Booklet 17 18

LITERATURA NORTEAMERICANA I / AMERICAN LITERATURE 1
2 CUATRIMESTRE
FILOLOGÍA INGLESA
INDEX
1. Bibliography 3
2. Maps 7
3. Chronological Table 13
4. Basic Documents: Declaration of Independence 17
5. Early Nineteenth Century: Romanticism and Transcendentalism 21
a. Romantic Writers
i. James Fenimore Cooper, from The Last of the Mohicans 21
b. American Renaissance 27
i. Transcendentalist Writers 27
1. Walt Whitman, from “Song of Myself”
ii. Boston Brahmins 29
1. Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter
(lectura obligatoria 1)
iii. The Renaissance of New England 29
1. Edgar Allan Poe, “The Raven”
iv. On Slavery and the Woman Question 33
1. Frederick Douglass, from Narrative of the Life of Frederick
Douglass
6. Late Nineteenth Century: Realism, Naturalism and the New Women 36
a. Realism
i. Mark Twain, from Huckleberry Finn
b. Naturalism 39
i. Stephen Crane, from Maggie
c. New Women 43
i. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, from “The Yellow Wallpaper”
7. Early Twentieth Century: Modernisms 45
a. Imagism and Modernist Poetry. Selection 45
b. Harlem Renaissance Poetry. Selection 50
8. Postwar Literature: Alienation and Rebellion 53
a. Realism and Naturalism 53
i. Carson McCullers, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (lectura obligatoria 2)
b. Beat Generation, Feminist and Black Aesthetics. Selection 54
9. Postmodernist and Contemporary Scene 58
a. All the Pretty Horses (lectura obligatoria 3) Cormac McCarthy,
Literatura Norteamericana I
1. BIBLIOGRAFÍA
GENERAL:
Bercovitch, Sacvan, ed. The Cambridge History of American Literature. Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1994.
——. Reconstructing American Literary History. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1986.
Bradbury, Malcolm y Richard Ruckland, eds. From Puritanism to Postmodernism: A
History of American Literature. London: Routledge, 1992.
Conn, Peter. Literatura norteamericana. Trad. Carme Franci. Madrid: Cambridge UP,
1988.
Cunliffe, Marcus. The Literature of the United States. 1954. Harmondsworth: Penguin,
1978.
Davidson, Cathy y Linda Wagner-Martin, eds. The Oxford Companion to Women’s Writing
in the United States. New York: OUP, 1995.
Elliott, Emory, ed. Columbia Literary History of the United States. New York: Columbia
UP, 1988.
——, ed. Historia de la literatura norteamericana. Madrid: Cátedra, 1991.
Ford, Boris. The New Pelican Guide to English Literature. Vol. 9: American Literature.
Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1985.
Gray, Richard. A History of American Literature. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell, 2004.
Gurpegui, José Antonio, ed. Historia crítica de la novela norteamericana. Salamanca:
Almar, 2001.
Hart, James, ed. The Oxford Companion to American Literature. New York: OUP, 1983.
Parini, Jay. The Columbia History of American Poetry. New York: Columbia UP, 1993.
Pattee, F. L. The Development of the American Short Story. New York: Harper, 1923.
Stauffer, Donald Barlow. A Short History of American Poetry. New York: Dutton, 1974.
Pérez Gallego, C. Guía de la literatura norteamericana. Madrid: Fundamento, 1982.
Ruland, Richard y Malcolm Bradbury. From Puritanism to Postmodernism: A History of
American Literature. London: Routledge, 1991.
Stokes, Claudia. Writers in Retrospect: The Rise of American Literary History, 1875-
1910. Chapel Hill: U of North Carolina P, 2006.
Cambridge UP, 1994.
Bradbury, Malcolm y Howard Temperley, eds. Introduction to American Studies. London:
Longman, 1981.
3
1988.
1978.
UP, 1988.

Almar, 2001.

ESPECÍFICA
Bercovitch, Sacvan, ed. The Cambridge History of American Literature, Vol. 4:
Nineteenth-Century Poetry, 1800-1910. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
2004.
Burt, Daniel S. The Chronology of American Literature: America's Literary
Achievements from the Colonial Era to Modern Times. London: Houghton Mifflin,
2004.
Cunliffe, Marcus, ed. American Literature to 1900. The Penguin History of Literature Vol.
8. London: Penguin, 1993.
Gunn, Giles, ed. Early American Writing. New York: Penguin, 1994.
Gurpegui, Jose A., ed. Puritanos y liberales en la literatura norteamericana de los siglos
XVII y XVIII. Alcalá de Henares: Servicio de Publicaciones, 2000.
Jehlen, Myra y Michael Warner, ed. The English Literatures of America. 1500-1800. New
York: Routledge, 1997.
Lamarca Margalef, Jordi. The Literature of the United States. From the Colonial Period
4
to the End of the Nineteenth Century. Madrid: Síntesis, 1990.

Lowance, Mason, Jr. The Language of Canaan. Metaphor and Symbol in New England
from the Puritans to the Trascendentalists. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1980.
Mulford, Carla, ed. Teaching the Literatures of Early America. New York: MLA, 1999.
Nelson, Dana. The World in Black and White: Reading “Race” in American Literature,
1638-1867. New York: OUP, 1992.
Radzinowicz, Mary Ann, ed. American Colonial Prose: John Smith to Thomas Jefferson.
New York: CUP, 1984.
Schucard, Alan. American Poetry: The Puritans Through Walt Whitman. Amherst: U of
Massachusetts P, 1988.
Spengemann, William. A New World of Words: Redefining Early American Literature.
New York: Yale UP, 1994.
Cambridge UP, 1994.
Bradbury, Malcolm y Howard Temperley, eds. Introduction to American Studies. London:
Longman, 1981.
1988.
1978.
UP, 1988.
Almar, 2001.
Cunliffe, Marcus, ed. American Literature to 1900. The Penguin History of Literature.
Vol. 8. London: Penguin, 1993.
5
Gunn, Giles, ed. Early American Writing. New York: Penguin, 1994.
Gurpegui, Jose A., ed. Puritanos y liberales en la literatura norteamericana de los siglos
XVII y XVIII. Alcalá de Henares: Servicio de Publicaciones, 2000.
Jehlen, Myra y Michael Warner, ed. The English Literatures of America. 1500-1800. New
York: Routledge, 1997.
Lamarca Margalef, Jordi. The Literature of the United States. From the Colonial Period
to the End of the Nineteenth Century. Madrid: Síntesis, 1990.
Lowance, Mason, Jr. The Language of Canaan. Metaphor and Symbol in New England
from the Puritans to the Trascendentalists. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1980.
Mulford, Carla, ed. Teaching the Literatures of Early America. New York: MLA, 1999.
Nelson, Dana. The World in Black and White: Reading “Race” in American Literature,
1638-1867. New York: OUP, 1992.
Radzinowicz, Mary Ann, ed. American Colonial Prose: John Smith to Thomas Jefferson.
New York: CUP, 1984.
Schucard, Alan. American Poetry: The Puritans Through Walt Whitman. Amherst: U of
Massachusetts P, 1988.
Spengemann, William. A New World of Words: Redefining Early American Literature.
New York: Yale UP, 1994.
6
2. MAPS
The United States
Physical Map
7
Capitals and States
8
Historical Maps
The Thirteen Colonies
9
The Indians in the United States
Territorial Acquisitions
10
The American Revolution
11
The Civil War
12
3. CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE
The Creation of a New Nation

th
Circa 10 century Vikings explore the North Atlantic area, probably settling
somewhere in the coast.
15th century Christopher Columbus starts the expeditions in the New Continent.
Portuguese sailors look for a route to Asia circumnavigating Africa.
16th century French and English ships explore the coast of North America looking for
a passage to Asia.
17th century The English Colonies are being established and founded.
1607 Jamestown (Virginia) founded.
1620 The Puritans (Pilgrim Fathers) arrive in Plymouth.
1622 New Hampshire founded.
1630 Boston, and Massachusetts, founded.
1634 Saint Mary, and Maryland, founded.
1635 Hartford, and Connecticut, founded.
1636 Providence, and Rhode Island, founded/ Harvard College established.
1649 Maryland’s Act of Tolerance is created.
1651 A settlement in Delaware is established.
1662 Connecticut gets status as a royal colony.
1663 Caroline is founded south of Virginia/ Rhode Island becomes a royal
colony.
1664 New Jersey founded on Dutch territory/ New Amsterdam-New York
conquered from the Dutch.
1667 Treaty of Breda: New York becomes British territory.
1670 North Carolina and Charleston and South Carolina established.
1675-76 War with the Indians in New England.
1679 New Hampshire acquires status as a royal colony.
1681 The Quakers (Sir William Penn) founded Pennsylvania.
1682 Philadelphia is founded. The French claim the Louisiana territory.
1683 Port Royal in Carolina is founded.
1699 Jamestown destroyed. Williamsburg becomes the capital city in Virginia.
th
18 century Wars with Spanish and French colonies. The British Colonies gradually
gain territory and wealth.
1707 Act of Union in the metropolis: United Kingdom of Great Britain. The
new name is British Colonies/ Delaware founded.
1733 Savannah founded. Georgia becomes a new colony.
1763 Treaty of Paris. France loses Canada and the Louisiana territories. Spain
loses the Florida. The northern part of the continent belongs to the
United Kingdom.
13
1764 First Acts against the Colonies (Sugar Act). The “Paxton Boys”
massacred some members of Indian tribes in Pennsylvania1.
1765 The Stamp Act.
1770 Boston Massacre. Coercive acts—except the Tea Act—removed from the
colonies.
1773 Sam Adams and The Boston Tea Party: the “Sons of Liberty” attack
three tea cargos in Boston.
1774 More Coercive Acts (Intolerable Acts—for the colonists—) passed by
British Parliament.
1774 The First Continental Congress meets in Philadelphia with at least one
delegate from each colony except Georgia. “The Declaration of Rights
and Grievances addressed to the People of Great Britain and the
Colonies” passed by the Congress.
1775 War breaks out. The Second Continental Congress is assembled and
sends to London the “Olive Branch Petition”. Battles of Lexington and
Concord/ II Continental Congress/ Battle of Bunker Hill;
1776 Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense widely read in the colonies.
Declaration of Independence adopted 4 July.
1777 Battle of Saratoga. Articles of Confederation.
1781 Battle of Yorktown.
1783 Treaty of Paris.
1787 Northwest Ordinance. The Constitution starts to be signed by different
states.
1789 George Washington elected First President.
1790 The Industrial Revolution.
1791 Vermont enters the Union (14th state)/ Bill of Rights (first ten
Amendments to the Constitution).
1792 Kentucky enters the Union (15th state).
1793 Declaration of neutrality.
1796 Tennessee enters the Union (16th state).
1798 11th Amendment.
19th century
1800 Washington D. C. becomes capital city.
1801 War with Tripoli.
1803 Ohio enters the Union/ Louisiana territory purchased.
1810 Western Florida annexed.
1812 Louisiana enters the Union/ The War of 1812 or the Second War with
Britain.
1814 Treaty of Ghent.
1823 Monroe Doctrine.
1 Source: Morrison et al. A Concise History of the American Republic. Oxford: OUP, 1983. p 73.
14
1845 Texas and Florida enter the Union.

1846 War with Mexico.
1848 Gold rush in California.
1850 Fugitive Slave Act.
1852 Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin published.
1860 Lincoln elected President/ South Carolina’s secession from the Union.
1861 Confederate States of America created/ Jefferson Davies elected
President of the Confederation/ Fort Sumter: the Civil War begins.
1865 End of the Civil War/ Lincoln assassinated/ Andrew Jackson becomes
President.
1867 Reconstruction Act/ Alaska is purchased to the Russians.
1869 Grant elected President/ Transcontinental railway founded.
1876 Centennial Exhibition/ Little Big Horn (Sitting Bull / George Custer).
1882 Chinese Exclusion Act.
1890 Battle of Wounded Knee. End of Indian resistance, end of “the frontier.”
1893 Ford builds his first automobile.
1898 Maine explosion/ War with Spain. Treaty of Paris.
20th century
1901 Platt’s Amendment/ Roosevelt elected President.
1914 WW1 starts in Europe (1914-18). America remains neutral.
1915 German submarine sinks the British liner Lusitania.
1917 President Wilson declares war on Germany.
1919 Treaty of Versailles signed.
1919 18th amendment prohibits the manufacture and sale of alcoholic
beverages: beginning of Prohibition and the “happy twenties”.
1920 19th amendment grants women the right to vote/ Constitution of Ku Klux
Klan.
1929 Depression starts: October Wall Street Crash.
1939 Hitler invades Poland: WW2 breaks out (1939-45).
1941 Japan attacks Pearl Harbour on Dec 7: the U.S. declares war.
1944 Allied troops invade Normandy on June 6, D-Day.
1945 Atomic bombings in Japan.
1946 The Cold War (1946-88)/ Containment theory.
1947 Committee on un-American activities starts to investigate: Senator
McCarthy’s Witch Hunt.
1948 Marshall Plan/ State of Israel created.
1949 NATO established.
1950 President Truman sends troops to Korea: the Korean war.
15
1955 Rosa Parks’ incident. Montgomery Bus Boycott and beginning of Civil
Rights Movement.
1957 School desegregation is initiated.
1961 President Kennedy orders first US military assistance to South Vietnam.
Attempt to invade Cuba at Bay of Pigs fails.
1962 Cuban missile crisis.
1963 Kennedy assassinated. Johnson becomes President/ March on
Washington.
1964 North Vietnamese attack on US ships in Gulf of Tonkin/ Civil Rights Act
ends discrimination (on grounds of gender and race) in all public
institutions/ Malcom X assassinated.
1966 NOW (National organisation of women) is created.
1967 Anti-war demonstrations begin in the USA.
1968 Martin Luther King assassinated/ American Indian Movement (AIM)
founded.
1973 US and North Vietnam sign a peace agreement.
1974 The Watergate scandal.
1980 Reagan elected president. Hysteria followed.
1984 Jesse Jackson runs for president. Reagan reelected.
1986 Martin Luther King’s birthday is observed.
1988 George Bush elected president.
1991 Persian Gulf War to drive Iraq out of Kuwait.
1992 Clinton elected president/ Los Angeles riot after Rodney King’s incident.
1995 Million Men March on Washington.
1996 Million Women March on Washington.
1999 Clinton’s impeachment.
2000 Bush (son) wins divided elections.
2001 World Trade Center and Pentagon terrorist attacks. War on terrorism
starts in Afganistan/ No Child Left Behid: major educational reform since
60s.
2004 Second term for Bush/ No weapons of mass destruction found in Iraq.
2005 Katrina hurricane.
2008 Obama elected president.
2012 Obama is reelected for second term.
16
4. BASIC DOCUM ENTS: DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
A DECLARATION BY THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

2
IN GENERAL CONGRESS ASSEMBLED.
When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for

one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them
with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth the
separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's
God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires
that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self evident: that all men are created equal; that
they are endowed by their Creator with [inherent and] inalienable rights; that among
these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights,
governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of
the governed; that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these
ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new
government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in
such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be
changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that
mankind are more disposed to suffer while evils are sufferable, than to right
themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long
train of abuses and usurpations, [begun at a distinguished period and] pursuing
invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute
despotism, it is their right, it is their duty to throw off such government, and to
provide new guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of
these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to [expunge]
their former systems of government. The history of the present king of Great Britain is
a history of [unremitting] injuries and usurpations, [among which appears no solitary
fact to contradict the uniform tenor of the rest, but all have] in direct object the
establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be
submitted to a candid world [for the truth of which we pledge a faith yet unsullied by
falsehood.]
He has refused his assent to laws the most wholesome and necessary for the
public good.
He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing
importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained;
and, when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of
people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the
legislature, a right inestimable to them, and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and
distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing
them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly [and continually] for
opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time after such dissolutions to cause others to be
elected, whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to
the people at large for their exercise, the state remaining, in the meantime, exposed
2 http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/AMERICA/DECLAR.HTM
17
to all the dangers of invasion from without and convulsions within.

He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose
obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners, refusing to pass others to
encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of
lands.
He has [suffered] [Changed by Congress: obstructed] the administration of
justice [totally to cease in some of these states] [Changed by Congress: by] refusing
his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers.
He has made [our] judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure of their
offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of new offices, [by a self-assumed power] and sent
hither swarms of new officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us in times of peace standing armies [and ships of war]
without the consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, the civil
power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our
constitutions and unacknowledged by our laws giving his assent to their acts of
pretended legislation for quartering large bodies of armed troops among us; for
protecting them by a mock trial from punishment for any murders which they should
commit on the inhabitants of these states; for cutting off our trade with all parts of the
world, for imposing taxes on us without our consent; for depriving us [added by
Congress: in many cases] of the benefits of trial by jury; for transporting us beyond
seas to be tried for pretended offences; for abolishing the free system of English laws
in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging
its boundaries, so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing
the same absolute rule into these [states] [Changed by Congress: colonies]; for taking
away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the
forms of our governments; for suspending our own legislatures, and declaring
themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated government here [withdrawing his governors, and declaring
us out of his allegiance and protection.] by declaring us out of his protection, and
waging war against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and
destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete
the works of death, desolation and tyranny already begun with circumstances of
cruelty and perfidy [Added by Congress: scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous
ages, and totally] unworthy the head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas, to bear
arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren,
or to fall themselves by their hands.
He has [Added by Congress: excited domestic insurrection among us, and has]
endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages,
whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and
conditions [of existence].
[He has incited treasonable insurrections of our fellow citizens, with the
allurements of forfeiture and confiscation of our property.
He has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating its most sacred
rights of life and liberty in the persons of a distant people who never offended him,
18
captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur

miserable death in their transportation thither. This piratical warfare, the opprobrium
of INFIDEL powers, is the warfare of the CHRISTIAN king of Great Britain. Determined
to keep open a market where MEN should be bought and sold, he has prostituted his
negative for suppressing every legislative attempt to prohibit or to restrain this
execrable commerce. And that this assemblage of horrors might want no fact of
distinguished die, he is now exciting those very people to rise in arms among us, and
to purchase that liberty of which he has deprived them, by murdering the people for
whom he also obtruded them: thus paying off former crimes committed against the
LIBERTIES of one people, with crimes which he urges them to commit against the
LIVES of another.]
In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most
humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injuries.
A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a
tyrant is unfit to be the ruler of a [Added by Congress: free] people [who mean to be
free. Future ages will scarcely believe that the hardiness of one man adventured,
within the short compass of twelve years only, to lay a foundation so broad and so
undisguised for tyranny over a people fostered and fixed in principles of freedom].
Nor have we been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have
warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend [a] [Added
by Congress: an unwarrantable] jurisdiction over [these our states]. We have
reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here, [no one
of which could warrant so strange a pretension: that these were effected at the
expense of our own blood and treasure, unassisted by the wealth or the strength of
Great Britain: that in constituting indeed our several forms of government, we had
adopted one common king, thereby laying a foundation for perpetual league and amity
with them: but that submission to their parliament was no part of our constitution, nor
ever in idea, if history have may be credited: and,] we [Added by Congress: have]
appealed to and their native justice and magnanimity [as well as to] [Changed: and
we have conjured them by] the ties of our common kindred to disavow these
usurpations which [were likely to] [Changed: would inevitably] interrupt our
connection and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of
consanguinity, [and when occasions have been given them, by the regular course of
their laws, of removing from their councils the disturbers of our harmony, they have,
by their free election, reestablished them in power. At this very time too, they are
permitting their chief magistrate to send over not only soldiers of our common blood,
but Scotch and foreign mercenaries to invade and destroy us. These facts have given
the last stab to agonizing affection, and manly spirit bids us to renounce forever these
unfeeling brethren. We must endeavor to forget our former love for them, and hold
them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends. We might
have been a free and a great people together; but a communication of grandeur and
of freedom, it seems, is below their dignity. Be it so, since they will have it. The road
to happiness and to glory is open to us, too. We will tread it apart from them, and]
[Changed: We must therefore] acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our
[eternal] separation [Added: and hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies
in war, in peace friends]!
We therefore the representatives We, therefore, the representatives

of the United States of America in General of the United States of America in General
Congress assembled, do in the name, and Congress assembled, appealing to the
by the authority of the good people of supreme judge of the world for the
these [states reject and renounce all rectitude of our intentions, do in the
allegiance and subjection to the kings of name, and by the authority of the good
Great Britain and all others who may people of these colonies, solemnly publish
hereafter claim by, through or under and declare, that these united colonies
them; we utterly dissolve all political are, and of right ought to be free and
19
connection which may heretofore have independent states; that they are
subsisted between us and the people or absolved from all allegiance to the British
parliament of Great Britain: and finally we crown, and that all political connection
do assert and declare these colonies to be between them and the state of Great
free and independent states,] and that as Britain is, and ought to be, totally
free and independent states, they have dissolved; and that as free and
full power to levy war, conclude peace, independent states, they have full power
contract alliances, establish commerce, to levy war, conclude peace, contract
and to do all other acts and things which alliances, establish commerce, and to do
independent states may of right do. all other acts and things which
independent states may of right do.
And for the support of this
declaration, we mutually pledge to each And for the support of this
other our lives, our fortunes, and our declaration, with a firm reliance on the
sacred honor. protection of divine providence, we
mutually pledge to each other our lives,
our fortunes, and our sacred honor.
20
5. EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY: ROMANTICISM AND TRANSCENDENTALISM
5.1 ROMANTIC WRITERS
5.1.1 JAMES FENIMORE COOPER, FROM “THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS”
Chapter 1
Mine ear is open, and my heart prepared:

The worst is wordly loss thou canst unfold: -
Say, is my kingdom lost?
SHAKESPEARE
It was a feature peculiar to the colonial wars of North America, that the toils and
dangers of the wilderness were to be encountered before the adverse hosts could
meet. A wide and apparently an impervious boundary of forests severed the
possessions of the hostile provinces of France and England. The hardy colonist, and
the trained European who fought at his side, frequently expended months in struggling
against the rapids of the streams, or in effecting the rugged passes of the mountains,
in quest of an opportunity to exhibit their courage in a more martial conflict. But,
emulating the patience and self-denial of the practiced native warriors, they learned to
overcome every difficulty; and it would seem that, in time, there was no recess of the
woods so dark, nor any secret place so lovely, that it might claim exemption from the
inroads of those who had pledged their blood to satiate their vengeance, or to uphold
the cold and selfish policy of the distant monarchs of Europe.
Perhaps no district throughout the wide extent of the intermediate frontiers can
furnish a livelier picture of the cruelty and fierceness of the savage warfare of those
periods than the country which lies between the head waters of the Hudson and the
adjacent lakes.
The facilities which nature had there offered to the march of the combatants were too
obvious to be neglected. The lengthened sheet of the Champlain stretched from the
frontiers of Canada, deep within the borders of the neighboring province of New York,
forming a natural passage across half the distance that the French were compelled to
master in order to strike their enemies. Near its southern termination, it received the
contributions of another lake, whose waters were so limpid as to have been
exclusively selected by the Jesuit missionaries to perform the typical purification of
baptism, and to obtain for it the title of lake “du Saint Sacrement‘. The less zealous
English thought they conferred a sufficient honor on its unsullied fountains, when they
bestowed the name of their reigning prince, the second of the house of Hanover. The
two united to rob the untutored possessors of its wooded scenery of their native right
to perpetuate its original appellation of “Horican”.
Winding its way among countless islands, and imbedded in mountains, the “holy lake‘
extended a dozen leagues still further to the south. With the high plain that there
interposed itself to the further passage of the water, commenced a portage of as
many miles, which conducted the adventurer to the banks of the Hudson, at a point
where, with the usual obstructions of the rapids, or rifts, as they were then termed in
the language of the country, the river became navigable to the tide.’”
While, in the pursuit of their daring plans of annoyance, the restless enterprise of the
French even attempted the distant and difficult gorges of the Alleghany, it may easily
be imagined that their proverbial acuteness would not overlook the natural
advantages of the district we have just described. It became, emphatically, the bloody
21
arena, in which most of the battles for the mastery of the colonies were contested.
Forts were erected at the different points that commanded the facilities of the route,
and were taken and retaken, razed and rebuilt, as victory alighted on the hostile
banners. While the husbandman shrank back from the dangerous passes, within the
safer boundaries of the more ancient settlements, armies larger than those that had
often disposed of the scepters of the mother countries, were seen to bury themselves
in these forests, whence they rarely returned but in skeleton bands, that were
haggard with care or dejected by defeat. Though the arts of peace were unknown to
this fatal region, its forests were alive with men; its shades and glens rang with the
sounds of martial music, and the echoes of its mountains threw back the laugh, or
repeated the wanton cry, of many a gallant and reckless youth, as he hurried by
them, in the noontide of his spirits, to slumber in a long night of forgetfulness.
Chapter 17
[THE SLAUGHTER AT FORT WILLIAM HENRY]
Then, extending the little volume, and giving the pitch of the air anew with
considerate attention, David recommenced and finished his strains, with a fixedness of
manner that it was not easy to interrupt. Heyward was fain to wait until the verse was
ended; when, seeing David relieving himself from the spectacles, and replacing the
book, he continued.
"It will be your duty to see that none dare to approach the ladies with any rude
intention, or to offer insult or taunt at the misfortune of their brave father. In this task
you will be seconded by the domestics of their household."
"Even so."
"It is possible that the Indians and stragglers of the enemy may intrude, in which case
you will remind them of the terms of the capitulation, and threaten to report their
conduct to Montcalm. A word will suffice."
"If not, I have that here which shall," returned David, exhibiting his book, with an air
in which meekness and confidence were singularly blended. Here are words which,
uttered, or rather thundered, with proper emphasis, and in measured time, shall quiet
the most unruly temper:
"'Why rage the heathen furiously'?"
"Enough," said Heyward, interrupting the burst of his musical invocation; "we
understand each other; it is time that we should now assume our respective duties."
Gamut cheerfully assented, and together they sought the females. Cora received her
new and somewhat extraordinary protector courteously, at least; and even the pallid
features of Alice lighted again with some of their native archness as she thanked
Heyward for his care. Duncan took occasion to assure them he had done the best that
circumstances permitted, and, as he believed, quite enough for the security of their
feelings; of danger there was none. He then spoke gladly of his intention to rejoin
them the moment he had led the advance a few miles toward the Hudson, and
immediately took his leave.
By this time the signal for departure had been given, and the head of the English
column was in motion. The sisters started at the sound, and glancing their eyes
around, they saw the white uniforms of the French grenadiers, who had already taken
possession of the gates of the fort. At that moment an enormous cloud seemed to
22
pass suddenly above their heads, and, looking upward, they discovered that they
stood beneath the wide folds of the standard of France.
"Let us go," said Cora; "this is no longer a fit place for the children of an English
officer."
Alice clung to the arm of her sister, and together they left the parade, accompanied by
the moving throng that surrounded them.
As they passed the gates, the French officers, who had learned their rank, bowed
often and low, forbearing, however, to intrude those attentions which they saw, with
peculiar tact, might not be agreeable. As every vehicle and each beast of burden was
occupied by the sick and wounded, Cora had decided to endure the fatigues of a foot
march, rather than interfere with their comforts. Indeed, many a maimed and feeble
soldier was compelled to drag his exhausted limbs in the rear of the columns, for the
want of the necessary means of conveyance in that wilderness. The whole, however,
was in motion; the weak and wounded, groaning and in suffering; their comrades
silent and sullen; and the women and children in terror, they knew not of what.
As the confused and timid throng left the protecting mounds of the fort, and issued on
the open plain, the whole scene was at once presented to their eyes. At a little
distance on the right, and somewhat in the rear, the French army stood to their arms,
Montcalm having collected his parties, so soon as his guards had possession of the
works. They were attentive but silent observers of the proceedings of the vanquished,
failing in none of the stipulated military honors, and offering no taunt or insult, in their
success, to their less fortunate foes. Living masses of the English, to the amount, in
the whole, of near three thousand, were moving slowly across the plain, toward the
common center, and gradually approached each other, as they converged to the point
of their march, a vista cut through the lofty trees, where the road to the Hudson
entered the forest. Along the sweeping borders of the woods hung a dark cloud of
savages, eyeing the passage of their enemies, and hovering at a distance, like
vultures who were only kept from swooping on their prey by the presence and
restraint of a superior army. A few had straggled among the conquered columns,
where they stalked in sullen discontent; attentive, though, as yet, passive observers
of the moving multitude.
The advance, with Heyward at its head, had already reached the defile, and was
slowly disappearing, when the attention of Cora was drawn to a collection of stragglers
by the sounds of contention. A truant provincial was paying the forfeit of his
disobedience, by being plundered of those very effects which had caused him to desert
his place in the ranks. The man was of powerful frame, and too avaricious to part with
his goods without a struggle. Individuals from either party interfered; the one side to
prevent and the other to aid in the robbery. Voices grew loud and angry, and a
hundred savages appeared, as it were, by magic, where a dozen only had been seen a
minute before. It was then that Cora saw the form of Magua gliding among his
countrymen, and speaking with his fatal and artful eloquence. The mass of women and
children stopped, and hovered together like alarmed and fluttering birds. But the
cupidity of the Indian was soon gratified, and the different bodies again moved slowly
onward.
The savages now fell back, and seemed content to let their enemies advance without
further molestation. But, as the female crowd approached them, the gaudy colors of a
shawl attracted the eyes of a wild and untutored Huron. He advanced to seize it
without the least hesitation. The woman, more in terror than through love of the
ornament, wrapped her child in the coveted article, and folded both more closely to
her bosom. Cora was in the act of speaking, with an intent to advise the woman to
abandon the trifle, when the savage relinquished his hold of the shawl, and tore the
23
screaming infant from her arms. Abandoning everything to the greedy grasp of those
around her, the mother darted, with distraction in her mien, to reclaim her child. The
Indian smiled grimly, and extended one hand, in sign of a willingness to exchange,
while, with the other, he flourished the babe over his head, holding it by the feet as if
to enhance the value of the ransom.
"Here--here--there--all--any--everything!" exclaimed the breathless woman, tearing

the lighter articles of dress from her person with ill-directed and trembling fingers;
"take all, but give me my babe!"
The savage spurned the worthless rags, and perceiving that the shawl had already
become a prize to another, his bantering but sullen smile changing to a gleam of
ferocity, he dashed the head of the infant against a rock, and cast its quivering
remains to her very feet. For an instant the mother stood, like a statue of despair,
looking wildly down at the unseemly object, which had so lately nestled in her bosom
and smiled in her face; and then she raised her eyes and countenance toward heaven,
as if calling on God to curse the perpetrator of the foul deed. She was spared the sin
of such a prayer for, maddened at his disappointment, and excited at the sight of
blood, the Huron mercifully drove his tomahawk into her own brain. The mother sank
under the blow, and fell, grasping at her child, in death, with the same engrossing
love that had caused her to cherish it when living.
At that dangerous moment, Magua placed his hands to his mouth, and raised the fatal
and appalling whoop. The scattered Indians started at the well-known cry, as coursers
bound at the signal to quit the goal; and directly there arose such a yell along the
plain, and through the arches of the wood, as seldom burst from human lips before.
They who heard it listened with a curdling horror at the heart, little inferior to that
dread which may be expected to attend the blasts of the final summons.
More than two thousand raving savages broke from the forest at the signal, and threw
themselves across the fatal plain with instinctive alacrity. We shall not dwell on the
revolting horrors that succeeded. Death was everywhere, and in his most terrific and
disgusting aspects. Resistance only served to inflame the murderers, who inflicted
their furious blows long after their victims were beyond the power of their resentment.
The flow of blood might be likened to the outbreaking of a torrent; and as the natives
became heated and maddened by the sight, many among them even kneeled to the
earth, and drank freely, exultingly, hellishly, of the crimson tide.
The trained bodies of the troops threw themselves quickly into solid masses,
endeavoring to awe their assailants by the imposing appearance of a military front.
The experiment in some measure succeeded, though far too many suffered their
unloaded muskets to be torn from their hands, in the vain hope of appeasing the
savages.
In such a scene none had leisure to note the fleeting moments. It might have been
ten minutes (it seemed an age) that the sisters had stood riveted to one spot, horror-
stricken and nearly helpless. When the first blow was struck, their screaming
companions had pressed upon them in a body, rendering flight impossible; and now
that fear or death had scattered most, if not all, from around them, they saw no
avenue open, but such as conducted to the tomahawks of their foes. On every side
arose shrieks, groans, exhortations and curses. At this moment, Alice caught a
glimpse of the vast form of her father, moving rapidly across the plain, in the direction
of the French army. He was, in truth, proceeding to Montcalm, fearless of every
danger, to claim the tardy escort for which he had before conditioned. Fifty glittering
axes and barbed spears were offered unheeded at his life, but the savages respected
his rank and calmness, even in their fury. The dangerous weapons were brushed aside
by the still nervous arm of the veteran, or fell of themselves, after menacing an act
24
that it would seem no one had courage to perform. Fortunately, the vindictive Magua
was searching for his victim in the very band the veteran had just quitted.
"Father--father--we are here!" shrieked Alice, as he passed, at no great distance,

without appearing to heed them. "Come to us, father, or we die!"
The cry was repeated, and in terms and tones that might have melted a heart of
stone, but it was unanswered. Once, indeed, the old man appeared to catch the
sound, for he paused and listened; but Alice had dropped senseless on the earth, and
Cora had sunk at her side, hovering in untiring tenderness over her lifeless form.
Munro shook his head in disappointment, and proceeded, bent on the high duty of his
station.
"Lady," said Gamut, who, helpless and useless as he was, had not yet dreamed of
deserting his trust, "it is the jubilee of the devils, and this is not a meet place for
Christians to tarry in. Let us up and fly."
"Go," said Cora, still gazing at her unconscious sister; "save thyself. To me thou canst
not be of further use."
David comprehended the unyielding character of her resolution, by the simple but
expressive gesture that accompanied her words. He gazed for a moment at the dusky
forms that were acting their hellish rites on every side of him, and his tall person grew
more erect while his chest heaved, and every feature swelled, and seemed to speak
with the power of the feelings by which he was governed.
"If the Jewish boy might tame the great spirit of Saul by the sound of his harp, and
the words of sacred song, it may not be amiss," he said, "to try the potency of music
here."
Then raising his voice to its highest tone, he poured out a strain so powerful as to be
heard even amid the din of that bloody field. More than one savage rushed toward
them, thinking to rifle the unprotected sisters of their attire, and bear away their
scalps; but when they found this strange and unmoved figure riveted to his post, they
paused to listen. Astonishment soon changed to admiration, and they passed on to
other and less courageous victims, openly expressing their satisfaction at the firmness
with which the white warrior sang his death song. Encouraged and deluded by his
success, David exerted all his powers to extend what he believed so holy an influence.
The unwonted sounds caught the ears of a distant savage, who flew raging from group
to group, like one who, scorning to touch the vulgar herd, hunted for some victim
more worthy of his renown. It was Magua, who uttered a yell of pleasure when he
beheld his ancient prisoners again at his mercy.
"Come," he said, laying his soiled hands on the dress of Cora, "the wigwam of the
Huron is still open. Is it not better than this place?"
"Away!" cried Cora, veiling her eyes from his revolting aspect.
The Indian laughed tauntingly, as he held up his reeking hand, and answered: "It is
red, but it comes from white veins!"
"Monster! there is blood, oceans of blood, upon thy soul; thy spirit has moved this
scene."
"Magua is a great chief!" returned the exulting savage, "will the dark-hair go to his
tribe?"
25
"Never! strike if thou wilt, and complete thy revenge." He hesitated a moment, and
then catching the light and senseless form of Alice in his arms, the subtle Indian
moved swiftly across the plain toward the woods.
"Hold!" shrieked Cora, following wildly on his footsteps; "release the child! wretch!
what is't you do?"
But Magua was deaf to her voice; or, rather, he knew his power, and was determined
to maintain it.
"Stay--lady--stay," called Gamut, after the unconscious Cora. "The holy charm is
beginning to be felt, and soon shalt thou see this horrid tumult stilled."
Perceiving that, in his turn, he was unheeded, the faithful David followed the
distracted sister, raising his voice again in sacred song, and sweeping the air to the
measure, with his long arm, in diligent accompaniment. In this manner they traversed
the plain, through the flying, the wounded and the dead. The fierce Huron was, at any
time, sufficient for himself and the victim that he bore; though Cora would have fallen
more than once under the blows of her savage enemies, but for the extraordinary
being who stalked in her rear, and who now appeared to the astonished natives gifted
with the protecting spirit of madness.
Magua, who knew how to avoid the more pressing dangers, and also to elude pursuit,
entered the woods through a low ravine, where he quickly found the Narragansetts,
which the travelers had abandoned so shortly before, awaiting his appearance, in
custody of a savage as fierce and malign in his expression as himself. Laying Alice on
one of the horses, he made a sign to Cora to mount the other.
Notwithstanding the horror excited by the presence of her captor, there was a present
relief in escaping from the bloody scene enacting on the plain, to which Cora could not
be altogether insensible. She took her seat, and held forth her arms for her sister,
with an air of entreaty and love that even the Huron could not deny. Placing Alice,
then, on the same animal with Cora, he seized the bridle, and commenced his route
by plunging deeper into the forest. David, perceiving that he was left alone, utterly
disregarded as a subject too worthless even to destroy, threw his long limb across the
saddle of the beast they had deserted, and made such progress in the pursuit as the
difficulties of the path permitted.
They soon began to ascend; but as the motion had a tendency to revive the dormant
faculties of her sister, the attention of Cora was too much divided between the
tenderest solicitude in her behalf, and in listening to the cries which were still too
audible on the plain, to note the direction in which they journeyed. When, however,
they gained the flattened surface of the mountain-top, and approached the eastern
precipice, she recognized the spot to which she had once before been led under the
more friendly auspices of the scout. Here Magua suffered them to dismount; and
notwithstanding their own captivity, the curiosity which seems inseparable from
horror, induced them to gaze at the sickening sight below.
The cruel work was still unchecked. On every side the captured were flying before
their relentless persecutors, while the armed columns of the Christian king stood fast
in an apathy which has never been explained, and which has left an immovable blot
on the otherwise fair escutcheon of their leader. Nor was the sword of death stayed
until cupidity got the mastery of revenge. Then, indeed, the shrieks of the wounded,
and the yells of their murderers grew less frequent, until, finally, the cries of horror
were lost to their ear, or were drowned in the loud, long and piercing whoops of the
triumphant savages.
26
5.2 AMERICAN RENAISSANCE (1840-1860)
5.2.1 TRANSCENDENTALIST WRITERS. WALT WHITMAN, FROM “SONG OF MYSELF”
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,

I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,

Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.
2
Houses and rooms are full of perfumes, the shelves are crowded with
perfumes,
I breathe the fragrance myself and know it and like it,
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.
The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the

distillation, it is odorless,
It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it,
27
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.
The smoke of my own breath,

Echoes, ripples, buzz'd whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and vine,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing
of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and
dark-color'd sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,
The sound of the belch'd words of my voice loos'd to the eddies of

the wind,
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields
and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising
from bed and meeting the sun.
Have you reckon'd a thousand acres much? have you reckon'd the earth much?
Have you practis'd so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?
Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of
all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions
of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look through
the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.
21
I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,

The pleasures of heaven are with me and the pains of hell are with me,
The first I graft and increase upon myself, the latter I translate
into new tongue.
I am the poet of the woman the same as the man,

And I say it is as great to be a woman as to be a man,
And I say there is nothing greater than the mother of men.
I chant the chant of dilation or pride,

We have had ducking and deprecating about enough,
I show that size is only development.
Have you outstript the rest? are you the President?

It is a trifle, they will more than arrive there every one, and
still pass on.
I am he that walks with the tender and growing night,

I call to the earth and sea half-held by the night.
Press close bare-bosom'd night--press close magnetic nourishing night!

Night of south winds--night of the large few stars!
Still nodding night--mad naked summer night.
28
Smile O voluptuous cool-breath'd earth!

Earth of the slumbering and liquid trees!
Earth of departed sunset--earth of the mountains misty-topt!
Earth of the vitreous pour of the full moon just tinged with blue!
Earth of shine and dark mottling the tide of the river!
Earth of the limpid gray of clouds brighter and clearer for my sake!
Far-swooping elbow'd earth--rich apple-blossom'd earth!
Smile, for your lover comes.
Prodigal, you have given me love--therefore I to you give love!

O unspeakable passionate love.
5.2.2 BOSTON BRAHMINS. NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE, THE SCARLET LETTER (LECTURA OBLIGATORIA 1)
5.2.3 THE RENAISSANCE OF NEW ENGLAND. EDGAR ALLAN POE, “THE RAVEN”
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping—rapping at my chamber door.
"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
"'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—
This it is and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
"Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping—tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you"—here I opened wide the door:—
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore!"
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!"—
29
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping, somewhat louder than before,
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—
Let my heart be still a moment, and this mystery explore;—
'Tis the wind and nothing more."
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not an instant stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord and lady, perched above my chamber door—
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—
Perched and sat and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
30
31
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such a name as "Nevermore."
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered; not a feather then he fluttered—
Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends have flown before—
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before."
Then the bird said, "Nevermore."
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master, whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore—
Till the dirges of his Hope the melancholy burden bore
Of 'Never—nevermore.'"
But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore."
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer,
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!"
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—

Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
32
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—

On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—
Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!"
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a saintly maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore."
"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting—
"Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!"
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting—still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a Demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted—nevermore!
5.2.4 ON SLAVERY AND THE WOMAN QUESTION.
5.2.4.1 FREDERICK DOUGLASS, FROM NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.
Chapter 1
I was born in Tuckahoe, near Hillsborough, and about twelve miles from Easton, in
Talbot county, Maryland. I have no accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen
any authentic record containing it. By far the larger part of the slaves know as little of
their ages as horses know of theirs, and it is the wish of most masters within my
knowledge to keep their slaves thus ignorant. I do not remember to have ever met a
slave who could tell of his birthday. They seldom come nearer to it than planting-time,
harvest- time, cherry-time, spring-time, or fall-time. A want of information concerning
my own was a source of unhappiness to me even during childhood. The white children
could tell their ages. I could not tell why I ought to be deprived of the same privilege.
I was not allowed to make any inquiries of my master concerning it. He deemed all
33
such inquiries on the part of a slave improper and impertinent, and evidence of a
restless spirit. The nearest estimate I can give makes me now between twenty-seven
and twenty- eight years of age. I come to this, from hearing my master say, some
time during 1835, I was about seventeen years old.
My mother was named Harriet Bailey. She was the daughter of Isaac and Betsey
Bailey, both colored, and quite dark. My mother was of a darker complexion than
either my grandmother or grandfather.
My father was a white man. He was admitted to be such by all I ever heard speak of
my parentage. The opinion was also whispered that my master was my father; but of
the correctness of this opinion, I know nothing; the means of knowing was withheld
from me. My mother and I were separated when I was but an infant--before I knew
her as my mother. It is a common custom, in the part of Maryland from which I ran
away, to part children from their mothers at a very early age. Frequently, before the
child has reached its twelfth month, its mother is taken from it, and hired out on some
farm a considerable distance off, and the child is placed under the care of an old
woman, too old for field labor. For what this separation is done, I do not know, unless
it be to hinder the development of the child's affection toward its mother, and to blunt
and destroy the natural affection of the mother for the child. This is the inevitable
result.
I never saw my mother, to know her as such, more than four or five times in my life;
and each of these times was very short in duration, and at night. She was hired by a
Mr. Stewart, who lived about twelve miles from my home. She made her journeys to
see me in the night, travelling the whole distance on foot, after the performance of her
day's work. She was a field hand, and a whipping is the penalty of not being in the
field at sunrise, unless a slave has special permission from his or her master to the
contrary--a permission which they seldom get, and one that gives to him that gives it
the proud name of being a kind master. I do not recollect of ever seeing my mother by
the light of day. She was with me in the night. She would lie down with me, and get
me to sleep, but long before I waked she was gone. Very little communication ever
took place between us. Death soon ended what little we could have while she lived,
and with it her hardships and suffering. She died when I was about seven years old,
on one of my master's farms, near Lee's Mill. I was not allowed to be present during
her illness, at her death, or burial. She was gone long before I knew any thing about
it. Never having enjoyed, to any considerable extent, her soothing presence, her
tender and watchful care, I received the tidings of her death with much the same
34
emotions I should have probably felt at the death of a stranger.
Called thus suddenly away, she left me without the slightest intimation of who my
father was. The whisper that my master was my father, may or may not be true; and,
true or false, it is of but little consequence to my purpose whilst the fact remains, in
all its glaring odiousness, that slaveholders have ordained, and by law established,
that the children of slave women shall in all cases follow the condition of their
mothers; and this is done too obviously to administer to their own lusts, and make a
gratification of their wicked desires profitable as well as pleasurable; for by this
cunning arrangement, the slaveholder, in cases not a few, sustains to his slaves the
double relation of master and father.
I know of such cases; and it is worthy of remark that such slaves invariably suffer
greater hardships, and have more to contend with, than others. They are, in the first
place, a constant offence to their mistress. She is ever disposed to find fault with
them; they can seldom do any thing to please her; she is never better pleased than
when she sees them under the lash, especially when she suspects her husband of
showing to his mulatto children favors which he withholds from his black slaves. The
master is frequently compelled to sell this class of his slaves, out of deference to the
feelings of his white wife; and, cruel as the deed may strike any one to be, for a man
to sell his own children to human flesh-mongers, it is often the dictate of humanity for
him to do so; for, unless he does this, he must not only whip them himself, but must
stand by and see one white son tie up his brother, of but few shades darker
complexion than himself, and ply the gory lash to his naked back; and if he lisp one
word of disapproval, it is set down to his parental partiality, and only makes a bad
matter worse, both for himself and the slave whom he would protect and defend.
Every year brings with it multitudes of this class of slaves. It was doubtless in
consequence of a knowledge of this fact, that one great statesman of the south
predicted the downfall of slavery by the inevitable laws of population. Whether this
prophecy is ever fulfilled or not, it is nevertheless plain that a very different-looking
class of people are springing up at the south, and are now held in slavery, from those
originally brought to this country from Africa; and if their increase do no other good, it
will do away the force of the argument, that God cursed Ham, and therefore American
slavery is right. If the lineal descendants of Ham are alone to be scripturally enslaved,
it is certain that slavery at the south must soon become unscriptural; for thousands
are ushered into the world, annually, who, like myself, owe their existence to white
fathers, and those fathers most frequently their own masters.
I have had two masters. My first master's name was Anthony. I do not remember his
first name. He was generally called Captain Anthony--a title which, I presume, he
acquired by sailing a craft on the Chesapeake Bay. He was not considered a rich
slaveholder. He owned two or three farms, and about thirty slaves. His farms and
slaves were under the care of an overseer. The overseer's name was Plummer. Mr.
Plummer was a miserable drunkard, a profane swearer, and a savage monster. He
always went armed with a cowskin and a heavy cudgel. I have known him to cut and
slash the women's heads so horribly, that even master would be enraged at his
cruelty, and would threaten to whip him if he did not mind himself. Master, however,
was not a humane slaveholder. It required extraordinary barbarity on the part of an
overseer to affect him. He was a cruel man, hardened by a long life of slave- holding.
He would at times seem to take great pleasure in whipping a slave. I have often been
awakened at the dawn of day by the most heart-rending shrieks of an own aunt of
mine, whom he used to tie up to a joist, and whip upon her naked back till she was
literally covered with blood. No words, no tears, no prayers, from his gory victim,
seemed to move his iron heart from its bloody purpose. The louder she screamed, the
harder he whipped; and where the blood ran fastest, there he whipped longest. He
35
would whip her to make her scream, and whip her to make her hush; and not until
overcome by fatigue, would he cease to swing the blood-clotted cowskin. I remember
the first time I ever witnessed this horrible exhibition. I was quite a child, but I well
remember it. I never shall forget it whilst I remember any thing. It was the first of a
long series of such outrages, of which I was doomed to be a witness and a participant.
It struck me with awful force. It was the blood-stained gate, the entrance to the hell of
slavery, through which I was about to pass. It was a most terrible spectacle. I wish I
could commit to paper the feelings with which I beheld it.
This occurrence took place very soon after I went to live with my old master, and
under the following circumstances. Aunt Hester went out one night,-- where or for
what I do not know,--and happened to be absent when my master desired her
presence. He had ordered her not to go out evenings, and warned her that she must
never let him catch her in company with a young man, who was paying attention to
her belonging to Colonel Lloyd. The young man's name was Ned Roberts, generally
called Lloyd's Ned. Why master was so careful of her, may be safely left to conjecture.
She was a woman of noble form, and of graceful proportions, having very few equals,
and fewer superiors, in personal appearance, among the colored or white women of
our neighborhood.
Aunt Hester had not only disobeyed his orders in going out, but had been found in
company with Lloyd's Ned; which circumstance, I found, from what he said while
whipping her, was the chief offence. Had he been a man of pure morals himself, he
might have been thought interested in protecting the innocence of my aunt; but those
who knew him will not suspect him of any such virtue. Before he commenced whipping
Aunt Hester, he took her into the kitchen, and stripped her from neck to waist, leaving
her neck, shoulders, and back, entirely naked. He then told her to cross her hands,
calling her at the same time a d----d b---h. After crossing her hands, he tied them
with a strong rope, and led her to a stool under a large hook in the joist, put in for the
purpose. He made her get upon the stool, and tied her hands to the hook. She now
stood fair for his infernal purpose. Her arms were stretched up at their full length, so
that she stood upon the ends of her toes. He then said to her, "Now, you d----d b---h,
I'll learn you how to disobey my orders!" and after rolling up his sleeves, he
commenced to lay on the heavy cowskin, and soon the warm, red blood (amid heart-
rending shrieks from her, and horrid oaths from him) came dripping to the floor. I was
so terrified and horror-stricken at the sight, that I hid myself in a closet, and dared
not venture out till long after the bloody transaction was over. I expected it would be
my turn next. It was all new to me. I had never seen any thing like it before. I had
always lived with my grandmother on the outskirts of the plantation, where she was
put to raise the children of the younger women. I had therefore been, until now, out of
the way of the bloody scenes that often occurred on the plantation.
6. LATE NINETEETH CENTURY: REALISM AND NATURALISM

6.1.REALISM
6.1.2 MARK TWAIN, FROM THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN
Chapter 1
YOU don't know about me without you have
read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom
Sawyer; but that ain't no matter. That book was made
by Mr. Mark Twain, and he told the truth, mainly. There
was things which he stretched, but mainly he told the
truth. That is nothing. I never seen anybody but lied
one time or another, without it was Aunt Polly, or the
widow, or maybe Mary. Aunt Polly -- Tom's Aunt Polly,
36
she is -- and Mary, and the Widow Douglas is all told about in that book, which is
mostly a true book, with some stretchers, as I said before.
Now the way that the book winds up is this: Tom and me found the money that
the robbers hid in the cave, and it made us rich. We got six thousand dollars apiece --
all gold. It was an awful sight of money when it was piled up. Well, Judge Thatcher he
took it and put it out at interest, and it fetched us a dollar a day apiece all the year
round -- more than a body could tell what to do with. The Widow Douglas she took me
for her son, and allowed she would sivilize me; but it was rough living in the house all
the time, considering how dismal regular and decent the widow was in all her ways;
and so when I couldn't stand it no longer I lit out. I got into my old rags and my
sugar-hogshead again, and was free and satisfied. But Tom Sawyer he hunted me up
and said he was going to start a band of robbers, and I might join if I would go back
to the widow and be respectable. So I went back.
The widow she cried over me, and called me a poor lost lamb, and she called
me a lot of other names, too, but she never meant no harm by it. She put me in them
new clothes again, and I couldn't do nothing but sweat and sweat, and feel all
cramped up. Well, then, the old thing commenced again. The widow rung a bell for
supper, and you had to come to time. When you got to the table you couldn't go right
to eating, but you had to wait for the widow to tuck down her head and grumble a
little over the victuals, though there warn't really anything the matter with them, --
that is, nothing only everything was cooked by itself. In a barrel of odds and ends it is
different; things get mixed up, and the juice kind of swaps around, and the things go
better.
After supper she got out her book and learned me about Moses and the
Bulrushers, and I was in a sweat to find out all about him; but by and by she let it out
that Moses had been dead a considerable long time; so then I didn't care no more
about him, because I don't take no stock in dead people.
Pretty soon I wanted to smoke, and asked the widow to let me. But she
wouldn't. She said it was a mean practice and wasn't clean, and I must try to not do it
any more. That is just the way with some people. They get down on a thing when they
don't know nothing about it. Here she was a-bothering about Moses, which was no kin
to her, and no use to anybody, being gone, you see, yet finding a power of fault with
me for doing a thing that had some good in it. And she took snuff, too; of course that
was all right, because she done it herself.
Her sister, Miss Watson, a tolerable slim old maid, with goggles on, had just
come to live with her, and took a set at me now with a spelling-book. She worked me
middling hard for about an hour, and then the widow made her ease up. I couldn't
stood it much longer. Then for an hour it was deadly dull, and I was fidgety. Miss
Watson would say, "Don't put your feet up there, Huckleberry;" and "Don't scrunch up
like that, Huckleberry -- set up straight;" and pretty soon she would say, "Don't gap
and stretch like that, Huckleberry -- why don't you try to behave?" Then she told me
all about the bad place, and I said I wished I was there. She got mad then, but I didn't
mean no harm. All I wanted was to go somewheres; all I wanted was a change, I
warn't particular. She said it was wicked to say what I said; said she wouldn't say it
37
for the whole world; she was going to live so as to go to the good place. Well, I
couldn't see no advantage in going where she was going, so I made up my mind I
wouldn't try for it. But I never said so, because it would only make trouble, and
wouldn't do no good.
Now she had got a start, and she went on and told me all about the good place.
She said all a body would have to do there was to go around all day long with a harp
and sing, forever and ever. So I didn't think much of it. But I never said so. I asked
her if she reckoned Tom Sawyer would go there, and she said not by a considerable
sight. I was glad about that, because I wanted him and me to be together.
Miss Watson she kept pecking at me, and it got tiresome and lonesome. By and
by they fetched the niggers in and had prayers, and then everybody was off to bed. I
went up to my room with a piece of candle, and put it on the table. Then I set down in
a chair by the window and tried to think of something cheerful, but it warn't no use. I
felt so lonesome I most wished I was dead. The stars were shining, and the leaves
rustled in the woods ever so mournful; and I heard an owl, away off, who-whooing
about somebody that was dead, and a whippowill and a dog crying about somebody
that was going to die; and the wind was trying to whisper something to me, and I
couldn't make out what it was, and so it made the cold shivers run over me. Then
away out in the woods I heard that kind of a sound that a ghost makes when it wants
to tell about something that's on its mind and can't make itself understood, and so
can't rest easy in its grave, and has to go about that way every night grieving. I got
so down-hearted and scared I did wish I had some company. Pretty soon a spider
went crawling up my shoulder, and I flipped it off and it lit in the candle; and before I
could budge it was all shriveled up. I didn't need anybody to tell me that that was an
awful bad sign and would fetch me some bad luck, so I was scared and most shook
the clothes off of me. I got up and turned around in my tracks three times and crossed
my breast every time; and then I tied up a little lock of my hair with a thread to keep
witches away. But I hadn't no confidence. You do that when you've lost a horseshoe
that you've found, instead of nailing it up over the door, but I hadn't ever heard
anybody say it was any way to keep off bad luck when you'd killed a spider.
I set down again, a-shaking all over, and got out my pipe for a smoke; for the
house was all as still as death now, and so the widow wouldn't know. Well, after a long
time I heard the clock away off in the town go boom -- boom -- boom -- twelve licks;
and all still again -- stiller than ever. Pretty soon I heard a twig snap down in the dark
amongst the trees -- something was a stirring. I set still and listened. Directly I could
just barely hear a "me-yow! me-yow!" down there. That was good! Says I,"me-yow!
me-yow!" as soft as I could, and then I put out the light and scrambled out of the
window on to the shed. Then I slipped down to the ground and crawled in among the
trees, and, sure enough, there was Tom Sawyer waiting for me.
38
6.2 NATURALISM
3
6.2.1 STEPHEN CRANE, FROM MAGGIE
Chapter II
Eventually they entered into a dark region where, from a careening building, a dozen
gruesome doorways gave up loads of babies to the street and the gutter. A wind of
early autumn raised yellow dust from cobbles and swirled it against an hundred
windows. Long streamers of garments fluttered from fire-escapes. In all unhandy
places there were buckets, brooms, rags and bottles. In the street infants played or
fought with other infants or sat stupidly in the way of vehicles. Formidable women,
with uncombed hair and disordered dress, gossiped while leaning on railings, or
screamed in frantic quarrels. Withered persons, in curious postures of submission to
something, sat smoking pipes in obscure corners. A thousand odors of cooking food
came forth to the street. The building quivered and creaked from the weight of
humanity stamping about in its bowels.
A small ragged girl dragged a red, bawling infant along the crowded ways. He was
hanging back, baby-like, bracing his wrinkled, bare legs.
The little girl cried out: "Ah, Tommie, come ahn. Dere's Jimmie and fader. Don't be a-
pullin' me back."
She jerked the baby's arm impatiently. He fell on his face, roaring. With a second jerk
she pulled him to his feet, and they went on. With the obstinacy of his order, he
protested against being dragged in a chosen direction. He made heroic endeavors to
keep on his legs, denounce his sister and consume a bit of orange peeling which he
chewed between the times of his infantile orations.
As the sullen-eyed man, followed by the blood-covered boy, drew near, the little girl
burst into reproachful cries. "Ah, Jimmie, youse bin fightin' agin."
The urchin swelled disdainfully.
"Ah, what deh hell, Mag. See?"
The little girl upbraided him, "Youse allus fightin', Jimmie, an' yeh knows it puts
mudder out when yehs come home half dead, an' it's like we'll all get a poundin'."
She began to weep. The babe threw back his head and roared at his prospects.
"Ah, what deh hell!" cried Jimmie. "Shut up er I'll smack yer mout'. See?"
As his sister continued her lamentations, he suddenly swore and struck her. The little
girl reeled and, recovering herself, burst into tears and quaveringly cursed him. As she
slowly retreated her brother advanced dealing her cuffs. The father heard and turned
about.
"Stop that, Jim, d'yeh hear? Leave yer sister alone on the street. It's like I can never
3
Proyecto Gutenberg. http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/447
39
beat any sense into yer damned wooden head."
The urchin raised his voice in defiance to his parent and continued his attacks. The
babe bawled tremendously, protesting with great violence. During his sister's hasty
manoeuvres, he was dragged by the arm.
Finally the procession plunged into one of the gruesome doorways. They crawled up
dark stairways and along cold, gloomy halls. At last the father pushed open a door and
they entered a lighted room in which a large woman was rampant.
She stopped in a career from a seething stove to a pan-covered table. As the father
and children filed in she peered at them.
"Eh, what? Been fightin' agin, by Gawd!" She threw herself upon Jimmie. The urchin
tried to dart behind the others and in the scuffle the babe, Tommie, was knocked
down. He protested with his usual vehemence, because they had bruised his tender
shins against a table leg.
The mother's massive shoulders heaved with anger. Grasping the urchin by the neck
and shoulder she shook him until he rattled. She dragged him to an unholy sink, and,
soaking a rag in water, began to scrub his lacerated face with it. Jimmie screamed in
pain and tried to twist his shoulders out of the clasp of the huge arms.
The babe sat on the floor watching the scene, his face in contortions like that of a
woman at a tragedy. The father, with a newly-ladened pipe in his mouth, crouched on
a backless chair near the stove. Jimmie's cries annoyed him. He turned about and
bellowed at his wife:
"Let the damned kid alone for a minute, will yeh, Mary? Yer allus poundin' 'im. When I
come nights I can't git no rest 'cause yer allus poundin' a kid. Let up, d'yeh hear?
Don't be allus poundin' a kid."
The woman's operations on the urchin instantly increased in violence. At last she
tossed him to a corner where he limply lay cursing and weeping.
The wife put her immense hands on her hips and with a chieftain-like stride
approached her husband.
"Ho," she said, with a great grunt of contempt. "An' what in the devil are you stickin'
your nose for?"
The babe crawled under the table and, turning, peered out cautiously. The ragged girl
retreated and the urchin in the corner drew his legs carefully beneath him.
The man puffed his pipe calmly and put his great mudded boots on the back part of
the stove.
"Go teh hell," he murmured, tranquilly.
The woman screamed and shook her fists before her husband's eyes. The rough
yellow of her face and neck flared suddenly crimson. She began to howl.
40
He puffed imperturbably at his pipe for a time, but finally arose and began to look out
at the window into the darkening chaos of back yards.
"You've been drinkin', Mary," he said. "You'd better let up on the bot', ol' woman, or
you'll git done."
"You're a liar. I ain't had a drop," she roared in reply.
They had a lurid altercation, in which they damned each other's souls with frequence.
The babe was staring out from under the table, his small face working in his
excitement.
The ragged girl went stealthily over to the corner where the urchin lay.
"Are yehs hurted much, Jimmie?" she whispered timidly.
"Not a damn bit! See?" growled the little boy.
"Will I wash deh blood?"
"Naw!"
"Will I—"
"When I catch dat Riley kid I'll break 'is face! Dat's right! See?"
He turned his face to the wall as if resolved to grimly bide his time.
In the quarrel between husband and wife, the woman was victor. The man grabbed his
hat and rushed from the room, apparently determined upon a vengeful drunk. She
followed to the door and thundered at him as he made his way down stairs.
She returned and stirred up the room until her children were bobbing about like
bubbles.
"Git outa deh way," she persistently bawled, waving feet with their dishevelled shoes
near the heads of her children. She shrouded herself, puffing and snorting, in a cloud
of steam at the stove, and eventually extracted a frying-pan full of potatoes that
hissed.
She flourished it. "Come teh yer suppers, now," she cried with sudden exasperation.
"Hurry up, now, er I'll help yeh!"
The children scrambled hastily. With prodigious clatter they arranged themselves at
table. The babe sat with his feet dangling high from a precarious infant chair and
gorged his small stomach. Jimmie forced, with feverish rapidity, the grease-enveloped
pieces between his wounded lips. Maggie, with side glances of fear of interruption, ate
like a small pursued tigress.
The mother sat blinking at them. She delivered reproaches, swallowed potatoes and
41
drank from a yellow-brown bottle. After a time her mood changed and she wept as
she carried little Tommie into another room and laid him to sleep with his fists doubled
in an old quilt of faded red and green grandeur. Then she came and moaned by the
stove. She rocked to and fro upon a chair, shedding tears and crooning miserably to
the two children about their "poor mother" and "yer fader, damn 'is soul."
The little girl plodded between the table and the chair with a dish-pan on it. She
tottered on her small legs beneath burdens of dishes.
Jimmie sat nursing his various wounds. He cast furtive glances at his mother. His
practised eye perceived her gradually emerge from a muddled mist of sentiment until
her brain burned in drunken heat. He sat breathless.
Maggie broke a plate.
The mother started to her feet as if propelled.
"Good Gawd," she howled. Her eyes glittered on her child with sudden hatred. The
fervent red of her face turned almost to purple. The little boy ran to the halls,
shrieking like a monk in an earthquake.
He floundered about in darkness until he found the stairs. He stumbled, panic-

stricken, to the next floor. An old woman opened a door. A light behind her threw a
flare on the urchin's quivering face.
"Eh, Gawd, child, what is it dis time? Is yer fader beatin' yer mudder, or yer mudder
beatin' yer fader?"
6.2 NEW WOMEN
4
6.2.2 CHARLOTTE PERKINS GILMAN, FROM THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
Hurrah! This is the last day, but it is enough. John to stay in town over night, and
won't be out until this evening.
Jennie wanted to sleep with me -- the sly thing! but I told her I should undoubtedly
rest better for a night all alone.
4
Electronic Text Center, University of Virginia Library. http://etext.virginia.edu
42
That was clever, for really I wasn't alone a bit! As soon as it was moonlight and
that poor thing began to crawl and shake the pattern, I got up and ran to help her.
I pulled and she shook, I shook and she pulled, and before morning we had peeled
off yards of that paper.
A strip about as high as my head and half around the room.
And then when the sun came and that awful pattern began to laugh at me, I
declared I would finish it to-day!
We go away to-morrow, and they are moving all my furniture down again to leave
things as they were before.
Jennie looked at the wall in amazement, but I told her merrily that I did it out of
pure spite at the vicious thing.
She laughed and said she wouldn't mind doing it herself, but I must not get tired.
How she betrayed herself that time!
But I am here, and no person touches this but me, -- not alive !
She tried to get me out of the room -- it was too patent! But I said it was so quiet
and empty and clean now that I believed I would lie down again and sleep all I could;
and not to wake me even for dinner -- I would call when I woke.
So now she is gone, and the servants are gone, and the things are gone, and there
is nothing left but that great bedstead nailed down, with the canvas mattress we
found on it.
We shall sleep downstairs to-night, and take the boat home to-morrow.
I quite enjoy the room, now it is bare again.
How those children did tear about here!
This bedstead is fairly gnawed!
But I must get to work.
I have locked the door and thrown the key down into the front path.
I don't want to go out, and I don't want to have anybody come in, till John comes.
I want to astonish him.
I've got a rope up here that even Jennie did not find. If that woman does get out,
and tries to get away, I can tie her!
But I forgot I could not reach far without anything to stand on!
43
This bed will not move!
I tried to lift and push it until I was lame, and then I got so angry I bit off a little
piece at one corner -- but it hurt my teeth.
Then I peeled off all the paper I could reach standing on the floor. It sticks horribly
and the pattern just enjoys it! All those strangled heads and bulbous eyes and
waddling fungus growths just shriek with derision!
I am getting angry enough to do something desperate. To jump out of the window

would be admirable exercise, but the bars are too strong even to try.
Besides I wouldn't do it. Of course not. I know well enough that a step like that is
improper and might be misconstrued.
I don't like to look out of the windows even -- there are so many of those creeping
women, and they creep so fast.
I wonder if they all come out of that wall-paper as I did?
But I am securely fastened now by my well hidden rope -- you don't get me out in
the road there!
I suppose I shall have to get back behind the pattern when it comes night, and that
is hard!
It is so pleasant to be out in this great room and creep around as I please!
I don't want to go outside. I won't, even if Jennie asks me to.
For outside you have to creep on the ground, and everything is green instead of
yellow.
But here I can creep smoothly on the floor, and my shoulder just fits in that long
smooch around the wall, so I cannot lose my way.
Why there's John at the door!
It is no use, young man, you can't open it!
How he does call and pound!
Now he's crying for an axe.
It would be a shame to break down that beautiful door!
"John dear!" said I in the gentlest voice, "the key is down by the front steps, under
a plantain leaf! "
That silenced him for a few moments.
44
Then he said very quietly indeed, "Open the door, my darling!"
"I can't," said I. "The key is down by the front door under a plantain leaf!"
And then I said it again, several times, very gently and slowly, and said it so often
that he had to go and see, and he got it of course, and came in. He stopped short by
the door.
"What is the matter?" he cried. "For God's sake, what are you doing!"
I kept on creeping just the same, but I looked at him over my shoulder.
"I've got out at last," said I, "in spite of you and Jane. And I've pulled off most of
the paper, so you can't put me back! "
Now why should that man have fainted? But he did, and right across my path by
the wall, so that I had to creep over him every time!
7. EARLY TWENTIETH CENTURY: MODERNISMS

7.1 IMAGIST AND MODERNIST POETRY
7.1.1 EZRA POUND, “A FEW DON’TS”5 AND “IN THE STATION OF THE METRO”6
An “Image” is that which presents an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant
of time. I use the term “complex” rather in the technical sense employed by the newer
psychologists, such as Hart, though we might not agree absolutely in our application.
It is the presentation of such a “complex” instantaneously which gives that sense of
sudden liberation; that sense of freedom from time limits and space limits; that sense
of sudden growth, which we experience in the presence of the greatest works of art.
It is better to present one Image in a lifetime than to produce voluminous works . . .
5
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/article/335
6
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/in-a-station-of-the-metro/
45
Language
Use no superfluous word, no adjective, which does not reveal something . . .
Go in fear of abstractions. Don’t retell in mediocre verse what has already been done
in good prose. Don’t think any intelligent person is going to be deceived when you try
to shirk all the difficulties of the unspeakably difficult art of good prose by chopping
your composition into line lengths . . .
Don’t imagine that the art of poetry is any simpler than the art of music, or that you
can please the expert before you have spent at least as much effort on the art of
verse as the average piano teacher spends on the art of music.
Be influenced by as many great artists as you can, but have the decency either to
acknowledge the debt outright, or to try to conceal it . . .
Use either no ornament or good ornament.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
The apparition of these faces in the crowd;

Petals on a wet, black bough.
7.1.2 H. D. (HILDA DOOLITTLE), “SEA ROSE”7
Rose, harsh rose,
7
http://www.writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88/hd-sea-rose.html
46
marred and with stint of petals,
meagre flower, thin, spare of leaf,
more precious than a wet rose single on a stem
-- you are caught in the drift.
Stunted, with small leaf, you are flung on the sand,
you are lifted in the crisp sand that drives in the wind.
Can the spice-rose drip such acrid fragrance hardened in a leaf?
47
7.1.3 WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS, “THE GREAT FIGURE”8
Among the rain
and lights
I saw the figure 5
in gold
on a red
firetruck
moving
tense
unheeded
to gong clanes
siren howls
and wheels rumbling
through the dark city.
8
http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/19475
48
7.1.4 E. E. CUMMINGS, “MY SWEET OLD ETCETERA”9
my sweet old etcetera
aunt lucy during the recent
war could and what is more
did tell you just what everybody was fighting
for, my sister Isabel created hundreds (and hundreds) of socks
not to mention fleaproof earwarmers etcetera wristers etcetera,
my mother hoped that
i would die etcetera bravely of course
my father used to become hoarse
talking about how it was a privilege
and if only he could meanwhile my
self etcetera lay quietly in the deep mud et
cetera (dreaming, et cetera,

of Your smile eyes knees and of your etcetera)
9
http://whydthathappen.hubpages.com/hub/World-War-One-WWI-WW1-Cummings-Etc-Etcetera-Poem
49
7.2 HARLEM RENAISSANCE

7.2.1 LANGSTON HUGHES, “THE WEARY BLUES”10
1 Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,

2 Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,
3 I heard a Negro play.
4 Down on Lenox Avenue the other night
5 By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light
6 He did a lazy sway ....
7 He did a lazy sway ....
8 To the tune o' those Weary Blues.
9 With his ebony hands on each ivory key
10 He made that poor piano moan with melody.
11 O Blues!
12 Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool
13 He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.
14 Sweet Blues!
15 Coming from a black man's soul.
16 O Blues!
17 In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone
10
http://cai.ucdavis.edu/uccp/workingweary.html
50
18 I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan--

19 "Ain't got nobody in all this world,
20 Ain't got nobody but ma self.
21 I's gwine to quit ma frownin'
22 And put ma troubles on the shelf."
23 Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.
24 He played a few chords then he sang some more--
25 "I got the Weary Blues
26 And I can't be satisfied.
27 Got the Weary Blues
28 And can't be satisfied--
29 I ain't happy no mo'
30 And I wish that I had died."
31 And far into the night he crooned that tune.
32 The stars went out and so did the moon.
33 The singer stopped playing and went to bed
34 While the Weary Blues echoed through his head.
35 He slept like a rock or a man that's dead.
7.2.2 CLAUDE MCKAY, “IF WE MUST DIE”11
If we must die—let it not be like hogs

Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs,
Making their mock at our accursed lot.
If we must die—oh, let us nobly die,
So that our precious blood may not be shed
In vain; then even the monsters we defy
Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!
Oh, Kinsmen! We must meet the common foe;
Though far outnumbered, let us show us brave,
And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow!
What though before us lies the open grave?
Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!
11
51
7.2.3 GEORGIA DOUGLASS JOHNSON, “BLACK WOMAN”12
Don’t knock at the door, little child,

I cannot let you in,
You know not what a world this is
Of cruelty and sin.
Wait in the still eternity
Until I come to you,
The world is cruel, cruel, child,
I cannot let you in!
Don’t knock at my heart, little one,

I cannot bear the pain
Of turning deaf-ear to your call
Time and time again!
You do not know the monster men
Inhabiting the earth,
Be still, be still, my precious child,
I must not give you birth!
12
52
8. POSTWAR LITERATURE: ALIENATION AND REBELLION

8.1 REALISM AND NATURALISM. Carson McCullers, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter
8.2 BEAT GENERATION, FEMINIST AND BLACK AESTHETICS

8.2.1 BEAT GENERATION. ALLEN GINSBERG, FROM HOWL
For Carl Solomon
I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving

hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry
fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the
starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the
supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of
cities contemplating jazz,
who bared their brains to Heaven under the El and saw Mohammedan angels
staggering on tenement roofs illuminated,
who passed through universities with radiant cool eyes hallucinating Arkan-
sas and Blake-light tragedy among the scholars of war,
who were expelled from the academies for crazy & publishing obscene odes
on the windows of the skull,
who cowered in unshaven rooms in underwear, burning their money in
wastebaskets and listening to the Terror through the wall,
who got busted in their pubic beards returning through Laredo with a belt
of marijuana for New York,
who ate fire in paint hotels or drank turpentine in Paradise Alley, death, or
purgatoried their torsos night after night
with dreams, with drugs, with waking nightmares, alcohol and cock and
endless balls,
incomparable blind streets of shuddering cloud and lightning in the mind
leaping toward poles of Canada & Paterson, illuminating all the mo-
tionless world of Time between,
Peyote solidities of halls, backyard green tree cemetery dawns, wine drunk-
enness over the rooftops, storefront boroughs of teahead joyride neon
53
blinking traffic light, sun and moon and tree vibrations in the roaring
winter dusks of Brooklyn, ashcan rantings and kind king light of
mind,
who chained themselves to subways for the endless ride from Battery to holy
Bronx on benzedrine until the noise of wheels and children brought
them down shuddering mouth-wracked and battered bleak of brain
all drained of brilliance in the drear light of Zoo,
who sank all night in submarine light of Bickford's floated out and sat
through the stale beer afternoon in desolate Fugazzi's, listening to the
crack of doom on the hydrogen jukebox,
who talked continuously seventy hours from park to pad to bar to Bellevue
to museum to the Brooklyn Bridge,
a lost battalion of platonic conversationalists jumping down the stoops off fire
escapes off windowsills of Empire State out of the moon,
yacketayakking screaming vomiting whispering facts and memories and
anecdotes and eyeball kicks and shocks of hospitals and jails and wars,
whole intellects disgorged in total recall for seven days and nights with
brilliant eyes, meat for the Synagogue cast on the pavement,
who vanished into nowhere Zen New Jersey leaving a trail of ambiguous
picture postcards of Atlantic City Hall,
suffering Eastern sweats and Tangerian bone-grindings and migraines of
China under junk-withdrawal in Newark's bleak furnished room,
who wandered around and around at midnight in the railroad yard wonder-
ing where to go, and went, leaving no broken hearts,
8.2.2 FEMINIST AESTHETICS
8.2.2.1 SYLVIA PLATH, “EVENT”13
How the elements solidify! ---

The moonlight, that chalk cliff
In whose rift we lie
Back to back. I here an owl cry

From its cold indigo.
Intolerable vowels enter my heart.
The child in the white crib revolves and sighs,
13
http://www.poetrysoup.com/famous/poems/best/sylvia_plath
54
Opens its mouth now, demanding.

His little face is carved in pained, red wood.
Then there are the stars - ineradicable, hard.

One touch : it burns and sickens.
I cannot see your eyes.
Where apple bloom ices the night

I walk in a ring,
A groove of old faults, deep and bitter.
Love cannot come here.

A black gap discloses itself.
On the opposite lip
A small white soul is waving, a small white maggot.

My limbs, also, have left me.
Who has dismembered us?
The dark is melting. We touch like cripples.

8.2.2.2 ANNE SEXTON, “HOUSEWIFE”14
Some women marry houses.

It's another kind of skin; it has a heart,
a mouth, a liver and bowel movements.
The walls are permanent and pink.
See how she sits on her knees all day,
faithfully washing herself down.
Men enter by force, drawn back like Jonah
into their fleshy mothers.
A woman is her mother.
That's the main thing.
8.2.3 BLACK AESTHETICS
8.2.3.1 AMIRI BARAKA, “BLACK ART”
Poems are bullshit unless they are

teeth or trees or lemons piled
on a step. Or black ladies dying
of men leaving nickel hearts
beating them down. Fuck poems
and they are useful, wd they shoot
come at you, love what you are,
14
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/housewife-2/
55
breathe like wrestlers, or shudder

strangely after pissing. We want live
words of the hip world live flesh &
coursing blood. Hearts Brains
Souls splintering fire. We want poems
like fists beating niggers out of Jocks
or dagger poems in the slimy bellies
of the owner-jews. Black poems to
smear on girdlemamma mulatto bitches
whose brains are red jelly stuck
between 'lizabeth taylor's toes. Stinking
Whores! we want "poems that kill."
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
with tongues pulled out and sent to Ireland. Knockoff
poems for dope selling wops or slick halfwhite
politicians Airplane poems, rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . .tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuh
. . .rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . Setting fire and death to
whities ass. Look at the Liberal
Spokesman for the jews clutch his throat
& puke himself into eternity . . . rrrrrrrr
There's a negroleader pinned to
a bar stool in Sardi's eyeballs melting
in hot flame Another negroleader
on the steps of the white house one
kneeling between the sheriff's thighs
negotiating coolly for his people.
Aggh . . . stumbles across the room . . .
Put it on him, poem. Strip him naked
to the world! Another bad poem cracking
steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth
Poem scream poison gas on beasts in green berets
Clean out the world for virtue and love,
Let there be no love poems written
until love can exist freely and
cleanly. Let Black people understand
that they are the lovers and the sons
of warriors and sons
of warriors Are poems & poets &
all the loveliness here in the world
We want a black poem. And a

Black World.
Let the world be a Black Poem
And Let All Black People Speak This Poem
Silently
or LOUD
8.2.3.2 MARI EVANS, “I AM A BLACK WOMAN”15
I am a black woman
the music of my song
15
http://www.ctadams.com/marievans2.html
56
some sweet arpeggio of tears

is written in a minor key
and I
can be heard humming in the night
Can be heard
humming
in the night
I saw my mate leap screaming to the sea and I
/with these hands/cupped the lifebreath
from my issue in the canebrake
I lost Nat's swinging body in a rain of tears
and heard my son scream all the way from Anzio
for Peace he never knew....I learned Da Nang and Pork Chop Hill
in anguish Now my nostrils know the gas
and these trigger tire/d fingers
seek the softness in my warrior's beard
I am a black woman
tall as a cypress strong beyond all definition still
defying place and time and circumstance
assailed impervious indestructible
Look on me and be renewed
9. POSTMODERNIST AND CONTEMPORARY SCENE

9.1 Cormac Mccarthy, All the Pretty Horses
57

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LITERATURA NORTEAMERICANA I / AMERICAN LITERATURE 1

——, ed. Historia de la literatura norteamericana. Madrid: Cátedra, 1991.

Gurpegui, José Antonio, ed. Historia crítica de la novela norteamericana. Salamanca:

Pérez Gallego, C. Guía de la literatura norteamericana. Madrid: Fundamento, 1982.

to the End of the Nineteenth Century. Madrid: Síntesis, 1990.

The United States

Capitals and States

The Indians in the United States

The American Revolution

The Civil War

The Creation of a New Nation

1845 Texas and Florida enter the Union.

4. BASIC DOCUM ENTS: DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE

A DECLARATION BY THE REPRESENTATIVES OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for

to all the dangers of invasion from without and convulsions within.

captivating and carrying them into slavery in another hemisphere, or to incur

We therefore the representatives We, therefore, the representatives

5. EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY: ROMANTICISM AND TRANSCENDENTALISM

5.1 ROMANTIC WRITERS

5.1.1 JAMES FENIMORE COOPER, FROM “THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS”

Mine ear is open, and my heart prepared:

"'Why rage the heathen furiously'?"

"Here--here--there--all--any--everything!" exclaimed the breathless woman, tearing

"Father--father--we are here!" shrieked Alice, as he passed, at no great distance,

5.2 AMERICAN RENAISSANCE (1840-1860)

5.2.1 TRANSCENDENTALIST WRITERS. WALT WHITMAN, FROM “SONG OF MYSELF”

I celebrate myself, and sing myself,

I loafe and invite my soul,

Creeds and schools in abeyance,

The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the

The smoke of my own breath,

The sound of the belch'd words of my voice loos'd to the eddies of

I am the poet of the Body and I am the poet of the Soul,

I am the poet of the woman the same as the man,

I chant the chant of dilation or pride,

Have you outstript the rest? are you the President?

I am he that walks with the tender and growing night,

Press close bare-bosom'd night--press close magnetic nourishing night!

Smile O voluptuous cool-breath'd earth!

Prodigal, you have given me love--therefore I to you give love!

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Merely this and nothing more.

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—

Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—

5.2.4 ON SLAVERY AND THE WOMAN QUESTION.

5.2.4.1 FREDERICK DOUGLASS, FROM NARRATIVE OF THE LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS.

emotions I should have probably felt at the death of a stranger.

6. LATE NINETEETH CENTURY: REALISM AND NATURALISM

The urchin swelled disdainfully.

"Ah, what deh hell, Mag. See?"

beat any sense into yer damned wooden head."

"Go teh hell," he murmured, tranquilly.

"You're a liar. I ain't had a drop," she roared in reply.

"Are yehs hurted much, Jimmie?" she whispered timidly.

"Not a damn bit! See?" growled the little boy.

"Will I wash deh blood?"

Maggie broke a plate.

The mother started to her feet as if propelled.

He floundered about in darkness until he found the stairs. He stumbled, panic-

6.2 NEW WOMEN

A strip about as high as my head and half around the room.

How she betrayed herself that time!