HANDOUTS ON THE SUMMARY OF SURVEY OF ENGLISH AND AMERICAN LITERATURE (FINALS)

Elizabethan literature- body of works written during the reign of Elizabeth I of England (1558–1603), probably the most splendid
age in the history of English literature, during which such writers as Sir Philip Sidney, Edmund Spenser, Roger Ascham, Richard
Hooker, Christopher Marlowe, and William Shakespeare flourished. The epithet Elizabethan is merely a chronological reference and
does not describe any special characteristic of the writing.

The Elizabethan age saw the flowering of poetry (the sonnet, the Spenserian stanza, dramatic blank verse), was a golden age of
drama (especially for the plays of Shakespeare), and inspired a wide variety of splendid prose (from historical chronicles, versions of
the Holy Scriptures, pamphlets, and literary criticism to the first English novels).

From about the beginning of the 17th century a sudden darkening of tone became noticeable in most forms of literary expression,
especially in drama, and the change more or less coincided with the death of Elizabeth. English literature from 1603 to 1625 is
properly called Jacobean, after the new monarch, James I. But, in so far as 16th-century themes and patterns were carried over into
the 17th century, the writing from the earlier part of his reign, at least, is sometimes referred to by the amalgam “Jacobethan.”

NOTABLE AUTHORS

1. Nathaniel Hawthorne 1804 – 1864

Nathaniel Hawthorne was a novelist and short story writer. Hawthorne’s works have been labelled ‘dark romanticism,’
dominated as they are by cautionary tales that suggest that guilt, sin, and evil are the most inherent natural qualities of humankind.
His novels and stories, set in a past New England, are versions of historical fiction used as a vehicle to express themes of ancestral
sin, guilt and retribution

2. Edgar Allan Poe 1809 –1849

Edgar Allan Poe was an American writer, editor, and literary critic. He is best known for his poetry and short stories, particularly
his tales of mystery and suspense. He is generally considered the inventor of detective ficiton. Poe’s work as an editor, a poet, and a
critic had a profound impact on American and international literature. In addition to his detective stories he is one of the originators
of horror and science fiction. He is often credited as the architect of the modern short story…

3. Herman Melville 1819 – 1891

Herman Melville was an American writer of novels, short stories and poems. He is best known for the novel Moby-Dick and a
romantic account of his experiences in Polynesian life, Typee. His whaling novel, Moby-Dick is often spoken of as ‘the great
American novel’ ’vying with Scott Fitgerald’s The Great Gatsby and Mark Twain’s Huckleberry Finn for that title…

4. Walt Whitman 1819-1892

Walt Whitman was a poet, essayist, and journalist who transformed poetry around the world with his disregard for traditional
rhyme and meter and his celebration of democracy and sensual pleasure. His masterpiece, Leaves of Grass, a collection of poems, is
widely studied by poets, students and academics, set to music, translated into numerous languages, and is widely quoted. His
influence can be found everywhere – in contemporary best seller lists to feature films and musical works, both “serious” and
popular…

5. Emily Dickinson 1830 – 1886

Unknown as a poet during her lifetime, Emily Dickinson is now regarded by many as one of the most powerful voices of American
culture. Her poetry has inspired many other writers, including the Brontes. In 1994 the critic, Harold Bloom, listed her among the
twenty-six central writers of Western civilisation. After she died her sister found the almost two thousand poems the poet had
written…
 6. Mark Twain 1835 – 1910

Samuel Langhorne Clemens , far better known as Mark Twain, was an American writer, businessman, publisher and lecturer. He
progressed from his day job as pilot of a Mississippi riverboat to legend of American literature. His work shows a deep seriousness
and at the same time, it is hilariously satirical, as seen in his many quotes on all aspects of life. His masterpiece is the novel,
Huckleberry Finn, which is regularly referred to as ‘the great American novel.’…

7. Henry James 1843 – 1916

Henry James is regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He is noted for writing from a character’s point
of view’ which allowed him to explore consciousness and perception. His imaginative use of point of view, interior monologue and
unreliable narrators brought a new depth to narrative fiction, all of which were influential on the writing of the novelists who
followed him. He was nominated for the Nobel prize for literature three times…

8. T.S. Eliot 1888 – 1965

Thomas Stearns Eliot was an American-born, British, poet, essayist, playwright, critic, now regarded as one of the twentieth
century’s major poets. He received more rewards than almost any other writer of the past two centuries, including the Nobel prize,
the Dante Gold Medal, the Goethe prize, the US Medal of Freedom and the British Order of Merit…

9. F. Scott Fitzgerald 1896 – 1940

Francis Scott Fitzgerald was an American novelist, widely regarded as one of the greatest, if not the greatest, American writers of
the 20th century. He is best known for his novel, The Great Gatsby, which vies for the title ‘Great American Novel’ with Mark
Twain’s Huckleberry Finn and Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick. Fitzgerald’s place on this list is justified by the fact that his great novel is
actually about America…

10. William Faulkner 1897 –1962

William Cuthbert Faulkner was a Nobel Prize laureate, awarded the literature prize in 1949. He wrote novels, short stories, poetry,
and screenplays. He is known mainly for his novels and short stories set in the fictional Yoknapatawpha Country, Mississippi.
Faulkner is one of the most celebrated American writers, regarded, generally as the great writer of the American South…

11. Tennessee Williams 1911-1983

Thomas Lanier Williams III, known as Tennessee Williams is one of America’s most popular playwrights and now regarded as one
of the most significant writers of the twentieth century. He wrote more than thirty plays, some of which have become classis of
Western drama. He also wrote novels and short stories but is known almost exclusively for his plays. His genius was in the honesty
with which he represented society and the art of presenting that in the form of absorbing drama.

12. Arthur Miller 1915 – 2005

Arthur Miller was a playwright and ‘great man’ of American theatre, which he championed throughout his long life. His many
dramas were among the most popular by American authors and several are considered to be among the best American plays, among
them the classics, The Crucible, All My Sons, A View from the Bridge and, above all, the iconic American drama, Death of a
Salesman. He also wrote film scripts, notably the classic, The Misfits…

13. Joseph Heller 1923 – 1999

Joseph Heller was an American writer of satirical novels, short stories and plays. Although he wrote several acclaimed novels, his
reputation rests firmly on his masterpiece, the great American anti-war satire, Catch 22. Because of the quality of the novel and the
impact it has made on American culture it has catapulted Heller into the ranks of the great American writers… Heller >>
 14. Ernest Hemingway 1899 – 1961

Ernest Hemingway was a novelist, short story writer, and journalist. He published seven novels, six short story collections, and two
non-fiction works, and won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954. More works, including three novels, four short story collections,
and three non-fiction works, were published posthumously…

15. Raymond Chandler 1888 – 1959

Raymond Chandler was a British-American novelist who wrote several screenplays and short stories. He published seven novels
during his lifetime. The first, The Big Sleep, was published in 1939. An eighth, Poodle Springs, unfinished at his death, was
completed by another great crime writer, Robert B Parker. Six of Chandler’s novels have been made into films, some more than
once…

16. Toni Morrison 1931 – 2019

Toni Morrison’s novels are known for their vivid dialogue, their detailed characters and epic themes. Her most famous novel is
the 1987 novel, Beloved. She was awarded both the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award in 1988 for Beloved, and the Nobel
Prize for Literature in 1993…

17. Vladimir Nabokov 1899 – 1977

Vladimir Vladimirovich Nabokov was a Russian-American novelist, and also a famous entomologist, specialising in butterflies, a
topic on which he wrote several academic books. He wrote nine novels in Russian, but it was when he began writing in English that
he achieved international recognition…

18. Flannery O’Connor 1925 – 1964

Mary Flannery O’Connor wrote two novels and thirty-two short stories, and also several reviews and commentaries. Her reputation
is based mainly on her short stories. She was a Southern writer and relied heavily on regional settings and typically southern
characters. She was strongly Roman Catholic, which informed her exploration of ethics and morality… Read more about Flannery
O’Connor >>

19. John Steinbeck 1902 – 1968

John Ernst Steinbeck was the author of 16 novels and various other works, including five short story collections. He is widely
known for the novels, East of Eden, Of Mice and Men, and particularly, the Puliter Prize winning novel, The Grapes of Wrath, his
masterpiece, which is one of the great American novels: it has sold more than 15 million copies so far…

20. John Updike 1923 – 2009

John Updike was a novelist, short story writer and poet. He was also a literary and art critic. He published more than twenty novels,
numerous short-story collections, eight volumes of poetry and many children’s books. He is most famous for his ‘Rabbit‘ series –
novels that chronicle the life of his protagonist, Harry Angstrom – in which Updike presented his progress over the course of several
decades…

21. Kurt Vonnegut 1922 – 2007

Kurt Vonnegut was an American writer who published fourteen novels, three short story collections, five plays, and five works of
non-fiction. He is most famous for his novel ‘Slaughterhouse-Five’ (1969) which has become an American classic. It’s a semi-
autobiographical novel based on his experience as a prisoner of war who survived the allies’ bombing of Dresden
Periods of American Literature

The history of American literature reaches from the oral traditions of Native peoples to the novels, poetry, and drama created in the
United States today. This list describes its six major periods.

Pre-colonization

Literature has been created in what is today the United States for thousands of years. This history began with the many oral
traditions of the Indigenous peoples of North America

Among the Native peoples of the Plains, the Southwest, and parts of present-day California, Coyote was the central figure of the age
before humans were created. Hundreds of tales told by these peoples describe his exploits as a trickster and as a benefactor to
humankind.

Raven was Coyote’s counterpart for the Indigenous peoples of the Northwest Coast, the Pacific coast stretching from what is today
Alaska to northwestern California. The Raven cycle is a collection of tales that describe the chaos that Raven creates and the order
that eventually emerges, often at Raven’s expense.

• The oral traditions of the Pueblo, in the Southwest, include stories about kachinas, the ancestral spirit-beings that exist
among humans and actively shape their environment.

• Among the Native peoples of the Plains, a wide range of creation myths explain how the world came into existence. The
stories of the Comanche, for example, center on the Great Spirit, which created different groups of humans, while the Sioux describe
how the winds came into being and, together with the Sun and the Moon, control the universe.

The Colonial and Early National Period (17th century–1830)

The first colonists of North America wrote, often in English, about their experiences starting in the 1600s. This literature was
practical, straightforward, often derivative of literature in Great Britain, and focused on the future.

John Smith wrote histories of Virginia based on his experiences as an English explorer and as president of the Jamestown Colony.
These histories, published in 1608 and 1624, include his controversial accounts of the Powhatan girl Pocahontas.

Nathaniel Ward and John Winthrop wrote books on religion, a topic of central concern in colonial America.

Anne Bradstreet’s The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America (1650) may be the earliest collection of poetry written in and about
America, although it was published in England.

A new era began when the United States declared its independence in 1776, and much new writing addressed the country’s future.
American poetry and fiction were largely modeled on what was being published overseas in Great Britain, and much of what
American readers consumed also came from Great Britain.

The Federalist Papers (1787–88), by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay, shaped the political direction of the United
States.

Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography, which he wrote during the 1770s and ’80s, tells a quintessentially American life story.

statue of Phillis WheatleyA statue of Phillis Wheatley in Boston by Meredith Bergmann, dedicated in 2003.

Phillis Wheatley, an African woman enslaved in Boston, was the first Black poet of note in the United States. Her first book was
Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773). Philip Freneau is another notable poet of the era.

The first American novel, The Power of Sympathy by William Hill Brown, was published in 1789.

Olaudah Equiano’s autobiography, The Interesting Narrative (1789), is among the earliest slave narratives and stands as a forceful
argument for abolition.
By the first decades of the 19th century, a truly American literature began to emerge. Though still derived from British literary
tradition, the short stories and novels published from 1800 through the 1820s began to depict American society and explore the
American landscape in an unprecedented manner.

Washington Irving published the collection of short stories and essays The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. in 1819–20. It
includes “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” and “Rip Van Winkle,” two of the earliest American short stories.

James Fenimore Cooper wrote novels of adventure about the frontiersman Natty Bumppo. These novels, called the Leatherstocking
Tales (1823–41), depict his experiences in the American wilderness in both realistic and highly romanticized ways.

The Romantic Period (1830–70)

Romanticism is a way of thinking that values the individual over the group, the subjective over the objective, and a person’s
emotional experience over reason. It also values the wildness of nature over human-made order. Romanticism as a worldview took
hold in western Europe in the late 18th century, and American writers embraced it in the early 19th century.•

Edgar Allan PoeU.S. Signal Corps/National Archives, Washington, D.C.

Edgar Allan Poe most vividly depicted, and inhabited, the role of the Romantic individual—a genius, often tormented and always
struggling against convention—during the 1830s and up to his mysterious death in 1849.

Poe invented the modern detective story with “The Murders in the Rue Morgue” (1841).

The poem “The Raven” (1845) is a gloomy depiction of lost love. Its eeriness is intensified by its meter and rhyme scheme.

The short stories “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839) and “The Cask of Amontillado” (1846) are gripping tales of horror.

In New England, several different groups of writers and thinkers emerged after 1830, each exploring the experiences of individuals in
different segments of American society.

James Russell Lowell was among those who used humor and dialect in verse and prose to depict everyday life in the Northeast.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and Oliver Wendell Holmes were the most prominent of the upper-class Brahmins, who filtered their
depiction of America through European models and sensibilities.

The Transcendentalists developed an elaborate philosophy that saw in all of creation a unified whole. Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote
influential essays, while Henry David Thoreau wrote Walden (1854), an account of his life alone by Walden Pond. Margaret Fuller
was editor of The Dial, an important Transcendentalist magazine.

Three men—Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, and Walt Whitman—began publishing novels, short stories, and poetry during
the Romantic period that became some of the most-enduring works of American literature.

As a young man, Hawthorne published short stories, most notable among them the allegorical “Young Goodman Brown” (1835). In
the 1840s he crossed paths with the Transcendentalists before he started writing his two most significant novels—The Scarlet Letter
(1850) and The House of the Seven Gables (1851).

Melville was one of Hawthorne’s friends and neighbors. Hawthorne was also a strong influence on Melville’s Moby Dick (1851),
which was the culmination of Melville’s early life of traveling and writing.

Whitman wrote poetry that described his home, New York City. He refused the traditional constraints of rhyme and meter in favor of
free verse in Leaves of Grass (1855), and his frankness in subject matter and tone repelled some critics. But the book, which went
through many subsequent editions, became a landmark in American poetry, and it epitomized the ethos of the Romantic period.

During the 1850s, as the United States headed toward civil war, more and more stories by and about enslaved and free Black people
were written.
William Wells Brown published what is often considered the first Black American novel, Clotel, in 1853. He also wrote the first
African American play to be published, The Escape (1858).

In 1859 Frances Ellen Watkins Harper and Harriet E. Wilson became the first Black women to publish fiction in the United States.

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, first published serially in 1851–52, is credited with raising opposition in the North to
slavery.

Harriet Jacobs published a searing account of her life as an enslaved woman in 1861, the same year that the Civil War began. It
became one of the era’s most influential slave narratives.

Emily Dickinson lived a life quite unlike other writers of the Romantic period: she lived largely in seclusion; only a handful of her
poems were published before her death in 1886; and she was a woman working at a time when men dominated the literary scene.
Yet her poems express a Romantic vision as clearly as Whitman’s or Poe’s. They are sharp-edged and emotionally intense. Here are
five of her notable poems:

“I’m Nobody! Who are you?”

“Because I could not stop for Death –”

“My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun”

“A Bird, came down the Walk –”

“Safe in their Alabaster Chambers”

Realism and Naturalism (1870–1910)

The human cost of the Civil War in the United States was immense: more than 2,300,000 soldiers fought in the war, and perhaps as
many as 851,000 people died in 1861–65. Walt Whitman claimed that “a great literature will…arise out of the era of those four
years,” and what emerged in the following decades was a literature that presented a detailed and unembellished vision of the world
as it truly was. This was the essence of realism. Naturalism was an intensified form of realism. After the grim realities of a
devastating war, these styles became writers’ primary mode of expression.

Mark Twain

Mark Twain in Constantinople, c. 1867, during the travels he later described in The Innocents Abroad (1869).

Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. LC-USZ62-28851

Samuel Clemens was a typesetter, a journalist, a riverboat captain, and an itinerant laborer before he became, in 1863 at age 27,
Mark Twain. He first used that name while reporting on politics in the Nevada Territory. It then appeared on the short story “The
Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County,” published in 1865, which catapulted him to national fame. Twain’s story was a
humorous tall tale, but its characters were realistic depictions of actual Americans. Twain deployed this combination of humor and
realism throughout his writing. The following are some of Twain’s notable works:
Major novels: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (1876), Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885)

Travel narratives: The Innocents Abroad (1869), Roughing It (1872), Life on the Mississippi (1883)

Short stories: “Jim Baker’s Blue-Jay Yarn” (1880), “The Man that Corrupted Hadleyburg” (1899)

Naturalism, like realism, was a literary movement that drew inspiration from French authors of the 19th century who sought to
document, through fiction, the reality that they saw around them, particularly among the middle and working classes living in cities.

Theodore Dreiser was foremost among American writers who embraced naturalism. His Sister Carrie (1900) is the most important
American naturalist novel.

Maggie: A Girl of the Streets (1893) and The Red Badge of Courage (1895), by Stephen Crane, and McTeague (1899), The Octopus
(1901), and The Pit (1903), by Frank Norris, are novels that vividly depict the reality of urban life, war, and capitalism.

Paul Laurence Dunbar was an African American writer who wrote poetry in Black dialect—“Possum” and “When de Co’n Pone’s
Hot”—that were popular with his white audience and gave them what they believed was reality for Black Americans. Dunbar also
wrote poems not in dialect—“We Wear the Mask” and “Sympathy”—that exposed the reality of racism in America during
Reconstruction and afterward.

Sophia Alice Callahan, who was of Muskogee Creek descent, published in 1891 what is often considered the first novel by a Native
woman: Wynema: A Child of the Forest. Zitkala-Sa, whose mother was Yankton Sioux, published a collection of Dakota stories, Old
Indian Legends, in 1901. She used this collection and other early writings to document her experience of forced assimilation, and she
spent the rest of her life advocating for Native peoples.

Henry James shared the view of the realists and naturalists that literature ought to present reality, but his writing style and use of
literary form sought to also create an aesthetic experience, not simply document truth. He was preoccupied with the clash in values
between the United States and Europe. His writing shows features of both 19th-century realism and naturalism and 20th-century
modernism. Some of his notable novels include:

The American (1877)

The Portrait of a Lady (1881)

What Maisie Knew (1897)

The Wings of the Dove (1902)

The Golden Bowl (1904)

The Modernist Period (1910–45)

Advances in science and technology in Western countries rapidly intensified at the start of the 20th century and brought about a
sense of unprecedented progress. The devastation of World War I and the Great Depression also caused widespread suffering in
Europe and the United States. These contradictory impulses can be found swirling within modernism, a movement in the arts
defined first and foremost as a radical break from the past. But this break was often an act of destruction, and it caused a loss of
faith in traditional structures and beliefs. Despite, or perhaps because of, these contradictory impulses, the modernist period proved
to be one of the richest and most productive in American literature.

A sense of disillusionment and loss pervades much American modernist fiction. That sense may be centered on specific individuals,
or it may be directed toward American society or toward civilization generally. It may generate a nihilistic, destructive impulse, or it
may express hope at the prospect of change.

F. Scott Fitzgerald skewered the American Dream in The Great Gatsby (1925)

Richard Wright

Richard Wright, 1943.Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (LC-USW3-030278-D)

Richard Wright exposed and attacked American racism in Native Son (1940).

Zora Neale Hurston told the story of a Black woman’s three marriages in Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937).

Ernest Hemingway’s early novels The Sun Also Rises (1926) and A Farewell to Arms (1929) articulated the disillusionment of the Lost
Generation.

Willa Cather told hopeful stories of the American frontier, set mostly on the Great Plains, in O Pioneers! (1913) and My Ántonia
(1918).

William Faulkner used stream-of-consciousness monologues and other formal techniques to break from past literary practice in The
Sound and the Fury (1929).

John Steinbeck depicted the difficult lives of migrant workers in Of Mice and Men (1937) and The Grapes of Wrath (1939).

T.S. Eliot was an American by birth and, as of 1927, a British subject by choice. His fragmentary, multivoiced The Waste Land (1922)
is the quintessential modernist poem, but his was not the dominant voice among American modernist poets.

Robert Frost and Carl Sandburg evocatively described the regions—New England and the Midwest, respectively—in which they lived.

The Harlem Renaissance produced a rich coterie of poets, among them Countee Cullen, Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and Alice
Dunbar Nelson.

Harriet Monroe founded Poetry magazine in Chicago in 1912 and made it the most important organ for poetry not just in the United
States but for the English-speaking world.

During the 1920s Edna St. Vincent Millay, Marianne Moore, and E.E. Cummings expressed a spirit of revolution and experimentation
in their poetry.

Drama came to prominence for the first time in the United States in the early 20th century. Playwrights drew inspiration from
European theater but created plays that were uniquely and enduringly American.

Eugene O’Neill was the foremost American playwright of the period. His Long Day’s Journey into Night (written 1939–41, performed
1956) was the high point of more than 20 years of creativity that began in 1920 with Beyond the Horizon and concluded with The
Iceman Cometh (written 1939, performed 1946).

During the 1930s Lillian Hellman, Clifford Odets, and Langston Hughes wrote plays that exposed injustice in America.
Thornton Wilder presented a realistic (and enormously influential) vision of small-town America in Our Town, first produced in 1938.

The Contemporary Period (1945–present)

The United States, which emerged from World War II confident and economically strong, entered the Cold War in the late 1940s.
This conflict with the Soviet Union shaped global politics for more than four decades, and the proxy wars and threat of nuclear
annihilation that came to define it were just some of the influences shaping American literature during the second half of the 20th
century. The 1950s and ’60s brought significant cultural shifts within the United States driven by the civil rights movement and the
women’s rights movement. By the turn of the 21st century, American literature was recognized as being a complex, inclusive story
that is grounded on a wide-ranging body of past writings produced in the United States by people of different backgrounds and is
open to the experiences of more and more Americans in the present day.

Literature written by African Americans during the contemporary period was shaped in many ways by Richard Wright, whose
autobiography Black Boy was published in 1945. He left the United States for France after World War II, repulsed by the injustice and
discrimination he faced as a Black man in America; other Black writers working from the 1950s through the ’70s also wrestled with
the desires to escape an unjust society and to change it.

Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man (1952) tells the story of an unnamed Black man adrift in, and ignored by, America.

James Baldwin wrote essays, novels, and plays on race and sexuality throughout his life, but his first novel, Go Tell It on the
Mountain (1953), was his most accomplished and influential.

Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, a play about the effects of racism in Chicago, was first performed in 1959.

Gwendolyn Brooks became, in 1950, the first African American poet to win a Pulitzer Prize.

The Black Arts movement was grounded in the tenets of Black nationalism and sought to generate a uniquely Black consciousness.
The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965), by Malcolm X and Alex Haley, is among its most-lasting literary expressions.

Toni Morrison

American author Toni Morrison, 2009.

Toni Morrison’s first novel, The Bluest Eye (1970), launched a writing career that would put the lives of Black women at its center.
She received a Nobel Prize in 1993.

In the 1960s Alice Walker began writing novels, poetry, and short stories that reflected her involvement in the civil rights movement.

The American novel took on a dizzying number of forms after World War II. Realist, metafictional, postmodern, absurdist,
autobiographical, short, long, fragmentary, feminist, stream of consciousness—these and dozens more labels can be applied to the
vast output of American novelists. Little holds them together beyond their chronological proximity and engagement with
contemporary American society. These are representative novels:

Norman Mailer: The Naked and the Dead (1948), The Executioner’s Song (1979)

Vladimir Nabokov: Lolita (1955)

Jack Kerouac: On the Road (1957)

Thomas Pynchon: The Crying of Lot 49 (1966)

N. Scott Momaday: House Made of Dawn (1968)

Kurt Vonnegut: Slaughterhouse-Five (1969)

Eudora Welty: The Optimist’s Daughter (1972)

Philip Roth: Portnoy’s Complaint (1969), American Pastoral (1997)

Ursula K. Le Guin: The Left Hand of Darkness (1969)

Saul Bellow: Humboldt’s Gift (1975)

Toni Morrison: Song of Solomon (1977), Beloved (1987)

Alice Walker: The Color Purple (1982)

Sandra Cisneros: The House on Mango Street (1983)

Jamaica Kincaid: Annie John (1984)

Maxine Hong Kingston: Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book (1989)

David Foster Wallace: Infinite Jest (1996)

Don DeLillo: Underworld (1997)

Ha Jin: Waiting (1999)

Jonathan Franzen: The Corrections (2001)

Junot Díaz: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007)

Colson Whitehead: The Underground Railroad (2016)

Ocean Vuong: On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (2019)

The Beat movement was short-lived—starting and ending in the 1950s—but had a lasting influence on American poetry during the
contemporary period. Allen Ginsberg’s Howl (1956) pushed aside the formal, largely traditional poetic conventions that had come to
dominate American poetry. Raucous, profane, and deeply moving, Howl reset Americans’ expectations for poetry during the second
half of the 20th century and beyond. Among the important poets of this period are the following:

Anne Sexton Robert Pinsky

Sylvia Plath Adrienne Rich

John Berryman Rita Dove

Donald Hall Yusef Komunyakaa

Elizabeth Bishop W.S. Merwin

James Merrill Tracy K. Smith

Nikki Giovanni

- In the early decades of the contemporary period, American drama was dominated by three men: Arthur Miller, Tennessee
Williams, and Edward Albee. Miller’s Death of a Salesman (1949) questioned the American Dream through the destruction
of its main character, while Williams’s A Streetcar Named Desire (1947) and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955) excavated his
characters’ dreams and frustrations. Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1962) rendered what might have been a
benign domestic situation into something vicious and cruel. By the 1970s the face of American drama had begun to change,
and it continued to diversify into the 21st century.

Notable dramatists include:

David Mamet Tony Kushner

Amiri Baraka David Henry Hwang

Sam Shepard Richard Greenberg

August Wilson Suzan-Lori Parks

Ntozake Shange Young Jean Lee

Wendy Wasserstein Jeremy O. Harris

1. ROMEO & JULIET 2013

Genre:

Romance, Drama & Tragedy

Introduction:

Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet love story is still so powerful that it dominates every theater that features the
playwright's works, as well as general and school productions and different film adaptations. It depends on the audience's
capacity for mental flexibility whether they choose to accept this version of the tragedy, which is one of the most
condensed and believable adaptations to date, or reject it because it is not an exact replica of the original. Film allows a
story to be expanded upon and condensed, and Fellowes has done just that by reshaping some characters and reducing
some of the play in order to enhance the love story.

There is no need to summarize the well-known tale of Romeo and Juliet's covert marriage, which took place in
spite of their families' professed disdain for one another. But before long, a series of unfortunate incidents permanently
alters the course of both families' lives. Though she may not be the most beautiful Juliet in history, she had a captivating
transformation from child to woman. The actor who played the ideal Romeo was incredibly attractive and sincere as well.
The rest of the characters were portrayed really well as well.

Plot Summary:

There was a great deal of hostility in Verona due to the bitter feud between the Montague and Capulet families.
Despite the animosity, Romeo Montague accepted an invitation to the Capulets' castle for a masked ball, where he met
their daughter Juliet. The two fell in love right away but were shocked to find that their families were rivals. The course of
their journey as lovers never did run smooth but their true love persisted up to their bitter end.

Characters:

Romeo Montague is a young man of about sixteen years old who is sensitive, smart, and attractive. He may be impetuous and
immature, but his idealism and passion make him a very endearing character. Although he is surrounded by a vicious feud between
the Capulets and his family, he has no interest in using violence.

Juliet Capulet is a lovely thirteen-year-old girl, is naive at the start of the play and hasn't given much consideration to marriage or
love, but after falling in love with Romeo, the son of her family's worst enemy, she swiftly matures.

One of main bridge to the love of both characters is Friar Lawrence. A Franciscan friar, friend to both Romeo and Juliet. Kind, civic-
minded, a proponent of moderation, and always ready with a plan, Friar Lawrence secretly marries the impassioned lovers in hopes
that the union might eventually bring peace to Verona.

Mercutio, Romeo's close friend and the Prince's kinsman. He is full of wit, imagination, and occasionally a strange, biting satire
mixed with brooding fervor. Enjoys wordplay, particularly when it involves sexual allusions. He has a tendency to become very
impetuous and despises those who are influenced, conceited, or fixated on current trends. He tries to persuade Romeo that love is
just a matter of sexual desire because he finds Romeo's idealized conceptions of love to be tedious. The main villain of the story,
Tybalt is a Capulet, Juliet’s cousin on her mother’s side. Vain, fashionable, supremely aware of courtesy and the lack of it, he
becomes aggressive, violent, and quick to draw his sword when he feels his pride has been injured. Once drawn, his sword is
something to be feared. He loathes Montagues. Benvolio, on the other hand is Montague’s nephew, Romeo’s cousin and thoughtful
friend. Benvolio makes a genuine effort to defuse violent scenes in public places, though Mercutio accuses him of having a nasty
temper in private. He spends most of the play trying to help Romeo get his mind off Rosaline, even after Romeo has fallen in love
with Juliet. Now, we go to the heads of both family. First, Capulet is the patriarch of the Capulet family, father of Juliet, husband of
Lady Capulet, and enemy, for unexplained reasons, of Montague. He truly loves his daughter, though he is not well acquainted with
Juliet’s thoughts or feelings, and seems to think that what is best for her is a “good” match with Paris. Often prudent, he commands
respect and propriety, but he is liable to fly into a rage when either is lacking. Lady Capulet , Juliet’s mother, Capulet’s wife is a
woman who herself married young (by her own estimation she gave birth to Juliet at close to the age of fourteen), she is eager to
see her daughter marry Paris. She is an ineffectual mother, relying on the Nurse for moral and pragmatic support. Montague is
Romeo’s father, the patriarch of the Montague clan and bitter enemy of Capulet. At the beginning of the play, he is chiefly
concerned about Romeo’s melancholy. Lady Montague is Romeo’s mother, Montague’s wife. She dies of grief after Romeo is exiled
from Verona. As Romeo’s rival, Paris is a kinsman of the Prince, and the suitor of Juliet most preferred by Capulet. Prince Escalus is
the Prince of Verona, kinsman of Mercutio and Paris. As the seat of political power in Verona, he is concerned about maintaining the
public peace at all costs.

Of all characters, the two most notable characters with their Oscar-worthy performances were Paul Giamatti as Romeo's confidant
Friar Laurence and Lesley Manville as Juliet's nurse. They added so much maturity, authority and light-heartedness to their roles as
Romeo & Juliet’s bridge.

Themes and Messages:

The most obvious theme in Romeo and Juliet is that of love. The play focuses on romantic love, specifically the intense passion
that springs up at first sight between Romeo and Juliet. But the play deals with many other important ideas too. Shakespeare invites
us to examine the importance of fate, death, honour, friendship and duality. Moreover, love, in other words, resists any single
metaphor because it is too powerful to be so easily contained or understood. Romeo and Juliet does not make a specific moral
statement about the relationships between love and society, religion, and family; rather, it portrays the chaos and passion of being
in love, combining images of love, violence, death, religion, and family in an impressionistic rush leading to the play’s tragic
conclusion.

With love and romance as its main themes, "Romeo and Juliet" has had a profound influence on how society views love and
romance. It has become a symbol of romantic love and has helped shape societal expectations about what love should look like.

Recognizing that the nature of desire and identity is subject to historical change and cultural innovation can provide the basis for
rereading Romeo and Juliet. Instead of an uncomplicated, if lyrically beautiful, contest between young love and “ancient grudge,”
the play becomes a narrative that expresses an historical conflict between old forms of identity and new modes of desire, between
authority and freedom, between parental will and romantic individualism.

2. GETTYSBURG ADDRESS
The Gettysburg Address was delivered by President Abraham Lincoln on November 19, 1863, during the dedication
ceremony of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, following the Battle of Gettysburg in the
American Civil War. In this brief but powerful speech, Lincoln eloquently expressed the principles of human equality and the
significance of the Union in the face of the devastating conflict. The address began with the famous opening line "Four
score and seven years ago," referring to the establishment of the United States in 1776. Lincoln highlighted the nation's
dedication to the proposition that all men are created equal, emphasizing the enduring importance of democracy and the
Union. The speech concluded with a call for a "new birth of freedom" and a commitment to ensuring that government of
the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the earth. The Gettysburg Address is considered one of
the greatest speeches in American history, succinctly capturing the essence of the nation's ideals and the sacrifice of those
who fought in the Civil War.

3. "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"

 It is a classic novel written by Mark Twain. The story is set in the fictional town of St. Petersburg, Missouri, and
revolves around the mischievous and imaginative young boy, Tom Sawyer. The novel follows Tom's various escapades and
adventures as he navigates childhood, often getting into trouble but ultimately learning valuable life lessons

The narrative begins with Tom engaging in activities like skipping school, tricking his friends into whitewashing a fence for
him, and exploring a cave with his friend Huckleberry Finn. Tom's life takes a turn when he witnesses a murder, leading to a
series of events that include treasure hunts, courtroom dramas, and a romantic interest in a girl named Becky Thatcher.

Throughout the story, Tom's character undergoes development as he confronts moral dilemmas, discovers the
consequences of his actions, and grows into a more responsible individual. The novel explores themes of friendship, freedom,
and the contrast between societal expectations and the adventurous spirit of childhood.

In the end, Tom and Huck Finn find treasure, and Tom reveals himself at his own funeral, having faked his death. The novel
concludes with Tom's Aunt Polly happy to see him alive, and Tom reflects on the joys and challenges of being a boy. "The
Adventures of Tom Sawyer" captures the essence of childhood, portraying the universal experiences of growing up and the
timeless allure of youthful escapades.

4. "Dr. Heidegger's Experiment"- is a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. The narrative revolves around an elderly
physician, Dr. Heidegger, who invites four friends to his study for an unusual experiment. The characters are Mr.
Medbourne, Colonel Killigrew, Mr. Gascoigne, and Widow Wycherly.
Dr. Heidegger's study is filled with various curiosities, including a mysterious, centuries-old black book containing
magical spells. The experiment involves water from the legendary Fountain of Youth in Florida, which Dr. Heidegger
obtained during his travels.
The four guests eagerly agree to participate, and Dr. Heidegger pours the water into a vase. As the group observes,
a withered, dried rose placed in the vase miraculously comes back to life. Encouraged by this spectacle, each guest decides
to drink from the vase, hoping to regain their lost youth.
However, the rejuvenation is short-lived. The guests revert quickly to their old habits and flaws. The Widow
Wycherly becomes coquettish, Mr. Medbourne reverts to his gambling interests, Colonel Killigrew returns to his pursuit of
pleasure, and Mr. Gascoigne resumes his political ambitions.
The story concludes with Dr. Heidegger musing about the human condition and the folly of those who do not learn
from their mistakes. He considers the experiment a success, as it has provided valuable insight into human nature. The tale
serves as a moral allegory, cautioning against the futile pursuit of recapturing the past and emphasizing the importance of
learning from one's experiences.

5. "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" by Robert Frost.

The poem captures a moment of reflection as the speaker stops by a snowy woods on a dark evening. The setting is
serene and peaceful, with the only sound being the sweep of wind and snow. The speaker, however, feels the pull of
obligations and responsibilities, signaling that he has promises to keep and miles to go before he sleeps.

Despite the allure of the tranquil scene, the speaker acknowledges the pressing demands of life and moves on. The
poem subtly explores themes of duty, the conflict between the natural world and human responsibilities, and the tension
between the desire for restful contemplation and the necessity of fulfilling one's commitments. The repetition of the last
line, "And miles to go before I sleep," emphasizes the speaker's sense of duty and the journey that lies ahead.

6. "Ode to the West Wind" is a poem written by Percy Bysshe Shelley. It's one of Shelley's major works and is considered an
ode, a form of lyric poetry characterized by its serious and thoughtful tone. Here's a summary of the poem along with a
brief mention of the setting:

Summary:

The poem is divided into five stanzas, each consisting of fourteen lines. In "Ode to the West Wind," Shelley addresses the west wind
as a powerful force of nature and a symbol of change. The speaker describes the wind's various forms, from the gentle breeze of
spring to the violent storm of autumn. Throughout the poem, the speaker expresses a desire to harness the power of the west wind
to bring about personal and societal renewal.

The wind is portrayed as a force that can carry the poet's words and ideas across the world, acting as a catalyst for change. The
poem reflects Shelley's own revolutionary and visionary ideals, calling for a renewal of human thought and society.

Setting:

The setting of "Ode to the West Wind" is primarily the natural world, with a focus on the changing seasons. The poet uses vivid
imagery to describe the wind's effects on the landscape, from the blossoming flowers of spring to the falling leaves of autumn. The
setting also extends to the broader context of the early 19th century, a time of political and social upheaval in Europe. Shelley, a
Romantic poet, was influenced by the spirit of the age, and this ode is a reflection of his engagement with both the natural world
and the political and intellectual currents of his time.

7. "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" is a poem written by William Wordsworth. The poem, often known as "Daffodils,"
describes the poet's encounter with a field of golden daffodils while he was wandering in a state of solitude. Here's a
summary of the poem:

The speaker begins by expressing his loneliness and compares himself to a drifting cloud. He then recounts a day when he happened
upon a field of daffodils beside a lake. The sight of the flowers, fluttering and dancing in the breeze, captivates the speaker and lifts
his spirits.

The memory of the daffodils becomes a source of solace for the poet in times of solitude and melancholy. The beauty of the scene,
with thousands of daffodils stretched along the shore, brings him a sense of tranquility and joy. The poet reflects on the enduring
impact of this picturesque encounter, asserting that the memory of the daffodils continues to "flash upon that inward eye" and "fill
[his] heart with pleasure" even when he is alone.

The poem is a celebration of the beauty of nature and the power of its memory to alleviate feelings of isolation. It emphasizes the
idea that the beauty of the natural world can provide solace and inspiration, staying with the observer long after the actual
encounter.

"I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud," also known as "Daffodils," was written by William Wordsworth and is often associated with the
poet's experiences in the Lake District of England. While the poem does not provide specific details about the setting, Wordsworth is
known for drawing inspiration from the landscapes of the Lake District, where he spent much of his life.

The general setting of the poem is a picturesque natural landscape, and it is commonly believed that Wordsworth's inspiration for
the poem came from an actual experience during a walk with his sister, Dorothy Wordsworth, near Ullswater in the Lake District in
1802. The setting includes a lake, hills, and a field of daffodils, which become the focal point of the poem.

The Lake District, with its scenic beauty and diverse flora, was a significant influence on Wordsworth's poetry, and "I Wandered
Lonely as a Cloud" is a notable example of his ability to capture the essence of the natural world in his verses. The setting described
in the poem reflects the Romantic fascination with nature and the belief in its power to inspire and uplift the human spirit.

8. Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" is a poem written by Thomas Gray. Here's a summary of the poem:

Summary:

The poem is a reflection on life, death, and the passage of time. It begins with the speaker wandering through a country churchyard
and observing the graves of humble villagers. The tone is melancholic, contemplating the lives of the deceased and the anonymity
that accompanies a simple rural life.

The speaker imagines the untold stories and potential greatness of those buried in the churchyard, speculating on the unfulfilled
aspirations and talents that may have gone unrecognized. Despite their humble lives, the speaker suggests that these villagers
possessed virtues and qualities that deserve acknowledgment.
As the poem progresses, the focus shifts from the individual lives of the deceased to a broader meditation on mortality. The speaker
reflects on the inevitability of death and the idea that all people, regardless of their station in life, will eventually share a common
fate.

The elegy concludes with a call for the reader to ponder the universal themes presented in the churchyard scene. It encourages
contemplation of the transient nature of life, the impact of death on human aspirations, and the idea that even those in obscurity
may leave behind a meaningful legacy.

Setting:

The setting of the poem is a country churchyard, a quiet and rural burial ground. Gray's choice of setting reflects the tranquility and
simplicity of rural life, and it becomes a contemplative space where the speaker reflects on the lives and deaths of the villagers
buried there. The churchyard serves as a metaphorical and physical space for the broader meditations on life, death, and the human
condition that unfold throughout the poem.

9. "A Tale of Two Cities" is a historical novel written by Charles Dickens, set in London and Paris before and during the French
Revolution.

Summary:

The story begins with the famous line "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," establishing the novel's dual settings and
the contrasting circumstances faced by its characters.

The narrative revolves around several characters, including Charles Darnay, a French aristocrat, and Sydney Carton, a dissolute
English lawyer. Darnay faces charges of treason in England but is acquitted due to the efforts of his defense attorney, Carton. Over
time, Darnay and Carton become entwined in their personal lives, including their love for the same woman, Lucie Manette.

The plot extends to revolutionary Paris, where the oppressed lower class rises against the aristocracy. Darnay, despite renouncing
his family's title, becomes embroiled in the French Revolution. The novel explores themes of sacrifice, resurrection, and the impact
of social injustice on individuals and society.

The climax occurs with Carton's self-sacrifice for the happiness of Lucie and her family, embodying the novel's famous last lines: "It is
a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known."

Setting:

The novel is set in London and Paris during the late 18th century, a tumultuous period marked by social and political upheaval.
Dickens vividly portrays the stark differences between the two cities, capturing the social injustices and economic disparities that
contributed to the French Revolution. The contrasting settings serve as a backdrop for the novel's exploration of the impact of
historical events on individuals and the interconnectedness of lives across borders.

10. "Pride and Prejudice" is a classic novel written by Jane Austen.

Summary:

The novel follows the life and romantic journey of Elizabeth Bennet, one of five daughters in the Bennet family. Mrs. Bennet is eager
to see her daughters married, as the family estate is entailed to a male heir, and they face the risk of financial instability if none of
the daughters marry well.

Enter Mr. Charles Bingley, a wealthy and amiable bachelor, who becomes enamored with Jane Bennet, the eldest daughter.
Simultaneously, the brooding and wealthy Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy, Bingley's close friend, attracts the attention of Elizabeth Bennet.
However, Darcy's initial pride and Elizabeth's prejudice create misunderstandings that complicate their budding romance.

The novel explores themes of social class, manners, morality, and the complexities of love and marriage in early 19th-century
England. As Elizabeth navigates her relationships with Darcy, other suitors, and her own family, she undergoes personal growth and
challenges societal expectations.
The novel culminates in a satisfying resolution where misunderstandings are clarified, and characters find happiness in unexpected
ways.

Setting:

The novel is set in the English countryside during the early 19th century, a time when social class and marriage were of great
significance. The story primarily unfolds in the fictional town of Meryton and the nearby estate of Netherfield, as well as the grand
estate of Pemberley. The social structure, manners, and expectations of the time play a significant role in shaping the characters'
lives and interactions. Austen's depiction of the English Regency era provides a rich backdrop for the exploration of the novel's
themes and the development of its characters.

11. "The Lord of the Flies" is a classic novel written by William Golding.

Summary:

The story begins with a group of British boys, ranging from ages six to twelve, stranded on a deserted island due to a plane crash
during a wartime evacuation. The boys attempt to establish a society with rules and order, choosing Ralph as their leader. Ralph,
along with Piggy and Simon, strives to create a signal fire to attract passing ships and be rescued.

However, the boys' attempts at civilization gradually deteriorate as they struggle with their own fears, desires, and the emerging
chaos on the island. A faction led by Jack, who is more interested in hunting and indulging in primal instincts, forms a separate
group. This division sparks a descent into savagery, and the boys' behavior becomes increasingly brutal and violent.

The titular "Lord of the Flies" is a severed pig's head mounted on a stick, which becomes a symbol of the boys' descent into savagery
and the inherent darkness within human nature. As the boys lose touch with civilization and morality, the island becomes a
battleground for power, survival, and the clash between reason and primal instincts.

The novel reaches its climax with a tragic confrontation between the two factions, resulting in the arrival of a naval officer who
rescues the surviving boys. The officer is unaware of the true savagery that transpired on the island, highlighting the stark contrast
between the boys' brutal behavior and the external veneer of civilization.

Setting:

The novel is set on a remote, uninhabited tropical island during an unspecified war. The lush, idyllic setting initially represents the
potential for paradise and adventure. However, as the boys struggle for survival and societal order collapses, the island transforms
into a harsh and dangerous environment. The physical setting mirrors the psychological and moral deterioration of the boys, and the
island becomes a microcosm reflecting the darker aspects of human nature.