Important movements in American literature

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Important movements in American literature
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Puritanism
1620-1700

• Purpose for Literature
• provide spiritual insight and instruction
• Mostly sermons, theological studies, and hymns

Puritan Style Simple, Spare, Straightforward.
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The Founding Fathers Neoclassicists
1750-1800
Emphasized reason, harmony, and
restraint Also some embraced Deism
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American Romanticism
1820-1865
INDIVIDUALISM
IMAGINATION
NATURE
EMOTION
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Transcendentalists
1840-1855
Part of the American Romantic Movement
Believed that
Truth could not be perceived with the five
senses Human soul is part of the Oversoul or
universal spirit, which it returns to at a
persons death Held nature in as an object of
worship
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Realism
1865-1900
Reaction against Romanticism and Neoclassicism

• Factual is more important than the intellectual
  or the emotional  
• Treats nature objectively
• Tells the stories of everyday people
• Use of details more important than plot
• Atheistic
• Life is driven by fate

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Modernism
1920-1950

• Period following World War I characterized by
• Disillusionment with tradition
• Interest in wide range of experimental trends in
  literature
• Adoption complex and difficult new forms and style

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Existentialism
Europe 1950-1970
Mankind has free will.         Life is a series
of choices, creating stress.         Few
decisions are without any negative consequences.
        Some things are irrational or absurd,
without explanation.         If one makes a
decision, he or she must follow through.
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Contemporary Characteristic of the Modern or
1950--?
Postmodernism

• Reaction against Realism and Modernism
• Stresses the importance of community over the
  individual
• Allows for the the rational and the irrational
  (spiritual) in decision making