PartIV2TheLiteratureofRealism美国文学.pptx

Part IVThe Literature of RealismO.Henry(18621910)oWilliam Sidney Porter oa bookkeeper,a drugstore clerk and a Texas ranger oa prolific writer:published 10 collections and over 600 short stories during his lifetime;three more collections appeared posthumously oNew York city(Baghdad on the Subway)osympathetic to the socially low oThematic concern:oquestions of loneliness,of desolate people,of grotesque underlingsoStyle:otend to repeat the motifs of his stories and fall into melodrama and sentimentality odirect;warm characterization;use of southern dialect;use of slang;master of surprise(O.Henry ending:clever twist endings);full of humor.EvaluationoThe American answer to Guy de Maupassant oHis stories are amusing,witty,flat,biting and are filled with irony,sentiment,and pathos.oHe combined realism with a world of his own,reflecting a fatalistic view of life.oThere is no great concern with unchanging human problems,and he had no firm moral messages.oHis works are typically American,and portray various types of people in the United States.Major WorksoCabbages and Kings(1904)oThe Four Million(1906)(“The Gift of the Magi”)oThe Trimmed Lamp(1907)(“The Last Leaf”)oHeart of the West(1907)oThe Voice of the City(1908)oRoads of Destiny(1909)oSixes And Sevens(1911)oRolling Stones(1912)oWaifs And Strays(1917)oThe O.Henry Award is a prestigious annual prize given to outstanding short stories.Henry James(18431916)onovelist,literary critic,playwright and essayist onovels,travel papers,critical essays,literary portraits,plays,autobiographies and a series of critical prefaces oone of the major figures of trans-Atlantic literatureoBorn into a wealthy familyoBrother:William James(pragmatist philosopher and psychologist)ounmarriedolife-long friendship with William Dean HowelloHarvard Law School oInfluence by English,European and American writer:oBalzac,Zola,Ibsen,oGeorge Eliot,Flaubert,Trugenev and Hawthorneofelt the materialistic bent of American life and its lack of culture and sophistication intolerable;an admirer of European mannersoLondon,1876 a naturalized British citizen in 1915:an expatriate(an American-born British author);in 1916,receive the Order of Merit from King George VoA prolific writer o3 distinctive periods:o1865-1881:international theme o1882-1895:tales of inter-personal relationships o1895-1916:A.till 1900:a few novellas and tales dealing with childhood and adolescence,which was a revival of his earlier theme of innocence in a corrupted world B.1901-1904:“the major phase”of his career(summit of his art):the accomplishment of the trilogy,in which he returned to his old“the international theme”C.till death:some American impressions and autobiographical matter,two unfinished novelsCharacteristics of his fictionoHis works frequently juxtapose characters from the Old World(Europe)and from the New World(United States).The purpose is to stress mutual understanding and sympathy.The ideal may have been to combine the best of both cultures harmoniously.oHis protagonists were often young American women facing oppression or abuse.oHis plots often centered on the clash of personalities and cultures in stories of personal relationships,and other moral questions.oThe settings of his fiction range from working class to aristocratic,and often describe the efforts of middle-class Americans to make their way in European capitals.oHis method of writing from the point of view of a character within a tale allowed him to explore the phenomena of consciousness and perception.EvaluationoHe insisted that writers in Great Britain and America should be allowed the greatest freedom possible in presenting their view of the world.oHe argues for inclusion of the disagreeable,the ugly,and the commonplace.oThe first American to achieve a blend of detailed observation and polished style.oOne of the founders and leaders of a school of realism in fiction.oThe most expert stylist of his time.Psychological realism:his imaginative use of point of view,interior monologue and unreliable narrators brought a new depth and interest to realistic fiction,thus probably the first of the modern psychological analysts in the novel and anticipated the modernist work of the twentieth century.oHis literary criticism is both concerned with form and devoted to human values.On one hand:“art without life is a poor affair”On the other hand:“It is art that makes life,makes interest,makes importance.”oIn political-social ideas and attitudes:oA spokesman of the wealthy,deep-rooted leisure class,stressing travel,cosmopolitanism,manners,and taste as indices to social superiorityo conservative toward overzealous reformerso critical of U.S.imperialist behavioro expose predatory business competition of the New World and its dehumanizing result,and the decadence and corruption of the Oldocritical of American life,its obsession with“business,”it extremes of wealth and poverty,its lack of culture and sophisticationoregard evil as essentially of inward cause and cure,advocate free-willed renunciation of the low or mean,and repeatedly emphasized magnanimity and the beauty of goodnessoA remarkable New World bridge from the Enlightenment to all that is“modern”in the literary art of the twentieth century.Major WorksoRoderick Hudson 1875oThe American 1877 oDaisy Miller 1878 (international fame)oThe Portrait of a Lady 1881o“The Art of Fiction”1884oThe Bostonians 1886oThe Princess Casamassima 1886oThe Tragic Muse 1890oThe Turn of the Screw 1898oThe Wings of the Dove 1902oThe Ambassadors 1903 (his most perfect work of art)oThe Golden Bowl 1904 oIsabel Archer oThemes:othe differences between the New World and the Old;personal freedom;moral responsibility;betrayal;sexuality ointernational theme:othe meeting of America and Europe,American innocence in contact and contrast with European sophistication(decadence),and the consequent moral and psychological complications oThe typical pattern of the international theme:oA young American man or an American girl who goes to Europe and affronts his or her destiny.The unsophisticated boy or girl would be beguiled,betrayed,cruelly wronged at the hands of those who pretend to stand for the highest possible civilization.oMarriage and love are used by James as the focal point of the confrontation between the two value systems,and the protagonist usually goes through a painful process of a spiritual growth,gaining knowledge of good and evil from the conflict.oStyle:simple and direct(by the standards of Victorian magazine writing).oexperimented widely with forms and methods,generally narrating from a conventionally omniscient point of view;oplots generally concern romance,except for the three big novels of social commentary that conclude this period.oHe increasingly abandoned direct statement in favor of frequent double negatives,and complex descriptive imagery.Single paragraphs began to run for page after page,in which an initial noun would be succeeded by pronouns surrounded by clouds of adjectives and prepositional clauses,far from their original referents,and verbs would be deferred and then preceded by a series of adverbs.oTo correspond to life the author should avoid artificial omniscience as much as possible.o“Point of view”lies at the center of his aesthetic of the novel.oThe novelist must be faithful to life as it actually appears.oThere must be freedom for the artist to choose what subject he will deal with.oDramatization:showing rather than tellingoPsychological realismoAmbiguity