English-American Literature Reported by: Salas, Meia Ester T. BsEd2-Eng Reported by: Salas, Meia Ester T. BsEd2-Eng.

English-American Literature

Reported by:Salas, Meia Ester T.

BsEd2-Eng

2 New Yorkers created some of the most memorable characters & stories in Early American fiction.

Washington IrvingJames Fenimore Cooper

Washington Irving-published his Sketch Book in 1820, w/c introduced the unforgettable Ichabod Crabe & Rip Van Winkle, both of whom become enduring parts of America’s folklore.

William Thackeray called him the first “Ambassador” from the “the New World of Letters to the Old”

James Fenimore Cooper- son of wealthy land holder.- he was skeptical of democracy.- he invented several of the themes that would occupy the attention of later American novelists.

His Works are:The Spy (1821) – melodrama about RevolutionThe Pilot(1823)- sea story based on the career of John Paul Jones.

The most important of Cooper’s Novels are the 5 volumes in the leatherstocking series beginning with* The Pioneers (1823)* The Last of the Mohicans (1826)*The Deerslayer (1841) >these novels dealt with the rapid westward march of white settlement & destruction of the frontier.

>presented an idealized portrait of the woodsman.

>Natty Bumppo- figure of American myth.

Romanticism

-It is a movement in art, music, & literature that began in the late1700’s & continued into the first half of the 1800’s.-It is a period when reason was stressed as the best way to discover truth.- In contrast, Romanticism emphasized emotion & individual feelings over

reason & logic.

Followers of Romanticism:

William Cullen Bryant - was the 1st American poet to respond to the new movement.His poems are:- Thanatopsis (1821)- A forest Hymn (1825) – spoke of nature w/ affection & reverence.

Edgar Allan Poe- He earned a very little success in his brief life but;- He has had a great influence on European as well as American Literature in the years since his death.- His poetic theories insisting on beauty & emotional nature of poetry.- He pioneered in the mystery story & detective where he invented C. Auguste Dupin looks forward to a later fictional

Sherlock Holmes.

Poe’s tales of the grotesque are:* The black cat* The pit & the pendulum* The fall of the house of Usher

> It fascinated generations of readers.> He is “The Father of the Short Story”

The Early 1800’s

-New England Poets- Emarson, Fuller, & Thoreau- Histories- Nathaniel Hawthorne-Herman Melville