The Novel, the Short Story, and Poetry in the

United States: H. Melville, E. A. Poe, and W.

Whitman

1. Introduction
2. The Historical Context: America’s Transformation in the 19th century
3. The Search for the ʻGreat American Novelʼ: Romanticism
4. Herman Melville: The Depths of Darkness in Moby-Dick
5. Edgar Allan Poe: The Master of Mystery and the Mind
6. Walt Whitman: A Celebration of Democracy, Nature, and the Self
7. Specific Teaching Ideas for the Subject of English as a Foreign
Language Aimed at Spanish Teenagers
8. Conclusion

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 1. Introduction

In the 18th century, the United States achieved independence, and in the 19th
century, the nation was consolidated in political, economic, social, and also
literary terms. One of the great concerns of the time was to free itself from
European cultural dependence. The goal was to generate creations of the
highest level to become references both within the country and around the
world. In every historical moment and society, there are some predominant
artistic and intellectual movements. The United States would reach literary
maturity with 19th-century Romanticism and its various trends.

Further on, three literary figures will be examined through three completely
distinct genres and one of their masterpieces. On one hand, Herman Melville
reflects on the human figure and its existence through the novel. On the other
hand, Edgar Allan Poe is a great innovator of the psychological short story,
where there seems to be a conflict between reason and madness. Finally, Walt
Whitman establishes the figure of the poet as a representative of the nation with
free verse poetry that praises nature.

The works of these authors can be used for learning English as a foreign
language in the Spanish education system. The idea is to absorb the message
of these works and produce a reflection on universal themes that still concern
us today. Moreover, writing of the highest level serves as an exemplary model
for teaching many linguistic skills.

2. The Historical Context: America’s Transformation in the 19th century

In the first half of the 19th century, known as the ʻFirst National Period,ʼ the
United States expanded westward, adding new territories to the original 13
colonies. Land was acquired from France, Spain, the United Kingdom, Mexico,
and Russia, alongside the annexation of Texas and Hawaii. This expansion
triggered the Indian Wars and drew waves of immigrants seeking land,
prosperity, and religious freedom, earning the U.S. the title ʻLand of Liberty and
Prosperity.ʼ

The 1840s saw major immigration surges due to events like the Irish Potato
Famine, which drove over 1.5 million people to America, and the California Gold

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Rush (1848-1849), which spurred western migration. Railroads facilitated
westward settlement but intensified conflicts with Native Americans. By the mid-
19th century, over 40 million bison were slaughtered, devastating the Plains
Indians, who relied on them.

During this time, differences between the North and South deepened. The
industrial North modernized with advances in education, banking, and
commerce and supported abolition. In contrast, the agrarian South relied on
slavery to sustain its economy, particularly in rice, tobacco, and cotton
production. These tensions over slavery culminated in the Civil War when
Abraham Lincoln won the election in 1860.

3. The Search for the ʻGreat American Novelʼ: Romanticism

Literary speaking, in the beginning of the 19 th century Sydney Smith’s jibe still
ranked ʻWho reads an American Book?ʼ There was a search for the definite
author, the ʻGreat American Novelʼ, an expression of nationalist pride and a
challenge to the European fictional canon. But around the 1840s, America was
already prepared to produce magnificent works. This period of flourishment is
called American Naissance, and it starts with Nature (1836) by Emerson and it
ends with the American Civil War (1861). As Emerson affirmed this time
signaled America’s ʻcoming to its first maturity and affirming its rightful heritage
in the whole expanse of art and cultureʼ.

Romanticism was the artistic expression that predominated but in America it

was divided in two strands. One, practised notably by Ralph Waldo Emerson,
Henry David Thoreau and Walt Whitman, was Transcendentalism, an idealistic
movement centred on a belief in the soul or ʻinner lightʼ, and the inherent
goodness of humans and the natural world. The other was Dark Romanticism,
which took a less optimistic view of human nature; writers such as Edgar Allan
Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Herman Melville explored ideas of the individual
susceptible to sin and self-destruction, in a reaction against Transcendentalism
idealism.

Both schools recognized a spiritual energy in nature, but whereas the

Transcendentalists saw nature as a mediating channel between God and
humanity, the Dark Romantics were less sanguine about human perfectibility.

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They saw nature as embodying dark, mysterious truths that humans confront at
their peril. In the same spirit of pessimism, they regarded attempts at social
reform as dubiously utopian.

4. Herman Melville: The Depths of Darkness in Moby-Dick

ʻA black conceitʼ that ʻpervades him through and throughʼ, a ʻblackness ten
times blackʼ; a writer of obscurity misunderstood as ʻa man who means no
meaningsʼ, ʻdeep as Danteʼ with a ʻgreat, deep intellect, which drops down into
the universe like a plummetʼ, this is Herman Melville. This is a quote by Melville
referring to Hawthorn but also to himself.

The son of an importer and merchant, Melville was born in 1819 in New York. At
age 20, he enrolled on a merchant ship sailing to Liverpool, then he got a job in
a whaling ship and he had an interlude in the Marquesas Islands in the South
Pacific. Like many American writers, he successfully began with fictionalized
travel writing very in tune with 1840s American expansionism and the interest in
contrasts between social and natural life. Later he served on further whalers
and on a US Navy frigate. Seafaring provided material for Moby-Dick, his
masterpiece. But by the time the book was published, public interest had shifted
to the American West. Finally, he died of a heart attack in 1891.

Rich in language, incident, character, and symbolism, and displaying and

extraordinary depth and breadth of knowledge within its maritime subject area,
Moby-Dick; or, The Whale (1851) is the first American Novel. Following the
trend of Dark Romanticism, in this oeuvre nature is a sinister spiritual force that
reveals terrifying truths, human kind is imperfect and inclined towards sin and
self-destruction and individuals fail when trying to change things for better.

Its three central characters are the wandering narrator Ishmael, the
monomaniac Captain Ahab and the white whale itself. Ishmael, the observer
and wry storyteller, gives the book its speculative and varying narrative voice,
indeed voices. Ahab’s bitter revenge on the whale that has not nourished but
wounded him provides a mythic struggle, which is as much a battle of intellect
and faith as of action. The whale itself represents the terrible and unfeeling
nature, the embodiment of man’s limitations, the evil incarnate, the mask of an
inscrutable God and Ahab’s madness made flesh.

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This is a story of obsession and also an enquiry into the meaning of life and
death, with insights on subjects from religion to madness. Melville started it as a
factual account of the whaling industry, but it crossed with his reading of
Shakespeare, his involvement with Hawthorne, his wish to write a ʻwickedʼ book
to interrogate the persistent innocence of his age. It is a book driven by an
intense literary ambition. As in other Melville’s works, meaning remains
sombrely uncertain through metaphors and biblical references:

ʻThere is one knows not what sweet mystery about this sea, whose
gently awful stirrings seem to speak of some hidden soul beneath.ʼ

Herman Melville: Moby Dick

5. Edgar Allan Poe: The Master of Mystery and the Mind

ʻPoe is not merely a writer of tales; he is a profound poet and philosopher,

haunted by the infinite and capable of penetrating the most secret depths of the
soul.ʼ Baudelaire’s quote captions the magnitude of this amazing storyteller.

Edgar Allan Poe was born in Boston, very much by chance, for he was the son
of a traveling actress. When his father disappeared and his mother died, he was
adopted as an infant in Richmond, Virginia. Poe’s upbringing was that of the
insecure gentleman; he had a period of schooling in England, a year at the
University of Virginia ending in bad debts and a spell at West Point Military
Academy ending in dismissal. In his adulthood, he developed his skills as a
troubling poet, a significant symbolist theorist and major originator of the
modern short story. Married to his fourteen-year-old cousin Virginia, he moved
north to New York in 1837. But he had great difficulty in attracting the attention
of the American public, not with European as we have seen with Beaudelaire’s
quote. At forty, he was found dying penniless in a Baltimore gutter.

His poetry and fiction arise from an inwardly constructed and mentally
anguished landscape, far from familiarity, nature and society in any
conventional form where reality is not framed. The egotistical narrators seem
psychotic and divided – as Larzer Ziff puts it, ʻA Poe character is never more
insane than at the moment he begins to reason with us,ʼ for reason is not the
governor of excess. Dream situations and dream functions dominate

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everywhere. Furthermore, he uses ʻratiocinationʼ which refers to the use of
reason and logical analysis to solve complex problems and to uncover hidden
truths.

This ratiocinative narrator is everywhere in Poe’s prose and makes it

unmistakable. Yet the rational analytical narrator has his adversary, or else is
his own adversary. In the best known tale of all, ʻThe Fall of the House of
Usher,ʼ the narrator, a man of reason and analysis, enters a world where veils
gradually fall until everything is inverted and even the house follows its mirror
image into the tarn. The narrator visits the eerie, decaying mansion of his
childhood friend, Roderick Usher, who suffers from acute mental distress and
hypersensitivity. Roderick’s twin sister, Madeline, is gravely ill and presumed
dead, but she is buried alive, only to return in a horrifying climax that leads to
the deaths of both siblings. As the narrator flees, the mansion collapses into the
tarn:

ʻFrom that chamber, and from that mansion, I fled aghast. The storm was
still abroad in all its wrath as I found myself crossing the old causeway.ʼ

The Fall of House of Usher, Edgar Allan Poe

It symbolizes the end of the Usher family line and the destructive power of
madness and decay.

6. Walt Whitman: A Celebration of Democracy, Nature, and the Self

Opposite to the previous authors, Whitman had more a transcendentalist view

of his work where nature is a divine spiritual force that mediates between man
and God, where humankind possesses a divine spark, making humans innately
good and where individuals are at their best when self-reliant and independent.
Furthermore, he incorporates to transcendentalism a personal view more
democratic, celebratory, earthy and, even with a sensual tone as it is seen in his
masterpiece Leaves of Grass.

Whitman, born into a modest Long Island family with limited formal schooling
and he worked as a printer and teacher before turning to journalism, as editor of
the Brooklyn Daily Eagle. He resigned in 1847 over the paper’s conservative
stance on slavery. Though he published Leaves of Grass, he never made a

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living from his poetry. He held a government job until it was revoked due to the
explicit content of his work. During the Civil War, he served as a nurse for
wounded soldiers. After suffering a stroke in 1873, he retired to Camden, New
Jersey, where he continued revising his poetry and reflecting on his life. Despite
his physical decline, Whitman remained a symbolic figure of national heroism,
echoing Milton’s blind epic mission.

His most recognisable work was Leaves of grass (1855). For the next three
decades, Whitman worked this same free-verse poetic book like a landscape
garden, shifting and changing, revising and deleting, developing mass and
detail, dramatizing his own complex self, but above all incorporating. This book
is a celebration of the self, where he emphasizes individualism, exploring the
idea of self-expression and the interconnectedness of all people. Furthermore, it
advocates for equality, freedom, and democracy, embracing diversity in race,
gender and class. Finally, it has a great connection with nature as a source of
inspiration and with the body, as the pleasure of life.

The great metaphor is the grass itself. It represents life, it speaks beyond and
behind death, it is common everywhere and to all, endlessly vital, tirelessly
procreative.

ʻAnd the grass that grows over the grave of the poet,

Is as a natural thing, reminding us that we are part of a cycle.ʼ

Leaves of Grass, Walt Whitman

7. Specific Teaching Ideas for the Subject of English as a Foreign

Language Aimed at Spanish Teenagers

Teaching English as a foreign language to Spanish teenagers requires

engaging and relevant approaches that align with educational standards and
legal requirements. The Spanish education system, governed by the LOMLOE,
emphasises competency-based learning and the integration of cross-curricular
themes. Here are specific teaching ideas that incorporate these principles.

Using literature as a teaching tool can enhance language skills and cultural
understanding. For instance, students can learn how grammatical structures are
used naturally, aiding both understanding and then application from the three
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authors mentioned. To give an example, the passive voice could be taught to
students selecting some sentences in context, discussing why the passive is
used and understanding how it is built.

Project-based learning (PBL) aligns with LOMLOE’s emphasis on active and

participatory learning. A project for Halloween could involve researching Poe’s
figure, how he hid the truth to generate an impact and finally the students can
create their own tales. At the same time, students can gather new vocabulary,
grammar, writing skills and ways of thinking. They could work in groups to
create a single tale and even represent it as a play.

Integrating English lessons with other subjects can provide a holistic learning
experience. For example, collaborating with history teachers to explore the
concept of freedom in Leaves of Grass related to democracy vindications in the
19th century can deepen students’ understanding of the period while enhancing
their English skills. Activities could include finding examples of modern
speeches, songs, or movements that reflect Whitman’s ideals and then
compare grammatical structures and vocabulary through reading tasks.

Incorporating technology can make learning more engaging and interactive.

Educational apps, online quizzes, or a virtual tour in Whitman’s house-museum
can enhance students’ understanding and interest. Encouraging students to use
digital content, such as videos or blogs, can also improve their language skills
and digital literacy. A video on Moby-Dick could be used to work on listening
comprehension and then having a peer-assessment to analyse between
students what it is understood.

8. Conclusion

The literary contributions of Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe, and Walt
Whitman exemplify the richness and diversity of American Romanticism during
the "First National Period." Each author, in their unique way, encapsulated the
era's struggles and aspirations, weaving themes of freedom, individuality, and
the human condition into their works.

Melville's Moby-Dick explored the darker, mysterious forces of nature and

humanity, painting a sombre picture of human imperfection and existential

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questions. Poe, with his intricate tales of psychological depth and ratiocination,
introduced readers to the haunting landscapes of the mind, where reason and
madness intersect. In contrast, Whitman's Leaves of Grass celebrated
democracy, unity, and the divine spirit within humanity, embracing a more
optimistic and inclusive vision of life.

Together, these authors laid the foundation for a distinctly American literary
identity, reflecting the nation's growing maturity and its tensions between
idealism and reality. Their works not only challenged the dominance of
European literary traditions but also forged a new cultural legacy that continues
to inspire readers and learners worldwide. By engaging with these texts,
students and readers alike can deepen their understanding of the historical,
cultural, and philosophical undercurrents that shaped 19th-century America and
appreciate the enduring power of literature as a mirror of society and a catalyst
for thought.

Bibliography

Ruland, R. y Bradbury. M. (1991). From Puritanism to Postmodernism. A

History of American Literature, Penguin Books.