The Complete Idiot's Guide to American Literature

by Rozakis, Laurie E.

• ISBN13: 9780028633787
• ISBN10: 0028633784
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1999-08-01
• Publisher: DK Publishing, Inc.

Summary

You're no idiot, of course. You know that Samuel Clemens had a better-known pen name, Moby Dick is a famous whale, and the Raven only said,"Nevermore." But when it comes to understanding the great works of Mark Twain, Herman Melville, and Edgar Allan Poe, you'd rather rent the videos than head to your local library. Don't tear up your library card yet! The Complete Idiot's Guide to American Literature teaches you all about the rich tradition of American prose and poetry, so you can fully appreciate its magnificent diversity. In this Complete Idiot's Guide, you get:

Author Biography

Laurie E. Rozakis, Ph.D., is a member of the Modern Language Association, the American Association of University Women, the National Educational Association, the National Council of Teachers of English, and Women in Literature, Dr. Rozakis lives and teaches in Farmingdale, New York.

Table of Contents

A New Land, a New Literature (1607-1840)	p. 1
America the Beautiful--and Talented	p. 3
What's So American About American Literature?	p. 4
Write Away	p. 6
Words to the Wise	p. 8
In the Beginning: America's First Writers (1607-1750)	p. 13
Saints and Strangers	p. 14
William Bradford (1590-1657)	p. 16
Anne Bradstreet (1612-1672)	p. 17
Edward Taylor (1645-1729)	p. 19
Cotton Mather (1663-1728)	p. 20
John Smith (1580-1631)	p. 22
Don't Tread on Me: The Revolutionary Period (1750-1800)	p. 25
The Dream Team	p. 26
J. Hector St. Jean de Crevecoeur (1735-1813)	p. 27
Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)	p. 28
Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)	p. 31
Thomas Paine (1737-1809)	p. 36
The (Cultural) State of the Union	p. 37
The Big Daddy of American Literature: Washington Irving (1789-1851)	p. 39
Always a Bridesmaid, Never a Bride	p. 40
A Declaration of Independence	p. 41
The Big Kahuna	p. 43
Pumpkin Head	p. 44
The Big Sleep	p. 45
Going to the Devil	p. 47
Father of the American Novel: James Fenimore Cooper (1789-1851)	p. 49
Green Acres Is the Place for Me	p. 50
Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better	p. 52
Bumpp and Grind	p. 53
My Hero: The Last of the Mohicans	p. 54
So Why Not Just Watch the Movie?	p. 56
Sn of a Bestseller: The Deerslayer	p. 56
So What's It All About?	p. 58
The Broken Twig Series	p. 58
Life on the Ledge: Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)	p. 61
A Rocky Start	p. 62
Great Balls of Fire	p. 64
For the Birds: The Raven	p. 65
The Philosophy of Composition	p. 67
Annabel Lee	p. 68
The Cask of Amontillado	p. 70
Gilt Trip: The Gold Bug	p. 71
Dick Lit	p. 72
The New England Renaissance (1840-1855)	p. 75
The Sage of Concord: Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)	p. 77
Transcendentalism	p. 78
Where's Waldo?	p. 80
Nature	p. 80
The American Scholar	p. 81
Divinity School Address	p. 82
The Fame Game	p. 83
Master of His Domain	p. 85
Nature Boy: Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)	p. 87
Oh Henry!	p. 88
A Travel Guide for the Mind: Walden	p. 89
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience	p. 91
Nate the Great: Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864)	p. 95
Begin at the Very Beginning	p. 96
Gimme an A	p. 98
You Play, You Pay	p. 102
Romancing the Novel	p. 103
Short, but Not Sweet: Hawthorne's Stories	p. 103
Just Don't Call Me Hermie: Herman Melville (1819-1891)	p. 107
Man Overboard	p. 108
A Whale of a Tale: Moby Dick	p. 110
Swimming with the Fishes	p. 113
Life Before Xerox: Bartleby the Scrivener	p. 113
The War Between the States (1855-1865)	p. 117
The Little Woman Who Started This Great Big War: Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896)	p. 119
The Beecher Preachers	p. 120
The Price of Fame	p. 122
Uncle Tom's Cabin: Life Among the Lowly	p. 123
The Medium Is the Message	p. 125
The Mighty Mite	p. 126
Rebel with a Cause: Frederick Douglass (1817-1895)	p. 129
Bound and Determined	p. 129
The Man with the Iron Heart	p. 132
Let Freedom Ring	p. 133
True Grit	p. 134
Working Without a Net	p. 135
That Barbaric Yawp: Walt Whitman (1819-1892)	p. 137
Letting It All Hang Out	p. 138
Soul Man	p. 139
I Sing the Body Electric	p. 140
Black-Widow Blues: A Noiseless Patient Spider	p. 142
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd	p. 143
Out of the Cradle, Endlessly Rocking	p. 145
Advertisements for Myself	p. 146
The Big Mama of American Literature: Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)	p. 149
Without Feathers	p. 150
Write Away	p. 151
Not Waving, But Drowning	p. 154
Remembrance of Flings Past?	p. 154
A Snake in the Grass	p. 156
A Date with Destiny	p. 158
Speaking of Death	p. 159
Realism and the Frontier (1865-1915)	p. 161
Samuel Clemens: A.K.A. Mark Twain (1835-1910)	p. 163
Fun and Games	p. 164
Ever the Twain Shall Meet	p. 165
"The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County"	p. 167
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn	p. 171
Mark My Words	p. 176
Mr. Clemens and Mark Twain	p. 177
Life Is Short and Then You Die: Stephen Crane (1871-1900)	p. 179
Even Stephen	p. 180
The March of Time	p. 181
Only the Good Die Young: Maggie: A Girl of the Streets	p. 183
The Red Badge of Courage	p. 185
So What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?	p. 187
The Open Boat	p. 188
Rub-a-Dub-Dub: Four Men in a Tub	p. 191
Three on a Match: The Naturalists Jack London, Frank Norris, and Theodore Dreiser (1890-1925)	p. 193
The Law of the Claw: Naturalism	p. 194
Jack London (1876-1916)	p. 197
The Call of the Wile	p. 198
To Build a Fire	p. 200
Frank Norris (1870-1902)	p. 201
McTeague, a Story of San Francisco	p. 202
No Teddy Bear: Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945)	p. 203
An American Tragedy	p. 204
Color My World: The Local Colorists	p. 207
In Living Color	p. 208
Bret Harte (1836-1902)	p. 208
Mary Wilkins Freeman (1852-1930)	p. 210
Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909)	p. 211
Down in the Bayou: Kate Chopin (1851-1904)	p. 212
The Awakening	p. 213
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935)	p. 214
Prairie Tales: Willa Cather (1873-1947)	p. 216
Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous: Edith Wharton and Henry James	p. 219
High Society: Edith Wharton (1862-1937)	p. 219
Birds in Gilded Cages	p. 221
Ethan Frome	p. 222
Henry James (1843-1916)	p. 224
Culture Vulture	p. 225
Bet You Can't Read Just One	p. 227
Edie and Hank	p. 228
Modern Literature (1915-1945)	p. 229
Macho, Macho Man: Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)	p. 231
Hunt and Peck	p. 232
The War to End All Wars	p. 233
Home Not-So-Sweet Home	p. 234
A Shooting Star	p. 236
Death in the Afternoon	p. 239
Less Is More	p. 239
Hemingway's Code	p. 240
The Sun Also Rises	p. 241
The One That Got Away: The Old Man and the Sea	p. 243
The Fickle Finger of Fame	p. 245
Party Hearty: F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)	p. 247
Great Scott!	p. 248
The Beautiful and the Damned	p. 250
Paradise Lost	p. 251
Snatching Victory from the Jaws of Defeat	p. 252
The Jazz Age: "The Greatest, Gaudiest Spree in History"	p. 253
The Great Gatsby	p. 255
A Great Novel	p. 259
Mint Juleps, Moonlight, and Madness: William Faulkner (1897-1962)	p. 261
Southern Comfort	p. 262
My World, and Welcome to It	p. 263
Pushing the Envelope: Faulkner's Style	p. 265
Shrink Lit: Faulkner's Top Ten	p. 265
The Sound and the Fury	p. 266
Three Big Deals: Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, and John Steinbeck	p. 271
Pound Cake	p. 272
Make It New!	p. 273
Pound of Flesh	p. 275
T.S. Eliot (1888-1965)	p. 276
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock	p. 277
The Waste-Land	p. 279
Big Man on Campus	p. 281
John Steinbeck (1902-1968)	p. 282
The Grapes of Wrath	p. 284
A Pack of Poets (1900-1960)	p. 289
Robert Frost (1874-1963)	p. 289
Frosty the Poet	p. 290
Sound of Sense	p. 291
e(dward). e(stlin). cummings (1894-1962)	p. 293
Somewhere I have never travelled, gladly beyond	p. 294
Here's to You, Mr. Robinson: Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869-1935)	p. 296
The Chicago Poets: Carl Sandburg, Edgar Lee Masters, and Vachel Lindsay	p. 297
The Harlem Renaissance (1915-1929)	p. 303
The Place to Be	p. 304
Richard Wright (1908-1960)	p. 305
Native Son	p. 308
Langston Hughes (1902-1967)	p. 310
Countee Cullen (1903-1946)	p. 311
Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960)	p. 311
Jean Toomer (1894-1967)	p. 312
Claude McKay (1890-1948)	p. 313
Additional Voices	p. 313
Cult Figures (1945-Present)	p. 315
The Beat Goes On	p. 316
William S. Burroughs (1914-1997)	p. 317
Jack Kerouac (1922-1969)	p. 318
Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997)	p. 319
More Than I Needed to Know	p. 321
Sylvia Plath (1932-1963)	p. 322
Anne Sexton (1920-1974)	p. 323
Robert Lowell (1917-1977)	p. 324
J.D. Salinger (b. 1919)	p. 325
The Catcher in the Rye	p. 326
Horror and Humor (1930-1960)	p. 329
Flannery O'Connor (1925-1964)	p. 330
Make Me Laugh, Make Me Cry	p. 332
James Thurber (1894-1961)	p. 332
Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)	p. 335
Legends of Laughter	p. 336
Contemporary Literature (1946-Present)	p. 339
Jewish-American Literature	p. 341
Gentleman's Agreement	p. 342
Saul Bellow (b. 1915)	p. 343
Erica Jong (b. 1942)	p. 344
Norman Mailer (b. 1923)	p. 345
Bernard Malamud (1914-1986)	p. 347
Philip Roth (b. 1933)	p. 347
Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904-1991)	p. 348
Elie Wiesel (b. 1928)	p. 350
Contemporary African-American Literature	p. 353
I Have A Dream	p. 354
Ralph Ellison (1914-1994)	p. 355
Gwendolyn Brooks (b. 1917)	p. 357
James Baldwin (1924-1987)	p. 358
Maya Angelou (b. 1928)	p. 359
Toni Morrison (b. 1931)	p. 360
Alice Walker (b. 1944)	p. 361
Jamaica Kincaid (b. 1949)	p. 362
Modern Canadian Literature	p. 365
O Canada!	p. 366
Stephen Leacock (1869-1944)	p. 368
Between the Wars	p. 368
Alfred Purdy (b. 1918)	p. 369
Pierre Berton (b. 1920)	p. 370
Mavis Gallant (b. 1922)	p. 371
Margaret Laurence (1926-1987)	p. 371
Mordecai Richler (b. 1931)	p. 372
Alice Munro (b. 1931)	p. 373
Margaret Atwood (b. 1939)	p. 373
Michael Ondaatje (b. 1943)	p. 374
Native-American, Latino-American, and Asian-American Literature	p. 377
Modern Native-American Writers	p. 378
Today's Latino-American Writers	p. 382
Contemporary Asian-American Writers	p. 385
New Frontiers	p. 389
John Cheever (1912-1982)	p. 390
John Updike (b. 1932)	p. 390
Truman Capote (1924-1984)	p. 392
Mary Gordon (b. 1948)	p. 395
Stephen King (b. 1947)	p. 396
Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938)	p. 398
Appendixes
The Authors and Their Most Famous Works	p. 401
Additional Reading	p. 417
Timeline	p. 445
Index	p. 459
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