Romanticism 18th - 19th Centuries

Concerned primarily with the individual over society.

Especially fascinating to the Romantics were individual
consciousness and individual imagination.
Melancholy - 1. Dreamy thoughtfulness. Longing, yearning.
2. A gloomy, prolonged state of mind.
Downing of importance of reason as a reaction against
Enlightenment thinking. Reason replaced by feeling and
intuition.
Works would sometimes take on mystical qualities.
On a formal level there was a loosening of rules of artistic
expression. Less regard for traditional structure and style.
American Romantic Period 1800 - 1850 (Civil War)
Political unrest helped create a darker aesthetic.
Puritan work ethic informed a fire and brimstone aesthetic.
Focus on history, legend, and The American Frontier.
Plots often contain unusual events and mystery.
Settings are often exotic, strange, and mysterious.

Washington Irving 1783 - 1859

First American writer to place stories firmly in the United States.
Wrote stories with an emphasis on entertainment rather than
Enlightenment.
Famous Short Stories
Rip Van Winkle (1819)
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1820)
The Devil and Tom Walker (1824)

The Devil and Tom Walker (1824)

by Washington Irving
1776 The Declaration of Independence is signed.
1783 Washington Irving is Born.
America is growing as an economic power.
Changing American Culture.
Increasingly Capitalist in thinking.
By 1824, Americas economy is booming.
For the first time, manufactured goods are widely
available and people have money to buy them.

Edgar Alan Poe 1809 - 1849

Exemplar of the Dark Romantic Movement in America.
Works explored the strange side of human nature.
Fascinated with the grotesque and strange beauty.
Sing-song rhymes and dreary settings.
Inventor of detective fiction.
One of the original Masters of Horror.

Famous Short Stories

The Mask of the Red Death (1842)
The Pit and the Pendulum (1842)
The Tell-Tale Heart (1843)

3-2-1
Instructions: After submitting your pop-quiz to grade cam and collecting the Romanticism
Graphic Organizer you turned in yesterday, please respond to the following questions.

What are 3 things you KNOW about Roman2cism?

What are 2 ques,ons you have about The Devil and Tom Walker?

What is 1 ques,on you have about the Tell-Tale Heart?

Transcendentalism 1830 - 1850 (Civil War)

Transend-dentalism.
Belief that knowledge can be arrived at through
intuition and contemplation of the internal spirit.
Belief that Divinity resides within the individual.
Abstraction of existence.
Blends strong idealism with Puritan Work Ethic.
The grind of ordinary life and society as barriers
between the self and the spirit.
Nature as a way to free the mind from daily distractions.
Concerned with Individual potential.
Wanted to effect positive change personally and globally.
Idealistic.
The United States was young and discovering its unique voice while expanding boarders.
Literature for a new continent. Bold, expressive, and wild like the continent itself.

Walt Witman 1819 - 1892

Does away with traditional structure and style.
High-flown language replaced by natural cadence and verse.
Free Verse - Poetry with no consistent rhyme or patterns.
Dominant theme of Nature and its power to create strong
impressions in the mind and imagination.
Observent and meditative.
Famous Poems
Leaves of Grass (1855) is an American poetry collection containing many popular poems
including Song of Myself.

Realism Civil War - 1900s

Real -ism.
Attempt to replicate the true nature of reality.
The strength of novels and short stories rest upon
the strengths of its characters, rather than plot.
Characters are psychologically complicated with
conflicting impulses and motivations.
Heavily informed by journalistic techniques such
as objectivity and fidelity to the facts.
Informed by advances in human psychology.
Concerned with inner workings of the mind and the delicate play of emotions.
People as not simply good or bad.
Overriding concern is character.
Motivations, interests, desires and fears. Changes in mood, in perceptions, in opinions
and ideas constitute turning points or climaxes (rather than plot).
Reality as unknowable, uncertain, and ever-shifting.
Important: Subject focus slowly moved from dominantly elitist, upperclass to lower
classes, bringing characters such as slaves and the poor into the privileged content of The
Novel.
Q: What is meant by the privileged content of The Novel?

Naturalism 1880 - 1930

Used detailed realism to suggest that social
conditions, heredity, and environment had an
inescapable force in shaping human character.
Social Darwinism in literature.
Locale and environment played a large role in how
character developed.
People are fated by heredity, environment, and
social conditions.
Pessimistic.

Ambrose Bierce 1842 - 1914

Grim and pessimistic view of Human Nature
Journalist
Writings contained vague references to time and
themes of war.
Critics nicknamed him Bitter Bierce.
His motto is reputed to have been, Nothing matters.
Author of An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge