美国文学史复习资料(名词解释)

1. American Puritanism: a domination factor in American life. American

Puritanism was one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thoughts and literature.

2. Transcendentalism: time 1836. Features: 1.the transcendentalists

placed emphasis on spirit, or over soul, as the most important thing in the universe 2. The transcendentalists stressed the importance of the individual. 3. The transcendentalists offered a fresh perception of nature as symbolic of the spirit of God. The representatives are Emerson and Thoreau.

3. Free Verse: like traditional verse, it is printed in short lines instead of

the continuity of prose, but it has no meter and either lack rhyme or uses it occasionally. A representative is Whitman’s Leave of Grass. 4. Realism: time: 2nd and half of 19th century. Features: verisimilitude of

details derived from observation. Representatives are Howells, James, Mark Twain

5. Local Colorism: It is a branch of Realism; it refers to detailed

representation, in fiction of the setting, dialect, customs, dress and ways of thinking which are distinctive of a particular region. The representative of Local Colorism is Mark Twain.

6. American Naturalism: time: 1890s. Features: 1. naturalists wrote

about the helplessness of man, his insignificance in a cold world, and his lack of dignity in face of the crushing forces of environment and heredity.2. They reported truthfully and objectively with passion for scientific accuracy and an overwhelming accumulation of factual detail.3. The representatives are Crane, Dreiser.

7. Imagism: six principles: momentary, one dominant image, hard

personal word, direct treatment, concise, free verse. The representatives are Pound.

8. Lost generations: it refers to a group of American writers of the

decade following WWI, disillusioned by their War experience or by materialization of American culture, holds a pessimistic new of life.

The representatives are Fitzgerald and Hemingway.

9. Flashback: interpolating narratives or scenes which represent events

that happened before the story began. For example: Miller used flashback in Death of Salesman.

10. Black Humor: the tragic absurdity of the human condition is often

seen in their novels. As a cosmic joke. The response they intend to provoke in the reader to the blackness of modern life is a laughter that is, laughing in face of a tragic situation. The representative work of black humor is Heller’s Catch-22.

11. Harlem Renaissance: a period of remarkable creativity in literature

and other arts by African Americans, from the end of WWI in 1917 through the 1920s. The representative is Hughes.