The history of the American multicultural literature - Курс лекций

His opinions about the Indians were surprisingly liberal for the time. He felt that the English should marry them rather than fight them. He had a similarly liberal view of blacks: “We all know that very bright Talents may be lodged under a dark Skin.” These ideas were certainly not shared by the majority of Southern plantation owners. 5. The Birth of a Nation The most memorable writing in 18th century America was done by the Founding Fathers, the men who led the Revolution of 1775-1783 and who wrote the Constitution of 1789. None of them were writers of fiction. Rather, they were practical philosophers, and their most typical product was a political pamphlet. They both admired and were active in the European “Age of Reason” or “Enlightenment”. They shared the Enlightenment belief that human intelligence (or reason) could understand both nature and man. Paine remained in France during the early Napoleonic era, but condemned Napoleons dictatorship, calling him the completest charlatan that ever existed. At President Jeffersons invitation, in 1802 he returned to America. Thomas Paine died, at the age of 72, at 59 Grove Street, Greenwich Village, New York City, on June 8, 1809, alienated due to his religious views only 6 people attended. He was buried at what is now called the Thomas Paine Cottage in New Rochelle, New York, where he had lived after returning to America in 1802. His remains were later disinterred by an admirer, William Cobbett, who sought to return them to England and give him a heroic reburial on his native soil. The bones were, however, later lost and his final resting place today is unknown. Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 - July 4, 1826) was the third President of the United States (1801-1809), the principal author of the Declaration of Independence (1776), and one of the most influential Founding Fathers for his promotion of the ideals of republicanism in the United States. The hero travels around the country with his low-class servant. The author and reader should concentrate on the emotional life of the central character. Cather’s speciality was portraits of the pioneer men and women of Nebraska. She had grown up there, and the values of the old pioneer people were her values. Her famous short story Neighbor Rossicky is about the last days of a simple, hard-working immigrant farmer. After much struggle, he has a successful farm and a loving family. Then he dies and is buried in the Nebraska land he had loved so much. Cather’s most famous novels-O Pioneers! The Song of the Lark and My Antonia-all have the same Nebraska setting. Each is a success story. Between 1923 and 1925- in A Lost Lady and The Professor’s House- Cather describes the decline and fall of the great pioneer tradition. It is being defeated by a new spirit of commerce and the new kind of man: the businessman. The greed of such people is destroying. After 1927, with her famous Death Comes for the Archbishop, Cather turned to historical fiction. In writing of the past she was trying to escape from the ugliness of the present. Ellen Glasgow (1874-1945) is often compared with Willa Cather. Both novelists examined the problem of change. Glasgow, who grew up in Virginia, spent her life writing novels about her state’s past. The Battle-Ground (1902), The Deliverance (1904), Virginia (1913) and Life and Gabriella. 5. Psychological realism Henry James (1843-1916) was a realist, but not a naturalist. Unlike Howells and the naturalists, he was not interested in business, politics or the conditions of society. He was an observer of the mind rather than a recorder of the times. His realism was a special kind of psychological realism. Few of his stories include big events or exciting action. In fact, the characters in his last (and finest) novels rarely do anything at all. His Esther (1884) was about a cultural education of a young woman.