American literature

Lecture # 8 Colonial period

Lecturer: Tulegenova Aida

 American literature, the body of written works
produced in the English language in the United States.
 Like other national literatures, American literature was shaped by the history of the country that
produced it. For almost a century and a half, America was merely a group of colonies scattered
along the eastern seaboard of the North American continent—colonies from which a few hardy
souls tentatively ventured westward.
 After a successful rebellion against the motherland, America became the United States, a nation.
 By the end of the 19th century this nation extended southward to the Gulf of Mexico, northward to
the 49th parallel, and westward to the Pacific.
 By the end of the 19th century, too, it had taken its place among the powers of the world—its
fortunes so interrelated with those of other nations that inevitably it became involved in two world
wars and, following these conflicts, with the problems of Europe and East Asia.
 Meanwhile, the rise of science and industry, as well as changes in ways of thinking and feeling,
wrought many modifications in people’s lives.
 All these factors in the development of the United States molded the literature of the country.
Significant Historical Dates:

 1558: English Uniformity Act legally requires Anglican Church attendance

(under Elizabeth)
 1607: Jamestown founded (first settlement in America by Western Europeans)
 1620: Pilgrims land at Plymouth
 1625: Charles I accedes to English throne, appoints Archbishop Laud who
persecutes Puritans
 1630: Massachusetts Bay Colony founded (700 Puritans)
 1649: English Puritans under Cromwell oust king and rule England until 1660:
Commonwealth

 The foundation of American people are due to the pilgrims and puritans. Both very important in
producing the American behavior and character.
  Colonial Period (17th – 18th)
Representatives: D.Denton, T.Ashe
Periods of American Literature  Revolutionary Period (End 18th century
– 1820) Representatives: S.Adams
 Romanticism (1820-1900)
Representatives: Edgar Poe, Washington
Irving
Ethnic Literatures, including, but not  Realism (1900-1945) Representatives:
limited to: Dreiser, Hemingway, Fitzgerald
African‐American Writers /Native  Non-conformism (70s 20th century)
American Writers / Asian‐American Representatives: D. Salinger
Writers
 Postmodernism (1945 to Present)
Representatives: K. Keasey, J. Updike
 Multiculturalism (60s 20th to Present)
Representatives: T. King, Black Elk
 History of American Literature / Colonial Period
Early Colonial Literature. 1607‐ 1700
 American literature begins with the orally transmitted myths, legends, tales,
and lyrics (always songs) of Indian cultures.
 There was no written literature among the more than 500 different Indian
languages and tribal cultures that existed in North America before the first
Europeans arrived. As a result, Native American oral literature is quite diverse.
 Narratives from quasi‐nomadic hunting cultures like the Navajo are different
from stories of settled agricultural tribes such as the pueblo‐dwelling Acoma;
the stories of northern lakeside dwellers such as the Ojibwa often differ
radically from stories of desert tribes like the Hopi.
 Tribes maintained their own religions ‐‐ worshipping gods, animals, plants, or
sacred persons. Systems of government ranged from democracies to councils
of elders to theocracies. These tribal variations enter into the oral literature as
well.
 Still, it is possible to make a few generalizations. Indian stories, for example,
glow with reverence for nature as a spiritual as well as physical mother.
Nature is alive and endowed with spiritual forces; main characters may be
animals or plants, often totems associated with a tribe, group, or individual.
 The closest to the Indian sense of holiness in later American literature is Ralph
Waldo Emerson's transcendental "Over‐Soul," which pervades all of life.
 The 17th century
Representatives of the period

 This history of American literature begins with the arrival of English-speaking Europeans in what
would become the United States.
 At first American literature was naturally a colonial literature, by authors who were Englishmen
and who thought and wrote as such.
 John Smith, a soldier of fortune, is credited with initiating American literature. His chief books
included A True Relation of…Virginia…(1608) and The Generall Historie
of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles (1624). Although these volumes often glorified
their author, they were avowedly written to explain colonizing opportunities to Englishmen.
 In time, each colony was similarly described: Daniel Denton’s Brief Description of New
York (1670), William Penn’s Brief Account of the Province of Pennsylvania (1682), and Thomas
Ashe’s Carolina (1682) were only a few of many works praising America as a land of economic
promise.
 The 17th century
Representatives of the period

 Such writers acknowledged British allegiance, but others stressed the differences of opinion that spurred the
colonists to leave their homeland. More important, they argued questions of government involving the relationship
between church and state.
 The attitude that most authors attacked was jauntily set forth by Nathaniel Ward of Massachusetts Bay in
The Simple Cobler of Aggawam in America (1647). Ward amusingly defended the status quo and railed at colonists
who sponsored newfangled notions. A variety of counterarguments to such a conservative view were published.
 John Winthrop’s Journal (written 1630–49) told sympathetically of the attempt of Massachusetts Bay Colony to
form a theocracy—a state with God at its head and with its laws based upon the Bible.
 Later defenders of the theocratic ideal were Increase Mather and his son Cotton.
 William Bradford’s History of Plymouth Plantation (through 1646) showed how his pilgrim Separatists broke
completely with Anglicanism.
 Even more radical than Bradford was Roger Williams, who, in a series of controversial pamphlets, advocated not
only the separation of church and state but also the vesting of power in the people and the tolerance of different
religious beliefs.
 The 17th century
Representatives of the period

 The utilitarian writings of the 17th century included biographies, treatises, accounts of
voyages, and sermons. There were few achievements in drama or fiction, since there was
a widespread prejudice against these forms.
 Bad but popular poetry appeared in the Bay Psalm Book of 1640 and in
Michael Wigglesworth’s summary in doggerel verse of Calvinistic belief,
The Day of Doom (1662).
 There was some poetry, at least, of a higher order. Anne Bradstreet of Massachusetts
wrote some lyrics published in The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America (1650),
which movingly conveyed her feelings concerning religion and her family.
 Ranked still higher by modern critics is a poet whose works were not discovered and
published until 1939: Edward Taylor, an English-born minister and physician who lived
in Boston and Westfield, Massachusetts.
 Less touched by gloom than the typical Puritan, Taylor wrote lyrics that showed his
delight in Christian belief and experience.
Conclusion

 All 17th-century American writings were in the manner of British writings of the
same period.
 John Smith wrote in the tradition of geographic literature, Bradford echoed the
cadences of the King James Bible, while the Mathers and Roger Williams wrote
bejeweled prose typical of the day.
 Anne Bradstreet’s poetic style derived from a long line of British poets,
including Spenser and Sidney, while Taylor was in the tradition of such
Metaphysical poets as George Herbert and John Donne.
 Both the content and form of the literature of this first century in America were
thus markedly English.
 Indian and Early American Literature

American children's literature originated with the oral tradition of its Native peoples. When stories and legends were told
by Native Americans, children were included in the audience as a means of passing on the society's culture and values to
succeeding generations. This oral literature included creation stories and stories of chiefs, battles, intertribal treaties,
spirits, and events of long ago. They entertained as they instructed, and were often the most important part of sacred
ceremonies.
The Puritans and other British settlers in New England brought with them printed matter for children to be used for
advancing literacy, teaching religion, and other didactic purposes. British works were imported and reprinted in the
American colonies, beginning a trend of European imports that would continue for some time. A number of the earliest
known children's works written in the colonies borrowed heavily from these imports in theme and purpose.
These include:
John Cotton's Spiritual Milk for Boston Babes (1646), New England Primer, (1686 and 1690).
John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress (1678)
Noah Webster's Webster's American Spelling Book (1783)
George Wilson’s American Class Reader (c. 1810).
Hometask:

Seminar:
 Historical background:
I. The English in Virginia.
II. Pilgrims and Puritans in New England.
III. The New England Clergy.
IV. Puritan Poetry in New England

 Representatives of the colonial period

 https://usa.usembassy.de/etexts/oal/lit1.htm
 https://readgreatliterature.com/literature-lists-timelines/american-literature-1
600s/
 https://www.britannica.com/art/American-literature/The-17th-century