A Handbook of American Literature for Students of English_Z.Lewicki.pdf

AMERICAN

LITERATURE

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A HANDBOOK OF AMERICAN LITERATURE

FOR STUDENTS OF ENGLISH

Zbigniew Lewicki, ed.

Text prepared by the faculty of American Literature Department, Institute of English, University of Warsaw

Published by the Cultural Section, US Embassy, Warsaw

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction (Teresa Kieniewicz).................................................................................................................................. 5

1. TheBeginnings(Zbigniew Lewicki) ..................................................................................................................... 8

2. Early American Fiction (Wiesław Furmańczyk).................................................................................................. 16

3. Transcendentalism:Emersonand Thoreau (Bernard Koloski) ............................................................................ 23

4. RomanticFiction:Hawthorne, Melville (Bernard Koloski)................................................................................. 27

5. WhitmanandDickinson (Bernard Koloski)......................................................................................................... 33

6. Mark Twain and the American Themes (Teresa Kieniewicz).............................................................................. 39

7. The Literary Art of Henry James (Teresa Kieniewicz) ........................................................................................ 42

8. From the Genteel Tradition to Naturalism (Wiesław Furmańczyk) ..................................................................... 45

9. Innovative Fiction Between the Two World Wars (Elżbieta Foeller) .................................................................. 57

10. Post-War “Traditional” Fiction (Zbigniew Lewicki) ........................................................................................... 66

11. Recent Innovations in American Fiction (Elżbieta Foeller) ................................................................................. 71

12. Afro-American Literature (Kathe Davis Finney) ................................................................................................. 75

13. American Poetry 1900-1980 (Mary McGann, Kathe Davis Finney).................................................................... 80

14. Modern American Drama (Timothy Wiles) ......................................................................................................... 93

Appendix ................................................................................................................................................................... 102

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Introduction

Teresa Kieniewicz

Introduction

The present volume is designed as a textbook for any student taking a survey course in American literature. It

contains the body of knowledge deemed necessary for students graduating from the English Institute of Warsaw

University. Hence its authors devote more space and attention to information about American literature than to detailed

analyses or interpretations of particular novels or poems. While it is a manual, it tries to avoid extended discussions of

works that appear on our syllabus (see Appendix) because we do not want to prejudice classroom discussions. The

book is consciously eclectic: it focuses on major writers, trends, and phenomena; it presents well-established,

“standard” opinions; it includes different approaches and points of emphasis. For these very reasons it does not offer a

uniform and complete account of the development of American literature. Although arranged in chronological order,

the book is not really a history of American literature but a survey – a more selective study, narrower in scope yet no

less academic and reliable, we hope, because of its instrumental character as a manual.

American writing from the early colonial days through the 1960s is divided into 14 units of more or less equal

importance and very unequal length. Some chapters are devoted to single writers (Twain, James) or perhaps two

(Melville and Hawthorne, Whitman and Dickinson). Some discuss specific literary genres (drama, poetry) or trends

(the realistic and naturalistic tradition, transcendentalism), while others are organized by historical periods or by ethnic

categories (colonial, post-World War I, Afro-American literature). This diversity signifies a practical goal – to provide

students with a clear indication of the dominant character and relative importance of particular authors and periods.

The volume, however, is more than a collection of essays on American literature: much effort went to making

its chapters complementary and continuous. Its unity derives primarily from certain assumptions about literature and

literary creativity that the contributors share or subscribe to in their common task. The first and foremost among these

tenets is the perception of literature as a continuum. Since each generation contributes its share, the cumulative process

is never broken. Whether accepting or rejecting its cultural heritage, each generation enters into a direct and intimate

relation with the past; each spins new tales or recreates the old ones, develops new ideas or resolves old dilemmas

feeding ceaselessly upon the past. Hence, to understand literature at any point in time, one needs to be familiar with its

past – the years and ages of human history that went into its making.

The concern with the past does not diminish the significance of the present moment. It means that every book,

whether of poetry or fiction, is marked profoundly by the time and place of its writing. Like any work of art, literature

is created by individual talent, and so far as it is individual it is unique: in each case an original talent responds

imaginatively to experience. Since writers live in society, their experience is colored, although in varying degrees, by

the prevailing mores, institutions, and ideas of their society. No one can ever be absolutely free from the influence of

his immediate environment. Thus, to understand literature, one should comprehend its social context – the mainstream

of contemporary events and concerns as well as currents of upheld and developing ideas.

The above considerations point out the necessity of providing a comprehensive chronological framework or

pattern in which every chapter could be readily placed. The chronology here follows, by and large, that of The

American Tradition in Literature by Bradley, Beatty and Long. Students, however, should keep in mind that in

literature or history no chronological classification is ever final or absolute. The dates indicated as turning points

seldom define moments of change, and they should be regarded as referring to periods of transition at least five to ten

years long.

By general consent, American literature begins in 1620 with the settling of the Plymouth Plantation. The first

period of its development ends with the American Revolution, and the treaty of Paris of 1783, which confirmed the

independence of the United States. The term „colonial period,” a political rather than literary one, covers two very

different strains. One, the Puritan culture, flourished in New England well into the second half of the 18th century.

Nourished by Calvinist theology and supervised by the ministers and the elders of the church, it combined pure,

absolute faith with rationality, intellect with emotions, joy of life with rigorous moral conduct, independent study of the

Bible with strict communal control, otherworldliness with acute business sense – into a well-balanced, if precarious

entity. The main body of Puritan writing is, in fact, only semi-literary (histories, diaries, sermons). If it attracts much

interest and discussion it is because the impact of Puritan thinking proved lasting. It continued to color American ideas

and attitudes long after their Calvinist doctrine gave way to more liberal forms of Christianity.

The other strain, the Enlightenment (the second half of the 18th century) shared many characteristics with its

European counterpart, cultivating rationalism in thought and classicism in taste. The Age of Reason produced little

fiction or poetry. Involved in political affairs of the day, the best minds were more likely to write political pamphlets or

philosophical tracts than literary works. This non-literary orientation prevailed until the early 1800s, as if only the

generation born to independence was able to undertake the task of creating its own, no longer colonial but truly

national, literature.

The American Literature of the 19th century aimed at emancipation from the English tradition and English

models, although some writers considered native material scarce and impoverished by the lack of historical past. The

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