world affairs. His last years were saddened by personal bereavement.（2010年川师大真题）Give a brief description to the American realists of the later part of the 19th century?In the later part of the 19th century, famous American realists include: Mark Twain, Henry James, Jack London and Theodorn Dreiser.Mark Twain was the first literary giant in that he broke the narrow limits of local color and described the breadth of American as no one had ever done before. He was acclaimed as "the true father of our national literature". He first created the American boy in his book The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. It has always been regarded as one of the greatest books of western literature and western civilization. Hemingway described it as the book from which" all modern American literaturecomes." Other famous books of Mark Twain include: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi River and The Gilded Age.Henry James is considered as the founder of psychological realism. He stresses the "psychology" of human being and his realism is characterized by his psychological approach to his subject matter. He was the first American writer to conceive his artistic work in international themes. His novels describe the life of the upper class, and they are marked by highly refined language. His famous works include: Daisy Miller and The Portrait of a Lady.Jack London is one of the most articulate and militant spokesman of the working class at the turn of century. He is a leading figure of naturalism. His famous works include: Martin Eden, The call of the Wild and The Law of Life. The Call of the Wild is London's best-known story in which the protagonist is a sled-dog who under the pressure of the environment reverts to savagery.Theodore Dreiser is generally acknowledged as one of American's literary naturalist. His famous work include Sister Carrie and An American Tragedy. Sister Carrie tells about a poor country girl who goes to Chicago to pursue the American dream. The novel shows Dresser's naturalistic view about life by illustrating the purposelessness of life. The dominant symbol of the novel is the rocking chair that is indicative of the uncertainty of life.O. Henry 欧·亨利H e wrote stories for different magazines, and when there came a big demand for his stories, the publishers of “Ainslee’s Magazing” invited him to come to New York.Many of his stories tell about the lives of poor people in New York, as well as in other places, his works abound in good-natured humor. His stories are usually short, the plots are exceedingly clever and interesting; humor abounds, and the end is always surprising. Many of his stories contain a great deal of slang and colloquial expressions that make them hard to be understood by people outside of America. Such forms of speech are used to give what is called local, to make the stories fit in with the characters and scenes described.His works include:The Gift of the Magi A Municipal Report The Cop and the AnthemJack London杰克·伦敦1876-1916He grew up in extreme poverty: from earliest youth he supported himself with menial and dangerous jobs, experiencing profoundly the struggle for survival. His works include:The Call of the Wild The Son of the Wolf The Sea Wolf Martin Eden The Law of LifeThe most enduringly popular of his stories involved the primitive (and melodramatic) struggle of strong and weak individuals in the context of irresistible natural forces such as the wild sea or the arctic wastes.London’s stories of man in and against nature continue to be popular all over the world. In them, London strips everything down to the symbolic starkness of dream, to a primordial simplicity that has the strange and compelling power of ancient myth.Theodore Dreiser西奥多·德莱塞1871-1945From his mother he seems to have absorbed a quality of compassionate wonder, from his father he seems to have inherited moral earnestness and the capacity to persist in the faceof failure, disappointment, and despair.Dreiser’s childhood was decidedly unhappy. The large family moved from house to house in Indiana dogged by poverty, insecurity, and internal division. Dreiser as a youth was as ungainly, confused, shy, and full of vague yearnings as most of his fictional protagonists, male and female, his education was to come from experience and from independent reading and thinking.Sister Carrie, which traces the material rise of Carrie Meeber and the tragic decline of G·W·Hurstwood. It depicted social transgressions by characters who felt no remorse and largely escaped punishment, and it used “strong” language and used names of living persons.H is best short fictions “Nigger Jeff” and “Butcher Rogaum’s Daughter””Trilogy of Desire”: “The Financier”; “The Titan”; “The Stoic”, Dreiser shifted from the pathos of helpless protagonists to the power of those unusual individuals who assume dominant roles in business and society.The identification of potency with money i s at the heart of Dreiser’s greatest and most successful novel, “An American Tragedy”. The Center of this immense novel’s thick texture of biographical circumstance, social fact, and industrial detail is a young man who acts as if the only way he can be truly fulfilled is by acquiring wealth-through marriage if necessary. Part Five American Literature in the 1920sImagism came into being in Britain and U.S around 1910 as a reaction to the traditional English poetry to express the sense of fragmentation and dislocation. The imagists, with Ezra Pound leading the way, hold that the most effective means to expressthese momentary impressions is through the use of one dominant image. Imagism is characterized by the following three poetic principles: A.direct treatment of subject matter;B.economy of expression;C. as regards rhythm ,to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in the sequence of metronome. Pound’s In a Station of the Metro is a well-known imagist poem.Ezra Pound埃兹拉·庞德1885-1972He had a distinct poetic personality, he combined a command of the older tradition with impressive and often daring originality. He was a prolific essayist for the little magazines of New York, London, Paris, which then constituted a large and exciting literary world. He unselfishly and persistently championed the experimental and often unpopular artists. Most important of all, perhaps, was the advice and encouragement which he gave to T·S· Eliot.Both Pound and Eliot required of their readers a familiarity with the classics, the productions of Italian and English Renaissance,, and specialized areas of Continental literature, including the works of the French symbolists. Pound’s continued to draw fundamentally upon his formidably recondite culture. His works include：The Cantos In a Station of the Metro A VirginalThomas Stearns Eliot托马斯·斯特恩斯·爱略特1888-1965He won the Nobel Prize in 1948.His first book of poems “Prufrock and Other Observations”, which concerns various aspects of the frustration and enfeeblement of individual character as seen in perspective with the decay of states, peoples, and religious faith.The Waste Land, one of the major works of modern literature. Its subject, the apparent failure of western civilization whichWorld War I seemed to demonstrate, suggested the spiritual debility of the modern individual and his culture while in satirical counterpoint his Sweeney poems had symbolized the rising tide of anticultural infidelity and human baseness. It used abundant of literary reference. It also introduced a form-the orchestration of related themes in successive movements. His works include:The Hollow Men Ash-Wednesday Four Quartets The Love Song of J·Alfred Prufrock Robert Frost罗伯特·弗洛斯特1874-1963 By the end of his life he had become a national bard; he won four Pulitzer Prizes; the United States Senate passed resolutions honoring his birthdays, and when he was eighty-seven he read his poetry at the inauguration of President JohnF·Kennedy. Frost had rejected the revolutionary poetic principles of his contemporanes,(选择题常考）choosing instead “the old-fashioned way to be new”. He employed the plain speech of rural New Englanders and preferred the short, traditional forms of lyric and narrative, As a poet of nature he had obvious affinities with romantic writers. He saw nature as a storehouse of analogy and symbol, but he had little faith in religious dogma or speculative thought. His poetry, for all its apparent simplicity, often probes mysteries of darkness and irrationality in the bleak and chaotic landscapes of an indifferent universe where men stand alone, unaided and perplexed.Carl Sandburg卡尔·桑德堡1878-1967He lived to enjoy enormous popular acclaim, by the end of his life he had become a familiar figure to national television audiences who listened to him read his poems, sing folk ballads and relate anecdotes about Lincoln.His works include:Chicago Poems Cornhuskers Flash Crimson Chicago Cool Tombs。
美国文学笔记完整版专八人文知识.docx
美国文学笔记整理完整版1607-1776北美殖民时期Colonial Settlements约翰·史密斯美国文学史上第一个作家John Smith A Ture Relation of Virginia《关于费吉尼亚的真实叙述》（美国文学第一本书）乔纳森·爱德华兹清教徒主义作家（Puritanism ）Jonathan Edwards1776-1783独立革命时期Revolution of Independence（启蒙运动）本杰明·富兰克林Poor Richard ’s Almana c 穷查理历书；Benjamin Franklin The Way to Wealth致富之道；1706-1790The Autobiography自传(记录作者从穷到成功的经历，“美国梦”反映，体现启蒙倡导的理性主义和有序、教育的观点 )托马斯·潘恩美国独立之父the father of American revolutionThomas Paine Common Sense常识（独立战争宣传册revolutionary pamphlets ）1737-1809American Crisis美国危机（鼓励人民抵抗英军，共16小册）Rights of Man人的权利（支持法国革命）The Age of Reason理性时代（基督给他名誉带来的影响）菲利普·弗伦诺独立诗人 a poet of the American Revolution，美国诗歌之父Philip Freneau The Rising Glory of America蒸蒸日上的美洲1752-1832The British Prison Ship英国囚船The Wild Honey suckle野生的金银花The Indian Burying Ground印第安人殡葬地To the Memory of the Brave Americans纪念美国勇士--同类诗中最佳托马斯·杰斐逊独立宣言 Declaration of IndependenceThomas Jefferson18 世纪末 -19 世纪中后浪漫主义时期Romanticism1.早期浪漫主义华盛顿·欧文美国文学之父father of American Literature(为美国文学第一次赢得世界声誉)Washington Irving以笔记小说和历史传厅闻名，humor1783-1859The Sketch Book见闻札记（标志浪漫主义开始）A History of New York纽约史---美国人写的第一部诙谐文学杰作；----The Legend of Sleepy Hollow睡谷的传说---成为美国第 1 个获国际声誉作家-----Rip Van Winkle里普·万·温克尔( 李伯大梦 )The Alhambra 阿尔罕伯拉詹姆斯·费尼莫尔·库珀frontier novel边疆传奇小说sea novelJames Fenimore Cooper The Spy间谍（独立战争间谍对抗英国）1789-1851The Pilot领航者（sea novel）Leatherstocking Tales皮袜子五步曲（frontier novel ）The Pioneer 拓荒者（ the first true romance of the frontier in American literatureThe Last of Mohicans 最后的莫希干人（主角： Natty Bumppo纳蒂班波）The Prairie大草原The Pathfinder探路者The Deerslayer杀鹿者2.超验主义New England Transcendentalism拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生Nature论自然-----新英格兰超验主义者的宣言书 manifestoRalf Waldo Emerson The American Scholar论美国学者;1803-1882Self-reliance论自立The Transcendentalist超验主义者Representative Men代表人物School Address神学院演说Days 日子 - 首开自由诗之先河free verse亨利·大卫·梭罗Walden 瓦尔登湖Henry David Thoreau A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers在康科德河和梅里麦克河上的一周1817-1862Civil Disobedience论公民之不服从纳撒尼尔·霍桑subject: human soul first great Americanwriter of fiction象征主义大师Nathaniel Hawthorne The Scarlet Letter红字1804-1864Twice-told Tales尽人皆知的故事Mosses from an Old Manse古屋青苔The House of the Seven Gables有七个尖角阁的房子The Marble Faun玉石雕像The Blithedale Romance福谷传奇Young Goodman Brown年轻的布朗The Birthmark胎记赫尔曼·迈尔维尔擅长航海奇遇和异域风情Herman Melville Moby Dick/The White Whale白鲸（first American proseepic 史诗）1819-1891Typee泰比Omoo 奥穆Mardi玛地White Jacket白外衣Pierre皮尔埃;Billy Budd比利·巴德沃尔特·惠特曼Father of free verse自由诗之父Walt Whitman Leaves of Grass 草叶集（the birth of truly American poetryand the end of romanticism）(共和圣经 Democratic Bible美国史诗American Epic)1819-1892Song of Myself自我之歌Democratic Vistas民主的前景埃米莉·迪金森她的诗大量破折号dash, 主题love, nature, death, immortality;语言 plain, brevity, directEmily Dickinson This is My Letter to the World这是我给世界的一封信1830-1886I Heard a Fly Buzz When I Died我死时听到一只苍蝇叫Because I could not Stop for Death因为我不能等待死神I ’ m Nobody. Who Are You? 我是无名小卒。
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文学史笔记：
一、Early American and colonial period (1607-1765)
(religious conflicts Catholism vs.Puritanism)
1.Puritanism:
1.) Simply speaking , American Puritanism just refers to the spirit and ideal of puritans,who settled in the North American continent in the early part of the seventeenth century because of religious persecutions.In content it means scrupulous ,moral rigor ,especially hostility to social pleasures and indulgences,that is strictness,sternness and austerity in conduct and religion.
2.)with time passing it became a dominant factor in American life , one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thought and 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.
3.）Actually it is a code of values , a philosophy of life and a point of view in American minds , also a two-faceted tradition of religious idealism and level -headed in common sense .
2.The main features of this period
1).American literature grew out of humble origins. Diaries, histories, journals, letters, commonplace books, travel books, sermons, in short, personal literature in its various forms, occupy a major position in the literature of the early colonial period.
2)In content these early writings served either God or colonial expansion or both. In form, if there was any form at all, English literary traditions were faithfully imitated and transplanted.
3)The Puritanism formed in this period was one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thought and American literature.
注：the first work published in the puritan colonials was the Bay Psalm Book(1640)
The best of the puritan poets is Edward Taylor.
二、The period of enlightenment and the independence war
1.American enlightenment movement(in the 18th century)
①Marked by an emphasis on rationality,scientific inquiry and representative government.
②The representative writers:Benjamin Franklin(Poor Richard’s Almanac,The Autobiography) ,Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson
③Influence:it accelerated the social progress ;freed people from limitations set by prevailing puritanism;make spiritual preparation for following American civilization.
④Effects on literature:a.in form:these American writers imitated English classical writers;b.these American writers have utilitarian tendency/inclination.
2.Benjamin Franklin(1706-1790)
①He was born in Boston in 1706. ②。