Aspects of the American historical and cultural context

The discovery of the New World is related to the journeys the people from Norway were
used to at the beginning of the first millennium when Leif Eriksson, the son of Eric the Red,
wanted to visit his father who had settled in Greenland. October 9 was proclaimed Leif Eriksson
Day in 1964. Christopher Columbus, known as the discoverer of the New World, was sailing to
the Far East when he reached the new land, that he took possession of it for the King and Queen
of Aragon and Castile, on October 20, 1492. Thinking that he had reached India and seeing the
reddish colour of the natives’ skin, he called them Indians. He also mistook the word
"Cubanaquan" for Kublai Khan, which strengthened his belief that he was exploring the West
Indies. At the same time John Cabot, another Italian, sailed to the northern side of the new land
for Henry VII of England and thought he had discovered the New Indies. Among the other
explorers who visited the new land there was Americus Vespucius who wrote about his voyages
and realised that the territory of South America was not Asia, but the New World. It was at the
beginning of the 16th century that Waldseemüller and other scholars working on a book that
contained large maps decided to name the continent America, after Americus Vespucius’ first
name.

Colonization
Waves of colonizers from different European countries settled in the New World and
with great risks and losses slowly succeeded in founding colonies, towns and countries. The
French founded the country Acadia and the town Port Royal in the Northern side of the continent
at the beginning of the 17th century. Finding it more and more difficult to earn their living in their
country, many English thought of becoming colonists and others had money to invest in these
colonies, which led to the formation of the Virginia Company in 1606 and to the beginning of the
process of colonization.
Jamestown was their first settlement in Virginia in 1607. The English belonged to
different categories, most of them unused to working hard or poor and idle, were unfit for the
experience and most of them died of starvation. Maryland, another important settlement in
Virginia, is known for the Toleration Act, 1649. Roman Catholics who were oppressed in
England found a place to live in Maryland where there were also Protestants and Puritans who
needed a law to help them live together in peace. The first toleration act allowed any Christian to
worship as he considered. However, by that time, religious freedom had been established in
Rhode Island. Maryland developed into two directions: agriculture and commerce. People used
to grow tobacco and grain, but there were also ship-owners and merchants. Baltimore is one of
the old commercial towns of Virginia.
So far as religion is concerned, English Puritanism is related to the foundation of the New
England as they tried to establish a freer government than the one in their home country. Yet
they could not agree and two major groups emerged: the Non-Conformists who wanted few
changes and settled in Boston and the towns around and the Separatists who aimed at many
changes and settled in Plymouth. Some Puritans are known for their intolerance and dissident
groups appeared among them: Quakers, Baptists, Antinomians, Methodists, Presbyterians.
The Pequot people lived in the area of present Connecticut and the tribe is known for the
wars it waged against the colonizers. In 1637, the colonists led by Captain John Mason and
Captain John Underhill attacked the natives, set their fort on fire, killed many of them and
enslaved others. The Pequot war put an end to the tribe’s resistance and to the tensions in the
region.
The Pequot people had brought important losses to the colonists, but the end of the war
allowed the Connecticut inhabitants to organize their administration and follow the example of
Massachusetts which had a charter. The people in Connecticut met at Hartford and wrote the first
document known as the Connecticut Constitution in 1638-1639. Unlike the Massachusetts
charter, this constitution contained no religious restrictions for the people who had the right to
vote.
The English colonists were surrounded by other colonies (the French on the north, the
Dutch and the Swedish on the west), the Spanish, on the south, and also the Indians. They could
not expect much from the royal army of England which was far and engaged in other battles.
They decided to strengthen their position by forming the New England Confederation in 1643
which reunited four main colonies for protection: Massachusetts (the most important),
Connecticut, New Heaven and Plymouth. Although the settlements in Rhode Island and Maine
were not accepted in the Confederation, as a result of their religious divergence, they could enjoy
many benefits, including protection from attacks.
The New England colonists dealt with industry and commerce, and lived in towns. The
other two English colonies, Virginia and Maryland, were different from the Confederation and
the people dealt with agriculture producing large crops of tobacco and they had slaves. The
position of the English got stronger, they conquered the Dutch and the French, and extended to
the south of Virginia.

New York emerged on a much disputed territory between the French who initially had the
area, the Dutch who conquered it and the English who captured the colony in 1664, then lost it in
1672, and eventually received the place after the Third Anglo-Dutch War, through the treaty of
Westminster (1675). New York had been given by Charles II to his brother James, Duke of York
and Albany, who changed the name of the place from New Netherland into New York, with the
main towns New York and Albany.
During the 18th century the colonies received more and more immigrants which led to
industrial and commercial development. There were more wars with the French and the Indians,
Georgia was founded, Carolina went through a period of instability and indecision which led to
the separation into North Carolina and South Carolina.

The War of Independence / The Revolutionary War, 1775-1783

Causes: the growing tensions between colonists and the British authorities; the attempt of
the British to impose taxes and the weak representation of the colonists in the British Parliament
which led to protests and violence; the presence of the British army in the colonies. In 1774, a
group of colonial delegates met to denounce their discontents and issued a declaration of the
citizens’ rights, without asking for independence. After a conflict in April 1775, the Second
Continental Congress decided to form an army led by Washington. The members of the Second
Continental Congress were: George Washington, John and Samuel Adams, Patrick Henry, John
Jay, Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.
The British had several advantages over the colonists, such as: they were more numerous
in the British Isles than the English colonists; they had a great regular army and a great navy;
they had guns and ammunition. The Colonists had their own advantages, among which: the
distance from the British Isles which made transportation of the army costly and difficult; it was
difficult and costly to maintain the army (clothes and food); the colonists knew the country better
and the land was more appropriate for defense.
The conflicts of the 1776 made the colonists declare themselves independent and a
committee made up of three members (Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson)
wrote a declaration. After debates and several changes of words, it was adopted on July 4, 1776
and signed by all the members of the Congress on August 2. The English colonists were secretly
helped by French colonists and they obtained an important victory in Saratoga in 1778. The
Revolutionary War started as a civil war but turned into an international one when France
formally declared war to Great Britain. In 1781 the Revolutionary War brings more victories to
the rebels, but it is only in 1783 that the Treaty of Peace is signed. The United States covered the
territory from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, from the Spanish Florida and Louisiana on the
south to the Great Lakes on the north.

The Constitution
In 1787 there were 13 states and nine of them had to sign the Constitution. The delegates
of the Congress started discussing the necessity of a new document on May 25 1787 when
George Washington was elected the president of the Convention. All the problems emerging
from the way in which the states would be represented at the administrative level were solved
through a bicameral legislature and the Constitution was signed on September 17, 1787. Not all
the states agreed with the Constitution and several states, among which Massachusetts, signed on
the condition that amendments would be made while New Hampshire, the ninth state, and
Virginia signed only when the first ten amendments had been adopted, June, 1788. All the states
had adopted the Constitution by the time George Washington was elected President of the United
States of America, in 1789. He was elected again in 1792.

The American Civil War, 1860-1861

The leaders of the Southern states decided to dissolve the union with the Northern states
after Abraham Lincoln’s election as Presidents of the USA, being nominated by the Republican
Party, although the administration had stated they did not intend to interfere with slavery. South
Caroline and six other states (Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas)
adopted the secession declaration in 1860. When the Confederates attacked, President Lincoln
had to raise the army. He decided to abolish slavery in order to weaken the South and the
Emancipation Proclamation was issued on January 1, 1863. The Thirteenth Amendment
abolished slavery in 1865. The Union forces were led by Lieutenant General Grant, the
Confederates had as leaders Davis and Robert Lee. General Grant’s army brought the victory to
the Union on April 9, 1865. A sympathiser with slavery murdered Lincoln on April 14, 1865.
The 19th century is associated with industrial, economic and social progress as well as
with spiritual emancipation. Besides the fact that the population of the United States had greatly
increased, new states had been admitted to the Union: Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Alabama,
Mississippi, Louisiana and Missouri. Impressive development in transport led to steamboats
running on the great lakes, canals connecting rivers and lakes (Eric canal between Hudson River
and Erie Lake); railroads which were initially made of wood (the 1 st one built in Boston); in 1830
the invention of steam locomotive; the iron industry awake because of the discovery of means to
make iron from ore of anthracite; horse cars were invented which ran in iron tracks laid in the
streets.
 The school system was constantly improved; in 1828 Noah Webster published the 1 st
edition of his great dictionary; he unsuccessfully tried to change the spelling of many words.
Among the American writers who are representative for the period and their works we can
mention: James Fenimore Cooper (178-1851) - The Last of the Mohicans; Leatherstocking Tales;
Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) - The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, The
Blithedale Romance, The Marble Faun; Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1949) - The Fall of the House of
Usher, A Cask of Amontillado, The Tell-Tale Heart, The Raven; Herman Melville (1819-1891) –
Moby Dick, Bartleby the Scrivener; Walt Whitman (1819-1892) – Leaves of Grass, A Noiseless
Spider; Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) – Poems; Samuel Clemens / Mark Twain (1835-1910) –
The Adventure of Huckleberry Finn, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, A Connecticut Yankee in
King Arthur’s Court, Life on the Mississippi, The Prince and Pauper; Henry James (1843-1916)
The Ambassadors, The Portrait of a Lady, Daisy Miller, The Figure in the Carpet, The Turn of
the Screw.

The twentieth-century in the USA

The twentieth century began with the Progressive movement aimed at reforming society
and individuals and the government got involved in this action. Social workers were engaged in
establishing settlement houses in the slums to offer the poor health services. The sale of alcohol
was prohibited partly to improve life in families with alcoholic husbands and domestic violence.
Politicians tried to fight corruption and improve public transportation. The laws passed at the
time aimed to restrict child labour, to limit work days and provide compensation for injured
workers.
Four major events characterize the twentieth century American history:
When World War I started in Europe in 1914, President Woodrow Wilson promoted
strict American neutrality. In 1917 Congress declared war to Germany, due to the latter’s
declaration of warfare against all ships having as destination the Allied ports, but only in 1918
the American army could make a significant contribution to the war effort.
The Great Depression meant thousands of American banks and over 100 000 businesses
that had failed by 1932, the year when Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president on the
platform of “a new deal for the American people”. The “new deal”, also called the historic
“hundred days”, consisted of three months during which a great number of laws were passed to
help the economy recover. The “New Deal” was not as successful as President Roosevelt
thought, but it contributed to the improvement of the economy.
Year 1939 means the outbreak of World War II in Europe. The USA declared its
neutrality but in 1941 Pearl Harbor was bombed by the Japanese and the USA entered the war.
The Germans surrendered on May 5, 1945. The use of the atomic bomb against the Japanese
cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki made the war against Japan come to an end.
The Cold War marks the tensions developed between the USA and the Soviet Union. The
latter imposed Communist dictatorship in Eastern Europe, and the Western powers formed the
North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) as a response. The USA allied with Belgium,
Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and
the United Kingdom.

American arts
The 1st skyscraper was built in Chicago in 1884 and represents America’s contribution to
architecture. The influence of the German school known as “the Bauhaus” rests in geometrically
shaped buildings which were named “glass boxes” and had an austere look. Postmodern
buildings try to revive historical styles through bold decorations.
The 20th century brings a change in music as local rhythms are combined with European
music. Thus, plantation melodies, Caribbean rhythms, jazz enliven and individualize American
music. George Gershwin’s (1898-1937) is an example as he used rhythms of Jazz and African-
American songs in his famous “Rhapsody in Blue” and his opera “Porgy and Bess”.
A very important movement in American painting took place after World War II when a
group of young New York artists created a new trend, that is abstract expressionism. Among the
leaders were Jackson Pollock (1912-1956), Willem de Kooning (1904-1997) and Mark Rothko
(1903 – 1970. The abstract expressionists changed the technique and abandoned the
representation of real object, to focus on the impact of the association of colours, on the
movement of the lines on the canvas, and on instinctual arrangements of space.
Twentieth-century literature meant innovative techniques and new theories and concepts
to which both American and European writers adhered. Among the most important names related
to literature the following can be mentioned: Ezra Pound who theorized imagism in poetry,
Henry James and his innovative essays, Robert Frost (poetry: The Road Not Taken, The Death of
the Hired Man, Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, The Brook in the City, etc.), William
Carlos Williams (poems: The Red Wheelbarrow, Landscape with the Fall of Icarus, Transitional,
etc.), Sylvia Plath (poems: Lady Lazarus, Daddy, Ariel), H.D. (Hilda Doolittle) (poems: Heat,
Sea Rose, Helen, Pear Tree, etc), Allen Ginsberg (poems: Hospital Window, In Back Of The
Real, Paterson, A Supermarket In California, Cosmopolitan Greetings, etc.), Marianne Moore
(poems: Silence, A Grave, Poetry, etc.), Ernest Hemingway (The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to
Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Old Man and the Sea, Islands in the Stream, The Arden of
Eden), F.Scott Fitzgerald (This Side of Paradise, The Beautiful and Damned, The Great Gatsby,
Tender Is the Night), William Faulkner (Sanctuary, The Sound and the Fury, Light in August, As
I Lay Dying, Absalom, Absalom!), John Steinbeck (Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath,
East of Eden, etc.), John Updike (Rabbit, Run, The Centaur, In the Beauty of the Lilies, Seek My
Face, Terrorist, etc.), Arthur Miller (Death of a Salesman, The Crucible, All My Sons, etc.),
Eugene O’Neill (Long Days’ Journey into Night, Desire Under the Elms, Mourning Becomes
Electra, etc.), Tennessee Williams (A Streetcar Named Desire, The Glass Menagerie, Cat on a
Hot Tin Roof, etc.), Edward Albee (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, The American Dream,
The Zoo Story, etc.).

Bibliografie recomandată
 Avădanei, Ștefan. North American Literary History. Iași: Fundația Chemarea, 1993
 Baigell, Matthew. A History of American Painting. London: Thames and Hudson, 1971.
 Brogan, Hugh. The Penguin History of the USA: New edition, Penguin, 2001
 Hofstadter, Richard. Great Issues in American History : From Reconstruction to the Present
Day, 1864-1969. New York: Vintage Book, 1969.