美国文学7
美国文学中的几个主义
美国文学中的几个主义清教主义： Puritanism 代表人物： Anna Bradstreet ，Benjamin Franklin ，Thomas Paine ，Thomas Jefferson浪漫主义： Romanticism 代表人物：Washington Irving ，Edgar Allan PoeA超验主义：Transcendentalism ；代表人物：Ralph Waldo Emerson ，Emily Dickinson ，Walt Whitman自然主义：Naturalism ；代表人物：Henry D. Thoreau意向主义：Imagism ；代表人物：Ezra Pound心理现实主义：psychological realism ；代表人物：Henry James一清教主义对美国文学的影响清教徒文学传统形成于17世纪，清教主义与其它宗教相比,包含三个层面的价值体系,并对不同时期的美国文学产生了不同的影响,表现出不同时代特征,以清教主义作为参照系,可以说17世纪美国文学是“信仰时代的文学”,18世纪美国文学是“世俗时代的文学”,19世纪美国文学则可称为“宗教批判与宗教道德时代的文学”。
发端于英国的清教主义对美国社会有着更大的影响,“英格兰有过清教革命,却没有创建清教社会;美国没有经历清教革命,却创建了清教社会”①。
并且这种影响以其持久深厚而铸就了美利坚民族的灵魂。
正如朱世达先生所言:“清教传统像一条红线规范了从殖民时代到如今的美国的政治文化与社会文化”②。
作为美国文化一个独特的源头,清教主义在美国经历了由表及里、由明转暗的曲折发展,最终形成有美国特色的清教价值体系,从某种意义上说,文学是这一发展历程的最好见证。
一般而言,宗教都包含信仰与道德两个层面的价值体系。
清教主义的传播和渗入伴随着早期的移民拓荒、定居北美的整个过程。
作为一种教义 ,清教主义不再具有原有的意义 ,但它对新英格兰乃至整个美国由来已久的影响 ,却在美国形成了一种特殊的文化氛围 ,不仅与美国人性格中的个人主义有联系 ,对美国文学的发展和特点也起着重要作用。
美国文学名词解释（全的哦）
1. Allusion: A reference to a person, a place, an event, or a literary work that a writer expects the reader to recognize and respond to. An allusion may be drawn from history, geography, literature, or religion.2. American Naturalism:American naturalism was a new and harsher realism. American naturalism had been shaped by the war; by the social upheavals that undermined the comforting faith of an earlier age. 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 classes who were determined by their environment and heredity. In presenting the extremes of life, the naturalists sometimes displayed an affinity to the sensationalism of early romanticism, but unlike their romantic predecessors, the naturalists emphasized that the world was amoral, that men and women had no free will, that lives were controlled by heredity and environment, that the destiny of humanity was misery in life and oblivion in death. Although naturalist literature described the world with sometimes brutal realism, it sometimes also aimed at bettering the world through social reform.3 American Puritanism: Puritanism is the practices and beliefs of the Puritans. The Puritans were originally members of a division of the Protestant Church. The first settlers who became the founding fathers of the American nation were quite a few of them. They were a group of serious, religious people, advocating highly religious and moral principles. As the word itself hints, Puritans wanted to purity their religious beliefs and practices. They accepted the doctrine of predestination, original sin and total depravity, and limited atonement through a special infusion of grace form God. As a culture heritage, Puritanism did have a profound influence on the early American mind. American Puritanism also had an enduring influence on American literature.4. American Realism: in American literature, the Civil War brought the Romantic Period to an end. The Age of Realism came into existence. It came as a reaction against the lie of romanticism and sentimentalism. Realism turned from an emphasis on the strange toward a faithful rendering of the ordinary, a slice of life as it is really lived. It expresses the concern for commonplace and the low, and it offers an objective rather than an idealistic view of human nature and human experience.5. American Romanticism:The Romantic Period covers the first half of the 19th century. A rising America with its ideals of democracy and equality, its industrialization, its westward expansion, and a variety of foreign influences were among the important factors which made literary expansion and expression not only possible but also inevitable in the period immediately following the nation’s political independence. Yet, romantics frequently shared certain general characteristics: moral enthusiasm, faith in 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. Romantic values were prominent in American politics, art, and philosophy until the Civil War. The romantic exaltation of the individual suited the nation’s revolutionary heritage and its f rontier egalitarianism.6. American Transcendentalism:Transcendentalists terrors from the romantic literature of Europe. They spoke for cultural rejuvenation and against the materialism of Americagogopirit, or the Oversoul, as the most important thing in the Universe. They stressed the importance of the individual. To them, the individual was the most importantelement of society. They offered a fresh perception of nature as symbolic of the Spirit or God. Nature was, to them, alive, filled with God’s over whelming presence. Transcendentalism is based on the belief that the most fundamental truths about life and death can be reached only by going beyond the world of the senses. Emerson’s Nature has been called the “Manifesto of American Transcendentalism” an d his The American Scholar has been rightly regarded as America’s “Declaration of Intellectual Independence”.7. Dramatic monologue: A kind of narrative poem in which one character speaks to one or more listeners whose replies are not given in the poem. The occasion is usually a crucial one in the speaker’s personality as well as the incident that is the subject of the poem.8. Enlightenmen t: With the advent of the 18th century, in England, as in other European countries, there sprang into life a public movement known as the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment on the whole, was an expression of struggle of the then progressive class of bourgeois against feudalism. The egogo inequality, stagnation, prejudices and other survivals of feudalism. The attempted to place all branches of science at the service of mankind by connecting them with the actual deeds and requirements of the people.9. Imagism:It’s a poetic movement of England and the U.S. flourished from 1909 to 1917.The movement insists on the creation of i mages in poetry by “the direct treatment of the thing” and the economy of wording. The leaders of this movement were Ezra Pound and Amy Lowell.10. Local Colorism: Local Colorism or Regionalism as a trend first made its presence felt in the late 1860s and early seventies in America. It may be defined as the careful attegogoms in speech, dress or behavior peculiar to a geographical locality. The ultimate aim of the local colorists is to create the illusion of an indigenous little world with qualities that tell it apart from the world outside. The social and intellectual climate of the country provided a stimulating milieu for the growth of local color fiction in America. Local colorists concerned themselves with presenting and interpreting the local character of their regions. They tended to idealize and glorify, but they never forgot to keep an eye on the truthful color of local life. They formed an important part of the realistic movement. Although it lost its momentum toward the end of the 19th century, the local spirit continued to inspire and fertilize the imagination of author.11. Lost Generation: This term has been used again and again to describe the people of the postwar years. It describes the Americans who remained in Paris as a colony of “ expatriates” or exiles. It describes the writers like Hemingway who lived in semi poverty. It describes the Americans who returned to their native land with an intense awareness of living in an unfamiliar changing world. The young English and American expatriates, men and women, were caught in the war and cut off from the old values and yet unable to come to terms with the new era when civilization had gone mad. They wandered pointlessly and restlessly, enjoying things like fishing, swimming, bullfight and beauties of nature, but they were aware all the while that the world is crazy and meaningless and futile. Their whole life is undercut and defeated.12. Beat Generation: the Beat writers were a small group of close friends first, and a movement later. The term “Beat Generation” gradually came to represent an entire periodin time, but the entire original Beat Generation in literature was small enough to have fit into a couple of cars. The term was created by Jack Kerouac in 1948.The original word meant nothing mo re than “bad” or “ruined” or “spent” or “beaten-down, beaten-up and beaten-out”. The connotation is defeat, resignation, and disappointment.This kind of beatness is what Kerouac was describing in himself and his friends, bright young Americans who ha d come of age during WWII but couldn’t fit in as clean-cut soldiers or complacent young businessmen. They were beat because they didn’t believe in straight jobs and had to struggle to survive, living in dirty apartments, selling drugs or committing crimes for food money, hitchhiking across the country because they couldn’t stay still without getting bored. But the term “beat” had a second meaning: beatific or sacred and holy. Kerouac, a devout Catholic, explained many times that by describing his generation as beat he was trying to capture the secret holiness of the down trodden. In fact, this is probably the most central theme in Kerouac’s work.The Beats were essentially anarchic. They rejected conventional social and moral values; expressed their ali enation in their works from conventional “square” society by adopting a life style which featured sex, drugs, jazz and the freedom of the open road. Literally, the Beats were all experimenters who sought to express spontaneity of thought and feeling in a seemingly formless verse as Ginsberg did or prose as Kerouac. They tended to blur the line between poetry and prose in their writing, adopting rhythms of simple American speech and of so-called progressive jazz, so such so that the Beat style was criticized as likely to contribute more to American slang than to American letters. Perhaps in this sense they are postmodernist.13. Pre-Romanticism: It originated among the conservative groups of men and letters asa reaction against Enlightenment and found its mo st manifest expression in the “Gothic novel”. The term arising from the fact that the greater part of such romances were devoted to the medieval times.14. Psalm: A song or lyric poem in praise of God.15. Psychological Realism:It is the realistic writing that probes deeply into the complexities of characters’ thoughts and motivations. Henry James is considered the founder of psychological realism. His novel The Ambassadors is considered to be a masterpiece of psychological realism.16. Renaissance: The term originally indicated a revival of classical (Greek and Roman) arts and sciences after the dark ages of medieval obscurantism.17. Romanticism: A movement that flourished in literature, philosophy, music, and art in Western culture during most of the 19th century, beginnigogom.18. Satire: A kind of writing that holds up to ridicule or contempt the weaknesses and wrongdoings of individuals, groups, institutions, or humanity in general. The aim of satirists is to set a moral standard for society, and they attempt to persuade the reader to see their point of view through the force of laughter.19. Symbol: A symbol is a sign which suggests more than its literal meaning. In other words, a symbol is both literal and figurative. A symbol is a way of telling a story and a way of conveying meaning. The best symbols are those that are believable in the lives of the characters and also convincing as they convey a meaning beyond the literal level of thestory. If the symbol is obscure or ambiguous, then the very obscurity and the ambiguity may also be part of the meaning of the story.20. Symbolism: Symbolism 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 writers, 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.21.Modernism：It was a complex and diverse international movement in all the creative arts originating about the end of the 19th century. It provided the greatest creative renaissance of the 20th century. It was made up of many facets，such as symbolism，surrealism （超现实主义），cubism （立体主义），expressionism，futurism （未来主义），ect22American Dream:American dream means the belief that everyone can succeed as long as he/she works hard enough. It usually implies a successful and satisfying life. It usually framed in terms of American capitalism（资本主义）, its associated purported meritocracy,（知识界精华）and the freedoms guaranteed by the U.S. Bill of Rights. 23.The Harlem Renaissance：refers to the flowering of African American literature, art, and drama during the 1920s and 1930s. Though centered in Harlem, New York, the movement impacted urban centers throughout the United States. Black novelists, poets, painters, and playwrights began creating works rooted in their own culture instead of imitating the styles of Europeans and white American.24.free verse:: poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme or line length and depends on natural speech rhythms, the ebb and flow or cadences of speech, and the counterpoint of stressed and unstressed syllables. In conventional verse the unit is the foot, or, perhaps, the line, while in free verse the unit is the stanza or strophe syllables. Fee verse is not written in definite stanzas. The great majority of his poems depends on parallelism and other reiterative devices for its structure and cadence. It is exactly as its name implies—free, free to wander the printed page that the poet’s will, free to create pictures in random order. Imagery is very important in free verse since the poem has to capture the reader’s imagination with words alone, unaided by these old favorite rhyme and meter.。
美国文学
1.The Literature of Colonial America殖民主义时期的文学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。
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)。
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. 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)。
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.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”.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”.他一共出版了八本书，其中有关于新英格兰的历史及描述。
美国文学史复习要点手动
美国文学史复习要点手动1.早期美国文学（17世纪-18世纪）-早期美国文学的发展受到清教徒移民和殖民地环境的影响。
-早期作品主题包括宗教信仰、苦难和恐惧。
-著名作家有威廉·布拉德福和乔纳森·爱德华兹。
2.启蒙时期文学（18世纪）-美国启蒙时期的文学受到欧洲启蒙思想的影响。
-作品主题包括理性、自由和平等。
-著名作家有本杰明·富兰克林和汤玛斯·潘恩。
3.罗曼主义时期文学（19世纪早期）-罗曼主义时期美国文学反对启蒙时期的理性主义。
-作品主题包括个人感情、自然和超自然。
-著名作家有华盛顿·欧文和爱默生。
4.特拉华文学（19世纪中期）-特拉华文学是19世纪中期美国文学的重要流派。
-作品主题包括农民和工人的生活以及美国西部探险精神。
-著名作家有赫尔曼·梅尔维尔和华尔特·惠特曼。
5.现实主义和自然主义时期文学（19世纪末-20世纪初）-现实主义和自然主义时期的文学关注社会问题和个人命运。
-作品主题包括工业化、城市化和阶级冲突。
-著名作家有马克·吐温和斯蒂芬·克莱恩。
6.现代主义时期文学（20世纪初-中期）-现代主义时期的文学反对传统形式和价值观。
-作品表现迷失、不安和心理困惑。
-著名作家有欧内斯特·海明威和F·斯科特·菲茨杰拉德。
7.后现代主义时期文学（20世纪中期-现在）-后现代主义时期的文学拒绝一切形式的正统和稳定性。
-作品表现多样化的语言和视觉实验。
-著名作家有托尼·莫里森和大卫·福斯特·华莱士。
美国文学 名词 解释
1. Transcendentalism:Transcendentalism is a philosophical and literary movement. It exalted feeling over reason, individual expression over the restraints of law and custom. It expressed a new outlook or new ideas on life. It believed individualism, huma n beings’ divinity, nature, spiritual life, dignity of manual labor, self-trust/ self-reliance, democracy. (Emerson, Henry David Thoreau)2．Free verse:"free verse," that is, poetry without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme.A looser and more open-ended syntactical structure is frequently favored. Lines and sentences of different lengths are left lying side by side just as things are, undisturbed and separate. There are few compound sentences to draw objects and experiences into a system of hierarchy.3. The Lost Generation:It refers to, in general, the post-World WarⅠgeneration, but specifically a group of expatriate disillusioned intellectuals and artists, who experimented on new modes of thought and expression by rebelling against former ideals and values and replacing them only by despair or a cynical hedonism. (Hemingway, Ezra Pound/ The Sun Also Rises)4. Local Colorism:“ Local colorism” is a unique variation of American literary realism. Generally, the works by local colorists are concerned with the life of asmall, well--defined region or province. They worked from personal experience; they recorded the facts of a unique environment and suggested that the native life was shaped by the curious conditions of the loca1e. (Writers whose works are characterized with local colors are Mark Twain, Sarah Orne Jewett, Joseph Kirkland and Hamlin Garland.)5. The Hemingway Code Hero:It refers to some protagonists in Hemingway's works. To behave well in the lonely, losing battle with life is to show "grace under pressure" and constitutes in itself a kind of victory, a theme clearly established in The Old Man and The Sea. Though life is but a losing battle, it is a struggle man can dominate in such a way that loss becomes dignity; man can be physical1y destroyed but never defeated spiritually.6. Iceberg theory:"The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water.” Seemingly simple and natural, Hemingway's style is actually polished and tightly contro1led, but highly suggestive and connotative. While rendering vividly the outward physical events and sensations Hemingway expresses the meaning of the story and conveys the complex emotions of his characters with a considerable range and astonishing intensity of feeling. (Less is more.)7. Prose epic:Moby-dick is regarded as the Great American Novel, the first Americanprose epic(散文史诗：a long narrative poem telling of heroic deeds of reflecting the values of the society from which it originated), though it is presented in the form of a novel.。
美国文学史及选读
History And Anthology of American Literature (VolumeⅠ)美国文学史及选读1PartⅠThe 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 andother 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 ,Freunch ,Spaniards ,Italians and Portugueses(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 atJamestown,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 theCountry”.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。
美国文学浪漫时期文学特征：
文学特征：1、environment：①shaped by their New World environment美洲大陆新环境②array of ideas inherited from the romantic traditions of Europe.欧洲早期浪漫主义思潮2、美国文学特点:pluralistic多元化，manifestations表现形式: Varied多样, Individualistic个人主义,Conflicting矛盾3、romanticism的特点：frequently shared certain general characteristics; 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.浪漫主义之间大部分是相通的，都注重道德，强调个人主义价值观和直觉感受，并且认为自然是美的源头，人类社会是腐败之源。
★4、transcendentalism超验主义：①as a moral philosophy, transcendentalism was neither logical norsystematized. It exalted feeling over reason, individual expression over the restraints of law and custom. 不讲逻辑，不讲系统，只强调超越理性的感受，超越法律和世俗束缚的个人表达。
②they spoke for cultural rejuvenation and against the materialism of Americansociety.呼吁文化复兴，反对美国社会的拜金主义。
陶洁版 美国文学选读_第三版_课后习题答案.doc
美国文学选读第三版课后习题答案陶洁(部分)Unit 1 Benjamin FranklinQuestions1.Why did Franklin write his Autobiography?Franklin says that because his son may wish to know about his life, he is taking his one week vacation in the English countryside to record his past. He also says that he has enjoyed his life and would like to repeat it2.What made Franklin decide to leave the brother to whom he had been apprenticed?His brother was passionate, and had often beaten him. The aversion to arbitrary power that has stuck to him through his whole life .After a brush with the law, Franklin left his brother.3.How did he arrive in Philadephia?First he set out in a boat for Amboy, the boat dropped him off about 50 miles from Burlington, the next day he reached Burlington on foot, in Burlington he found a boat which was going towards Philadelphia, he arrived there about eight or nine o’clock, on the Sunday morning and landed at the Market Streetwharf.4.What features do you find in the style of the above selection? It is the pattern of Puritan simplicity, directness, and concision(言简意赅). The narrative is lucid(易懂的), the structure is simple, the imagery is homely(朴素的).Unit 2 Edgar Allen Poe1.Who is the narrator? What wrong does he want to redress? Montresor.Fortunato, one of wine experts insulted him, so he wanted to murder him.2.What is the pretext he uses to lure Fortunato to his wine cellar?He baits Fortunato by telling him he has obtained what he believes to be a cask of Amontillado a rare and valuable sherry wine.Fortunato is anxious to determine whether or not it is truly Amontillado, so he goes to the vault with Montresor.3.What happens to Fortunato in the end?He was walled up alive behind bricks in a wine cellar.4.Describe briefly how Poe characterizes Montresor and Fortunato as contrasts?Poe uses color imagery to characterize them. Montresor face is covered in a black silk mask, In contrast, Fortunato dresses the motley-colored costume of the court fool, who gets literally and tragically fooled by Montresor's masked motives.The color schemes here represent the irony of Fortunato's death sentence.Through the acts, words, and thoughts of Fortunato,we know He is greedy, he was lured into the dark and somber vaults just because a cask of Amontillado.This is also due to his bad habit of bibulosity(酗酒）. He lost himself on hearing the wine.At the same time, he was cheated by his enemy, which reflected his ignorance.When he heard the pretended compliment from Montresor, he became very boastful and arrogant.He was easily confused by the superficial phenomena and failed to watch out for others. He couldn’t tolerate that others werestronger than him.For example, Montresor always stimulated him with Luchresi who was good at connoisseur（鉴赏）in wine.Under the impulse of vanity, he fell into Montreso r’s terrible trap.In fact, he was careless and foolish and didn’t find that the danger was approaching him.He looked down upon Montresor and others.He didn’t realize his foolishness until the death was coming. Talking from the appearance, Monstresor was a well-educated and “kind” businessman.He enjoyed the honor and respect in the city. But in fact, he was an evil and awful person.His inner feelings were so cruel that they even made people tremble.Under his rich appearance was the dirty soul and despicable character.We couldn’t see any glorious virtues in his mind. Instead, his heart was cold and dark.It was the revenge that threw Montresor into the deep evil valley.unit 4 Nathaniel Hawthorne1.Why is the prison the setting of Chapter 1 ?No matter how optimistic the founders of new colonies may be, they are quick to establish a prison and a cemetery in their “Utopia,” for they know that misbehavior, evil, and death are unavoidable.This belief fits into the larger Puritan doctrine, which puts heavy emphasis on the idea of original sin—the notion that all people are born sinners because of the initial transgressions of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. he is therefore using the prison building to represent the crime and the punishment which are aspect of civilized lifeWhat is the implication of the description of the roses?The rosebush symbolizes the ability of nature to endure and outlast man's activities.The narrator suggests that roses offer a reminder of Nature's kindness to the condemned; for his tale, he says, it will provide either a “sweet moral blossom” or else some relief in the face of unrelenting sorrow and gloom.2.Describe the appearance of Hester Prynne and the attitude of the people towards her.The second paragraph on page 30.The crowd in front of the jail is a mixture of men and women, all maintaining severe looks of disapproval.Several of the women begin to discuss Hester Prynne, and they soon vow that Hester would not have received such a light sentence for her crime if they had been the judges.One woman, the ugliest of the group, goes so far as to advocate death for Hester.3.What has happened to Hester?As a young woman, Hester married an elderly scholar, Chillingworth, who sent her ahead to America to live.While waiting for him, she had an affair with a Puritan minister named Dimmesdale, after which she gave birth to Pearl.The scarlet letter is her punishment for her sin and her secrecy. Why does she make the embroidery of the letter A so elaborate? It seems to declare that she is proud, rather than ashamed, of her sin.In reality, however, Hester simply accepts the “sin” and its symbol as part of herself, just as she accepts her child.And although she can hardly believe her present “realities,” she takes them as they are rather than resisting them or trying toatone for them.How does this tell us about her character?Throughout The Scarlet Letter Hester is portrayed as an intelligent, capable. It is the extraordinary circumstances shaping her that make her such an important figure.Unit5 Herman Melville1.What are the stories Ismael tells about Moby Dick? Ishmael compares the legend of Moby Dick to his experience of the whale.He notes that sperm whale attacks have increased recently and that superstitious sailors have come to regard these attacks as having an intelligent, even supernatural origin.In particular, wild rumors about Moby Dick circulate among whalemen, suggesting that he can be in more than one place at the same time and that he is immortal. Ishmael remarks that even the wildest of rumors usually contains some truth. Whales, for instance, have been known to travel with remarkable speed from the Atlantic to the Pacific; thus, it is possible for a whale to be caught in the Pacific with the harpoons of a Greenland ship in it.Moby Dick, who has defied capture numerous times, exhibits an “intelligent malignity”（狠毒）in his attacks on men2.Why does Ahab react so violently against the white whale? First, he lost one of his legs because of the white whale. Second,He considers Moby Dick the embodiment of evil in the world, and he pursues the White Whale，because he believes it his inescapable fate to destroy this evil.Ishmael suggests that Ahab is “crazy”and call him “a raving lunatic.” Do you agree with him? Why or why not?Ishmael describes Ahab as mad in his narration, and it does indeed seem mad to try to fight the forces of nature or God.3. What narrative features can you find in the selected chapter? In the selected charpter, Melville employed the technique of multiple view of his narrative to portray Moby Dick to achieve the effect of ambiguity and let readers judge the meaning.Unit 6 Henry David Thoreau1.Where indeed did Thoreau live, both at a physical level and ata spiritual level?He lived in a cabin on Walden Pond, which belonged to Emerson’s property.2.Had Thoreau ever bought a farm? Why did he enjoy the act of buying?No, he hadn’t.He avoided purchasing a farm because it would inevitably tie him down financially and complicate his life.Thoreau didn’t see the acquisition of wealth as the goal for human existence, he saw the goal of life to be an exploration of the mind and of the magnificent world around us.He regarded the places as an existence free of obligations and full of leisure.3.Is it significant that Thoreau mentioned the Fourth of July as the day on which he began to stay in the woods? Why? Yes, it is.Because The Fourth of July is known as Independence Day,the birthday ot the United States.Here Thoreau uses the day to express his beginningof regeneration at Walden.It also means a symbol of his conquest of being.4.How could you answer the question Thoreau asked at the end of this selection?Unit 7 19th Century American Poets1. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow(1) I Shot an Arrow…1. Why did the speaker lose sight of his arrow and song? The arrow flies too swiftly and too far away to be seen by the speaker; whereas the song is naturally invisible.2. In what circumstances did he find them again?He finds them unexpectedly years later from the trunk of a tree and the heart of a friend.3. What do arrow and song stand for in this poem?The images of arrow and song here may stand for friendship.(2) A Psalm of Life1. What kind of person is the speaker of this poem?The speaker is a man of action, always optimistic and cheerful, trying to achieve as much as possible in the short span of life.2. According to the poem, how should our lives be led to overcome the fact that each day brings us nearer to death? We should work harder and live happier.3. Interpret the metaphor of "Footprints on the sand of time" (line 28).The metaphor refers to human deeds in real life.2. Walt Whitman(1)One's Self I Sing1. What is the significance of singing about one's self?It is an exaltation of the individual spirit, which is typical of American people.2. What is the difference between physiology and physiognomy?Physiology is a science that deals with the functions and life process of human beings, whereas physiognomy refers to an art of judging character from contours of face itself or the appearance of a person.3. What does Whitman mean by the term of "the Modern Man"? He means that a man should be free from any prejudice and pride, totally different from the traditional one, that is full of bias.(3) O Captain! My Captain!1. Why is the word "Captain" capitalized throughout the poem?In this poem the word “Captain” specially refers to Abraham Lincoln, president of the United States.2. What overall metaphor does the poet employ in this poem? Life is a journey.3. Why do people on the shores exult and bells ring, while the speaker remains so sad?They welcome the ship returning from its hard trip, whereas the speaker is sad because the captain fails to receive his own honor.3.Emily Dickinson(1) To Make a Prairie …1. What things are needed to "make" a prairie? In what sense can one really do it?Some grass and insects and small animals. People can make a prairie with their imagination.2. How can "revery alone" create a prairie?The prairie stays in one's mind.(2) Success Is Counted Sweetest1. Why is success "counted sweetest by those who ne'er succeed"?Those who have tasted the bitterness of failure would have a keener desire for success.2. Who are "the purple host"?The so-called successful people in the world.3. Who is "he" in the last stanza?Anyone who is pursuing his success.(3) I'm Nobody!1. Who are the "pair of us" and "they" in this poem? The "pair of us" refers to the speaker in the poem and the reader, and "they" refers to the public, especially those in power.2. What does "an admiring bog" really mean?" (line 28).It Implies the vain and empty common people, who are always admiring and pursuing the celebrities.3. What is the theme of this poem?The real admirable life is a secluded and common one.4. Do you want to be "nobody" or "somebody"? Explain your reasons.Different persons would have different answers to this question. Personally, I prefer to be nobody.Unit 8 Mark Twain1: Why do you think Mr.Wheeler is so eager to tell these stories?From Mr.Wheeler’s behaviors and contents of his narration we can know he is so eager to tell these stories.First, when "I" asked him to tell "me" something about W.Smiley, he “ backed me into a corner and blockaded me with his chair, and then sat down a nd reeled off the narrative”. And during the process of telling his stories, he never paid any attention to others'response to his story and just went on telling what amused him. At last when the listener felt boring and wanted toleave, Mr.Wheeler even didn't notice it and still asked him to sit there listening to him.2: Does his audience share his enthusiasm in telling the stories? No. the audience does not show any interest in Mr.Wheeler’ stories. In fact, the narrator was very feverish about his stories, but ,in the eyes of the listener,the stories were very boring and had nothing to do with his preoccupation. As an educated man, the listener couldn't understand the way of laborers for joy, and he would never bother himself to understand it. So after the long time of Mr.Wheeler’ solo narration and when the audience got a chance, he fled away.3: Do you think the narrator and his listener ever suspect the presence of humor? Why? How do you interpret their interactions?The narrator and his listener never noticed or suspected the presence of humor.During the intercourse,the narrator went vigorously on his monotonous narrative "wihout a little smiling" talking about the animals and the things like ,while the listener felt rather puzzled or bothered by his stories.It seemed to bekind of coarse things. So the two different scenes go on separately without a intersection.And their interaction was a complete failure according toour common sense about communication.But it in this sense produced the effect of humor which can be tasted by our readers due to the skills adopted by Mark Twain .Unit 14 F·Scott Fitzgerald1.Do you think Gatsby deserves to be called “the great”? Why?（1）I think it is too complicated to simply say Gatsby deserves to be ―great‖or not.For one thing, Gatsby was ambitious, hardworking, generous and passionate. He was so extremely loyal to his love and Daisy that he could do anything to get Daisy back: he did shady business to earn money and social position; he threw luxurious parties just to draw Daisy’s attention; he could take the blame for a death that he did not cause.（2）In this respect, he is much ―greater‖than his contemporaries. For another thing, Gatsby never realized that Daisy wasn’t the girl he loved anymore. Gatsby was so innocent that he staked everything on his dreams, not realizingthat his dreams are unworthy of him. He wasn’t sober enough to be great.2.Does “the green light”Gatsby believed in exist in reality? Why or why not ?（1）I think ―the green light‖does not exist in reality. Because the green light which situated at the end of Daisy’s East Egg dock and barely visible from West Egg lawn represents Gatsby’s unattainable dream. Although the color itself can be seen as hope a nd bright future, Gatsby’s quest for Daisy back is doomed to be impossible. Daisy lived in ―a material world without being real, where poor ghosts, breathing dream like air‖.（2）After five years when Gatsby met Daisy again, the miracle Daisy had lost her original glory. Therefore, there is no delaying that Gatsby’s dream would not come true. In the novel, the green light not only represents that innocent Gatsby looked forward to the future, but also means his longing for the history –his happy past with Daisy. The distinction between ideal and reality was huge. As if American dream between golden past and golden future always suffered from the realistic betrayal and crush.3.What does Gatsby’s Schedule reveal about him and how does it relate to the American Dream?（1）The schedule is a reflection of Gatsby’s determination and ambition. It reveals that he is hard on himself in pursuit of his goal—to be an upper-class man.（2）On one hand, we can know that he is persistent in pursuing his American Dream-- to attain wealth and happiness through his struggle. On the other hand, he is too idealistic and naive.（3）He tries his best to make money and learns everything required to be an upper-class man so that he can get access to his beloved girl.Money is important，but there are other barriers difficult to penetrate. The girl he loves is as vulgar and superficial as others in her circle, she is unable to meets Gatsby’s romantic fantasy. So his dream is destined to shatter, which indicates the disillusion of American Dream.4.When you read the line “He (the man with owl-eyed glasses) took off his glasses and wiped them again, outside and in ,” what images does it create in your mind, given the novel’snumerous references to the strikingly strange scene of the spectacled eyes?（1）From this line , superficially, owl-eyes is a person with thick and blurry glasses who can not see clearly all the things in the world. However, we know he is actually an owl-wise observer and sees more clearly than anyone else in the novel. Owl-Eyes, except Nick, is the only friend to appear at the rain-soaked burial of Gatsby, when others are unwilling to come. He feels sympathy for Gatsby’s tragedy.（2）After reading this line, I cannot help thinking of the Dr.Eckleburg billboard with its huge yellow spectacles in this novel. In many rainy days, Dr. Eckleburg’s eyes are also dimmed and seem blind. But in fact this is a pair of "all-seeing" eyes. The Owl-Eyed Man is similar to Dr. Eckleburg, sadly looking at the people’s life and idealism of this time. B oth of them symbolize an uninvolved spectator god. They watch all the activities of the humans. Owl-eyes is the avatar of the sightless Dr. Eckleburg.Unit 16 Ernest Hemingway1. How do you interpret the irony of the title after reading the story?（1）The title ―A Clean Well-Lighted Place‖refers to the caf éin the text. The caféwas very clean and well- lighted. From the literary meaning, we may feel this place was very warm and comfortable, was a place where people need warmth wanted to go. So the old man, who was rich but deaf and lonely came here to find warmth and avoided nada. It was the only place he could go and could find some comfort.（2）However, the younger waiter was very selfish. As his wife was waiting him on the bed, he wanted to go home early. Therefore, he refused to offer the old man another cup of wine by the excuse that the business was finished. In fact, there was still an hour from closing time. The younger thought an hour was more important to him than to the old man. The old man needed to leave the only place where he could get far away from nada/ nothing. This café should be warm but the younger waiter forced the lonely and deaf to leave without any sympathy. This is the irony of the title.2. Do you think youth and confidence can help one withstand the metaphorical dark？Why or why not? （1）I don’t thinkso.In our opinion, the metaphorical dark means nada，nothing in one’s inner heart. In the article, the younger waiter had both youth and confidence; however, he never made full use of them. As we can see, he didn’t understand the old man’s suicide and excessive drinking, and failed to see his tomorrow through the old man’s present situation.（2）What’s more, he had no idea that youth is not permanent, which cannot guarantee love and work. From above, there is no denying that he didn’t realize his nada. Therefore, his youth and confidence never contributed to withstanding his metaphorical dark.（3）I think that, nowadays, youth and confidence do can help to withstand the metaphorical dark, for one can bravely face the reality and overcome the nada with youth and confidence. But they only serve as two main factors. In fact, we need some other factors such as courage, dignity and so on if we want to withstand the metaphorical dark successfully.3.The older waiter said to the younger waiter:“We are of two different kinds.”In what way do you think they are different?（1）I think they are different from each other in the following four aspects：In the beginning, they are in different ages.The older waiter was in his middle age; while the other was much younger.（2）Then, they have different attitudes towards the old man. From the article, we know the older waiter had suffered a lot. He had maintained a clean and well-lighted place in his heart, and he could understand the old man and show sympathy to him. However, the young man was very selfish. He wanted to go home early so that he finished the business one hour earlier and forced the old man to leave. He showed hatred rather than sympathy to the old man.（3）Next, they have different attitudes towards life. The older waiter had a deep sense of life. He was brave and wanted to fight again nada. Besides, he cared about others. The younger one was totally different; he has a shadow understanding of life. He satisfied with his present love and work, he only care about himself and was reluctant to take others into consideration. He even never thought of his future.（4）Finally, they have different attitudes towards nada. The older waiter had realized that it is imp ossible to avoid nada in one’s whole life. The only thing hecan do is to keep a kind of clearness in his own mind. So he was willing to work late for the lonely old man and was pleased to help those who are suffering nada. But out of youth and confidence, he failed to overcome nada. On the contrary, the younger waiter had the two most important factors for withstanding nada; however, he didn’t realize the nada in his heart at all. Then his youth and confidence became useless.Unit 17 20th -Century American Poets1. Ezra Pound In A Station of the Metro1. Why does the poet call the faces of pedestrians "apparition"?These pedestrians are all walking in a hurry amidst the drizzling rain.2. What do "petals" and "bough" stand for? Petals refer to the faces while the bough stands for the floating crowd.2. Wallace Stevens Anecdote of the Jar1. What does the jar in poem symbolize? Why does the speaker place it on top of a hill? The jar here symbolizes a certainperspective on looking at this world. If the perspective of the viewing is creative and unique, it will change the conventional order of the old world. When a new perspective comes out, it will certainly hold attention from the rest.2. The jar is "round" and "of a port in air," meaning that it has a stately importance. What effect does it have on surroundings when placed on the ground? Maybe the round jar assumes the air of a domineering figure, which helps to form a certain order out of the disordered surrounding.3. How did the wilderness of Tennessee characterized? What words or phrases does the poet use to describe it? Tennessee seems to a place full of life and energy. “Slovenly,” “sprawl” and “wild” are some of the words used to describe the place. (See Anecdote of the Jar )4.Robert Frost(1)Fire and Ice1. What are the symbolic meanings of fire in this poem? Fire symbolizes natural disaster, human passion, as well as war.2. Why does the speaker say that ice is also great for destruction? Explain what ice stands for here. Ice, oppose to fire, is also a dreadful natural disaster in this world, and ice is always related to indifference, coldness, hatred, and the other negative sentiments of human beings.3. What is your opinion about fire and ice? Which one is more destructive? Both fire and ice can destroy this beautiful world if they are beyond control of human beings. Therefore we should be open-minded and reduce our prejudice and pride so as to keep this world in peace.(2)Stopping By Woods On a Snowy Evening1. In your opinion, what was the reason that made the speaker stop by the woods on a snowy evening? The poet was deeply attracted by the natural beauty of the scene at that very moment.2. Why did the horse give the harness bell a shake? The horse grew impatient by stopping in the middle of the dark, cold woods at midnight. It was eager to go home.3. Why couldn't the speaker stay longer by the woods to appreciate its mysterious beauty? He realized that it was lateat night and he would have to hurry home to get some food and sleep, because the next morning he would have a lot of work to do.4. What is the effect of repetition in the last two lines? The refrain-like repetition in the last two lines reminds the reader a simple fact of life: whatever happens, one must go forward in the journey of his or her life.(3) The Road Not Taken1. What is the speaker's initial response to the divergence of the two roads? The speaker is at a loss which road he should choose, and he feels sorry that he cannot explore both roads at the same time.2. Describe the similarities and differences of these two roads. Which one does the speaker take? Two roads are similar except one of them is more “grassy,” which implies that it is less traveled by people. The speaker prefers the less traveled one, because he likes adventure.3. What might the two roads stand for in the speaker's mind? One road stands for the traditional one and the other is unconventional one and full of challenges and difficulties. Tofollow other people's footsteps or to open a new road for himself is really not an easy decision for us to make in our lives.Unit22 Allen GinsbergAll through the poem, the speaker is addressing to Walt Whitman. Is this poem about Walt Whitman or about modern America?-----from Allen Ginsberg A Supermarket in CaliforniaThe author in this poem wanted to emphasis his theme about showing his respect to the passed age and showing his worry about the corrupt in the part of spirit and society. As we all know, Walt Whitman’s poetry was a revolution in American literature can be seen in the first publication of Leaves of Grass in 1855. His poetry is “free verse” in that the lack of meter and rhyme is known as his major technical innovation. Allen Ginsberg had a highly praise on him. As the movement of Beat Generation, Allen Ginsberg used poetry as weapon to express his own understanding of Beat---beatific and beat down.In this poem, the author wrote the sentence “shopping for images”. What he wanted t o buy is the things which were listed by Walt Whitman many years ago. What is in the supermarket? The fresh fruits on the shelf fit the needs of customers and the families. We across a strange statement: shopping for images. How can we shop for images? What he refers to us is still the pure image---“dreaming of your enumerations”. The things on the shelf are the images of languages in Walt Whitman’s poetry. The language in Walt Whitman’s poetry and the spirit in his poetry are the things which Allen Ginsberg dreamed of. A young America which is full of energy is worth being praised. Allen Ginsberg found the song of himself, the song full of courage and the echo of the real world among Walt Whitman’s work. The meaning of age in this poem is that the nation or the race opens the age which belongs to them and creates the history of them own. To a certain extend, the age singer equals the national singer. The world is the world which has its features of timing and events. This means that the link of combining the world is not the same as the goods on the shelf but the things which contain the world and individual spirits.。
美国文学---名词解释
An Outline of American Literatureby Kathryn VanSpanckerenglossary1Abolitionism-Active movement to end slavery in the U.S. North before the Civil War in the 1860s.2Allusion-An implied or indirect reference in a literary text to another text.3Beatnik-Artistic and literary rebellion against established society of the 1950s and early 1960s, associated with Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and others. "Beat" suggests holiness ("beatification") and suffering ("beaten down").4BostonBrahmins-Influential and respected 19th-centuryNew England writers who maintained the "genteel tradition"of upper- class values.5Calvinism-Strict theological doctrine of the French Protestant church reformer John Calvin (1509-1564) and the basis of Puritan society. Calvin held that all humans were born sinful and only God s grace (not the church) could save a person from hell. 6Captivity narrative-Account of capture by Native American tribes, such as those created by writers Mary Rowlandson and John Williams in colonial times.7Character writing-Popular 17th- and 18th-century literary sketch of a character who represents a group or type.8Civil War-The war (1861-1865) between the northernU.S. states, which remained in theUnion, and the southern states, which seceded and formed the Confederacy. The victory of the North ended slavery and preserved theUnion.9Conceit-Extended metaphor. Term used to describe Renaissance metaphysical poetry inEngland and colonial poetry, such as that of Anne Bradstreet, in colonialAmerica.10Decadents-Late 19th- and early 20th-century "aesthetic" artists and writers, chiefly British and French, involved with "turn of century" ideas of endings, decay, and artificiality.11Deconstruction-Controversial mode of textual analysis that can reveal hidden ideological assumptions. Questions hierarchical thinking in which one term is privileged over another (e.g. culture versus nature, man versus woman). Draws on thought of French theorist Jacques Derrida, who elaborated on linguist Ferdinand de Saussure s vision of language as a system of differences.12Deism-An 18th-century Enlightenment religion emphasizing reason, not miracles; partly a reaction against Calvinism and religious superstition.13Election-A Puritan doctrine in which God "elects," or chooses, the individuals who will enter heaven according to His divine will.14Ellipsis-Omission from a text of one or more words that are obviously understood but that must be supplied to make a construction gramatically correct.15Enlightenment-An 18th-century movement that focused on the ideals of good sense, benevolence, and a belief in liberty, justice, and equality as the natural rights of man.16Existentialism-A philosophical movement embracing the view that the suffering individual must create meaning in an unknowable, chaotic, and seemingly empty universe.17Expressionism-Post-World War I artistic movement, of German origin, that distorted appearances to communicate inner emotional states.18Faust-Literary character who sells his soul to the devil in order to become all-knowing, or godlike; protagonist of plays by English Renaissance dramatist Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593) and German Romantic writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832).19Feminism-The view, articulated in the 19th century, that women are inherently equal to men and deserve equal rights and opportunities. More recently, a social and political movement that took hold in theUnited States in the late 1960s, soon spreading globally.20Genre-A category of literary forms (novel, lyric poem, epic, for example).21HartfordWits-Patriotic but conservative late 18th-century literary circle centered atYale College inConnecticut (also known as the Connecticut Wits).22Hudibras-A mock-heroic satire by English writer Samuel Butler (1612-1680). Hudibras was imitated by early revolutionary-era satirists.23Image-Concrete representation of an object, or something seen.24Imagists-A group of mainly American poets, including Ezra Pound and Amy Lowell, who used sharp visual images and colloquial speech; active from 1912 to 1914.25Irony-A meaning (often contradictory) concealed behind the apparent meaning of a word or phrase.26KnickerbockerSchool-New York City-based writers of the early 1800s who imitated English and European literary fashions. "Light" literature - Popular literature written for entertainment.27McCarthy era-The period of the Cold War (late 1940s and early 1950s) during which U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy pursued American citizens whom he and his followers suspected of being members or former members of, or sympathizers with, the Communist party. His efforts included the creation of "blacklists" in various professions -- rosters of people who were excluded from working in those jobs. McCarthy ultimately was denounced by his Senate colleagues.28Metaphysical poetry-Intricate type of 17th-century English poetry employing wit and unexpected images.29Middle Colonies-Present-day Atlantic or eastern U.S. states-- colonial New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and sometimes Delaware -- known for commercial activities centering on New York City and Philadelphia.30Midwest-The central area of theUnited States, from theOhio River to theRocky Mountains, including the Prairie andGreat Plains regions (also known as theMiddle West).31Millennialism-Seventeenth-century Puritan belief that Jesus Christ would return to Earth and inaugurate 1,000 years of peace and prosperity, as prophesied in the New Testament.32Mock-epic-A parody using epic form (also known as mock-heroic).33Modernism-International cultural movement after World War I expressing disillusionment with tradition and interest in new technologies and visions.34Motif-A recurring element, such as an image, theme, or type of incident.35Muckrakers-American journalists and novelists (1900-1912) whose spotlight on corruption in business and government led to social reform.36Multicultural-The creative interchange of numerous ethnic and racial subcultures.37Myth-Legendary narrative, usually of gods and heroes, or a theme that expresses the ideology of a culture.38Naturalism-Late 19th- and early 20th-century literary approach of French origin that vividly depicted social problems and viewed human beings as helpless victims of larger social and economic forces.39Neoclassicism-An 18th-century artistic movement, associated with the Enlightenment, drawing on classical models and emphasizing reason, harmony, and restraint.40New England-The region of the United States comprising present- day Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut and noted for its early industrialization and intellectual life. Traditionally, home of the shrewd, independent, thrifty "Yankee" trader.41Objectivist-Mid-20th-century poetic movement, associated with William Carlos Williams, stressing images and colloquial speech.42Old Norse-The ancient Norwegian language of the sagas, virtually identical to modern Icelandic.43Oral tradition-Transmission by word of mouth; tradition passed down through generations; verbal folk tradition.44Plains Region-The middle region of theUnited States that slopes eastward from theRocky Mountains to the Prairie.45Post-modernism-Media-influenced aesthetic sensibility of the late 20th century characterized by open-endedness and collage. Post-modernism questions the foundations of cultural and artistic forms through self-referential irony and thejuxtaposition of elements from popular culture and electronic technology.46Prairie-The level, unforested farm region of the midwesternUnited States.47Primitivism-Belief that nature provides truer and more healthful models than does culture. An example is the myth of the "noble savage."48Providence-God s will, as expressed through events on Earth. Fate is seen as revelation.49Puritans-English religious and political reformers who fled their native land in search of religious freedom, and settled and colonizedNew England in the 17th century.50Reformation-A northern European political and religious movement of the 15th through 17th centuries that attempted to reform Catholicism; eventually gave rise to Protestantism.51Reflexive-Self-referential. A literary work is reflexive when it refers to itself.52Regional writing-Writing that explores the customs and landscape of a region of theUnited States.53Revolutionary War-The War of Independence, 1775-1783, fought by the American colonies againstGreat Britain.54Romance-Emotionally heightened, symbolic American novels associated with the Romantic period.55Romanticism-A reaction against neoclassicism. This early 19th- century movement elevated the individual, the passions, and the inner life. It stressed strong emotion, imagination, freedom from classical correctness in art forms, and rebellion against social conventions.56Saga-An ancient Scandinavian narrative of historical or mythical events.57SalemWitch Trials -Proceedings for alleged witchcraft held inSalem,Massachusetts, in 1692. Nineteen persons were hanged and numerous others were intimidated into confessing or accusing others of witchcraft.58Self-help book-Book telling readers how to improve their lives through their own efforts. A popular American genre from the mid- 19th century to the present.59Separatists-A strict Puritan sect of the 16th and 17th centuries that preferred to separate from the Church of England rather than reform. Many of those who first settledAmerica were separatists.60Slave narrative-First black literary prose genre in theUnited States; accounts of life of African-Americans under slavery.61South-Region of the United States including Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Missouri, Arkansas, Florida, West Virginia, and eastern Texas.62Surrealism-European literary and artistic movement that uses illogical, dreamlike images and events to suggest the unconscious.63Syllabic versification-Poetic meter based on the number of syllables in a line.64Synthesis-Blending of two senses, used by Edgar Allan Poe and others to suggest hidden correspondences and create exotic effects.65Tall tale-A humorous, exaggerated story common on the American frontier, often focusing on cases of superhuman strength.66Theme-Abstract idea embodied in a literary work.67Tory-Wealthy pro-English faction inAmerica at the time of the Revolutionary War in the late 1700s.68Transcendentalism-A broad, philosophical movement inNew England during the Romantic era (peaking between 1835 and 1845). It stressed the role of divinity in nature and the individual s intuition, and exalted feeling over reason.69Trickster-Cunning character of tribal folk narratives (particularly those of African-Americans and Native Americans) who breaks cultural codes of behavior; often a culture hero.70Vision song-Poetic song which members of some Native American tribes created when purifying themselves through solitary fasting and meditation.。
美国文学-名词解释
美国文学-名词解释美国文学重要名词解释American Romanticism(1)American Romanticism is one of the most important periods in the history of American literature.(2)It was a rebellion against the objectivity of rationalism．For romantics，the feelings，intuitions and emotions were more important than reason and common sense．They emphasized individualism，placing the individual against the group．They affirmed the inner life of the self, and cherished strong interest in the past，the wild，the remote，the mysterious and the strange．They stressed the element “Americanness” in their works．(3)It started with the publication of Washington Irving’s The Sketch Book and ended with Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass．(4)Being a period of the great flowering of American literature，it is also called “the Amer icanRenaissance．”(5)American 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．Transcendentalism(1) It refers to the religious and philosophical doctrines of Ralph Waldo Emerson and others in New England in the middle 1800’s，which emphasized the importance of individual inspiration and intuition，the Over-soul，and Nature．Other concepts that accompanied Transcendentalism include the idea that nature is ennobling and the idea that the individual is divineand，therefore，self-reliant．(2) New England Transcendentalism is the product of a combination of native American Puritanism and European Romanticism．3. Free Verse(1)Free verse means the rhymed or unrhymed poetry composed without paying attention to conventional rules of meter．(2)Free verse was originated by a group of French poets of the late 19th century．(3)Their purpose was to free themselves from the restrictions of formal metrical patterns and to recreate instead the free rhythms of natural speech．(4) Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Gra ss is，perhaps，the most notable example．4. Symbol(1)Symbol means an act，a person，a thing，or a spectacle that stands for something else，usually something less palpable than the named symbol．(2)The relationship between the symbol and its referent is not often one of simple equivalence．Allegorical symbols usually express a neater equivalence with what they stand for than the symbols found in modern realistic fiction．5. Theme(1) Theme means the unifying point or general idea Of a literary work．(2) It provides an answer to such question as “What is the work about?”(3) Each literary work carries its own theme or themes．For example，King Lear has many themes，among which areblindness and madness6. American Naturalism(1) The American naturalists accepted the more negative interpretation of Darwin’s evolutionary theory and used it to account for the behavior of those characters in literary works who were regarded as more or less complex combinations of inherited attributes, their habits conditioned by social and economic forces．2) American Naturalism is evolved from realism when the author’s ton e in writing becomes less serious and less sympathetic but more ironic and more pessimistic．It is no more than a gloomy philosophical approach to reality, or to human existence．(3) Dreiser is a leading figure of his school．7. Darwinism(1) Darwinism is a term that comes from Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theory．(2) Darwinists think that those who survive in the world are the fittest and those who fail toadapt themselves to the environment will perish．They believe that man has evolved from lower forms of life．Humans are special not because God created them in His image，but because they have successfully adapted to changing environmental conditions and have passed on their survival．making characteristics genetically．(3)Influenced by this theory，some American naturalist writers apply Darwinism as an explanation of human nature and social reality．8. Local Colorists(1) Generally speaking，the writings of local colorists are concerned with the life of a small，well-defined region orprovince．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 Locale．(3) Major local colorists include Hamlin Garland，Mark Twain，Kate Chopin，etc.9. The Lost Generation(1) The Lost Generation is a term first used by Gertrude Stein to describe the post-World WarI generation of American writers：men and women haunted by a sense of betrayal and emptiness brought about by the destructiveness of the war．(2)Full of youthful idealism，these individuals sought the meaning of life，drank excessively, had love affairs and created some of the finest American literature to date．(3)The three best—known representatives of Lost Generation are F Scott Fitzgerald．Ernest Hemingway and John Dos Passos．(4)Others usually included among the list are Sherwood Anderson，Kay Boyle，Hart Crane，Ford Maddox Ford and Zelda Fitzgerald．10. Imagism(1) Imagism 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．(2)The imagists．with Ezra Pound leading the way, hold that the most effective means to express these momentaryimpressions is through the use of one dominant image．(3)Imagism is characterized by the following three poetic principles：i1 direct treatment of subject matter；ii)economy of expression；iii)as regards rhythm，to compose in the sequence of the musical phrase，not in the sequence of metronome．(4)Ezra Pound's In a Station of the Metro is a well-known imagist poem．11. The Beat Generation(1)The members of the Beat Generation were new bohemian libertines，who engaged in a spontaneous，sometimes messy, creativity．(2)The beat writers produced a body of written work controversial both for its advocacy of non—conformity and for its non—conforming style．(3)The major beat writings are Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and AIlen Ginsberg’s Howl．Howl became the manifesto of the Beat Generation．12. American Dream(1)American Dream refers to the dream of material success，in which one，regard1ess of social status，acquires wealth and gains success by working hard and good luck．(2)In literature，the theme of American Dream recurs．In The Great Gatsby．Gatsby comes from the west to the east with the dream of material success．By bootlegging and other illegal means he fulfilled his dream but ended up being killed．The novel tells the shattering of American Dream rather than its Success．13. Expressionism(1)Expressionism refers to a movement in Germany early in the 20th century, in which a number of painters sought to avoidthe representation of external reality and，instead，to project a highly personal or subjective vision of the world．(2) Expressionism is a reaction against realism or naturalism，aiming at presenting a post—war world violently distorted．(3)Works noted for expressionism include：Eugene O’Neill’s The Emperor Jones，James Joy ce’s Ulysses and Finnegan’s Wake，and T S．Eliot’s The Waste Land, etc．．(4)In a further sense，the term is sometimes applied to the belief that literary works are essentially expressions of their authors’moods and thoughts；this has been the dominant assumption about literature since the rise of Romanticism14. Feminism(1) Feminism incorporates both a doctrine of equal rights for women and an ideology of social transformation aiming to create a world for women beyond simple social equality．(2) In general，femin ism is the ideology of women’s liberation based on the belief that women suffer injustice because of their sex．Under this broad umbrella various feminisms offer differing analyses of the causes，or agents，of female oppression．(3) Definitions of feminism by feminists tend to be shaped by their training，ideology or race．So，for example，Marxist and Socialist feminists stress the interaction within feminism of class with gender and focus on social distinctions between men and women．Black feminists argue much more for an integrated analysis which can unlock the multiple systems of oppression．15. Hemingway Code Hero(1) Hemingway Hero，also called code hero，is one who，wounded but strong, more sensitive，enjoys the pleasures of life (sex，alcohol，sport) in face of ruin and death，and maintains，through some notion of a code，an ideal of himself．(2) Barnes in The Sun Also Rises，Henry in A Farewell to Arms and Santiago in The Old Man and the Sea are typical of Hemingway Hero.16. Harlem Renaissance(1) Harlem Renaissance refers to a period of outstanding literary vigor and creativity thatoccurred in the United States during the 1920s．(2)The, Harlem Renaissance changed the images of literature created by many black and white American writers．New black images were no longer obedient and docile，instead they showed a new confidence and racial pride．(3)The center of this movement was the vast black ghetto of Harlem，in New York City．(4)The leading figures are Langston Hughes，James Weldon Johnson，Wallace Thurman，etc．．17. Impressionism(1) Impressionism is a style of painting that gives the impression made by the subject on the artist without much attention to details．Writers accepted the same conviction that the personal attitudes and moods of the writer were legitimate elements in depicting character or setting or action．(2)Briefly, it is a style of literature characterized by the creation of general impressions and moods rather than realistic moods．18. Puritanism(1)Puritanism refers to the practices and beliefs of the Puritans. The Puritans are the people who wanted to purify the Church of England and was persecuted in England. The first settlers who became the founding father of the American nation were quite a few of them Puritans. They came to America out of various reasons, but because they were a group of serious andreligious people, they carried a code of values, a philosophy of life, a point of view which, in time took root in the New World, and became what is popularly known as American Puritanism.(2) The American Puritans, like their brothers back in England, were idealists, believing that the Church should be restored to “purity” of the first century Church. To them religion was a matter of primary importance. They accepted the doctrine of predestination, original sin and total depravity, and limited atonement through a special infusion of grace from God. It was this kind of religious belief that they brought with them into the wilderness. There they meant to prove that they were God’s chosen people enjoying His blessings on this earth as in heaven.(3) In the grim struggle for survival that followed immediately after their arrival in America, the character of the people underwent a significant change. They became more practical, as indeed they had to be. Gradually a set of Puritan values came into being. They believe in hard working, piety, and sobriety.(4) In a word, American Puritanism was one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thought and American literature. It has become, to some extent, a state of mind, rather than a set of tenets, so much a part of the national cultural atmosphere that the American breathes. We can say that, without some understanding of Puritanism, there can be no real understanding of America and its literature.19. Gothic RomanceIt refers to the Romantic novels with the settings of the ancient castles or old houses and descriptions of supernatural elements like ghosts and specters, usually horror-provoking, like Poe’s “ The Fall of the House of Usher” and some of Irving’stales. 20. Psychological RealismIt is the realistic writing that probes deeply into the complexities of characters’ thoughts and motivations. Henry James’ novel The Ambassadors is considered to be a masterpiece of psychological realism. And Henry James is considered the founder of psychological realism. He believed that reality lies in the impressions made by life on the spectator, and not in any facts of which the spectator is unaware. Such realism is therefore merely the obligation that the artist assumes to represent life as he sees it, which may not be the same life as it “really” is.21. Waste Land Painters“Waste Land Painters” refers to such writers as F. Scott Fitzgerald, T.S. Eliot, Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner. With their writings, all of them painted the postwar Western world as a waste land, lifeless and hopeless. Eliot’s The Waste Land paints a picture of modern social crisis. In this poem, modern civilized society turns into a waste deathly land due to ethical degradation and disillusi onment with dreams. His “The Hollow Men”exhibited a pessimism no less depressing than The Waste Land. Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby wrote about the frustration and despair resulting from the failure of the American dream. Hemingway’s works, such as The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms, portrayed the dilemma of modern man utterly thrown upon himself for survival in an indifferent world, revealing man’s impotence and his despairing courage to assert himself against overwhelming odds. Faulkner made the history of the Deep South the subject of the bulk of his work, and created a symbolic picture of the remote past. His fictional Yoknapatwpha represents a microcosm of the whole macrocosmic nature ofhuman experience.22. ConflictThe conflict in a work of fiction is the battle that the main character must wage against an opposing force. Usually the events of the story are all related to the conflict, and the conflict is resolved in some way by the story’s end.A battle with nature is a common conflict in literature, particularly Naturalist literature. Other common types are conflict between two characters; conflict between a character and the laws of society; conflict between a character and chance or fate; the inner conflict, in which a character struggles with personal weakness, illusions, or desires.23. StyleBroadly speaking, style is the way a literary work is created of a writer writes his literary works. In a narrow sense it refers to the typical linguistic feature and specific literary techniques and devices for a literary work or a writer.24. Point of viewThe angle from which a story or a novel is written is the point of view. Generally speaking, fiction is written in the omniscient point of view, the third person point of view or the first-person point of view.25. Black HumorOriginally it refers to a type of course humor in which tragic events like death and serious wounds are made fun of. In American literature it refers to the novels which employ this type of humor.26. The Jazz AgeTo many, World War I was a tragic failure of old values, of old politics, of old ideas. The social mood was often one of confusionand despair. Yet, on the surface the mood in American during the 1920s did not seem desperate. Instead, Americans entered a decade of prosperity and exhibitionism that prohibition, the legal ban against alcoholic beverages, ded more to encourage than to curb. Fashions were extravagant; More and more automobiles crowded the roads, advertising flourished; and nearly every American home had a radio in it. Fads swept the nation. People danced the Charleston, and they sat upon the flagpoles. This was the Jazz Age, when New Orleans musicians moved “up the river” to Chicago and the theater of New York’s Harlem pulsed with the music that had become a symbol of the times. These were the Roaring Twenties. The roaring of the decade served to mask a quiet pain, the sense of loss that Gertrude Stein had observed in Paris. F. Scott Fitzgerald portrays the Jazz Age as a generation of “the beautiful and damned”, drowning in their pleasures.。
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美国超验主义 1.概述 美国超验主义也叫“新英格兰超验主义”或者说“美国文艺复兴”是美国的一种文学和哲学运动。它兴起于十九世纪三十年代的新英格兰地区，但波及其他地方。它宣称存在一种理想的精神实体，超越于经验和科学之处，通过直觉得以把握。领导人是美国思想家、诗人拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生。 2. 思想渊源及其核心观点 超验主义追求人的自由的精神成为美国文化中一个重要遗产。这种思潮发源于单一神教，同时又接受了浪漫主义的影响，强调人与上帝间的直接交流和人性中的神性，其结果是解放了人性，提高了人的地位，使人的自由成为可能。超验主义具有强烈的批判精神，其社会目标是建立一个道德完满、真正民主自由的社会，尽管带有乌托邦的理想色彩。 超验主义的核心观点是主张人能超越感觉和理性而直接认识真理，认为人类世界的一切都是宇宙的一个缩影——“世界将其自身缩小成为一滴露水”（爱默生语）。它强调万物本质上的统一，万物皆受“超灵”制约，而人类灵魂与“超灵”一致。这种对人之神圣的肯定使超验主义者蔑视外部的权威与传统，依赖自己的直接经验。 3. 超验主义的主要思想观点 首先，超验主义者强调精神，或超灵，认为这是宇宙至为重要的存在因素。超灵是一种无所不容、无所不在、扬善抑恶的力量，是万物之本、万物之所属，它存在于人和自然界内。 其二，超验主义者强调个人的重要性。他们认为个人是社会的最重要的组成部分，社会的革新只能通过个人的修养和完善才能实现。因此人的首要责任就是自我完善，而不是刻意追求金玉富贵。理想的人是依靠自己的人。 其三，超验主义者以全新的目光看待自然，认为自然界是超灵或上帝的象征。在他们看来，自然界不只是物质而已，它有生命，上帝的精神充溢其中，它是超灵的外衣。因此，它对人的思想具有一种健康的滋补作用。超验主义主张回归自然，接受它的影响，以在精神上成为完人。这种观点的自然内涵是，自然界万物具象征意义，外部世界是精神世界的体现。 爱默生有句名言——“相信你自己”，这句话成为超验主义者的座右铭。这种超验主义观点强调人的主观能动性，有助于打破加尔文教的“人性恶”、“命定论”等教条的束缚，为热情奔放，抒发个性的美国式文化奠定了基础。 正因为爱默生的超验主义观点摒弃了加尔文教派神为中心的思想，认为在某种意义上，“人”就上帝，才使得超验主义明显地烙上资本主义上升期的时代轰烈：“一个人一定能够成为他想成为的人。”而这种素来被称为美国平民宗教的自立自强，激励了美国民族精神的发展完善。 4. 经典之作 《自然》（Nature，1836）、《美国学者》（The American Scholar，1837）、 《知识的自然历史》（Natural History of Intellect，1893）、 《瓦尔登湖》（Walden，or Life in the Woods，1854）等等。
拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生 美国思想家，诗人。爱默生是确立美国文化精神的代表人物。 美国前总统林肯称他为“美国的孔子”、“美国文明之父”。1836年出版处女作《论自然》。他文学上的贡献主要在散文和诗歌上。 1.生平简介 1803年5月25日出生于马萨诸塞州波士顿附近的康考德村的牧师家庭，他的父亲威廉·爱默生是一位知名的一位论派牧师。 1811年，其父亲过世，由母亲和姑母抚养他成人。隔年他被送到了波士顿拉丁学校就读。 1817年10月，他入读哈佛大学并且被任命为新生代表，这个身份让他获得免费住宿的机会。为了增添微薄的薪水，寒假期间他会到Ripley 伯父在马萨诸塞州瓦胜市的学校进行辅导及教学事务。在校期间，他阅读了大量英国浪漫主义作家的作品，丰富了思想，开阔了视野。 1821年爱默生从哈佛大学毕业后，他协助自己的兄弟在母亲的家中设立一所给年轻女性就读的学校；当爱默生的兄弟前往格丁根读神学时，爱默生负责主持这所学校。之后数年，爱默生都过著担任校长的日子，然后进了哈佛大学神学院，并于1829年以一位论派牧师的形象崭露头角。 1831年2月8日，他的第一任妻子埃伦·塔克在她二十岁时因患肺结核过世。 1832年，一次与教会干事关于圣餐服务的管理权争执及关于公众祈祷的疑虑让他辞职了。 1832年以后，爱默生到欧洲各国游历，结识了浪漫主义先驱华滋华斯和柯尔律治，接受了他们的先验论思想，对他思想体系的形成具有很大影响。 1832年至1833年间，爱默生到欧洲旅游，这段经历记载在《英国人的性格》（English Traits）（1856年）中。在旅途中，他遇到了威廉·华兹华斯、柯尔律治、约翰·斯图尔特·密尔和托马斯·卡莱尔。在旅程结束后，爱默生与凯雷仍继续联系，直至凯雷于1881年逝世，爱默生在美国充当凯雷的代理人。爱默生的旅游地点不限于英国，他也去了法国（于1848年）、意大利和中东。 爱默生回到波土顿后，在康考德一带从事布道。这时他的演说更接近于亚里士多德学派风格，重要演讲稿有《历史的哲学》、《人类文化》、《目前时代》等。 爱默生经常和他的朋友梭罗、霍桑、阿尔柯、玛格利特等人举行小型聚会，探讨神学、哲学和社会学问题。这种聚会当时被称为“超验主义俱乐部”，爱默生也自然而然地成为超验主义的领袖。 1835年，爱默生在美国马萨诸塞州康科特买了一所屋子，很快就成为城中最重要的市民之一。他在那里娶了第二任妻子利迪亚·杰克逊。并生下孩子：华都、艾伦、伊蒂丝和爱德华·爱默生。 2.文学生涯 1835年9月，爱默生和其他志趣相投的知识分子创立了“超验俱乐部”，直到1840年7月，爱默生用化名出版了他在1836年9月创作的第一本小品文《论自然》（Nature)。 1837年爱默生以《美国学者》为题发表了一篇著名的演讲辞，宣告美国文学已脱离英国文学而独立，告诫美国学者不要让学究习气蔓延，不要盲目地追随传统，不要进行纯粹的摹仿。另外这篇讲辞还抨击了美国社会的拜金主义，强调人的价值。被誉为美国思想文化领域的“独立宣言”。 一年之后，爱默生在《神学院献辞》中批评了基督教唯一神教派死气沉沉的局面，竭力推崇人的至高无上，提倡靠直觉认识真理。 1838年他获邀回到哈佛大学神学院为毕业典礼致词。他的评论立刻震惊整个新教徒的社会，因为他说明了当耶稣是一个人时，他并不是神（当时人们宁愿没有听到这样的言论）。因此，他被谴责是一名无神论者，并毒害了年轻人的思想，面对着这些批评他并没有作任何回应或辩护。在之后的40年，他没有再被邀请到哈佛大学演讲了，但在1880年代中期，他的立场规范成为一位论派的教义。 1840年爱默生任超验主义刊物《日晷》的主编，进一步宣扬超验主义思想。后来他把自己的演讲汇编成书，这就是著名的《论文集》。《论文集》第一集于1841年发表，包括《论自助》、《论超灵》、《论补偿》、《论爱》、《论友谊》等12篇论文。三年后，《论文集》第二集也出版了。这部著作为爱默生赢得了巨大的声誉，他的思想被称为超验主义的核心，他本人则被冠以“美国的文艺复兴领袖”之美誉。 1842年早期，爱默生的长子华都因罹患猩红热而夭折。爱默生在他的两部名作：一首挽歌和他的小品《经验》（Experience）中呈现了自己的悲痛。 1882年4月27日，去世。过世之后，被葬于马萨诸塞州康科特郡的斯利培山谷公墓。在2006年5月，也就是爱默生发表了“神学院致辞”168之后年，哈佛大学神学院宣布了UUA（Unitarian Universalist Association）的创立。 爱默生收录在《Collected Essays: First (1841) and Second (1844) Series》的很多散文，都被认为是100本巨著之一。 3.主要作品 《论自然》、《论超灵》、《自助》、1847年和1867年他分别出版两册《诗集》、《代表人物》(1850)、《英国人的性格》(1856)《论文集》(1841)和《论文集:第二辑》、《五月节及其他诗》。
亨利·戴维·梭罗(Henry David Thoreau，1817-1862) 美国作家、哲学家，超验主义代表人物，也是一位废奴主义及自然主义者，有无政府主义倾向，曾任职土地勘测员。梭罗除了被一些人尊称为第一个环境保护主义者外，还是一位关注人类生存状况的生态主义哲学家。写有许多政论，反对美国与墨西哥的战争，一生支持废奴运动。其思想深受爱默生影响，提倡回归本心，亲近自然。 1.生平简介 1817年7月12日，梭罗出生于马萨诸塞州康科德； 1833-1837年就读于哈佛大学。毕业后，就和他的哥哥一同在一个私立学校里教书，不久就脱离了。他父亲制造铅笔，亨利有一个时期也研究这行手艺。 1841年起他不再教书而转为写作。在拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生（Ralph Waldo Emerson）的支持下，梭罗在康科德住下并开始了他的超验主义实践。这时期，他放弃诗歌创作而开始撰写随笔，起先给超验主义刊物《日晷》（Dial）写稿。 1845年7月4日梭罗开始了一项为期两年的试验，他移居到离家乡康科德城不远的瓦尔登湖（Walden）畔的次生林里过一种简单的隐居生活。出版于1854年的散文集《瓦尔登湖》详细记载了他在瓦尔登湖畔两年又两个月的生涯。在瓦尔登湖生活期间，因为梭罗反对黑奴制（Negro Slavery），拒交“人头税”而被捕入狱。虽然他只在狱中蹲了一宿就被友人代交了税款保其出狱，但这一夜却激发他思考了许多问题。出来后曾有一些市民问他“为什么有许多人宁愿坐牢也不愿意交税”。为解释这一问题，他结合自己的亲身体验，写成了著名的政论《抵制国民政府》（Resistance to Civil Government，后改名为Civil Disobedience，《论公民的不服从》）。他所宣传的这种依靠个人的力量，“非暴力抵抗”的斗争形式对印度的甘地和美国黑人领袖马丁·路德·金产生了很大的影响。 他对于测量有一种天然的技巧，由于他的数学知识，并且他有一种习惯，总想深知他认为有兴趣的物件的大小与距离，再加上他对于康科德附近地域知道得非常详细，所以他渐渐地成了个土地测量员。 1847年9月6日离开瓦尔登湖，重新和住在康科德城的他的朋友兼导师拉尔夫·沃尔多·爱默生一家生活在一起，决定研究自然史。 1862年5月6日，时年仅44岁，梭罗因肺病医治无效病逝。 2.主要作品 《瓦尔登湖》 政论《论公民的不服从义务》（1849）、《没有规则的生活》（1863） 游记《马萨诸塞自然史》、《康科德及梅里马克河畔一周》、《缅因森林》等。