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Evolution of American Literature

Romanticism

1800-1840

Romanticism

What is romanticism?

What is romanticism?

Romanticism is a very strong emotional type of writing that can be dark; this writing follows the "5 I's of romanticism"

  • Intuition
  • Imagination
  • Inner experience
  • Innocence
  • Inspiration of nature

Romanticism & Modern day literature

Romanticism is a great part of what literature is today, as this set the start to the following movements. It is a great deal to our entertainment and modern day art, and influenced many. A modern day example that represents this is the movie twilight.

Authors

Authors & Writings

HENRY DAVID THOREAU

WALT WHITMAN

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

HERMAN MELVILLE

"Moby Dick"

"Walden"

"Leaves Of Grass"

"The Rhodora"

WALT WHITMAN

"The father of free-verse" or otherwise known as Walt Whitman. He is recognized as this because almost every poem before Whitman rhymed. He glorified nature largely in his writing. He created mainly free-verse poems and inspired many. While using supernatural qualities made him a leaning writer for romanticism.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

American literature has been greatly impacted by this gentlemen as he is credited for coming upon trancendentalism. However, he was also a romanticism writer and had been during his earlier writings; this work was dark and used supernatural concepts.

HERMAN MELVILLE

"Man who lived among canibals" or Herman Melville... by this name clearly, he was a romanticism writer who had very dark pieces. In the beginning, as well as other dark romanticism writers, hewould often criticize reform writers.

HENRY DAVID THOREAU

As many other of the romanticism writers i've listed, Thoreau is in the same boat for the dark gothic writing. However not limiting to that, but also about nature. Henry was a pretty great romanticism, and had even contributed to the beginning of the trancendentalism era.

Important Events

1

Spanish American war (1898)

Important events

2

During the romanticism period many historical events were going on. After the French and American Revolution, Romanticism came to be the first literary movement. With everything growing, changing,and adapting literature begun to do the same.

The War of 1812

2

3

Protests beginning to arise (Child Labor, Womens Suffrage, etc.)

4

Industrial Revolution was on-going! Lots of new ideas and inventions

Transcendentalism

1830-1850

Authors

Transcendentalism

What is Transcendentalism?

What is Transcendentalism?

Transcendentalism is the concept that life is related to nature. It is based of off of 4 basic premises.

Basic Premises:

#1- A person is the spiritual center of the universe

#2- The structure of the universe is the structure of ones self

#3- Accept that nature is full of mysteries and signs and we have to look for them

#4- A persons happiness depends of self-realization

Modern day literature & Transcendentalism

Transcendentalism writers focused on the issues on hand. Topics such as womens suffrage, education, equal rights, etc. This movement has inspired many people, even now people are still influenced. We gained and we have not, but because of this people are still fighting for what they believe.

Authors

AUTHORS

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

MARGARET FULLER

AMOS BRONSON ALCOTT

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING

"The Scarlet Letter"

"Flaxman"

"Concord Days"

"Slavery"

MARGARET FULLER

Fuller was a huge advocate for women, and believed women deserve education and rights just as equally as men; she was one of the first feminsts. She pushed people to fufill their highest potential, especially women. She was one of the first feminsts

WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING

"Apostle of Unitarianism", was a name that referred to Channing. He spoke about some topics like slavery, alcoholism, poverty, and battles. He had possibly very controversial opinions.

AMOS BRONSON ALCOTT

During this time period, Alcott was a teacher and would teach his students how to write the transcendentatalist way. He always encouraged students to ask questions and not to be afraid.

NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE

Hawthorne often spoke about societies corruption and its affect on his members. He was one of the best fictional writers during this time, and he enjoyed the optimism this era brought.

Important Events

1

Westward Expansion

2

The westward expansion was huge for Americans, as they were beginning to discover new, and beautiful places they have never seen. All of these new places inspired writers to writer about the beautiful places they are coming across, which became to be a new literary movement.

Economic Growth

Important Events

3

Oregon Trail

Realism

1860-1890

Realism

What is realism?

What is realism?

Conflict is crucial to any story or play. Using evidence from the text, discuss which antagonist you believe to have been the most significant in leading to a hero’s downfall as it appears in both Chopin’s “Story of an Hour” and Thayer’s “Casey at the Bat.”

Louise Mallard seems to be in distress realizing her husband has passed away, however as she went to be alone her mind pondered off into realizing she is free. Others also seemed to believe she is distraught, but that didn’t seem to be exactly the case. In the text, it mentions several times that she wants to be free and independent, “When she abandoned herself a little whispered word escaped her slightly parted lips. She said it over and over under her breath: "free, free, free!" The vacant stare and the look of terror that had followed it went from her eyes.” (Chopin 2) She loved her husband dearly–sometimes, but the thought of freedom and being free of his oppress made her ecstatic. She loved the idea of being on her own and being independent.

Realism is reality over imagination. To differ from romanticism, it is knowledge over intuition. These sort of writings are more personal and realistic-unlike fantasies. These stories are complex, with complex characters and situations. Think of it as how you would actually react.

Modern day Literature & Realism

Realistic fiction is a wonderful example of realism in modern day. Realistic fiction represnts things that happen in day-to-day life, but made up scenarios; just based off real-life. Many movies and shows represent this topic, it is fairly popular.

Authors

AUTHORS

THOMAS NELSON PAGE

MARK TWAIN

KATE CHOPIN

HENRY JAMES

"In Ole Virginia"

"A Bundle Of Letters

"The Story of an Hour"

"The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"

Henry James

James would tell his stories from different point of views, and would deep dive into his characters minds to tell the story. Henry james was a realist and was introducing POV's. He was also considered a key person on the transition from realism to modernism.

Mark Twain

Twain was a pretty well known realism writer, and would base his writing of emotion. He included current and previous events going on and morals. He was very intricate about his work, and spoke upon the current societal issues.

Thomas Nelson Page

Page and his family were impacted by the civil war, and because of this he centered his writing on soldiers experiences while recruited fot the war. Writing was Page's passion.

Kate Chopin

Chopin would often include situations she's surrounded by in her writing. In New Orleans where she was raised, she wrote about her struggles growing up there. She included their speech, their lifestyle, and how they lived.

Important Events

1

American Civil War

Important Events

This was a very diificult time for those residing in the United States, as were going into war (The Civil War). This is very important because this is a huge part of our history, and these realism authors lived through and experienced these events. Most people being affected by this, and sensing all these tough emotions. Friends and family being recruited, losing loved ones, while keeping your family and yourself together while going through all of this.

2

Abraham Lincoln to presidency

3

Pony Express

Naturalism

1860-1890

Naturalism

What is Naturalism?

What is naturalism?

Naturalism follows many of the following:

  • Glorifies nature
  • Speaker has no opinion-just an observer
  • Frankness
  • Pessmism
  • Talks about topics seen as inappropriate (Sex, affairs, abortion, death)
  • Often poor characters
  • A "survival of the fittest" ideal

Modern Day Literature & Naturalism

Naturalism helped normalize the once "inappropriate" topics of sex, abortion, affairs, sex, etc. In modern day literature, this is very normal to be spoken about and written about. There are several movies and shows that mention it casually, which back then this was not seen as appropriate or acceptable.

Authors

AUTHORS

UPTON SINCLAIR

STEPHEN CRANE

FRANK NORRIS

JACK LONDON

"The Jungle"

"The Law of Life"

"The Red Badge of Courage"

"McTeague: A Story of San Francisco"

Frank Norris

Norris was one of the very first naturalism authors, and inspired and influenced many authors to write about socialism including Upton Sinclair. Norris's writing wasn't exactly socialist views, but that is likely due to him not being open about it.

Jack London

'Survival of the fittest' was one the main concepts London had spoke of in his writing. The sort of ideas he wrote of, is what made him a naturalist author. After his piece, "The Call of the Wild" He longlastingly changed fiction from that point forward.

Stephen Crane

Stephen Crane was also one of the first naturalist authors, and quite honestly one of the most important. Crane's stories shared beautiful concepts, and several representing naturalism ideas. He was a realist writer before he helped kick off the naturalism era. He was very intrigued on environmentsl factors and what that does to you as a person.

Upton Sinclair

Sinclair was another great author of naturalism, as he was very clear and honest about what he wanted to talk about. He exposed the meat-packing industry with his piece, "The Jungle." After these were exposed, much safer practices were put into place.

Important Events

1

Civil war

2

Important Events

Abraham Lincoln Assassinated

During this naturalism era, the civil war was still ongoing. Naturalism spoke about these topics and what is happening behind the scenes. People in poverty, food was seized, inflation, sicknesses, etc. It really brought to light what the civillians were experiencing.

3

Pony Express Begins

Modernism

1915-1945

Modernism

What is modernism?

What is Modernism?

Modernism is based upon these 5 characteristics

Individualism: Modernists focused on indivduals and how they adapted to change

Experimentation: They begun to drop the old way of writing and experiment and play around with diction, syntax, and form!

Absurdity: Writers saw life as just 'absurd'.' They felt as if people were focusing on the wrong ideas, and even symbolized their ridiculousness in their work.

Symbolism: Modernists would write things to symbol another, and layered messages for readers to depicts and understand.

Formalism: Modernists viewing their work as a craft rather than creativity.

Modern Day Literature & Modernism

Modernism was a big part of influencing people to take a minute to appreciate your surroundings and what is around you, in hopes to see different prespectives and understanding and analyzing the bigger picture. This is very common today as now we have mystery books and shows displaying families going through changes. An example of this could be the tv show, the fosters.

Authors

AUTHORS

ERNEST HEMINGWAY

EE CUMMINGS

ROBERT FROST

LANGSTON HUGHES

"The Sun Also Rises"

"Since Feeling is First"

"The Road Not Taken"

"Catch"

ee cummings

ee cummings was a quite briliant author of this period, he was very unique and nothing even similar to this man. He had his own guidelines for grammatical instances, and his writing pretty clearly reflected his personality. He was a very interesting and one-of-a-kind man.

Ernest Hemingway

Ernest was also an interesting man with all sorts of ideas, as his stories were the same. He shared in his stories how the war was affectcing the people, and how it played out.

Langston Hughes

Hughes was an African American rights activist in a form of writing, as he would write about equality, African-American culture, and several other topics-even if they were controversial he still made himself a voice. He did this , even with adding humor and spirituality to use in his work.

Robert Frost

Frost wrote relatable poems, and people thoroughly enjoyed all of the modernists new way of writing and how each writer is unique and apart from others. Frost especially, was a well-known poet during this era for his unique writing style.

Important Events

1

World War I

Important Events

During this era, a lot of new thing were hitting America and with no chance to catch a breath. The roaring 20's, America was in relatively good standing. Flappers became very popular, which drove some people mad. Now in the 30's things begin to go downhill and we hit an all time low economic state, The Great Depression. Finally, we have last but not least WWII. This gave the modernists plenty of topics to speak out about, and how all these events affected society.

2

Great Depression

3

World War II

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