Lecture 3 The Literature of Romanticism (1)

作者：曾兆令

美国文学简史

Lecture 3

第

1

页

2019-8-23

Lecture 3

The Literature of Romanticism (1)

From the end of the 18

Century to the Outbreak of the Civil War(1861)

th

浪漫主义时期的文学

1.

Washington Irving:

The Sketch Book

“Rip Van Winkle”“

瑞普凡温可尔

”

,

“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”

“

睡谷的传说

”

2.

James Fenimore Cooper

Leatherstocking Tales

《皮袜子故事集》（

Natty Bumppo

）

3.

William Cullen Bryant

To a Waterfowl

《致水鸟》

Thanatopsis< /p>

《死亡随想曲》

1. General Introduction

What is Romanticism

(c.f. English Romanticism, as a historical phase of literature, is generally said to have

beg

un in 1798 with the publication of Wordsworth and Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads and

to have ended in 1832 with Sir Walter Scott’s death and the passage of the first Reform

Bill in the Parliament.)

General features of Romanticism

A. Stressing emotion rather than reason

B. Stressing freedom and individuality

C. Idealism rather than materialism

D. Writing about nature, medieval legends and with supernatural elements

2.

Historical Introduction

of American Romanticism

:

(1)Time: from the end of the 18th century to the outbreak of the Civil War

(2)Reasons (Why Romanticism emerged?)

A.

Fast

development

of

the

new

nation

(flood

of

immigrants;

pioneers

pushing

the

frontier

further west;

industrialization; economic boom; a promising new land with prevailed optimistic

moods)

B.

Development

of

journalism

(Some

influential

periodicals

appeared,

such

as

The

North

American

Review,

The

New

York

Mirror,

The

American

Quarterly

Review,

The

New

England

Magazine,

The

Southern

Review,

The

Southern

Literary

Messenger,

The

Atlantic

Monthly,

Harper’s Magazine and Knickerbockers

. They need more literary productions.)

C. Foreign influence (Review history of English literature.)(from

the 18th century classicism to

sentimentalism to Pre-Romanticism to Romanticism which can be divided into passive group and

active group)(most influential British writers to American Romanticists-Walter Scott)

Features of American Romanticism

A. Imitative

B. Independent

a. peculiar American experience (landscape, pioneering to the West, Indian civilization, new

nation's democracy and dreams)

作者：曾兆令

美国文学简史

Lecture 3

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b. Puritan heritage (more moralizing, edifying more than mere entertainment) (careful about

love and sex. example: Scarlet Letter)

Two periods and representatives

American romanticism can be divided into the early period and the late period.

A. 1770s to 1830s Early period

Representatives: Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper and New England poets

Two famous poets: William Cullen Bryant (first distinctive American lyric poet; writing about

nature,

religion

and

life;

famous

poems

-

and

a

Waterfowl

and

Henry

Wadsworth Longfellow (balancing Romantic spirits with classical and Christian taste; famous

poem -

B. 1830s to 1860s Late period

Flowering of American literature

Representatives: Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Melville, Whitman, Dickinson, Poe etc.

Significance

Creative period of a native American culture and literature

II

Writers of the

Early

period

1.

Washington Irving (1783-1859)

华盛顿

欧文

American author, short story writer, essayist, poet, travel book writer, biographer, and columnist.

Irving has been called the father of the American short story. He is best known for 'The Legend of

Sleepy Hollow,' in which the schoolmaster Ichabold Crane meets with a headless horseman, and

'Rip Van Winkle,' about a man who falls asleep for 20 years.

several names attached to Irving

(1)

first writer of American imaginative literature

(2)

the beginning of shot story as a genre

(3)

the messenger sent from the new world to the old world

(4)

father of American literature

works

：

★

(1)

A History of New York

?

纽约外史

?

The short story as a genre in American literature began with Irving's

The Sketch

Book

. The book touched the American imagination and foreshadowed the coming of

Hawthorne,

Melville,

and

Poe,

in

whose

hands

the

short

story

attained

a

degree

of

perfection

as

a

literary

tradition.

It

also

marked

the

beginning

of

American

Romanticism.

★

(2)

The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.

?

见闻札记

?

A collection of essays, sketches

& tales

Marks the beginning of

American Romanticism

He won a measure of international

recognition

with

the

publication

of

this.

It

was

published

first

in

installment

in

America, then in full version in England. Two stories:

“Rip Van Winkle”“

瑞普凡温

可尔

”

,

“The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”

“

睡谷的传说

”

(3)

The History of the Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus

?

哥伦布的生平和

航行史

?

(4)

A Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada

?

攻克格拉纳达

?

(5)

The Alhambra

?

阿尔罕伯拉

?

He gathered material for these three books in Spain, so they are also known as

the

作者：曾兆令

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Spanish Sketch Book

(6)

Life of Oliver Goldsmith

?

哥德斯密斯传

?

(7)

Life of Washington

?

华盛顿传

?

Literary Position

—

“Father of American literature”

·

The 1st American writer to win international recognition.

·

The 1st American short stories and the 1st American juvenile appeared in his sketch book.

★

The theme of

“

Rip Van Winkle

”

(1) it reveals conservative attitude of Irving. (2) it might be an illustration of Irving

’

s argument that revolution upset the natural order of things.

The

story

is

a

tale

remembered

mostly

for

Rip's

20-year

s1eep,

set

against

the

background of the inevitably changing America. Rip went to sleep before the War of

Independence and woke up after it. The change that had occurred in the 20 years he

slept was to him not always for the better. The revolution upset the natural order of

things.

In

the

story

Irving

ski1lfu1ly

presents

to

us

paralleled

juxtapositions

of

two

totally different worlds before and after Rip's 20 years' s1eep. By moving Rip back

and forth from a noisy world with his wife on the farm to a wild but peaceful natural

world in the mountains,

and from

a pre-Revolution village to a George Washington

era,

lrving

describes

Rip's

response

and

reaction

in

a

dramatic

way,

so

that

we

see

clearly

both

the

narrator

and

Irving

agree

on

the

preferabi1ity

of

the

past

to

the

present,

and

the

preferability

of

a

dream-like

world

to

the

real

one.

Irving

never

seemed to accept a modern democratic America.

2. James Fennimore Cooper (1789-1851)

the first person to take writing as a way to

earn a living

(a)

Introduction:

(b)

Three subjects of his works

the revolution---

The Spy

the frontier---

The Pioneer

the Sea ---

The Pilot

( 1824 )

《舵手》

works

(1) Precaution

《戒备》

(1820, his first novel, imitating Austen’s Pride and Prejudice)

(2) The Spy ?

间谍

?

(his second novel and great success)

★

(3) Leatherstocking Tales

《皮袜子故事集》

（

Natty Bumppo

）

(his masterpiece,

a series of five novels)

The Deerslayer,

《猎鹿人》

The Last of the Mohicans,

《最后 一个莫希

干人》

The Pathfinder,

《探路人》

The Pioneer,

《开拓者》

The Prairie

《大草原》

.point of view

the theme of wilderness vs. civilization, freedom vs. law, order vs. change, aristocrat vs.

democrat, natural rights vs. legal rights

3. William Cullen Bryant

The first American writer who gains the worldwide fame

Work:

poem: To a Waterfowl

《致水鸟》

The Yellow Violet

《黄色的堇香花》