Академический Документы
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AN OUTLINEAMERICAN LITERATURE
Puritan Times 1650-1750
Content: Errand into the wilderness; be a city upon a hill; Christian utopia Genre/Style: sermons, diaries; personal narratives; captivity; narratives jeremiads; written in plain style Effect: instructive reinforces authority of the Bible and church Historical Context: a person's fate is determined by God all people are corrupt and must be saved by Christ
Authors
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) "first great man of letters," embodied the Enlightenment ideal of humane rationality. Practical yet idealistic, hardworking and enormously successful, Franklin recorded his early life in his famous Autobiography. Hector St. John de Crvecoeur (1735-1813) Another Enlightenment figure is Hector St. John de Crvecoeur, whose Letters from an American Farmer (1782) gave Europeans a glowing idea of opportunities for peace, wealth, and pride in America. Thomas Paine (1737-1809) pamphlet Common Sense Washington Irving (1789-1859) The Devil and Tom Walker; The Legend of the Sleep Hollow; Rip Van Winkle James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851) The Last of the Mohicans
Authors
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882) essay "Self-Reliance" Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862) essay "Civil Disobedience" Walt Whitman (1819-1892) His famous Leaves of Grass (Oh!
Captain My Captain) -1855
Effect: today in literature we still see portrayals of alluring antagonists whose evil characteristics appeal to one's sense of awe; today in literature we still see stories of the persecuted young girl forced apart from her true love
Historical Context: industrial revolution brings ideas that the "old ways" of doing things are now irrelevant
AUTHORS
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) Dickinson's 1,775 poems continue to intrigue critics, who often disagree about them. Some stress her mystical side, some her sensitivity to nature; many note her odd, exotic appeal. One modern critic, R.P. Blackmur, comments that Dickinson's poetry sometimes feels as if "a cat came at us speaking English." Her clean, clear, chiseled poems are some of the most fascinating and challenging in American literature. Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) The House of the Seven Gables; The Scarlet Letter (1850) Herman Melville (1819-1891) Moby-Dick
Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) "The Raven" (1845); Annabel Lee; The Bell. Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque (1840) : The Black Cat; The Fall of the House of Usher Frederick Douglass (1817-1895) Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass; An American Slave
Realism
1855-1900
Content: common characters not idealized (immigrants, laborers); people in society defined by class society corrupted by materialism; emphasizes moralism through observation Style: novel and short stories are important; prefers objective narrator; dialogue includes many voices from around the country; does not tell the reader how to interpret the story Effect: social realism: aims to change a specific social problem; aesthetic realism: art that insists on detailing the world as one sees it Historical Context: Civil War brings demand for a "truer" type of literature that does not idealize people or places
AUTHORS
Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) (1835-1910) Adventures of Huckleberry Finn; Life on the Mississippi Henry James (1843-1916) The Portrait of a Lady (1881); The Bostonians (1886) Stephen Crane (1871-1900) The Red Badge of Courage Jack London (1876-1916) The Son of the Wolf (1900); The Call of the Wild (1903) and The Sea-Wolf (1904) Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945) An American Tragedy
AUTHORS
Gertrude Stein (1874-1946) developed an abstract, experimental prose poetry. collection Tender Buttons (1914) Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) The Sun Also Rises(1926) F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940) The Great Gatsby; This Side of Paradise William Faulkner (1897-1962) The Sound and the Fury (1929) Poets: Ezra Pound (1885-1972); T.S. Eliot (1888-1965); Robert Frost (1874-1963);
Modernism 1900-1946
Content: dominant mood: alienation and disconnection; people unable to communicate effectively; fear of eroding traditions and grief over loss of the past
Genre/Style: highly experimental; allusions in writing often refer to classical Greek and Roman writings; use of fragments, juxtaposition, interior monologue, and stream of consciousness; writers seeking to create a unique style
Effect: common readers are alienated by this literature Historical Context: overwhelming technological changes of the 20th Century; World War I was the first war of mass destruction due to technological advances; rise of the youth culture
Authors
Harlem Renaissance:
Jean Toomer (1894-1967) Cane (1923) Richard Wright (1908-1960) his autobiography Black Boy (1945);Native Son (1940) Zora Neale Hurston (1903-1960) Mules and Men (1935) Toni Morrison (1931- ) Beloved (1987)
Modernism 1900-1946
Sinclair Lewis (1885-1951) Babbitt (1922). John Dos Passos (1896-1970) The 42nd Parallel (1930), 1919 (1932), and The Big Money (1936). John Steinbeck (1902-1968) The Grapes of Wrath (1939); Of Mice and Men(1937)
Postmodernism 1946-Present
Content: people observe life as the media presents it, rather than experiencing life directly; popular culture saturates people's lives; absurdity and coincidence Genre/Style: mixing of fantasy with nonfiction; blurs lines of reality for reader; no heroes; concern with individual in isolation; detached, unemotional usually humorless; narratives; metafiction; present tense; magic realism Effect: erodes distinctions between classes of people; insists that values are not permanent but only "local" or "historical" Historical Context: Post-World War II prosperity; media culture interprets values
AUTHORS
James Baldwin (1924-1987) Go Tell It On the Mountain (1953) Saul Bellow (1915- ) The Victim (1947) Eugene O'Neill (1888-1953) Long Day's Journey Into Night (1956) Arthur Miller (1915- ) Death of a Salesman Tennessee Williams (1911-1983) The Glass Menagerie (1944) and A Streetcar Named Desire (1947). Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980) Ship of Fools (1962) John Updike (1932- ) Rabbit, Run (1960) Jack Kerouac (1922-1969) On the Road (1957) Tom Wolfe (1931-) The Right Stuff (1979), and a novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities (1987) Philip K. Dick (1928-1982) Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?; Minority Report Walter Mosley (1952 -) Devil in A Blue Dress (1990) A Red Death (1991);White Butterfly (1992) Gone Fishin(1997); Bad Boy Brawly Brown (2002) Edward Albee (1928- ) Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1962)
ELEMENTS OF FICTION
5 MAJOR ELEMENTS
PLOT
The main point of intrigue or suspense -- what happens in the story. Unlike the storys theme (which can be applied to life situations), the plot is unique to each story. The plot usually involves several steps: EXPOSITION: Introducing the characters, establishing the setting, and laying the groundwork for a problem to develop CONFLICT: the major problem -- may be both External and Internal COMPLICATIONS: Just as it says, problems pile on. CLIMAX: the highest point of conflict RESOLUTION: everything winds down to the conclusion.
THEME
The broader subject or topic of the story. What type of universal statement is the author making? What is this story really about? Is it about the dangers of jealousy? the consequences of your decisions or actions? Is the author concerned about nature? survival? prejudice? the importance of making independent decisions?
SETTING
WHEN and WHERE the story occurs. If the author doesnt tell you exactly, look for hints. For example, if it occurs on Mars, chances are that the story takes place in the future in space. Be sure to note whether it takes place in the past, present or future and whether it takes place on land, in the water, in the air, or in space. Then add more details to be as specific as possible. Setting is critical in establishing the mood (atmosphere) and making the story and characters credible.
CHARACTERS
In a short story, there may be only one character. If there are quite a few, chances are that only one or two are the main characters. In a novel, there are usually several major characters as well as several minor characters. Why are certain characters considered to be major? Are the characters static or dynamic (do they remain the same or do they change?) Are the characters round (multi-dimensional) or flat (one-dimensional)?
POINT OF VIEW
This is NOT your opinion of the story. It refers to who is telling the story. A story can be told from different points of view. You are probably most familiar with the first person (I) narrative and with the omniscient narrative (where the story changes viewpoint, depending on who is talking or thinking). Get in the habit of looking at the point of view; sometimes you learn more about the story that way