AP U.S. History Ch 15, 340-345

1. AP U.S. HistoryCh 15, 340-345

2. The Blossoming of a National Literature • Literature was imported or plagiarized from England. • Americans poured literature into practical outlets (i.e. The Federalist Papers, Common Sense (Paine), Ben Franklin’s autobiography, Poor Richard’s Almanack) • A genuinely American literature received a strong boost from the wave of nationalism that followed the War of 1812.

3. The Knickerbocker Group in NY wrote some of the first truly notable American literature: • Washington Irving (1783-1859) - 1st U.S. internationally recognized writings, “The Sketch Book” (Rip Van Winkle, Sleepy Hollow) • James Fenimore Cooper(1789-1851) - 1st US internationally-acclaimed novelist, “Leatherstocking Tales” (which included “The Last of the Mohicans” – extremely popular in Europe) • William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878) – “Thanatopsis”, the 1st high quality poetry in U.S.

4. Irving, Cooper & Bryant

5. Trumpeters of Transcendentalism • A golden age of American literature dawned in the 2nd quarter of 19th century with the transcendentalist movement, beginning in the 1830s. • Transcendentalism clashed with John Locke (who argued knowledge came through the senses, reason, and observation); for transcendentalists, truth and knowledge came not by those things alone, but from an “inner light” within us all that can connect one directly with God. • It stressed individualism, self-reliance, and non-conformity.

6. Ralph Waldo Emersonwas popular since the ideal of his most famous essay, “The American Scholar”, reflected the nationalistic spirit of the U.S. • In it, he urged U.S. writers throw off European tradition and to proudly write and turn to their own land for inspiration. • Very influential as a practical philosopher (stressed self-government, self-reliance), he was always in demand on the lyceum circuit

7. Henry David Thoreau, another famous transcendentalist condemned slavery and most famously wrote “Walden” and ‘On the Duty of Civil Disobedience”, an essay which insisted that it is NOT wrong to disobey an unjust law - a revolutionary concept that was the inspiration for Gandhi and then Martin Luther King, Jr. in their quests for independence and racial justice. • Walt Whitman, whose transcendendalist poetry (most notably “Leaves of Grass”) was known as the “Poet Laureate of Democracy”. His writings exposed his love of the masses and enthusiasm for an expanding America.

8. Thoreau & Whitman

9. Glowing Literary Lights (not associated with transcendentalism) • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow - wrote poems especially popular in Europe such as “Evangeline” and “Hiawatha”. • John Greenleaf Whittier - poems that cried against injustice, intolerance, and inhumanity – a poet of freedom. • James Russell Lowell – poet and political satirist (The Biglow Papers) • Oliver Wendell Holmes – Last of the great Revolutionary writers (The Last Leaf) • Women writers whose work remain enormously popular today: • Louisa May Alcott – transcendentalist; wrote “Little Women” • Emily Dickinson – wrote of the universal themes of nature, love, death, and immortality in her poems • The South’s greatest literary figure – William Gillmore Simms - “the Cooper of the south”; wrote many books of life in frontier South during the Revolutionary War

10. Louisa May Alcott & Emily Dickinson

11. Literary Individualists and Dissenters • Not all writers in these years believed so keenly in human goodness and social progress. • Edgar Allan Poe is the most notable of these. • Possibly should be credited with inventing the modern detective novel and “psychological thriller” • he was fascinated by the supernatural and reflected a morbid sensibility (even more prized by Europe perhaps) • Reflections of Calvinist obsession with original sin and struggle between good & evil were reflected through: • Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Scarlet Letter”(psychological effect of sin) • Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick”- an allegory between good and evil told of an obsessed whaling captain

12. Poe, Hawthorne & Melville

13. Portrayers of the Past • George Bancroft – founded the naval academy; 1st to truly publish the full story of U.S. history; was known as the “Father of American History” • William H. Prescott - published classic accounts on the conquests of Mexico and Peru • Francis Parkman - published on the struggle between France and England for colonial North America • Virtually all the distinguished historians were from New England, therefore creating a clear anti-Southern bias in US history books.