American Literary Timeline

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American Literary Timeline

• Colonial Period
• Age of Reason
• Romanticism
• Transcendentalism
• Anti-Transcendentalism

• Realism
• Naturalism
• Regionalism
• Modernism
• Contemporary

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Colonial PeriodEarly America-1776

• This period was at the very beginnings of
  America and it made way for the rest of the
  countries literature. In the first stages of
  America there were writers, such as Thomas
  Hariot, who wrote A Brief and True Report of the
  New-Found Land of Virginia in 1588 in which he
  described The Americas in words and picture.
  The book was quickly translated into Latin,
  French, and German it was a window for the Old
  World to see an embellished version of the New
  World.
• Others that dominated this era were the Puritans
  whose definition of good writing was writing that
  brought home a full awareness of the importance
  of worshipping God and of the spiritual dangers
  that the soul faced on Earth, and the literature
  that was produced by the Puritans reflected this.

Authors of the Colonial Period
Edward Taylor
John Woolman
Anne Bradstreet
William Bradford
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Age of Reason Late 1770s to Early 1800s
Authors of the Age of Reason

• This period was a time when authors were
  focused more on their own reasoning rather than
  simply taking what the church taught as fact.
  During this period there was also cultivation of
  patriotism. The main medium during that period
  were political pamphlets, essays, travel
  writings, speeches, and documents.
• Also during this period many reforms were
  either made or requested, for instance during
  this time the Declaration of Independence was
  written.

Abigail Adams
Benjamin Franklin
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Paine
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Romanticism 1800-1850

• After the Age of Reason came to an end, the
  people of America were tired of reality they
  wanted to see life as more than it was. This was
  the Era of Romantics. The main medium that
  presented itself at that time were short stories,
  poems, and novels. During this era, as opposed
  to the Age of Reason, the imagination
  dominated intuition ruled over fact, and there
  was a large emphasis on the individual/common man
  and on nature or the natural world.
• Gothic literature was also introduced at this
  time, which is a sub-genre of Romanticism. This
  genre includes stories about characters that had
  both good and evil traits. Gothic literature
  also incorporated the use of supernatural
  elements.

Authors of the Romanticism
Washington Irving
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Edgar Allen Poe
Herman Melville
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Transcendentalism1840-1855

• This movement pushed America from the elaborate
  and fantasy writings displayed in the period of
  Romanticism into a period of literature that
  stressed individualism, nature, and
  self-reliance. Often Transcendentalists used
  nature to gain knowledge or to return to a life
  of self-reliance and individualism. It also
  stressed the fundamental idea of a unity between
  God and the world and that each person was a
  microcosm of the world.
• Unlike many European groups, the
  Transcendentalists never issued a manifesto.
  They insisted on the differences in each
  individual.

Authors of the Transcendentalism
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Henry David Thoreau
Walt Whitman
Sarah Margaret Fuller
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Anti-Transcendentalism 1840-1855

• During the same time period when
  Transcendentalism was taking place, its opposite,
  Anti-Transcendentalism, was also happening. As
  opposed to Transcendentalism, which focused on
  the natural world and its relationship to
  humanity and the quest for understanding of the
  human spirit, Anti-Transcendentalism focused on
  the limitations of mankind and its potential
  destructiveness of the human spirit. For
  instance, water brings life, but its excess, i.e.
  a flood, can bring death and destruction.
  (Notice how they sometimes use nature in their
  writings to reflect what goes on with humans.
  Example Scarlet Letter and the forest
  reflects Pearls wild nature, the only place
  Hester and Dimmesdale can be free, etc.)

Authors of the Anti-Transcendentalism
Herman Melville
Nathaniel Hawthorne
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Realism 1865-1915

• This literary movement took place during the
  Civil War. At a time when a war was taking place,
  people were tired of Transcendentalism and
  Anti-Transcendentalism. For one thing, they were
  both extremes of the same spectrum one was nice,
  happy, and frilly the other was dark and
  destructive. People wanted to see things how
  they were, so Realism came about.
• Realism also came about as a reaction to
  Romanticism, in which there were heroic
  characters and adventures with strange and
  unfamiliar settings. In response, Realisms
  authors tried to write truthfully and objectively
  about ordinary characters in ordinary situations.

Authors of the Realism
Mark Twain Samuel Clemens
Bret Harte
Sarah Orne Jewett
James Henry
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Naturalism 1865-1915

• The Naturalism literary movement that took place
  in the late nineteenth and early twentieth
  century tended to view people as hapless victims
  of immutable natural laws. Naturalism is closely
  related to Realism, only it usually views the
  world in a darker perspective. In Naturalism, it
  is widely shown that free will is an illusion
  that things that happen in the universe happen
  and could not happen any other way.
• Also a defining characteristic of Naturalism is
  that its characters lives are shaped by forces
  they cannot control.

Authors of the Naturalism
Stephen Crane
Jack London
Theodore Dreiser
Frank Norris
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Regionalism 1865-1915

• Regionalism was a literary movement in which
  authors would write a story about specific
  geographical areas. By writing about regions,
  the authors explore the culture of that area,
  including its languages, customs, beliefs, and
  history.
• Not only did writers in this time try to show
  the region they wrote about to their readers, but
  they also made an attempt at a sophisticated
  sociological or anthropological treatment of the
  culture of the region.

Authors of the Regionalism
Willa Cather
William Faulkner
Kate Chopin
Frank Norris
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Modernism 1915-1946

• This type of writing is one of the most
  experimental types. Modernist authors used
  fragments, stream of consciousness, and interior
  dialogue. The main thing that authors were
  trying to achieve with Modernism was a unique
  style, one that they could stand out and be known
  for its uniqueness.
• During this period, technology was taking
  incredible leaps. There were also two world wars
  and destruction on a global scale. The younger
  generation began to take over the main stage.

Authors of the Modernism
Ernest Hemingway
F. Scott Fitzgerald
John Steinbeck
Robert Frost
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Contemporary 1946-present

• In the years since the Modern period, American
  authors have begun to write from a plethora of
  genres. Many Americans simply write in the style
  that suits them individually rather than
  mimicking specific styles. There are more
  different types of writing being done at one time
  than at any other period in history fantasy,
  fiction, science fiction, horror, political
  writings, romantics, plays, and poems, anything
  and everything.

Authors of the Contemporary
J. D. Salinger
Stephen King
Joyce Carol Oates
Robert Jordan
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Edward Taylor (c. 1644-1729)

• Taylor was a Minister who studied at Harvard
  College, and whose works were never published by
  Taylor, himself, until they were discovered in
  1930s. He wrote such pieces as Metrical History
  of Christianity, which mainly a history of
  Christian martyrs.

Colonial Period
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John Woolman (1720-1772)

• The best known work by a Quaker was written by
  this man, simply named Journal in 1774, this
  journal was a complete and full account of his
  life in a pure, heartfelt style of great
  sweetness that have attracted many American and
  English writers for many years after Woolman had
  past away.

Colonial Period
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Anne Bradstreet (c. 1612-1672)

• The first publication of a book of poems in
  America, was also the first publication by a
  woman in America. She also wrote The Tenth Muse
  Lately Sprung Up in America in 1650.

Colonial Period
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William Bradford (1590-1657)

• He was elected governor of Plymouth shortly after
  the pilgrims landed in on Plymouth Rock. He was
  essentially the first historian of the new
  colonies. His participation in the voyage of the
  Mayflower and being governor made him the ideal
  person for this job. He wrote Of Plymouth
  Plantation in 1651.

Colonial Period
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Abigail Adams (1744-1818)

• She wrote letters that campaigned for womens
  rights. Her grandson, Charles Francis Adams,
  published The Familiar Letters of John Adams and
  His Wife Abigail During the Revolution, which
  were just what they said they were, letters
  written by Abigail and her husband.

Age of Reason
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Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)

• Franklin is well known worldwide for his
  discoveries in the world of science and also for
  works that he contributed to, such as the
  Declaration of Independence, and his theories on
  electricity. His works were all new ideas things
  people never thought of before because they
  always took what they got as fact.

Age of Reason
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Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

• Jefferson is bets know for writing the
  Declaration of Independence, the document came
  about as a response to these times, people were
  thinking for themselves, and one of the major
  thing the Americans discovered was that they
  didnt need England. So Jefferson wrote the D of
  I to formally state that.

Age of Reason
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Thomas Paine (1737-1809)

• Paine wrote mostly pamphlets that would spur
  ideas and immediate action. In the document "The
  American Crisis," Paine wrote about the
  oppression that America suffered from Britain,
  and propelled America into a war with Britain.
  Paine, to this day, is well known for his
  propaganda.

Age of Reason
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Washington Irving (1789-1851)

• Irving was the first famous American author
  hes also known as the Father of American
  Literature. He wrote travel books, short
  stories, and satires. Some of his works include
  Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Rip Van Winkle, and
  Devil and Tom Walker.

Romanticism
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Edgar Allen Poe (1809-1849)

• Poe had a bad childhood that made him despise the
  world, and his works reflected his work. He is
  credited for creating the modern short story, and
  the detective story. He also challenged two
  long-standing theories, one, a poem had to be
  long, and two, a poem had to teach you something.
  Some of his works include, "The Raven", "Bells",
  "Annabel Lee", and "Dream."

Romanticism
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Herman Melville (1819-1891)

• In his time Melville was not entirely recognized,
  however, in the more recent years he has been
  considered one of the most top rated novelist of
  all time. He is most well known for his epic
  novel Moby Dick.

Romanticism
Anti-Transcendentalism
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Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

• Emerson had a strong sense of a religious mission
  though he was accused of subverting Christianity.
  He left the church saying, to be a good
  minister, it was necessary to leave the church.
  Some of his mayor works include Nature, published
  in 1836.

Transcendentalism
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Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)

• Thoreau Lived his life, to do just that, live his
  life. He was never rich and for the most part
  lived with little money all his life. His work
  he is most well known for is Walden, published in
  1854.

Transcendentalism
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Walt Whitman (1819-1892)

• Whiteman was born on Long Island, and was, for
  most of his job life, a carpenter he was a man
  of the people. Most of his learning career was
  done on his own, after he left school the age of
  eleven. His major work was entitled His Leaves
  of Grass, published in 1855 over the years he
  made many rewrites for this book. Some of his
  famous poems are, "Crossing Brooklyn Ferry," "Out
  of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking," and "When
  Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd."

Transcendentalism
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Sarah Margaret Fuller (1810-1850)

• Fuller was born in Cambridgeport, Massachusetts.
  She learned Greek and Latin at a very young age,
  and later learned German and Italian. After her
  father, a congressman, died she became a
  schoolteacher. She worked with Ralph Emerson as
  editors of The Dial, a literary and philosophical
  journal, for which she wrote many articles
  including The Great Lawsuit. Man versus Woman,
  Woman versus Man in which she spoke for the
  equality of men and women. Some of her other
  works include Summer on the Lakes, published in
  1844, and Women in the Women in the Nineteenth
  Century, published in 1845.

Transcendentalism
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Nathaniel Hawthorne(1804-1864)

• Hawthorne was a Puritan who utilized his writings
  to express his dark, and gloomy outlook on life.
  Some of his works include Twice Told Tales,
  published in 1837 The Scarlet Letter, published
  in 1850 and The House of the Seven Gables,
  published in 1851.

Anti-Transcendentalism
Romanticism
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Mark Twain Samuel Clemens (1835-1910)

• Twain is known by many as the greatest American
  humorist and one of our greatest novelists. He
  was known for using vernacular, exaggeration, and
  deadpan narrator to create humor. Twain wrote
  many great novels including, the Adventures of
  Tom Sawyer, published in 1876 and The Prince and
  the Pauper, published in 1881.

Realism
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Bret Harte (1836-1902)

• Harte was born in New York, and later worked in
  California, on The California writing stories.
  He worked with other well-known authors as well,
  while at The California, authors like Mark Twain,
  Charles Warren Stoddard, and Prentice Mulford.
  He was later appointed Secretary of the United
  States Branch Mint at San Francisco he held this
  office until 1870. He then became the editor of
  Overland Monthly, where he published "The Luck of
  Roaring Camp," which brought him instant fame.
  Some of his works included "The Heathen
  Chinese, a poem published in 1870, Devil's Ford,
  "The Twins of Table Mountain," "By Shore and
  Sedge," and "A Millionaire of Rough and Ready."

Realism
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Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909)

• Jewett grew up with books all around her, it was
  only fitting she grow up to be a writer. The
  early years of her life were much like the story
  she wrote in A Country Doctor. Some of her works
  include Miss Tempy's Watchers, originally
  published in 1888 The Dulham Ladies, originally
  published in 1886 A White Heron, originally
  published in 1886.

Realism
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James Henry (1843-1916 )

• His father was an important theorist and
  lecturer, and his older brother was a famous
  American philosopher, William James. He attended
  Harvard College. His early stories depict the
  leisurely life of the well-to-do. In his time he
  wrote many short stories including The Short
  Story of a Year, published in 1865 Gabrielle
  de Bergerac, published in 1869 and Guest's
  Confession.

Realism
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Stephen Crane (1871-1900)

• Cranes writing was known for attacking
  patriotism, individualism, and organized
  religion it also confronted the meaninglessness
  of the world. His work was also very well known
  for its imagery and symbolism. The work he is
  most famous for Red Badge of Courage, which was
  set in the Civil War. Some of his other works
  include The Open Boat, published in 1894 An
  Episode of War, originally published in 1890.

Naturalism
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Jack London (1876-1916)

• London was born in San Francisco, California he
  lived a hard life, switching from job to job for
  whatever money he could get, after his father
  abandoned him at a young age. He is one of the
  most highly acclaimed writers of all time his
  stories of life and death struggles are vivid and
  engaging. Some of his works include The Call of
  the Wild, published in 1903 White Fang,
  published in 1906 Lost Face, published in
  1910 and The Night Born, published in 1913.

Naturalism
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Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945)

• One of Dreiser's favorite fictional devices was
  the use of contrast between the rich and the
  poor, the urbane and the unsophisticated, and the
  power brokers and the helpless. Some of his works
  include Twelve Men, published in 1919 A Book
  About Myself, published in 1922 The Color of a
  Great City, published in 1923 An American
  Tragedy, published in 1925.

Naturalism
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Frank Norris (1870-1902)

• Norris studied in Paris, at the Univ. of
  California, and Harvard. He also spent several
  years as a war correspondent in South Africa
  (1895-96) and Cuba (1898). Some of his works
  include The Responsibilities of the Novelist,
  published in 1903 The Octopus, published in
  1901 and The Pit published in 1903.

Naturalism
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Willa Cather (1873-1947)

• Cather has been called, one of the most
  interesting female writers in American literary
  history. She was a teacher, a journalist and a
  critic as well as a writer. She has a talent for
  presenting settings, and characters that are rich
  in language and imagery. She also won a Pulitzer
  Prize. Some of her works include April
  Twilights, published in 1903 and O Pioneers!,
  published in 1913.

Regionalism
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William Faulkner (1897-1962)

• He served in both the Canadian and the British
  Royal Air Force. He wrote most of his novel on a
  farm in Oxford, Mississippi. Some of his novels
  included The Hamlet, published in 1940 The
  Town, published in 1957 and The Mansion,
  published in 1959.

Regionalism
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Kate Chopin (1851-1904)

• Chopin loved literature as a child, and secluded
  herself in it after her grandmothers death. She
  never achieved much until 1884 when she finally
  decided to pursue a career in writing. Some of
  her writing included "Desirees Baby," published
  in 1893 "The Awakening," published in 1899.

Regionalism
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Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)

• Hemingway won a Pulitzer Prize and Noble Peace
  Price for Literature. He used concise, direct,
  spare, objective, precise, rhythmic writing
  styles to create larger than life heroes, big
  game hunters, etc. Some of his works include
  The Sun Also Rises, published in 1922 A Farewell
  To Arms published in 1929 For Whom the Bell
  Tolls, published in 1940.

Modernism
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F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)

• Fitzgerald wrote about the times. In his novel
  The Great Gatsby, published in 1925, he wrote
  about the roaring twenties, a time when no one
  cared about the future and they had fun with what
  they had then. Some of his other works include
  The Side of Paradise, published in 1920 and The
  Beautiful and the Damned, published in 1922.

Modernism
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John Steinbeck (1902-1968)

• Steinbeck wrote about the both the pains and joys
  of life. The Grapes of Wraith, published in
  1939, his most well known work told the story of
  families ring to survive and stay together during
  the depression. In other works like Tortilla
  Flat, published in 1935, Steinbeck wrote about
  the joys of life. Some of his other works
  include East of Eden, published in 1952 Of Mice
  and Men, published in 1937 and The Pearl,
  published in 1947.

Modernism
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Robert Frost (1874-1963)

• Americas best known and most loved poet, Frost
  wrote his poems in a traditional verse form. He
  used the plain speech of rural New Englanders.
  Some of his works include Death of the Hired
  Man, published in 1951 Birches, published
  in1920 and The Road Not Taken, published in
  1920.

Modernism
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J. D. Salinger (b.1919)

• Salinger studied at NYU, and Columbia University.
  After which he decided to devote his life to his
  writing. His writing career was interrupted by
  World War I, where he served in the U.S. Army.
  His most well known work was his novel Catcher in
  the Rye, published in 1951, a novel about a high
  school student who tries to run away from his
  life that he thinks is phony. Some of his
  works are A Perfect Day for Bananafish published
  in 1948 For Esmé With Love and Squalor,
  published in 1950.

Contemporary
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Stephen King (b.1947)

• King write novels that frighten people. Some of
  his major works are Carrie published in 1974
  The Shining, publishing in 1998 Salem's Lot,
  published in 1993 and The Stand, published in
  1991.

Contemporary
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Joyce Carol Oates (b.1938)

• Oates received a type writer at the age of
  fourteen and trained herself to write novel after
  novel through high school and college. She
  earned an M.A. in English at the University of
  Wisconsin. Some of her works include Blonde,
  published in 2000 Wonderland, published in 1971
  and The Tattooed Girl, published in 2003.

Contemporary
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Robert Jordan (b.1948)-

• He went to the Citadel, the Military College of
  South Carolina, where he received a degree in
  physics. Jordans main area of expertise is in
  the genre of fantasy. He is currently in the
  process of writing a series of novel entitled The
  Wheel of Time, some of the novels from this
  series are, The Eye of the World, published in
  1990 Crossroads of Twilight, published in 2003
  and The Novel New Spring published in 2004.

Contemporary