American literature

● American literature is much younger than British literature, because American continent
was discovered in 15th century
● Real settlers came to America in the 17th century, for two centuries there was British
literature, because all those settlers were British people who came to America to be free in
their religion. But the settlers devoted housing, livelihood much more than literature.
● American literature began in 1608 when John Smith wrote A True Relation, telling about the
newly discovered world.

Native American Literature

● Mainly Indian literature in spoken form, fairy tales, legends, myths, songs. Powwow = all
these stories / sessions where they are told.
● Vikings came from North- 1st literature work: “The Old Northern Viking Saga” – Scandinavian
language.
● The first notices of literature were often sent to Europe from Americans to inform in forms of
diaries, charts, maps, letters etc. 15th century – “Epistle of Columbus Diary”.

Colonial Literature (1600 – 1776)

● The beginnings of American literature can be traced back to the 17th century. The first educated
writers were explorers who described Native Americans and strange plants and animals of
the new continent.
● The first permanent settlers, the Puritans, wrote mainly religious text and educational
texts.

American revolutionary war (1776 – 1800)

● In the second half of the 18th century, when America was fighting for its independence,
political texts were typical.
● Some of the famous writers included Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson
(“The Founding Fathers of the USA”)
● 4th July, 1776- the Declaration of Independence, the main author of which was Thomas
Jefferson

19th century

● American literature developed more strongly in the area of fiction.

● Romanticism was connected with nationalism. Americans were proud of the American
intellectual tradition.

Herman Melville
● greatest symbolist, he sailed on seas for many years.
● His experiences at sea were the basis for almost all his novels. The most famous novel is
Moby-Dick
● Moby Dick - there describes the three-day hunt for the whale, by Captain Ahab. Moby-Dick
is the name of the white whale and it means evil.

James Fennimore Cooper

● wrote about conversion- differences between waste and civilised land.
● “The Pioneers “-life in the USA, Indians against white people
● “LeatherStocking Tales” -settling Wild West
● “The Last of the Mohicans” - Indian novels of adventure.

Walt Whitman
● he represented symbolism, he was a poet of democracy, freedom, sexual love
● The pioneer of new poetry (civilicism – celebration of human work, ordinary things, picture of
modern life)
● He made American poetry independent of European poetry
● He influenced the whole modern poetry with rhythmical free verse which was his
innovation- most famous collection is Leaves of Grass.
Edgar Alan Poe
● poet, editor and literary critic
● romanticism
● at 27, he married his fourteen years old cousin
● he invented a new literary form: the detective story
● he wrote stories about crimes, horror and mysteries
● Poe’s death is as mysterious as his books because the cause of his death has never been
revealed.
● The Black Cat
● The Raven- " a narrative poem that tells the story of a man who is visited by a mysterious
raven one night while mourning the loss of his beloved, Lenore. The raven perches on a bust
above his chamber door and repeatedly utters the word "Nevermore," causing the man to
spiral into despair as he asks the bird questions about his future and the afterlife. The poem
explores themes of grief, loss, and the torment of the human psyche.
● The Pit and the Pendulum

Mark Twain
● humorist, writer and journalist
● realism
● he gained most of the material for his stories and novels while piloting a steamboat on the
Mississippi
● „The Gilded Age“ is represented by Mark Twain
● The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn- books describe the
adventures of boyhood.
● The Prince and the Pauper

Jack London
● he tried a lot of jobs: miner, sailor, manual worker, a gold seeker, writer → he used his
experiences of this jobs to his works
● his most popular stories are connected with Alaska
● became very popular because of his describing the wildlife and adventurous life at the time
of the gold rush
● his novels: The Call of the Wild and Martin Eden → still remain world classics → these novels
are autobiographical

Henry James
● he is representative a psychological realism
● He got inspiration from European writers ( Zola, Flaubert…)

Theodore Dreiser
● naturalism and social realism
● An American Tragedy - his hero is negative, he becomes a murderer, but it is not the hero who
is to blame but the society and the system

Topic of Slavery

Harriet Beecher Stowe – “Uncle Tom's Cabin” – sufferings of separated family

Margaret Mitchell – “Gone with the Wind” – destiny of O´Hara family during the Civil War

Lost Generation

● refers to a group of American writers in the 1920s profoundly impacted by the

disillusionment following World War I.
● The war's devastation led them to question traditional values like patriotism and morality
● literary works often explored themes of alienation and existential angst, reflecting their
disenchantment with society.
● They introduced marking a shift towards modernism and influencing future American literature
and culture.
Gertrude Stein
● invented the term “Lost Generation” for a group of writers who lost their illusions after
the First World War

Ernest Hemingway
● prose writer, Nobel Prize winner for literature
● From 1921 he lived in Paris as a foreign correspondent
● His method of writing was called a "glacier method".
● A Farewell to Arms
● For Whom the Bell Tolls
● Death in the Afternoon
● The Old Man and the Sea - The story of the fate of Santiago. He cannot catch any fish for a
long time. And that's why Manolin is leaving his parent’s wishes to learn from other fishermen
from the village. Santiago decides to go out to sea and show everyone that he still can fish.
He must struggle with nature. The sharks attack the fish, and even though the old man fights
them almost to the brink of their forces, he cannot save the fish. The old man returns to the
village only with the skeleton. However, he regains his respect.

Francis Scott Fitzgerald

● connected with the golden youth, jazz age (at this time, the technique was growing
sharply in the US, the standard of living was rising, people were moving to cities and
trying to fulfill their "American Dream").
● wrote many stories about wealthy people, for whom everything is so easy because of money
● Jazz Age Tails
● Tender is the Night
● Great Gatsby - a naive romantic man going for his dream. But it is just an illusion, and in fact
it cannot be fulfilled: Jay Gatsby has worked out of the poor boy to the rich man and tried to
do his best to gain his love from his youth. But he did not see his wish as a mere illusion.

John Steinbeck
● writer, tried to uncover the reason for social injustice
● Of Mice and Men
● The Grapes of Wrath- fates of California farmers in time of economic cris
● East of Eden- tells a long family saga from the Civil War to World War I
● He got the Nobel Prize.

Beat generation
● formed a group of poets and writers during the 1960s who are called the Beat Generation
● They were disgusted by the corrupt, commercial and conventional world around them.
● They practiced free life, behaviour and new use of language and hoped they can make their
world better.
● The poetry of 20th century is represented mainly by members of Beat Generation
● They were also influenced by Zen Buddhism teaching.
● They had two centers: 1) was in New York 2) was in San Francisco

Jack Kerouac
● The biggest writer of this group
● On the Road → it was the bible of the Beat Group

Allen Ginsberg
● Howl

Other authors:
William Styron
● novelist and essayist
● influenced by Faulkner and writes novels about the South of the US
● Sophie’s Choice- about a Polish woman who, while imprisoned in a concentration camp was
forced to make a cruel choice – which of her two children would survive and which would be
killed. Her life in the U.S.A. after the war was influenced by the bitter war experience