美国文学1Romantic.docx

1、美国文学1Romantic美国文学-1.-Romantic第一章美国浪漫主义时期 一、美国浪漫主义时期概述 .本章学习目的和要求通 过本章学习，了解世纪初期至中叶美国文学产生的历史、文化背景；认识该时期文学创作的基本待征、基本主张，及其对同时代和后期美国文学的影响；了解该 时期主要作家的文学创作生涯、创作思想、艺术特色及其代表作品的主题思想、人物刻画、语言风格等；同时结合注释，读懂所选作品并了解其思想内容和艺术特 色，培养理解和欣赏文学作品的能力。.本章重点及难点：1浪漫主义时期美国文学的特点2主要作家的创作思想、艺术特色及其代表作品的主题结构、人物刻画、语言风格、思想意义。3分析讨论选读作品

2、.本章考核知识点和考核要求：1.美国浪漫主义时期概述(1)识记内容：美国浪漫主义文学产生的社会历史及文化背景(2)领会内容： 美国浪漫主义在文学上的表现a.欧洲浪漫主义文学的影响b.美国本土文学的崛起及其待证(3)应用内容：清教主义、超验主义、象征主义、自由诗等名词的解释2.美国浪漫主义时期的主要作家华盛顿欧文1一般识记：欧文的生平及创作主涯2识记：纽约外史见闻札记3领会：欧文的创作领域、创作思想，及其作品的艺术风格4.应用：选读瑞普凡温可尔的主题及其艺术特色拉尔夫华尔多爱默生1一般识记：爱默生的生平及创作生涯2识记：爱默生的超验主义思想3领会：（1）爱默生的散文：论自然论自助论美国学者等（2

3、）爱默生与梭罗：梭罗的超验主义思想和他的沃尔登4 应用：论自然节选：爱默生的基本哲 学思想及自然观纳撒尼尔霍桑1一般识记：霍桑的生平及创作主涯2识记：霍桑的长短篇小说3领会：（1）红字的主题、心理描写、象征手法和、小说结构 of literature, which included a liking for the picturesque, the exotic, the sensuous, the sensational, and the supernatural. (2) The Americans also placed an increasing emphasis on the fre

4、e expression of emotions and disp1ayed an increasing attention to the psychic states of their characters. Heroes and heroines exhibited extremes of sensitivity and excitement.(3) The strong tendency to exalt the individual and the common man was almost a national religion in America. Writers like Fr

5、eneau, Bryant, and Cooper showed a great interest in external nature in their respective works.(4) The literary use of the more colorfu1 aspects of the past was also to be found in Irvings effort to exploit the legends of the Hudson River region, and in Coopers long series of historical tales.(5) In

6、 short, American Romanticism is, in a certain way, derivative.2.The unique characteristics of American RomanticismAlthough greatly influenced by their English counterparts, the American romantic writers revealed unique characteristics of their own in their works and they grew on the native lands. Fo

7、r examp1e,(1) the American national experience of pioneering into the west proved to be a rich source of material for American writers to draw upon. They celebrated Americas landscape with its virgin forests, meadows, groves, endless prairies, streams, and vast oceans. The wilderness came to functio

8、n almost as a dramatic character that symbolized moral 1aw. (2)The desire for an escape from society and a return to nature became a permanent convention of American literature. Such a desire is particularly evident in Coopers Leather Stocking Tales, in Thoreaus Walden and, later, in Mark Twains Adv

9、entures of Huckleberry Finn. (3) With the growth of American national consciousness, American character types speaking local dialects appeared in poetry and fiction with increasing frequency. (4) Then the American Puritanism as a cultural heritage exerted great influences over American moral values

10、and American Romanticism. One of the manifestations is the fact that American romantic writers tended more to moralize than their English and European counterparts. (5) Besides, a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of origina1 sin and the mystery of evil marked the works of Hawthorne, Melville

11、and a host of lesser writers. (三)应用内容1. The American Puritanism and its great influence over American moral values, as is shown in American romantic writings.(1) American PuritanismPuritanism is the practices and beliefs of the Puritans. (The Puritans were originally members of a division of the Pro

12、testant Church, who came into existence in the reigns Queen Elizabeth and King James .The first settlers who became the founding fathers of the American nation were quite a few of them Puritans. They came to America out of various reasons, but it should be remembered that they were a group of seriou

13、s, religious people, advocating highly religious and moral principles. As the word itself hints, Puritans wanted to purify their religious beliefs and practices. They felt that the Church of England was too close to the Church of Rome in doctrine form of worship, and organization of authority.) The

14、American Puritans, like their brothers back in England, were idealists, believing that the church should be restored to complete purity. They accepted the doctrine of predestination, original sin and total depravity, and limited atonement through a special infusion of grace from God. But in the grim

15、 struggle for survival that followed immediately after their arrival in America, they became more and more practical, as indeed they had to be. Puritans were noted for a spirit of moral and religious earnestness that determinated their whole way of life. Puritans lives were extremely disciplined and

16、 hard. They drove out of their settlements all those opinions that seemed dangerous to them, and history has criticized their actions. Yet in the persecution of what they considered error, the Puritans were no worse than many other movements in history. As a culture heritage, Puritanism did have a p

17、rofound influence on the early American mind and American values. American Puritanism also had a conspicuously noticeable and an enduring influence on American literature. It had become, to some extent, so much a state of mind, so much a part of the national cultural atmosphere, rather than a set of

18、 tenets.(2) One of the manifestations is the fact that American romantic writers tended more to moralize than their English and European counterparts. Besides, a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of origina1 sin and the mystery of evil marked the works of Hawthorne, Melville and a host of less

19、er writers.2. New England Transcendentalism New England Transcendentalism is the mot clearly defined Romantic literary movement in this period. It was started in the area around Concord, Mass. by a group of intellectual and the literary men of the United States such as Emerson, Henry David Thoreau w

20、ho were members of an informal club, i. e. the Transcendental Club in New England in the l830s. The transcendentalists reacted against the cold, rigid rationalism of Unitarianism in Boston. They adhered to an idealistic system of thought based on a belief in the essential unity of all creation , the

21、 innate goodness of man, and the supremacy of insight over logic and experience for the revelation of the deepest truths. The writings of the transcendentalists prepared the ground of their contemporaries such as Walt Whitman, Herman Melville, and Nathaniel Hawthorne.The main issues involved in the

22、debate were generally philosophical, concerning nature, man and the universe. Basically, Transcendentalism has been defined philosophical1y as the recognition in man of the capacity of knowing truth intuitively, or of attaining knowledge transcending the reach of the senses. Emerson once proclaimed

23、in a speech, Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Other concepts that accompanied Transcendentalism inc1ude the idea that nature is ennobling and the idea that the individual is divine and, therefore, self-re1iant.3. American Romanticists differed in their understanding of h

24、uman nature.To the transcendentalists such as Emerson and Thoreau, man is divine in nature and therefore forever perfectible; but to Hawthorne and Melville, everybody is potentially a sinner, and great moral courage is therefore indispensab1e for the improvement of human nature, as is shown in Hawth

25、ornes The Scarlet Letter.二.美国浪漫主义时期的主要作家. Washington Irving(1783-l859) Irvings position in American literature Washington Irving was one of the first American writers to earn an international reputation, and regarded as an early Romantic writer in the merican literary history and Father of the Ameri

26、can short stories. 一一般识记His life and major works Washington Irving was born in New York City in a wealthy family. From a very early age he began to read widely and write juvenile poems, essays, and plays. In l798, he conc1uded his education at private schools and entered a law office, but he loved w

27、riting more.His first successful work is A History Of New York from the Beginning Of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty, which, written under the name of Diedrich Knickerbocker, won him wide popularity after it came out in 1809. With the publication of The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent

28、. in serials between 1819 and 1820, Irving won a measure of international fame on both sides of the Atlantic. The book contains familiar essays on the Eng1ish life and Americanized versions of European folk tales like Rip Van Winkle, and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Geoffrey Crayon is a carefully co

29、ntrived persona and behind Crayon stands Irving, juxtaposing the Old World and the New, and manipulating his own antiquarian interest with artistic perspectives.The major work of his later years was The Life of George Washington.二识记1.Irvings great indebtedness to European literatureMost of Irvings s

30、ubject matter are borrowed heavily from European sources, which are chiefly Germanic. Irvings relationship with the Old World in terms of his literary imagination can hardly be ignored considering his success both abroad and at home.A History of New York is a patchwork of references, echoes, and bur

31、lesques. He parodies or imitates Homer, Cervantes, Fielding, Swift and many other favorites of his. He was also absorbed in German Literature and got ideas from German legends for two of his famous stories Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The Alhambra is usually regarded as Irvings Sp

32、anish Sketch Book simply because it has a strong flavor of Spanish culture. Most of the thirty-three essays in The Sketch Book were written in England, filled with English scenes and quotations from English authors and faithful to British orthography. Washington Irving brought to the new nation what its peop1e desired most in a man of 1etters the respect of the Old Worl