16. Литература сша первой половины XIX века. Американский романтизм.

Romanticism – (1800-1855) - Romanticism was a literary and artistic movement of the nineteenth century that arose in reaction against eighteenth-century Neoclassicism and placed a premium on fancy, imagination, emotion, nature, individuality, and exotica.  There’s a movement here from personal and political documents to entertaining ones.  Purely American topics were introduced such as frontier life.  Romantic elements can be found in the works of American writers as diverse as Cooper, Poe, Thoreau, Emerson, Dickinson, Hawthorne, and Melville.  Romanticism is particularly evident in the works of the New England Transcendentalists.  Transcendentalism – (1840-1855) – An outgrowth of Romanticism, Transcendentalism was an American literary and philosophical movement of the nineteenth century.  The Transcendentalists, who were based in New England, believed that intuition and the individual conscience “transcend” experience and thus are better guides to truth than are the senses and logical reason.  Influenced by Romanticism, the Transcendentalists respected the individual spirit and the natural world, believing that divinity was present everywhere, in nature and in each person.  The Transcendentalists included Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Bronson Alcott, W.H. Channing, Margaret Fuller, and Elizabeth Peabody.  The Anti-Transcendentalists (Hawthorne and Melville) rebelled against the philosophy that man is basically good. 

    ROMANTIC                                                          NON-ROMANTIC/CLASSICAL

                   Emotional                                                              Reasonable and Practical

                   Individualistic                                                       Public Responsibility

                   Revolutionary                                                       Conservative

                   Loves Solitude & Nature                                    Loves Public, Urban Life

                   Fantasy/Introspection                                         External Reality

                   The Particular                                                      The Universal

                   Subjective Perception                                        Objective Science

                   Right Brain                                                            Left Brain

                   Satisfaction of Desire                                          Desire Repressed

                   Organic                                                                 Mechanical

                   Creative Energy/Power                                      Form

                   Exotic                                                                     Mundane

                   "Noble Savage"/Outcasts                                  Bourgeois Family

                   Idealist Philosophy                                              Materialist/Empirical Philosophy  

Washington Irving – “The Devil and Tom Walker”

James Finimore Cooper – from The Deerslayer

Edgar Allan Poe – “The Fall of the House of Usher,” “The Raven”

Emily Dickinson

Walt Whitman

Literary Themes: Highly imaginative and subjective Emotional intensity Escapism Common man as hero Nature as refuge, source of knowledge and/or spirituality

Characteristics:

• Characters and setting set apart from society; characters were not of our own conscious kind

• Static characters--no development shown

• Characterization--work proves the characters are what the narrator has stated or shown

• Universe is mysterious; irrational; incomprehensible

• Gaps in causality

• Formal language

• Good receive justice; nature can also punish or reward

• Silences of the text--universals rather than learned truths

• Plot arranged around crisis moments; plot is important

• Plot demonstrates

  • romantic love

  • honor and integrity

  • idealism of self

• Supernatural foreshadowing (dreams, visions)

• Description provides a "feeling" of the scene

Romanticism: Romantic Period in America 1828-1865.

1. Belief in natural goodness of man, that man in a state of nature would behave well but is hindered by civilization. The figure of the "Noble Savage" is an outgrowth of this idea. 

2. Sincerity, spontaneity, and faith in emotion as markers of truth. (Doctrine of sensibility)

3. Belief that what is special in a man is to be valued over what is representative; delight in self-analysis.

4. Nature as a source of instruction, delight, and nourishment for the soul;  return to nature as a source of inspiration and wisdom; celebration of man’s connection with nature; life in nature often contrasted with the unnatural constraints of society.

5. Affirmation of the values of democracy and the freedom of the individual. (Jacksonian Democracy)

6. High value placed on finding connection with fresh, spontaneous in nature and self. 

7. Aspiration after the sublime and the wonderful, that which transcends mundane limits. 

8. In art, the sublime, the grotesque, the picturesque, and the beautiful with a touch of strangeness all were valued above the Neoclassical principles of order, proportion, and decorum.  (Hudson River School of painters)

9. Interest in the “antique”: medieval tales and forms, ballads, Norse and Celtic mythology; the Gothic. 

10. Belief in perfectibility of man; spiritual force immanent not only in nature but in mind of man.

11. Belief in organicism rather than Neoclassical rules; development of a unique form in each work.

17. Творчество Э. По и особенности его эстетической концепции.

Edgar Allan Poe (born Edgar Poe; January 19, 1809 – October 7, 1849) was an American author, poet, editor, and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is generally considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre. He is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction. 

Genres

Poe's best known fiction works are Gothic. His most recurring themes deal with questions of death, including its physical signs, the effects of decomposition, concerns of premature burial, the reanimation of the dead, and mourning.

Many of his works are generally considered part of the dark romanticism genre, a literary reaction to transcendentalism, which Poe strongly disliked. 

Dark Romanticism (often conflated with Gothicism or called American Romanticism) is a literary subgenre.^[1] It has been suggested that Dark Romantics present individuals as prone to sin and self-destruction. Works of Dark Romanticism frequently show individuals failing in their attempts to make changes for the better.

Beyond horror, Poe also wrote satires, humor tales, and hoaxes (leg-pulls). For comic effect, he used irony and ludicrous extravagance, often in an attempt to liberate the reader from cultural conformity.

Examples of Poe’s use of mysterious writing are the tactic of using vagueness and lack of detail especially concerning time and space. By doing this, Poe keeps the readers guessing and asking questions which keeps them reading.

Poe achieves an aesthetic, or artistic, impression in his writings. Poe manages this by creating what he terms the "Philosophy of Composition."

Poe's "Philosophy of Composition" is basically a guideline that he created to determine what separates "art" from "fiction." According to this guideline, Poe believes the author must decide the purpose of the work, and the desired reaction from the reader. Secondly, Poe asserts the author can find ways to achieve this result by considering the theme, the plot, the setting, and the characters as well as the central conflicts within the story.

Poe's "Philosophy of Composition" can be applied to several of his works. Following this theory, when examining a piece of literature, the reader should first consider the author's intent. Understanding Poe's history, it is easy for the reader to understand that Poe's dark, Gothic roots could have been planted early in childhood. Secondly, the reader should thoroughly examine the plot, characters, setting and theme to find ways the author accomplishes the intended goals. Careful examination of word choice, theme, setting and character conflicts will reveal the ways in which Poe attains his literary goals.

Ruins and destruction are common elements of Gothic literature which help paint the picture of a terrifying setting for the reader.

Poe's "Philosophy of Composition" helped him follow guidelines to create aesthetic fiction. Aesthetic fiction paints a picture for the reader instead of merely tells the story. Anyone can tell a story, it takes remarkable talent to aesthetically illustrate the story to the imagination of millions of readers using limited tools-- tools like plot, setting, theme, characters and conflicts. Poe aesthetically shows many readers why they should be afraid rather than merely telling them to be afraid.

По часто повторял, что удел поэзии – воплощать прекрасное. Под прекрасным он подразумевал порядок, соразмерность и гармонию. Всякая диспропорция, отсутствие чувства меры, в том числе и пафос, им отвергались. Любовь к гармонии и отвращение к хаосу, полагал Э. По, были дарованы человеку самой природой. В его стихах царит пропорция, тождество, повтор, причем ритм, рифма, размер и строка – лишь форма выражения идеи равенства. Отсюда его приемы звуковой организации стиха: акцентировка ритма, аллитерация, ассонанс, внутренняя рифма, синтаксические повторы. Все эти приемы, связанные в одно целое, образуют законченную систему, определяющую особенности творческой манеры поэта.  Давно уже замечено, что монотонный скандирующий ритм многих поздних стихотворений, и, в частности, “Ворона”, оказывает завораживающее, близкое к гипнотическому воздействие на читателя. Такое воздействие позднее стали называть суггестивным, то есть основанным на внушении. Именно этот прием принес необыкновенную славу “Ворону”.