1、American Puritanism 殖民地时期( roughly from the settlement of America in the early 17th century through the end of the 18th) 一、 Benjamin Franklin 本杰明富兰克林 作品：1、Poor Richards Almanac 格言历书- A Collection of maxims, or proverbs, on the value of work and savings for success.2、The Autobiography 自传-“美国梦”的根源 3、参
2、与起草 独立宣言浪漫主义 American RomanticismThe Romantic Period stretches from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War. It is a period of the great flowering of American literature.The social and cultural background of RomanticismThe young Republic was flourishing into a politically, econo
3、mically and culturally independent country.The Romantic writings revealed unique characteristics of their own in their works and they grew on the native lands.The desire for an escape from society and a return to nature became a permanent convention of American literature.The American Puritanism as
4、a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values.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 mans societies as a s
5、ource of corruption.二、Edgar Allan Poe 埃德加爱伦 坡-poet, short story writer and literary critic (48 poems,70 short stories)He greatly influenced the devotees of “Art for arts sake.” He was father of psychoanalytic criticism (心理分析批评), and the detective story. 诗歌的精髓就是追求美 小说的主题常常是恐怖和死亡，其中还运用了象征手法。 The Poeti
6、c Principle : 1. The poem, should be short, readable at one sitting; 2. Beauty (the rhythmical creation of beauty); 3. Melancholy 忧伤(especially the death of a beautiful woman). 代表作：The Fall of the House of Usher 厄舍大厦的倒塌 Ligeia 莉盖亚 Annabel Lee 安娜贝尔 李 The Raven 乌鸦 The Cask of Amontillado 阿芒提拉多的酒桶-goth
7、ic novel 人物：蒙特利瑟 Montresor, 弗图纳多 Fortunato ，筵席上男人将喝醉的死对头哄骗至地窖并砌墙活埋的故事。 三爱默生Emerson = The chief spokesman of New England Transcendentalism 超验主义He was a descendent（后裔） of a long line of New England clergymen 牧师【pastor】.散文家、诗人、超验主义的哲学的主要倡导者。American TranscendentalismAs a philosophical and literary move
8、ment, American Transcendentalism (also known as “ American Renaissance”) flourshed in New England from the 1830s to the Civil War. It is the high tide of American romanticism and its doctrines found their greatest literary advocates in Emerson and Thoreau. Transcendentalists spoke for the cultural r
9、ejuvenation and against the materialism of American society.Transcendentalism 超验主义(+ H. D. Thoreau; Nathaniel Hawthorne; )The major features of Transcendentalism: The Transcendentalists placed emphasis on spirit, or the Oversoul, as the most important thing in the universe. 思想 超灵 宇宙 The Transcendent
10、alists stressed the importance of the individual. To them, the individual is the most important element of Society. 个体+ 社会 The Transcendentalists offered a fresh perception of nature as symbolic of the Spirit or God. Nature was not purely matter. It was alive, filled with Gods overwhelming presence.
11、 自然+上帝代表作：Nature论自然-the Bible of Transcendentalism by Emerson ； Self-Reliance 论自助 -是表达他的超验主义观点的最重要作品之一一 The American Scholar论美国学者 ； The Over-soul 论超灵四、Nathaniel Hawthorne 纳撒尼尔霍桑 - effected by 超验主义 He was born into a prominent Puritan family. One of the most ambivalent（矛盾的）writers in the American lit
12、erary history. 主要成就： 美国心理分析小说的开创者 浪漫主义小说家 心理小说家 代表作：Mosses from an Old Manse 古宅青苔; Twice-Told Tales 故事重述 ; The Marble Faun 玉石雕像; The House of the Seven Gables 带有七个尖角阁的房子 The Scarlet Letter红字 Many of his earlier stories had treated themes that led to The Scarlet Letter. Theme: Puritan severity toward
13、 sex and matrimony and its tendency to suppress bright color and true feelings. The Scarlet Letter红字 ： Hester Prynne-strong-willed, impetuous, a king of compassionate, maternal figure;Pearl-innocent, perceptive; Roger Chillingworth-a man deficient in human warmth, true evil in the story; Arthur Dimm
14、esdale-intelligent and emotional. Symbolism in his works Hawthorne is a master of symbolism, which he took from the Puritan tradition 清教徒传统and bequeathed to American literature in a revivified form. In his masterpiece, by using Pearl as a thematic symbol, Hawthorne emphasizes the consequence the sin
15、 of adultery has brought to the community and people living in that community. With the scarlet A as the biggest symbol of all, which is ambiguous, he proves himself to be one of the best symbolists.五、Herman Melville 赫尔曼 梅尔维尔 The early sailing experiences were rewarding. 代表作： White Jacket 白外衣 Billy
16、Budd毕利 伯德, Typee泰比, Omoo欧穆, Mardi玛地 . Moby Dick 1851 白鲸-百科全书式性质/ 海洋作品/动物史诗（ 熊 福克纳、老人与海 海明威、白鲸梅尔维尔） Moby Dick represents the sum total of Melvilles bleak view of the worldin which he lived. It is at once Godless and purposeless. Man in this universe lives a meaningless and futile life, meaningless be
17、cause futile.Once he attempts to seek power over it he is doomed. The idea that man can make the world for himself is nothing but a Transcendentalist folly. Moby Dick thus reveals the basic pattern of 19th century American life: loneliness and suicidal individualism in a self-styled democracy.(a neg
18、ative reflection upon Transcendentalism) Symbolism in Moby Dick： -It is regarded as the first American prose epic. It is not merely a whaling tale or sea adventure, considering that Melville is a great symbolist. It turns out to be a symbolic voyage of the mind in quest of the truth 寻找真理 and knowled
19、ge of the universe, a spiritual exploration into mans deep reality and psychology. -Different people on board the ship are representations of different ideas and different social and ethnic groups; facts become symbols and incidents acquire universal meanings; the Pequod isthe microcosm of human soc
20、iety and the voyage becomes a search for truth. The white whale, Moby Dick, symbolizes nature for Melville, for it is complex, unfathomable 难以理解的,malignant恶性的, and beautiful as well. 六H. D. Thoreau 梭罗 and his workWalden 瓦尔登湖 not only fully demonstrates Emersonian ideas of self-reliance but also deve
21、lops and tests Thoreaus own transcendental philosophy. 七Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 朗费罗Features of Longfellows poetic works1) lChief romantic tendencies as humanitarian attitude, love of nature and love of beauty.2) lThe first American poet to write narrative poems.3) lConventional style and subjects
22、4) lGenerally simple ideas expressed musically and powerfully.5) lSimplicity and detachment from the deep problems of contemporary life19 世纪美国最伟大的浪漫主义诗人 之一。传统派，励志型。 诗集： 夜吟Voices of the Night 歌谣及其他Ballads and Other Poems 伊凡杰琳Evangeline 海依华沙之歌The Song of Hiawatha 诗歌： 我射出一支箭 I Shot an Arrow. A Psalm of
23、 Life 生命颂/人生颂- 第一首被完整地介绍到中国的美国诗歌八、Walt Whitman 沃尔特 惠特曼 美国著名诗人、人文主义者，他创造了诗歌的自由体（Free Verse-without a fixed beat or regular rhyme scheme.），The first edition of Leaves of Grass 草叶集 was published in 1855. In this giant work, openness, freedom, and above all, individualism are all that concerned him. Wri
24、ting features of Whitman -A singer for the ideals of equality, democracy and human dignity. -Songs for himself, for the labour of common American people, natural creation, the independence of the country, love and friendship, and for the memorizing of President Lincoln. -Free verse, rhythmical unit,
25、 phonetic recurrence. 诗歌： 我歌唱自我Ones Self I Sing 噢，船长！ 我的船长！ O Captain! My Captain!九、Emily Dickinson（19 世纪唯一出名的女作家）-I Died for Beauty, because I could not stop for Death. 美国女诗人，狄金森一生都没有离开过自己的家乡，对她的诗歌风格产生直接影响的是爱默生的诗歌，她的诗歌预示了 20 世纪诗歌的诞生。 宅女，想象力，诗歌（死亡、爱情、失败、无标点） Whitman: society Dickinson: inner life of
26、 the individual Most of her poems are about death and immortality. Nature is to her both benevolent and cruel. Emily was an energetic and outgoing woman while attending the Academy and Seminary. Most of her poems are about life and nature. They are short; many of them are based on a single image or
27、symbol. 作品：要描绘一片草原 To Make a Prairie 最美妙的胜利感觉 Success Is Counted Sweetest 我是无名之辈 Im Nobody!The Age of Realism The war led many to question the assumptions shared by the transcendentalists -natural goodness, the optimistic view of nature and man, benevolent God. It taught men that life was not good,
28、man was not and God was not. As a literary movement, the Age of Realism came into existence after Romanticism with the Civil War It was a reaction against “the lie” of Romanticism and sentimentalism, and paved the way to Modernism. This literary interest in the so-called “reality” of life started a
29、new period in the American literary writing known as The Age of Realism. The three dominant figures of the period:William Dean Howells, Mark Twain, Henry James James wrote mostly of the upper reaches of American society. Howells concerned himself chiefly with middle class life. Twain dealt largely w
30、ith the lower strata of society. Mark Twain and Howells seemed to have paid more attention to the “life” of the Americans, and Henry James had apparently laid greater emphasis on the “inner world” of man. 十、Mark Twain 马克吐温 Writing: humor and local colorism The characteristics of local colorism: -Twa
31、in preferred to have his own region and people at the forefront of his stories. This particular concern about the local character of a region came about as “local colorism” a unique variation of American literary realism. -Local Colorism or Regionalism first appeared in the late 1860s and early seve
32、nties in America. Hamlin Garland defined local colorism as having “such quality of texture and background that it could not have been written in any other place or by anyone else than a native.” The ultimate aim of the local colorists is to create the illusion of an indigenous 土产的little world with q
33、ualities that tell it apart from the world outside. -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.代表作： Life on the Mississippi
34、密西西比河上 The Adventures of Tom Sawyer 汤姆索亚历险记 The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn 哈克贝里 费恩历险记 -(Mark Twains most representative work) The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn -The novel is written in a language that is totally different from the rhetorical language used by Emerson, Poe, and Melville. -His cha
35、racters, confined to a particular region and to a particular historical moment, speak with a strong accent, which is true of his local colorism. -The rich material of his boyhood experience on the Mississippi became the endless resources for his fiction, and the Mississippi valley and the West becam
36、e his major theme. -His humor, a kind of artistic style used to criticize the social injustice and satirize the decayed romanticism, is remarkable. 人物：Huckleberry Finn、Jim 、Tom Sawyer、Widow Douglas and Miss Watson、Pap The Duke and Dauphin (公爵和法国皇太子）Henry James 亨利詹姆斯 作品：The Portrait of a Lady 一个女士的画像
37、 Daisy Miller 黛西 密勒 The international theme: the meeting of America and Europe, American innocence in contact and contrast with European decadence and the moral and psychological complications arising therefrom. Like Hawthorne, James regarded evil as essentially of inward cause and repeatedly emphas
38、ized magnanimity and the beauty of goodness. Psychological Realism 心理现实主义 It is the realistic writing that probes deeply into the complexities of characters thoughts and motivations. And Henry James is considered the founder of psychological realism. He believedthat reality lies in the impressions m
39、ade by life on the spectator, and not in any facts of which thespectator is unaware. Such realism is therefore merely the obligation that the artist assumes to represent life as he sees it. American Naturalism 自然主义The impact of Darwins evolutionary theory 达尔文进化论 on the American thought and the 19th
40、century French literature on the American men of letters gave rise to another school of realism: American naturalism.The naturalists emphasized that the world was amoral 与道德无关的, that men and women had no free will, that lives were controlled by heredity 遗传 and environment, that the destiny of humani
41、ty was misery in life and oblivion 湮没 in death.代表作家 Stephen Crane；Frank Norris；Theodore Dreiser；Edwin Arlington Robinson；Upton Sinclair；Jack London；O HenryStephen Crane：Maggie: A Girl of the Streets街头女郎麦姬；The Red Badge of Courage；红色英勇勋章The Open Boat；海上扁舟Theodore Dreiser：Trilogy of Desire:1.The Finan
42、cier2. The Titan3. The Stoic； Sister Carrie；Jennie Gerhardt；An American TragedyO.Henry (William Sydney Porter)：The Gift of the Magi；The Cop and the anthemThe Modern Period The Modern Period ：The 1920s-1930s ( the second renaissance of American literature) 又称：-The Roaring Twenties (economically) -The
43、 Jazz Age (socially) -“lost” and “waste land” (spiritually)，其中，“lost ”来源：Gertrude Stein “waste land”来源 T.S.EliotThe historic and cultural background -The USAs participation in World Warmarked a crucial stage in the nations evolution to a world power. -By the second decade of the 20th century, the US
44、A had become the most powerful industrialized nation in the world. -There was a decline in moral standard and the first few decades of the 20th century was best described as a spiritual wasteland. There had been a big flush of new theories and new ideas in both social and natural sciences. Darwinism
45、 (Darwin), Socialism (Karl Marx), Psychoanalysis (Sigmund Freud)The Lost Generation The term “Lost Generation” came from Gertrude Stein, who had a salon in her house for English and American expatriates in Paris. The Phrase was a remark she made to a mechanic in Hemingways presence that “You are all
46、 a lost generation.” Gertrude Stein used the term to describe the post-World War I generation of American writers: men and women haunted by a sense of betrayal and emptiness brought about by the destructiveness of the war. The term is commonly applied to Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ezra P
47、ound, Sherwood Anderson, John Dos Passos, E.E. Cummings and some others. Winners of Nobel Prize for Literature during this period : Sinclair Lewis (1930) 第一个获奖的美国人(特点：Main Street, Babbitt); Eugene ONeill (1936); Pearl S. Buck (1938); T.S. Eliot (1948); William Faulkner (1949); Ernest Hemingway (1954
48、); John Steinbeck (1962)十一、F. Scott Fitzgerald 弗斯科特菲茨杰拉德 American Dream In the United States Declaration of Independence 独立宣言, our founding fathers: “held certain truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.“ . 作品 ：The Side of Paradise 人间天堂 The Beautiful and the Damned 漂亮的冤家 Flappers and Philosophers 姑娘们与哲学家们 Tales of the Jazz Age 爵士乐时代的故事 Tender is the Night 夜色温柔 The Crack-up 崩溃 The Last Tyc
