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The Age of Romanticism (1798-1832)

The romantic period is an age of poetry , especially in lyric and narrative poetry 1. Reason: the Enlightenment

2. Time: from the latter half of the eighteenth century to the Civil War 3. The representatives

George Gordon Byron (拜伦): Don Juan 《唐璜》

John Keats (济慈): Ode to a Nightingale 《夜莺颂》

Jane Austen (奥斯丁): Pride and Prejudice《傲慢与偏见》

Washington Irving

ⅰHe was the fist American author who explored native themes and won an international reputation. (By Sketch Book)

ⅱHis works: The Sketch Book, Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleeping Hollow

ⅲCharacteristic: His popularity came from his quiet humor, taste of satire, and his sticking to values of an older civilization amid the rising materialism and commercialism of the times.

WAL T WHITMAN

Basic information : Walt Whitman (1819—1892), born on Long Island, New York. He was the best and the most influential romantic poet in the 19th century. Walt Whitman once worked as a printer, a wandering school teacher, and a compositor. works : leaves of Grass

Dump-Taps Memories of President Lincoln

Democratic Vistas

● He developed a unique style of free verse, without rhyme or a fixed rhythm but distinguished by exotic and vulgar language and impressive repletion.

● His Leaves of Grass manifested America’s ideal of democratic equality and intense individuality.

● In Song of Myself, individualism, a major theme of American literature, is raised to a new height.

Realism

● Realism appears the period between the end of the Civil War and the beginning of World War. At the same time,it as a literary movement appeard in the United Stated about half a century later than in Europe. I t aimed at an interpretation of the actualities of any

aspect of life,free from subjective prejudice, idealism,or romanticcolor.William Dean Howells defined realism as 〝nothing more and and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material 〞

The represents are Mark Twain and Henry James.

Mark Twain ,psendonym of Samuel Langhome Clemens, is considerd the 〝the father of modern American literature〞.He is a humorist, statirist and pessimist. He was born ineFlorida ,Missouri, on the Mississippi River on November30 ,1835.He is one of America’s and foremost realists and humorists.He dealt largely with the lower strata of society ,as he himself puts it :he had never tired in even on single little instence to help cultivate the cultivated classes, but always hunted for bigger game –the masses. His contrubtion to development of realism and to America lterature as a whole was partly through his theories of localism in American foction ,and partly through his colloquial style..He is also known as a social critic,In all his life ,Mark Twain loved his life and ● ● ● Mark Twain(1896-1940)

people and freedom and justice ,felt a pride in human dignity .He hated tyranny and iniquity ,despised meanness and cruety, and took his role as a critic in a serious and responsible manner , His writings ,novels letters ,noteboooks pamphlets and all included ,touch upon almost every issue of his time such as politics ,capital and labor slavery ,US imperialism abroad ,and the persecution of the Jews .Just as Phillip Forner observes, 〝he took the side of defenseless ,and fought corruption ,privilege and abuse wherever he found them with a fierce〞.

His works

The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras Country. Innocent Abroad

The Gilded Age The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn The Man That Corrupted Handleburg

The Myterious Stranger MODERN AMERICAN LITERATURE

(1914- ) Influence:

1. Social and historical background: 1920s 2. Marxism 3. Freudianism: id, ego, superego.

4. 1930s 5. 1950s-1960 the Beat Generation

6. 1980s-1990 Multiculturalism

The “Roaring Twenties”(骚动的20年代) was the term to refer to the period during which the post-war generation rebelled against former ideals and values and indulged themselves in pleasure.

λ Gertrude Stein: poets as F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Ezra Pound, E. E. Cummings, and T. S. Eliot were guided by her. Her remark to Hemingway, “You are all a lost generation(迷茫的一代),” was used as a preface to the latter’s novel The Sun Also Rises.

λ Freudianism: his emphasis on the unconscious aspects in the anatomy of the personality: the id, the ego, and the superego.

λ Ezra Pound: He became the chief spokesman for the Imagist group. His famous two-line poem “In a Station of the Metro”. His Cantos was a lifelon g production of epic proportions.

λ T. S. Eliot : “The Waste Land《荒原》”

λ Robert Frost: stuck to conventional forms. His success as a poet lay in his graceful style and novel ideas ingeniously conveyed through symbols.

λ Sherwood Anderson: Winesburg , Ohio《小镇崎人》. The Great Gatsby《了不起的盖斯比》.

λ Ernest Hemingway ：created a new type of characters whose basic response to life appealed very strongly to his contemporaries. The so-called Hemingway code hero incarnated a complete break with the old values, a moral code of endurance, of “grace under pressure”, and an unswerving pursuit for all rewards of life.

λ William Faulkner: The Sound and the Fury《喧哗和骚动》， he used techniques of stream of consciousness(意识流) and multiple point of view(多视角)

λ Sinclair Lewis : the noveli st and America’s first recipient of the Nobel Prize for literature.

λ Eugene O’Neill: Desire under the Elms《榆树下的欲望》

λ Tennessee Williams: The Glass Menagerie 《玻璃动物园》. A Streetcar Named Desire 《欲望号街车》. Death of a Salesman《推销员之死》

λ

λ

λ Richard Wright: Native Son《土生子》 Ralph Ellison: Invisible Man《隐形人》 J. D. Salinger: The Catcher in the Rye《麦田里的守望者》

Robert Frost

Robert Frost was born in San Francisco, but he grew up in England. Frost did not follow the free verse fashion of his contemporaries. He was traditional in form, and his poetic language was unelevated, plain, clearly conveying a feeling in harmony with nature. He intended his poetry to provided ideas by means of images. He once said that he prefer the synecdoche in poetry. He seemed universally calm and controlled, standing in the middle of the road viewing the good and evil, beautiful and ugly

Works “Mending wall” appears to show Frost at work with a neighboring farmer, helping to repair a stone wall that separates their 2 farms. Two different attitudes to the wall represent two different philosophies about life.” the road not taken” the speaker utters a sigh because sometimes in life one has to make a decision when facing tow roads without knowing where the road lead to. “Fire and Ice” is woven to reflect upon the real threats against the destiny of mankind. “Dust of Snow’ is a beautiful little poem with an artistic conception much like that of a Chinese draws a simple scene in “Design” , the poem searches deep and offers thought-provoking speculations. “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” has been variously interpreted in terms of the symbols in the work. 托马斯•哈代（Thomas Hardy，1840-1928），英国诗人、小说家。他是横跨两个世纪的作家，早期和中期的创作以小说为主，继承和发扬了维多利亚时代的文学传统；晚年以其出色的诗歌开拓了英国20世纪的文学。

Thomas Hardy

Thomas Hardy was born at Higher Bockhampton, Dorset, on June 2, 1840, where his father worked as a master mason and builder. From his father he gained an appreciation of music, and from his mother an appetite for learning and the delights of the countryside about his rural home. Hardy was frail as a child, and did not start at the village school until he was eight years old. One year later he transferred to a new school in the county town of Dorchester.

In 1870 Hardy was sent to plan a church restoration at St. Juliot in Cornwall. There he met Emma Gifford, sister-in-law of the vicar of St.Juliot. She encouraged him in his writing, and they were married in 1874.

Hardy published his first novel, Desperate Remedies in 1871, to universal disinterest. But the following year Under the Greenwood Tree brought Hardy popular acclaim for the first time. As with most of his fictional works, Greenwood Tree incorporated real places around Dorset into the plot, including the village school of Higher Bockhampton that Hardy had first attended as a child. The success of Greenwood Tree brought Hardy a commission to write a serialized novel, A Pair of Blue Eyes, for Tinsley's Magazine. Once more Hardy drew upon real life, and the novel mirrors his own courtship of Emma.

代表作品

《计出无奈》 The Desperate Remedies(1871)

《绿茵林下》Under the Greenwood Tree(1872)

《一双湛蓝的秋波》A Pair of Blue Eyes

《德伯家的苔丝》Tess of the D'Urbervilles,(1891)

《远离尘嚣》Far From Madding Crowd(1874)

《无名的裘德》Jude the Obscure(1896)

《还乡》Return the Native(1878)

《威塞克斯诗集》Wessex Poems(1898)

《卡斯特桥市长》The Mayor of Casterbridg(1886)

Francis Bacon

弗兰西斯·培根

Francis Bacon (1561-1626) a very famous philosopher and prosper during the period of the Renaissance. He was the son of Nicolas Bacon, the Lord Keeper of the Seal of Elisabeth I. He entered Trinity College Cambridge at age 12. Bacon later described his tutors as "Men of sharp wits, shut up in their cells of a few authors, chiefly Aristotle, their Dictator." This is likely the beginning of Bacon's rejection of Aristotelianism and Scholasticism and the new Renaissance Humanism.

Bacon’s main literary works

《学术的进展》(Advancement of Learning,1605)、

《新大陆》(Novum Organum，1620) 、

《新大西岛》(New Atlantics,1627)、

《论说文集》(Essays,1597,1612,1625).

Bacon’s achievements

He is the founder of English materialist philosophy, the founder of modern science in England and the first English essayist. He introduced the essay as a literary form into the English language, which made essay a popular form in England.

He and Newton represent the advancement of science during the 17th century. In fact, Bacon devised the inductive method (归纳法) of doing research.

Bacon’s Essays

His essays cover a wide range of subjects. They are full of wisdom and elegantly phrased. They offered people useful and practical advices.

His essay is compact in style, powerful and clear in expression and profound in thoughts.

The neatness, the preciseness, the gravity, and the weightiness are the essential qualities of his writings.

William Shakespeare

William Shakespeare (威廉，莎士比亚，1564-1616) 是英国文艺复兴时期伟大的诗人和戏剧家。马克思把莎士比亚和古希腊悲剧诗人埃斯库罗斯看作是“世界上迄今为止的两个最伟大的天才戏剧家”。

William Shakespeare (威廉，莎士比亚) 生于英国中部艾汶河畔斯特拉夫镇一个富裕的市民家里，幼年进文法学校学习，接触到欧洲古代诗歌和戏剧，后因家庭破产而辍学，，靠自学获得了丰富的知识，二十多岁到伦敦谋生，不久成为剧团的演员和股东，1590年左右，莎士比亚开始创作剧本，在以后的20多年中，他以饱满的热情勤奋创作，写出了三十七个剧本，两首长诗和一百五十四首十四行诗，他晚年归居故里，于1616年4月23日去世。 William Shakespeare (威廉，莎士比亚) 的戏剧作品可分为四类：历史剧、喜剧、悲剧和传奇剧。它的主要作品有：

历史剧: 《亨利六世》上、中、下三部（Henry VI，1590-1591）

《理查三世》（Richard III ，1592）

《亨利四世》上、下部(Henry IV,1596-1597)

喜剧:《仲夏夜之梦》（A Midsummer Night’s Dream,1595）

《威尼斯商人》（The Merchant of Venice,1596）

《第十二夜》（Twelfth Night ,1600）

悲剧：《罗密欧与朱丽叶》（Romeo and Juliet,1595）

《汉姆雷特》（Hamlet ，1601）

《奥赛罗》（Othello,1604）

《李尔王》（King Lear,1605）

《麦克佩斯》（Macbeth,1605）

传奇剧：《辛白林》（Cymbeline,1609）

《暴风雨》（The Tempest,1611）等。

William Shakespeare (威廉，莎士比亚) 的生活与创作时代正处于英国封建制度解体，资本主义兴起的时期。他的剧作深刻反映了当时的时代特征。他的大部分戏剧都取材于民间故事，古代史料和当时的旧剧本，再改写过程中，他深入而广泛地观察了他所处时代的社会现实，推陈出新，在旧题材中注入了深刻的社会内容和自己的进步思想。

《威尼斯商人》（The Merchant of Venice）是莎士比亚喜剧中最富于社会讽刺意义的一部。剧本通过安东尼奥和夏洛克之间的对立，写出了友谊、爱情与贪婪、残酷之间的冲突，莎士比亚站在人文主义的立场上，歌颂了新兴工商业资本家安东尼奥，嘲讽、谴责了旧式高利贷者夏洛克。

《汉姆雷特》(Hamlet)是莎士比亚戏剧中最著名的一部，它与《奥赛罗》、《李尔王》、《麦克佩斯》合称四大悲剧。《汉姆雷特》(Hamlet)是莎士比亚剧本中最长的一部，通常被认为是他的代表作。剧中多处用长段独白来表现主人公的思想斗争。

十四行诗是一种格律比较严谨的诗体。它起源于文艺复兴初期，为意大利诗人彼特拉克（Francesco Petrarch ）所首创，十六世纪传入英国，曾盛极一时，英国十四行诗有多种变体，大致可分为三类：彼特拉克体abbaabba-cdecde （又称意大利体）、斯宾塞（Edmund Spenser ）体abab-bcbc-cdcd-ee 和莎士比亚体。莎士比亚体五音步抑扬格，十四行共分三段，按a-b-a-b-c-d-c-d-e-f-e-f-g-g 押韵，最后两句往往带有警句性质，总结全文。

Jonathan Swift (1667-1745)

Historical background: the 18th century (1688-1798)

The Enlightenment Movement (启蒙运动) ：

The intellectual movement from the 1680s to 1798, reason as the primary basis of authority. It is an expression of struggle of the bourgeoisie against feudalism.

Jonathan Swift is regarded as one of the greatest satirist in English literature history. His definition of good style is popular: proper words in proper places, make the true definition of a style.

Writing style: ①one of the greatest masters of English prose

②A master of satirist

③Powerful satire

④Simple, clear, vigorous, concrete language, uncomplicated sentence structure, economy and conciseness of language mark all writings.

Works : Gulliver’s Travels (1726)

A Modest Proposal (1729)

代表作 Gulliver’s Travels

Four parts: A voyage of Lilliput小人国

A voyage of Brobdingnag大人国

A voyage of Laputa, Balnibarbi, Luggnagg, Glubbdubdrib and Japan

A voyage of the Country of the Houyhnhnms智马国

Theme : satirizing the vices of the age, expressing a satirical view of the state of the

European government, and of petty conflicts between religions. Questions :

1 what does four voyages of Gulliver's travels? 2 the writing style of Gulliver's travel writer Jonathan Swift?

3 explain Mildendo; Lilliputian; Brobdingnagian; 4 what do Tramecksan and Slamecksan hint at? 5 ''One emperor lost his life, and another his crown'' mean? James Fenimore Cooper

ⅱHis works

The Spy ⅰHe was the first American novelist.

Leather Stocking Tales, which was made up of The Pioneers (1823), The Last of the Mohicans (1826), The Prairie (1827), The Pathfinder (1840), and The Deerslaye r(1841).

Edger Allan Poe

His poetry had a profound effect on the French symbolists and his stories of horror and detection initiated a very popular literary genre.

1. One of the characteristics of the American Romantic movement was that it took a

predominantly tone.

ⅱTranscendentalist Club appeared. Transcendentalists preached a complete break with tradition and custom, encouraged individualism and self-reliance and proposed Nature as the new Bible. They held that man can transcend the limits of his senses and directly reach truth.

ⅲRepresentatives: Ralph Waldo Emerson, a poet and a philosopher

Henry David Thoreau, Walden, or Life in the Woods

5 .Early in the 1820s democratic idealism began to exert influence on the developing country and greatly promoted the antislavery movement.

Antislavery works: Harriet Beecher Stowe ：Uncle Tom’s Cabin

6The nineteenth century’s poetry

Henry Wadsworth

Walt Whitman

Emily Dickenson