Literatura Norteamericana I

American Literature I
Ricardo Menéndez
10 ECTS Credits 2020-2021
Authors & Contents 1st Term
Study Block I
 Early American Literature
 Captain John Smith – Oct 7th
 William Bradford – Oct 14th
 Anne Bradstreet – Oct 21st
 Mary Rowlandson – Oct 28th
 The American Enlightment
 Jonathan Edwards – Nov 4th
 Benjamin Franklin – Nov 11th
 Olaudah Equiano – Nov 18th
 Phillis Wheatley – Nov 25th
Ricardo Menéndez
 Romanticism (part I)
 Washington Irving – Dec 2nd
 James Fenimore Cooper – Dec 9th
 Ralph Waldo Emerson – Dec 16th
 Henry David Thoroeau – Jan 13th
 REVIEW
 Units 1-12 – Jan 20th
UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es
“ The land of literature is a fairy land to
those who view it at a distance, but,
like all other landscapes, the charm
fades on a nearer approach, and the
thorns and briars become visible ”
Washington Irving (1783 - 1859)
 Biography
 Works by author
 Online resources
 Q&A
Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es
Unit 9 – Washington Irving

Objectives of the Unit

 Outline the transition from neoclassicism to romanticism
 Analyze how Irving freely adapts German folklore material and others
to create a distinctive American culture emerged after the War of
Independence
 Consider the role of the so-called Father of American fiction in the
birth and early development of the short story
 Trace Irving’s experiences in Spain that inspired The Alhambra
 Identify Romantic features
 Use a short story from The Alhambra to identify:
 Narrative elements (theme, plot, narrator, characters and settings)
 Main Narrative modes (description, report, speech, comment)
 Frame Story narrative device
Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es
Unit 9 – Washington Irving

Biography
 Born in the year the United States won its War of Independence in 1783 in
Manhattan and named after Washington, the war hero
 Eleventh child of a wealthy merchant
 At the age of 16 left school to study Law for two years in Manhattan
 Became interested in travel. He travelled up the Hudson(1800), then to
Montreal (1803) His parents, worried for his health, sent him to Europe in 1804.
He visited France, Italy , Switzerland, Holland and England
 Sir Walter Scott introduced Irving to German folk and fairy tales he would use to
write The Sketch Book and create his own writing style
 Studied Spanish becoming deeply interested in Spanish culture, history and
mythology
 Returned to Spain in 1842 as a minister to Spain during reign of Queen Isabella II
 In his last years tried to recover in the eyes of his American readership his lost
Americanness travelling to western frontier land, writing about it
Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es
Unit 9 – Washington Irving

American Romanticism
 Romanticism as a term, derives from Romance which means short story.
 Normally set in the period between 1770 to 1860
 Romances prototypically adventuristic and improbable vs Novels (which
emphasize the mundane and realistic)
 Romantic writers (and artists) saw themselves as revolting against the
‘Age of Enlightment’ (1700-1770) and its values (especially
Neoclassicism)
 The movement began in Germany with Goethe, continued in England
with Blake, Coleridge, Wordsworth, Shelley, Byron, and Keats
 Romanticism does not appear in the U.S. until Irving and Emerson
 American Romantics tend to venerate Nature as a sanctum of non-
artificiality, where the Self can fulfill its potential (earlier Puritans
tended to see nature as the fallen "wilderness," full of "savage" Indians)
 American Romantics use symbols, myths, or fantastic elements
Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es
Unit 9 – Washington Irving

Work of Washington Irving

 First internationally acclaimed American writer
 First American Literary artist to earn his living through writing
 His early love for travel would feed his cosmopolitan imagination throughout
his existence
 Contemporary criticism accused him of being too eager to please, writing
about foreign themes in a light-hearted way
 He never wrote a full length novel. He is known as father of a truly
prominent genre in the American literary canon: the short story
 Two stories have outlived him internationally: “Rip Van Winkel” and “The
Legend of Sleepy Hollow” both included in his Sketch Book (1819-1820)
 In Spain he is well known due to The Alhambra (1832)
 Resorts to well-known method of telling a story intermediary or second-
hand account, inventing a frame story with the narrator mediating
 Combination of Narrative Modes: description, report, speech and comment
Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es
Unit 9 – Washington Irving

The Alhambra
 Shortly after completing a biography of Christopher Columbus in 1828,
Washington Irving traveled from Madrid to Granada. The writer was granted
permission to stay in the Alhambra palace for three months
 Being a celebrity allowed Washington Irving to travel to Granada and stay at
the Alhambra palace
 Irving was researching for a book to be called A Chronicle of the Conquest of
Granada, a history of the years 1478–1492
 The book combines description, myth and narrations of real historical events
 Washington filled notebooks and journals with descriptions and observations
though he did not believe his writing would ever do it justice. He wrote, "How
unworthy is my scribbling of the place.“
 The Alhambra : a series of tales and sketches of the Moors and Spaniards
was published in May 1832 in the United States by publishers Lea & Carey and
concurrently in England by Henry Colburn. In 1851 Irving wrote an "Author's
Revised Edition", also titled Tales of the Alhambra

Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es

Unit 9 – Washington Irving

Online Resources for Washington Irving

 Washington Irving Wikipedia entry
 Wikipedia entry for Tales of the Alhambra
 Washington Irving on LION (Proquest Literature Online)
 Resources and Links suggested in the Curso Vitual
 Gutenberg.org eBook The Alhambra http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/49947
 Audiobook of The Alhambra:
https://librivox.org/the-alhambra-by-washington-irving/
 More audiobooks from Washington Irving
 Full text of The Alhambra (1832) in Word format
 Online text of Spanish Romance
 Online text of The Legend of Don Munio Sancho de Hinojosa

Ricardo Menéndez UNED 2020-2021 ricmenendez@madrid.uned.es

 Remember to complete
Self-Evaluation &
Exploratory Questions
from the Book
Online Self Evaluation Quiz

Questions?
Thank you