LITERATURA USA 15.11.2010
WYKŁAD 22.11.2010
29.11.2010
6.12.2010
Making of a National Literature (1800 - 1865)
Part 1
Historical background
Expanding territories
Immigrants are coming
Shift from agriculture to industry
Steamboat
Locomotive
Cotton gin
Abolitionist Movement
Native Americans removal
Women's movement
Debating societies, lyceum movements
Newspapers and magazines
William Lloyd Garrison
Founded the anti-slavery journal, to promote the Abolitionist Movement
“The Trial of Tears”
1830 - the US Government forced the removal of Native Americans
Washington Irving (1783 - 1859)
One of the 1st American writers to achieve international fame
His works
“Salmagundi” (1807, 1808) magazine: satirical essays about social climbers, politicians, military men, critics, belles written by W. Irving, his brother William and by James K. Paulding.
“A History of New York from the beginning of the world to the end of the Dutch Dynasty” - 1809; written under the name of Dietrich Knickerbocker.
“The Sketch Books of Geoffrey Grayon Gent” - 1820; a collection of tales and sketches including “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legends of Sleepy Hollow”
W. Irving's other collections
“Life and Voyages of Columbus” 1828, etc.
- historical books
W. Irving's style
Humour - it's not what he says, but how he says it
Exaggerates with a straight face
Makes ironic remarks
Says the opposite of what he means
Uses long sentences and many words of Latin derivation
Exaggerates grandly the seriousness of situations
W. Irving embraces the spirit of the new Romantic movement
An emphasis upon emotion
A great interest in the picturesque elements of the past
Enthusiasm about portraying national life and character
Drew from German literature for the suggestion of legends
Master of description (sights, colors, sounds, feelings)
Creator of an atmosphere indicating mystery and evil
Rip Van Winkle
Forerunner of Romanticism
Rip - a man of nature
Supernatural phenomena
The genre used (legend)
Nostalgia for the past
Concern for individual freedom
Love for the beauty of the natural landscape
Rip starts a certain tradition of American heroes - the counter-hero (negative but we like him)
James Fenimore Cooper
His works
“The Pilot”, 1823 - a sea novel
“Precaution”, 1820 - a dynastic novel of manners, political satire and allegory
“The Spy”, 1821 - about a secret agent Harvey Birch, who spied upon the British during the Revolutionary War (Cooper's 1st successful novel)
“Leatherstocking Series” - 5 novels, uniquely American, with a frontier setting, including Indians as characters and the westward migration as the social background (American frontier of 1740 - 1804).
Tales
Each incoming ware displaces the earlier the ongoing and inevitable ware of settlers is seen not only as gains, but also as losses; deep tensions between the lone individual and society, etc.
“Leatherstocking Tales”
Based on history; full of action, danger, escapes, brave deeds; arrival of the 1st Whites as scouts, soldiers, traders and frontiersmen; the coming of poor, rough settler families.
“The Pioneer” (1823) - Natty Bumpoo (White scout) is middle-aged and ahs difficulty setting in a “civilized” community; his friend Chiugachgook (Mohican Indian) dies despite Natty's efforts to save him.
“The Last of the Mohicans” (1826) - Bumpoo is called Hawkeye
“The Prairie”
“The Pathfinder” (1840)
“The Deerslayer” (1841) - a young Natty Bumpoo (Deerslayer) kills an Indian in a fight who gives him the name Hawkeye
To read the story of Natty Bumpoo from youth to old age one must read these novels not in the order of composition, but following this order: 5, 2, 4, 1, 3.
The American Frontier
The Leatherstocking novels move the reader back in time, further into the American past, emphasizing the youth and the innocence.
American Hero
Natty Bumpoo
Outstanding woodman
Peacefull man adopted by Indian tribe
Loves nature and freedom
Famous frontiersman in American literature
Literary forerunner of many cowboy and backwood heroes
An idealized individualist who is better than the society he protects
Is pure, with ethical values
Can distinguish good from evil
Complains about the destruction of wilderness
So-called AMERICAN ADAM (natural wisdom, morality, reliance on action and instinct rather than thought, reasoning)
Questions:
Are human beings basically good or evil?
What kind of society is needed in the New World?
Cooper's writing style
Long, complex descriptions
Careless about details in his wording
The characters: men seem self-important, while ladies are sentimental
At times the characters seem to be reading their lines, instead of talking naturally
W. Irving vs. J. F. Cooper
Irving searched Europe looking for themes. He imported and adopted European legends, culture and history.
Cooper grasped the essential myth of America - the wilderness and created distinctive American characters and themes.
Making of National Literature (1800 - 1065)
Part 2
Romanticism - a particular attitude toward the realities of man, nature and society.
Characteristics
Free rebellious spirit
Individualism
Intuition
Inner life, importance of the subconscious
Strangeness and mystery
Fantastic visions
Enthusiasm for primitive life
Nature (sources of the knowledge of the primitive, refuge from civilization, revelation of God to the individual)
Idealizing the “noble savage” - on individual not spoiled by luxury and sophistication
Stress on emotion rather than reason
Subjectivity in form and meaning
Edgar Allan Poe (1809 - 1849)
Poe's mother -> a talented English actress, Elizabeth Arnold
Poe's father -> a much less talented American (Irish) actor, David Poe. He was an alcoholic who deserted his wife.
Poe's mother died of consumption.
Poe is taken to the home of John Allan and wife (a wealthy tobacco merchant)
Relations with his foster father
GAINS
Poe spent time in England, beginning his education in private schools
Admitted to the University of Virginia and later to the U. S. Military Academy at West Point.
SUFFERING
Given a small allowance at the University of Virginia, Poe turns to gambling, later got no allowance at all, and could not pay his gambling debts;
Dismissed from West Point for violations of academy regulations.
Poe's first marriage
Poe married his thirteen -year-old cousin Virginia Clemm in 1835
This marriage gave his life some affection and structure
In 1842, Virginia ruptured a blood vessel while singing
When she died in 1847, he fell into an abnormal state of mind and body
Poe's character
Had an unstable temperament
Was insecure, troubled, disturbed, neurotic, unhappy, with reasonless, fears.
Led a life of outward struggle and inner turmoil
Moved from Richmond Virginia) to New York, then to Philadelphia, and finally to Baltimore
Maintained real and varied interest in the world around him (letters, reviews, essays), not only in literature but also in theatre, architecture, music, painting, commerce, education, government and science.
Kept the pose and beliefs of a souther aristocrat
Has been described by others as a: sadomasochist, drug addict, sex pervert, egomaniac.
Poe's ways of writing (5 examples)
Had genius when he was healthy
Had strong ambitious and enormous capacity for work
Used his experience in his writing
He meticulously revised what he regarded his best work
Had a logical mind (analyzing literary works in a magazine he edited - one of the best critics of his day)
The chief arm of the story writer should be to create an effect upon the reader's mind and feelings
The writer should first decide what effect he wanted to create and then make every event and word help to achieve it
Poe was a master of atmosphere, picturing and suspense (like today's psychothrillers)
Poe invented the detective story - the “ratiocinative” tale. The devices used in it.
A brilliant detective
The device o the “baffled friend” - the detective's companion is not good at solutions, the detective tells him the story
At the ends - the detective dissolves his surprising solution and “elucidates” step by step the reasoning that led to it
By eliminating all the impossibilities, you arrive at the truth
The foil is rather stupid
The official guardians of the law are unimaginative and blundering
The “locked room” convention
The unjust suspicion
Deduction by putting one's self in another's position
Poe's contribution to literary theory
Poet as a maker
“The Philosophy of Composition” or “How I wrote the Raven” (1846) - famous account of Poe's poetic practice
Every effect is planned, poetry is not spontaneous, it is strategic
There are no accidents, no effects of inspiration
Poe's poetry
Ideal subjects of poetry; beauty, melancholy, and death
- beauty - “the essence of the poem”
- sadness - the tone of beauty's “highest manifestation”
Has musical patterns, uses incantation, hypnotic rhythm and verbal melody, creating a sense of mystery
Repetition of sounds
The poet shares the world beyond phenomenal experience like a priest, shaman, or magician with almost divine knowledge, leading readers to the “promised land”, do they forget the ordinary world -> e.g. the poem “Dreamland”
Poe's themes (5 examples)
May be connected with the mental state of the author, but do not explain the work itself
Confinement
Burden of a doubt
Death of a beautiful woman; the seductive nature of death
Beauty
Alienation
Loss, despair
Violence
Double self (split - personality)
Inner conflict
Life after death
Scientific discoreries (trips into space, under the seas)
Urban sociology
Poe's hero
Lonely, alienated, tormented outsider
Driven to the brink of madness
Living through crises of consciousness
Experiences terror of the soul, anxiety and impulse toward self-destruction
Sinking into nightmare
Exploring the irrational, flirting with the anti-rational
Poe's setting
Mysterious, exotic, remote and away from the ordinary, phenomenal world
The sights and sounds ate fleeting, ephemeral
Scenes are shadowy, with dusky colors and dim lighting
Poe's works
“Tamerlane and Other Poems” (1827) - first volume of poems
“Al Adraaf” (1829) - second volume of poems
“Metzengerstein: A Tale in Imitation of the German” (1832) - first published story
“A Message Found in a Bottle” (1833) - won him a literary prize -> gothic fiction
“The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym” (1838) - a long prose work
“The Murders in the Rue Morgue”
“The Fall of the Mouse of Usher” (1839) - appeared in Burton's Gentleman's Magazine (Poe was its editor)
“Tales of Grotesque and Arabesque” (1841) - two-volume work
“The Raven and Other Poems”
“The Bells” - Poe's most extreme phonic experiment (capturing the actual sound of bells)
Unlucky in death as he had been in life thanks to:
An editor, critic and anthologist
Rufus Wilmot Grisworld
Wrote a long obituary which appeared in the “NY Tribune”, a memorial article signed by “Ludwig”
Wrote a biographical article called “Memoir of the author” included in an 1850 volume of the collected works
Depicted Poe as a drunk, drug-addict madman
`re-wrote' some of Poe's letters and probably forged letters entirely
Defending Poe
People come to the defense of Poe's reputation (N. P. Wills, Mrs. Whitman, George Graham)
Baudelaire exposed Poe's cause, translated his writing and wrote memorable essay on him. Poe became a major influence in French literature, particularly upon the symbolist school.
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804 - 1864)
Life
Tied to Salem, Massachusetts
His relatives were wealthy and influential citizens
Talented from the childhood, reading a lot and retelling what he read
Blot of family history and Hawthorne's sense of guilt - in 1862 Hawthorne' great-grandfather, John H. a judge in the Salem Witchcraft trials had condemned all three women (Goody Cloyse, Goody Cory, Martha Carrier) to be hanged
Knew he wanted to be a writer
Studied at Bowdoin College at his uncle's expense, returned to Salem
Happy marriage to Sophia
Working as a measurer of coal and salt in the Boston Customhouse
Living in Old Manse in rural Concord, Massachusetts
His room “an owl's nest”, hiding place
Sometimes he thought that it would be desirable
His works
Inner monologue - “dreaming in words”, outlining books in his head, shy men substitute for spoken conversation
Sense of music, sense of rhythm
Latinized vocabulary and formal sentence structure not always appropriate to the misty emotions he was trying to express
Mirrors - “a kind of window to spiritual world” - looking-glasses, burnished shields, cooper pots, fountains, lake's pools, anything that could reflect the human form
His tales begin with the idea of guilt, or pride, or intolerance, and he moves from there into complex personal relationships, into the secret mysteries of the human heart
“a certain remoteness” from actuality, paced in the post or in scenes removed from ordinary experience (Hawthorne chooses the setting and creates the circumstances)
There is sufficient reality, warmth and humour in his fiction to win sympathetic readers
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Made great art out of: ambiguity, irresdution, a refusal to close off debate or the search for truth
Was a moralist: concerned with moral errors of egoism and pride
Was aware of the complexity of human character and relationships
Aware of how subtle moral judgements have to be and how we have to understand and feel sympathy before we judge somebody
His characters seem to be outside of life, set apart by pride, egotism, innocence, guilt
Discovering the inner life, torments and tensions, fires hidden within every human being
“The Scarlet Letter” (1850)
A masterpiece of American literature
Evolving set of meanings: Adultery, Able, Angel, Art (A)
Set in Puritan New England
Tells of passionate, forbidden love affair between a sensitive, religious young man, Reverend Arthur Dimnesdale and Hester Prynne
The novel highlights
Obsession with morality
Sexual pepresion
Guilt and confession
Spiritual salvation
Conflict -> life inside and social domain
Constrictions and repression
Law and freedom
Condition of a woman in a society (separation and subjection)
Symbols (an object assumes multiple possible significances)
Hester -> love, Arthur -> spirit, Chillingworth -> mind
His other works
“The House of 7 Gables”
“Fanshawe” (1828)
“Mosses from an Old Manse”
“Twice-Told Tales” (1837, 1842, 1851) -> collection of short stories
Herman Melville (1819 - 1891)
Born in NY City
His father was an importing merchant, goes bankrupt and dies, Herman is 12 at the time
Junior clerk in a bank, helping on his uncle's form
Signed on a merchant ship St. Lawrence as a “boy” and sailed in the summer of 1829 for Liverpool
Signed up for another sailing ship Acushnet - a trip to the South Pacific to hunt whales
Dedicated his greatest book “Moby Dick” to Nathaniel Hawthorne
Melville admired Hawthorne's work
Wrote an article “Hawthorne's and His Mosses”, citing it's power of blackness
“Moby Dick, or the Whale”
Begins with a character directly addressing the reader
“Call me Ishmael”. He feels it is high time to go to sea
The sip is full of fascinating characters: the mysterious Fedallah, American-Indian, harpooner, Tashtego, African, Deggoo
The main character: Captain Ahab
Appears in the 28th chapter
Has iron (wooden) leg, a token of his last encounters with the legendary white whale, Moby Dick
He is gloomy, sinister
“ungodly”, “god-like man”
Dominates everything - crew, book and reader
Loses himself “Is Ahab, Ahab?” - lack of control
Universal ideas
“monkey rope bonds” - Ishmael holding the rope which is tied to him, Queequeg the harpooner is going down - the sense of connectedness
“fast fish” - it's your fish if you caught it (people controlling others)
“loose fish” - a fair game for anyone who can catch it first (e.g. Poland to Czar)
“The Whiteness of the Whale”
History suggest that white colour is purity: in contrast Melville examines the horror of whiteness, allied with atheism, nihilism and nothingness
Whiteness - absence of colour, Moby Dick can never be captured
The Whale - cosmic inscrutability (mystery), the unsearchable infinite. Ahab's ascription of malevolence (ill-will) to the whale is his interpretation, while starbuck insists that Moby Dick is merely a “dumb brute”.