usa literature in brief, Szkolne, historia i kultura USA [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
LITERATURE
IN BRIEF
USA
Literature
In Brief
E
XECUTIVE
E
DITOR
: G
EORGE
C
LACK
• A
UTHOR
: K
ATHRYN
V
AN
S
PANCKEREN
•
E
DITOR
: P
AUL
M
ALAMUD
• D
ESIGNER
: C
HLOE
D. E
LLIS
• C
OVER
I
LLUSTRATION
S
ALLY
V
ITSKY
• C
OVER
D
ESIGN
M
IN
Y
AO
U.S.A.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
of Tampa, has lectured in American literature widely abroad,
and is former director of the Fulbright-sponsored Summer
Institute in American Literature for international scholars. Her
publications include poetry and scholarship. She received her
Bachelors degree from the University of California, Berkeley, and
her Ph.D. from Harvard University.
1
K
athryn VanSpanckeren, professor of English at the University
CHAPTER 1
EARLY AMERICAN WRITING
“The First Thanksgiving, 1621,” by J.L.G. Ferris, depicts America’s early settlers and Native
Americans celebrating a bountiful harvest.
Courtesy Library of Congress.
orally transmitted myths, legends, tales, and lyrics (always
songs) of Indian cultures. Native American oral tradition is
quite diverse. Indian stories glow with reverence for nature
2
T
he foundation of American literature begins with the
as a spiritual, as well as physical, mother. Nature is alive and
endowed with spiritual forces; main characters may be animals
or plants, often totems associated with a tribe, group, or
individual.
The Indian contribution to America is greater than is often
believed. The hundreds of Indian words in everyday American
English include “canoe,” “tobacco,” “potato,” “moccasin,”
“moose,” “persimmon,” “raccoon,” “tomahawk,” and “totem.”
Contemporary Native American writing, discussed in chapter 8,
also contains works of great beauty.
The irst European record of exploration in America is in a
Scandinavian language. The Old Norse Vinland Saga recounts
how the adventurous Leif Eriksson and a band of wandering
Norsemen settled briely somewhere on the northeast coast of
America—probably Nova Scotia, in Canada—in the irst decade
of the 11th century.
The irst known and sustained contact between the
Americas and the rest of the world, however, began with the
famous voyage of an Italian explorer, Christopher Columbus,
funded by the Queen of Spain, Isabella. Columbus’s journal in
his “Epistola,” printed in 1493, recounts the trip’s drama.
Initial English attempts at colonization were disasters. The
irst colony was set up in 1585 at Roanoke, of the coast of North
Carolina; all its colonists disappeared. The second colony was
more permanent: Jamestown, established in 1607. It endured
3
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