清教主义Puritanism：On the one hand, Puritanism is a highly strict religious doctrine. The Puritans were determined to find a place on the new continent where they could worship God in the way they thought true Christians should.
On the other hand, Puritanism also has its practical aspect. The Puritans had to work hard in order to make a living and be ready for any misfortunes and tragic failures that might lie in wait for them.
先验主义Transcendentalism：
It was a form of idealism, or philosophical Romanticism. It was a way of knowing the belief that man can intuitively transcend the limits of the senses and of logic and receive directly higher truth and greater knowledge denied to other methods of knowing ---was another form of a classic American value-individualism. In fact, it was also another form of the American Dream, the ability to succeed by one’s own efforts . It was an ethical guide to life for a young nation.
Imagists意象派：
They are a group of English and American poets whose poetic tenets are: use of the common and “exact” word; creation of new rhythms; absolute freedom in choice of subject; presentation of sharp image; hard and clear poetry, never blurred or indefinite; concentration and suggestiveness. Among the imagist poets are Doolittle, Richard Aldington, Edith Sitwell, Pond
Realism现实主义
Realism aimed at the interpretation of the actualities of any aspect of life, free from subjective prejudice, idealism , or romantic color. Instead of thinking about the mysteries of life and death and heroic individualism，p eople’s attention was now directed to the interesting features of everyday existence, to what was brutal or sordid , and to the open portrayal of class struggle.
Robert Frost:
. He won the Pulitzer Prize four times 获奖理由：begins in delight,and ends in wisdom.
主要作品：Mountain Interval（山间）New Hampshire
West-Running Brook（小溪）， A Further Range (山外边) A Witness Tree
A Steeple Bush (尖塔丛), In the Clearing (林间空地).
雪夜停马在林边Stopping By W oods On A Snowy Evening：
1.Summary:
The scene of this poem is a cold, snowy evening of early winter. The principal characters are the poet, a horse, and a winter night.
2. Analysis:
1)The form is regular iambic tetrameter (four-beat lines); the rhyme scheme is a fairly complex one, aaba, bbcb.
2) Contrasts:
impractical poet and the practical owner of the woods;
the poet and his horse;The present natural world and the future world
未选择的路The Road Not Taken
1.Introduction:
It was included in Mountain Interval.
In reality, it concerns the important decisions which one must make in life, when one must give up one desirable thing in order to possess another. Then, whatever the outcome, one must accept the consequences of one’s choice for it is n ot possible to go back and have another to choose differently.
It is the feeling that, no matter what kind of choice one makes, he will always have the suspicion in the back of his mind that the other road, too, could have been taken One cannot know, when he makes a choice, what the results of his decision will be. Rather than being sorry that he took the untravelled road, the poet seems to be saying that he would probably do the same thing again.
The rhyme scheme: abaab. This rhyme scheme reflects the spe aker’s efforts to shape his life into a pleasing and coherent form
简答：
1 白鲸的象征意义
1. The Pequod a symbol of doom. It is painted a gloomy black and covered in
whale teeth and bones, literally bristling with the mementos of violent death.
It is, in fact, marked for death. Adorned like a primitive coffin, the Pequod becomes one.
2. Moby Dick
Moby Dick possesses various symbolic meanings for various individuals.
1) Symbol of nature for human beings, because it is mysterious, powerful,
unknown.
2) Symbol of evil for the Captain Ahab.
3) Symbol of good and purity because of its whiteness.
? 3 Voyage of the Pequod
Symbol of the pursuit of ideals, adventure, and the hunt in the vast wilderness.
4 Ahab：Symbol of solipsism, revenge and then evil.
5 Starbuck：Symbol of good and noble.
? 6 the Doubloon：Symbol of the lure of evil and enticements to greed.
?7 Sea:Symbol of vastness, loneliness, and isolation.
2 美国现实主义
Time: the latter half in the 19th century, (1870s--1880s)
Features: a. verisimilitude of details derived from observation
b. representative in plot, setting and character
c. an objective rather than an idealized view of human experience
Theme: the world of experience of the commonplace and the familiar and the low. Style: genteel , graceful prose ( Howells and Henry James)
plain and rough ( Mark Twain)local color writers
Representative writers:
1.William Dean Howells,The Rise of Silas Lapham and Criticism and Fiction.
2.Henry James,Daisy Miller, The Ambassadors, The Wings of the Dove and The Art of Fiction.
3.Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,
Life on the Mississippi
3海明威的冰山理论. Iceberg Theory
If a writer of prose knows enough about what he is writing about，the may omit things that he knows and the reader, if the writer is writing truly enough ,will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them .The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water .
4 伟大的盖茨比象征
Gatsby: the country’s history
Daisy: seemingly beautiful American Dream
Tom: commercialization which brought the country only moral depravity
Nick: hope of the country
Theme:Disillusionment of American Dream in the materialized America.
书中重点：
1 the first permanent English settlement in North America was established at Jamestown,Virginia in 1607.the first American writer is Captain John Smith.作品：A Map of Virginia:with a Description of the Country.
2 Anne Bradstreet（puritans）:the first notable poet in America.她的诗是对上帝的歌颂
3 Benjamin Franklin:There was only one writer in the colonial period,whose works are read today.this is Benjamin Franklin.He is the only good American author before the Revolutionary War.他发明了消防队眼镜路灯暖气电炉等。发现了电池的正负极。His best writing is found in his own Autobiography.影响：“His shadow lies heavier than any other man’s on this young nation.”
4 Thomas Paine:作品：小册子Common Sense和American Crisis
Franklin recommending him as “an ingenious worthy young man”.
5 Thomas Jefferson(美国第三任总统):写了独立宣言The Declaration of Independence:we hold these truths to be self-evident,that all Men are created equal,that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,that among these are Life,Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.(书P37)
6 Philip Freneau: the most understanding writer of the post-Revolutionary period.“the poet of the revolution”“Father of American Poetry”主要作品：The House of Night,The British Prison Ship,The wild Honey Suckle(书P45),The Indian Burying Ground
7 Francis Scott Key’s“Star-Spangled Banner”borrowed the music of an English drinking song.In the 1820s American painters began to turn from the conventions of eighteenth century aristocratic portraiture.The Hudson River School of landscape painters emerged.
8 In 1828 Noah Webster published An American Dictionary of the English Language.
9 Washington Irving “Father of American Imaginative literature”
“Father of the American short story”
was the first great prose stylist of American romanticism.In his Sketch Book appeared the first modern short stories and the first great American juvenile literature.（美国浪漫主义文学的开篇-见闻札记）作品:A History of the Life and Voyages of Grandada,The Alhambra,Legends of the Conquest of Spain,“Rip Van Winkle”“The
Legend of Sleepy Hollow”（睡谷传奇）
10Edgar Allan Poe father of modern short story，father of detective story ，father of psychoanalytic criticism 作品：“The Fall of the House of Usher”
《厄舍古屋的倒塌》，The Raven（书P129），Israfel
Annabel Lee ，To Helen
11Emerson was responsible for bringing Transcendentalism to New England. 相信个人独立和自助（书P161）作品：The American Scholar,Nature
12Nathaniel Hawthorne 作品：Mosses From an Old Manse (古屋青苔)
House of the Seven Gables (七个尖角阁的房子)，The Blithedale Romance (福谷传奇)，The Marble Faun (玉石雕像)，The Scarlet Letter(Major characters:Hester , Dimmesdale , Chillingworth ,Pearl ) 字母A的意义变化：Adultery → Able-angel Melville called him“the greatest brain with the greatest heart”in American literature. 13Herman Melville 作品：Moby Dick
14Naturalism:the pessimism and deterministic ideas of naturalism pervaded the works of such writers as Stephen Crane,Frank Norris,Jack London,Henry Adams,and Theodore Dreiser. Their detailed descriptions of the lives of the down-trodden and the abnormal.
15Walt Whitman 作品：Leaves of Grass自我之歌（书10）
16Emily Dickinson 写作主题; love,nature,suffering,faith,death 作品见书21
17Harriet Beecher Stowe作品：Uncle Tom’s Cabin
18Mark Twain（作品背景是密西西比河）The Adventures of Tom Sawyer,The Adventures of HuckleberryFinn,Life on the Mississippi, The Prince and the Pauper
19O.Henry:现实主义时期最重要的小说家作品:The Four Million,The Gift of the Magi,An Funished Story,The Cop and the Anthem
20Henry James 美国小说之父作品：The American(international theme of the tradtionless American ),Daisy Miller(which one American critic described as“an outrage to American girlhood”but which brought James his first international fame.)三部曲：The Wings of the Dove,The Ambassadors,The Golden Bowl
21Jack London自然主义代表人物作品：The Sea-Wolf，Martin Eden，The White Fang，The Call of the Wild，To Build a Fire
22Theodore Dreiser 作品：Sister Carrie（materialism），Jennie Gerhardt，An American Tragedy，The Financier，The Titan，The Stoic ，The Genius （欲望三部曲）
23Ezra Pound the father of modern poetry. 作品：In a Station of the Metro
24Carl Sandburg Fog
25Robert Frost诗圣取材于英格兰作品：Mountain Interval（山间），New Hampshire，West-Running Brook，A Further Range（山外边），A Witness Tree，
A Masque of Mercy (1947), A Steeple Bush (尖塔丛), In the Clearing（林间空地）The Road Not Taken（was included in Mountain Interval）：One cannot know, when he makes a choice, what the results of his decision will be. Rather than being sorry that he took the untravelled road, the poet seems to be saying that he would probably do the same thing again.
26 F. Scott Fitzgerald 爵士时代Major Works：This Side of Paradise，
Flappers and Philosophers，The Beautiful and Damned，Tales of the Jazz Age，The Great Gatsby，Tender Is the Night，The Last Tycoon
27 Earnest Hemingway works:The Sun Also Rises，For Whom the Bell Tolls，The Old Man and the Sea(1954年获诺贝尔奖)，A Farewell to Arms，The Snows of Kilimanjaro The Short, Happy Life of Francis Macomber 创作理论：冰山原则to Hemingway,man’s greatest achievement is to show grace under pressure,or he described in the sun also rises,as holding the “purity of line through the maximum of exposure”
The Old Man and The Sea：
Symbolism: Santiago--- mankind , sea---nature and environment; marlin---purpose of life; shark--- the evil force which control human’s fate
Theme: the importance of life lies in the process of searching and resistance
A Farewell to Arms（二战为背景士兵可以在战场上逃走）：
主题：The Grim Reality of War，The Relationship between Love and Pain
28 John Steinback:The Grapes of Warth
29 William Faulkner(1950年获诺贝尔文学奖) Works:The Sound and the Fury（浮躁与喧嚣），Light in August（八月之光），Absalom! Absalom!
Go Down, Moses，The Hamlet（小屋）, The Town, The Mansion，A Rose for Emily
美国文学选读第三版课后习题答案洁(部分) Unit 1 Benjamin Franklin Questions 1.Why did Franklin write his Autobiography? Franklin says that because his son may wish to know about his life, he is taking his one week vacation in the English countryside to record his past. He also says that he has enjoyed his life and would like to repeat it 2.What made Franklin decide to leave the brother to whom he had been apprenticed? His brother was passionate, and had often beaten him. The aversion to arbitrary power that has stuck to him through his whole life .After a brush with the law, Franklin left his brother. 3.How did he arrive in Philadephia? First he set out in a boat for Amboy, the boat dropped him off about 50 miles from Burlington, the next day he reached Burlington on foot, in Burlington he found a boat which was going towards Philadelphia, he arrived there about eight
1、The Colonial Period（1607-1765） American Puritanism ( in the early 17th century through the end of the 18th) 北美第一位女诗人Anne Bradstreet(宗教气息，夫妻恩爱) Edward Taylor 都受英国玄学派影响（metaphysical） 2、The Enlightenment and Revolution Period Benjamin Franklin:Poor Richard's Almanac The Autobiography---“美国梦”的根源 3、American Romanticism（end of 18th to the civil war） American writers emphasis upon the imaginative and emotional qualities of literature. 早期浪漫主义Washington Irving father of American Literature
1.Puritanism: Puritanism is the practices and beliefs of the Puritans. 1.simply speaking , American Puritanism just refers to the spirit and ideal of puritans,who settled in the North American continent in the early part of the seventeenth century because of religious persecutions. 2.In content it means scrupulous ,moral rigor ,especially hostility to social pleasure and religion . 3.with time passing it became a dominant factor in American life , one of the most enduring shaping influences in American thought and literature.to some extent it is a state of mind,a part of the national cultural atmosphere that the American breathes ,rather than a set of tenets. 4.Actually it is a code of values,a philosophy of life and a point of view in American minds,also a two-faceted tradition of religious idealism and level -headed in common sense . 2.The American Romanticism(浪漫主义):a literary movement flourished as a cultural force the early period and the late period. associated with imagination and boundlessness, as an historical movement it arose in the 18th and 19th centuries.(Walt Whitman, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, Edgar Allan Poe.) II.Features of American romanticism (1) It was the expression of “a real new experience(全新体验)”. (2) American Puritanism was a cultural heritage. Many American romantic writings intended to edify(启发) more than they entertained. (3) American Romanticism is full of “newness(新奇)” . Ideals：Individualism; political equality Dream：America: a new Garden of Eden (4)American romanticism was both imitative and independent. 3.Transcendentalism 超验主义 The major features of Transcendentalism: ① The Transcendentalists placed emphasis on spirit, or the Oversoul, as the most important thing in the universe. 思想超灵宇宙 ② The Transcendentalists stressed the importance of the individual. To them, the individual is the most important element of Society. ③ The Transcendentalists offered a fresh perception of nature as symbolic of the Spirit or God. Nature was not purely matter. It was alive, filled with God’s ove rwhelming presence. 自然+上帝 Ralph Waldo Emerson. American Transcendentalism:As a philosophical and literary
1.Why did Franklin write his Autobiography? Franklin says that because his son may wish to know about his life, he is taking his one week vacation in the English countryside to record his past. He also says that he has enjoyed his life and would like to repeat it 2.What made Franklin decide to leave the brother to whom he had been apprenticed? His brother was passionate, and had often beaten him. The aversion to arbitrary power that has stuck to him through his whole life .After a brush with the law, Franklin left his brother. 3.How did he arrive in Philadephia? First he set out in a boat for Amboy, the boat dropped him off about 50 miles from Burlington, the next day he reached Burlington on foot, in Burlington he found a boat which was going towards Philadelphia, he arrived there about eight or nine o’clock, on the Sunday morning and landed at the Market Street wharf. 4.What features do you find in the style of the above selection? It is the pattern of Puritan simplicity, directness, and concision(言简意赅). The narrative is lucid(易懂的), the structure is simple, the imagery is homely(朴素的). 二、Questions 1.How many characters does Poe include in The Cask of Amontillado? What are these names? Montresor, Fortunato and Luchesi 2. What drink are the French most famous for? Wine 3.Does Montresor have something of great value to him which we might consider to be his treasure? His pride and the pride of his French family heritage. Perhaps his devious plot of revenge. 4.Does Montresor seem to have much respect for Italians? Montresor does not have much respect for Italians. He feels the French are superior, especially with respect to wine. 5.What was Fortunato's insult? Poe does not tell us directly, but only implies it in the third paragraph 6.Which wine does Montresor use to lure Fortunato into the catacombs? "Amontillado" (the Spanish wine; Montresor's ruse to lead Fortunato down into the catacombs. 7.Why does Montresor entertain Fortunato with wines from his collection? Montresor wants to get Fortunato drunk enough to be able to trap him in his plan of vengeance. 8.In what two ways does Montresor imprison Fortunato? He fetters (chains and locks) Fortunato to the wall of the catacombs. He builds a wall to close Fortunato off in a small corner of the catacombs, where Montresor will leave him to die. 9.In what ways is The Cask of Amontillado grotesque? First, which of Montresor's actions are abnormal? The whole obsessive plot of vengeance. The fettering and entombment of Fortunato. Montresor's sick sense of humor. 10.Is there anything grotesque about Fortunato? His obsession with alcohol. His drunkenness. His tendency to berate Luchesi (he may have been drunk and may have insulted Montresor in a similar
2018年自学考试《美国文学选读》试题 Multiple choice; 1._________ works are marked by a preoccupation with the Calvinistic view of original sin and the mystery of evil. A.Emerson’s B. Hawthorne’s C. Thoreau’s D. Allan Poe’s 2. Irving’s “Rip Van Winkle”got ideas from _______ legends. A.B ritish B. German C. Italian D. French 3. “Rip Van Winkle”reveals the theme of ______ the past. A. nostalgia for B. rejectionn to C. detachment from D. dislike for 4. In Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter , “A”may stand for ____________. A. Angel B. Adultery C. Able D.all the above 4. According to Hawthorne, the scarlet letter “A”which originally stood for “____”finally obtained the meaning of “able”or “angel”through Hester’s efforts. A. adultery B. arrogance C. accomplishment D. agony 5. Which one is not the characteristics of the puritan style? A. Fresh B. Simple C. Grand D. Direct 6. In his ______, Benjamin Franklin creates the image of a boy’s rise from rags to riches and demonstrates his belief that the new world America was a land of opportunities which might be met through hard work and wise management.
《英语文学文化及影视赏析》课程教学大纲 一、课程说明 1、课程名称（中英文）：英语文学文化及影视赏析/English Literature and Culture & Appreciation of English movies 2、学时学分：75学时理论教学，2学分 3、适用专业：非英语专业研究生 4、开课学院：外国语学院 5、课程负责人：姜萌萌 二、课程描述： 本课程拟对英语经典文学与相关文化概况进行简要介绍，并遴选英美国家的经典作家和作品，对其文学特色、文化背景进行分析。课程重视文学作品与时代背景、西方历史文化的联系，在教学中将理论与实践相结合，做到寓教于乐。在课内，不仅有作家作品、相关文化背景和信息的介绍、经典作品片段的解读，并通过课堂讨论以及影视作品的欣赏帮助学生最直观地理解西方文化与文学作品的文本意义。在课外，学生需要查阅相关资料，完成相关问题的回答与读书报告，以一种轻松愉悦并且多方面切入的方式学习、了解和体验英语文学文化。该课程目的在于通过英语文学文化的学习，提高学生对英语语言的掌握能力、增强对英语文学经典的理解力和对西方文化的审美能力，进一步养成对英语的敏感性，培养人文素质和文学涵养。 三、教材： 王守仁主编，《英国文学选读》，北京：高等教育出版社。 陶洁主编，《美国文学选读》，北京：高等教育出版社。 秦秀白，《英美国家概况》，北京：高等教育出版社。 王佐良，《欧洲文化入门》，北京：外语教学与研究出版社。 自编讲义 四、教学方式： 理论与实践相结合。 五、考核方式： 提交一篇与所学课程相关的课程论文，用英语完成。 总成绩=期末考试成绩70%+平时成绩30%（考勤占10%）
III Multiple choice (20%) 1. Anne Bradstreet was a Puritan poet. When her poems were published in England, she became known as the “______” who appeared in America. A Ninth Muse B Tenth Muse C Best Muse D First Muse 2. ______ is the sometimes exaggerated use of local language, characters and customs in regional literature. A purple prose B waste-land imagery C local color D symbolism 3. The Fitzgeralds lived so extravagantly that they frequently spent more money than F. Scoot Fitzgerald earned for parties, liquor, entertaining their friends and traveling. It was this living style that nicknamed the decade of the 1920s as _______. A The Jazz Age B The Gilded Age C The Glorious Age D The Beat Age 4. ___________ was a reaction to the ideas of the Age of Reason and the Enlightenment. A Romanticism B Realism C Naturalism D Modernism 5. Although only few of her poems were published in her lifetime and a complete collection of them didn’t appear until the 1950’s, _____ had a major impact on 20th century poetry. A Anne Bradstreet B Gertrude Stein C Emily Dickinson D Amy Lowell 6. Who of the following is NOT a 20th century American poet? A Henry Wordsworth Longsfellow B Amy Lowell C Ezra Pound D Robert Frost 7. Mark Twain, one of the greatest 19th century American writers, is well known for his ______. A International theme B Waste-land imagery C Local color
1、Do you think Gatsby deserves to be called “the great”? Why? -------from F、Scoot、Fitzgerald The Great Gatsby Gatsby pursuit “a universe of ineffable gorgeous” in his young age、In fact, Gatsby from West Egg insists his Platonic fantasy、He fell in love with the blonde and his ineffable gorgeous ideal is bined with Daisy’s breathing and desire、Daisy bees the image of ideal in his mind; though she marries Tom and may does not love him, though he can realize her soul full of money and desire, he cannot change his mind which back his love and be together as before、Maybe that is the shining and great part of his soul、Maybe that is the American dream which can show to us、But through the novel, we can have the clear idea that Daisy’s desire was not his drea m, it is not Daisy’s fault but his dream has giant vitality and energy、His dream is far behind Daisy and everything exists、He does his best to build the perfect world and aim in his mind、So his spirit which pursuits on ideal and dedication is also far behind secular frolicking in the bed、For realizing his dream, he donated himself to mud of money in New York; he showed no interests in wealth itself and the life of debauchery、Just like the lotus lives in the pound around with mud but not be polluted、His soul no doubt is suffering in the social life but without any plain、3、What do “petals” and “bough” stands for? -----from Ezra Pound In A Station of the Metro、 First of all, this poem stands the points of economy by Imagism、Every word in this poem has its own unique meaning、For example, the color of black in this poem may represent the train’s color, the railway’s color, the pillar’s color or the dim light of the metro station、Ezra Pound was very sensitive to the color and usually used their different meanings in his poetry、He used the skill of painting in his process of creating the poem、In this poem, every word is used as the pigment、Petals stand for the meaning of color from their unique image、The word “wet” brings the feeling of fresh and bright to the people、And the word “apparition” gives the dim color of pale and weak to the “faces” and “petals”、And the author put the petals and faces together let the faces have the feeling of tender and red、Several pretty faces appear in the metro station from the dimly lit, and they bee the shining petals in the black bough which was wet by the rain、This transformation is based on our vision, but it also shows that the same point between the quiet nature scenery and the noisy industrial environment、Ezra Pound wants tell us that we can find the beauty everywhere in our daily life、And it also shows the metaphor of Imagism、 1、Do you think Gatsby deserves to be called “the great”? Why? (1)I think it is too plicated to simply say Gatsby deserves to be “great” or not、For one thing, Gatsby was ambitious, hardworking, generous and passionate、He was so extremely loyal to his love and Daisy that he could do anything to get Daisy back: he did shady business to earn money and social position; he threw luxurious parties just to draw Daisy’s attention; he could take the blame for a death that he did not cause、(2)In this respect, he is much “greater” than his contemporaries、For another thing, Gatsby never realized that Daisy wasn’t the girl he loved anymore、Gatsby was so innocent that he staked everything on his dreams, not realizing that his dreams are unworthy of him、He wasn’t sober enough to be great、
美国文学史及作品选读模拟试题一 ) '×15=15I.Multiple Choice (1'______was the first colony in American history. C1. D.Georgia C. Virginia A. Massachusetts B. New Jersey War. the before Revolutionary only good American author 2. _B_____ was the
One “His shadow lies heavier than any other man's on of his fellow Americans said, this young nation.”D.Thomas Paine B. Benjamin Franklin C. Thomas Jefferson A. John Smith 3. Romantics put emphasis on the following EXCEPT __A____. D. individualism C. intuition B. imagination A. common sense The Raven was written in 1844 by __B______ 4. B. Edgar Allan Poe A. Philip Freneau D. Emily Dickinson C. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 5. The ship __C____ carried about one hundred Pilgrims and took 66 days to beat its way across the Atlantic. In December of 1620, it put the Pilgrims ashore at Plymouth, Massachusetts. D. Titanic C. Mayflower B. Armada A. Sunflower D____ is a tremendous chronicle of a whaling voyage in 6. Melville's novel __ pursuit of a seemingly supernatural white whale. Moby Dick D. C. White Jacket A. Typee B. Omoo 7. As a philosophical and literary movement, __D____ flourished in New England from the 1830s to the Civil War. D.Transcendentalism C.Sentimentalism B.Rationalism A.Modernism 8. The theme of original sin is fully reflected in ___A______. B. Sister Carrie A. The Scarlet Letter The Old Man and Sea D. C. The Great Gatsby 9. In all his novels Theodore Dreiser sets himself to project the ___B___ American values. For example, in Sister Carrie, there is not one character whose status is not determined economically. 页1 第 A. Puritan B. materialistic C. psychological D. religious 10. Realism was a reaction against____B__ or a move away from the bias towards
《美国文学选读》课程标准 一、课程性质与任务 美国文学选读是英语专业高年级的选修课。它与英美文学史密切结合，使学生在接触到浩繁的文学作品的同时，可以对繁杂的文学现象加以整理和梳理，并形成自己阅读文学作品的习惯，开阔视野，在学习过程中把握正确的理解文学作品的方法。美国文学选读通过向学生介绍文学作品及其作品创作的历史文化背景，培养学生阅读文学作品的兴趣，增强语感，增进学生对美国社会、历史、文化以及生活习俗的了解，提高他们对西方文学的欣赏能力及批评能力。 二、课程教学目标 1．知识目标 1）文学知识：通过本课程的学习，学生应深入、直观地理解各个时期的美国文学作品，把握其思想、语言及创作技巧上的特点；另外，还应对美国的文学评论流变具备相对清晰的认识。 2）语言知识：本课程是通过介绍不同文体的文学作品，深化学生对英语语言的认知、理解和应用的能力。并通过对不同时期英语原文资料的阅读和解析，以一种更加直观的方式了解这门语言的发展。 2．能力目标 1）文学作品鉴赏能力：通过作者作品的讲解，学生可以对作品的社会历史价值和艺术价值进行评价，培养并提高自我的鉴赏能力； 2）语言表达能力：通过课堂和课下阅读及评价任务的完成，学生的口头和书面表达能力能够得到全面的提高； 3）思辩能力：课上小组讨论环节和presentation环节能够激发学生的思辩能力，助其开拓思路，同时也为以后对英语的有效使用打下基础。 3．素质目标 1）文学文化修养：本课程作为英语专业高年级学生的素养课，旨在培养学生对美国文学及文化的理解，可以使学生以直观的方式全面接触这种语言和文化，并形成独立的开放的文化观，进一步强化其跨文化意识； 2）基本的研究素质：本课程通过对文学评论的介绍和讲解向学生传授文学鉴赏的不同视角，可使其具备基本的文学研究素质； 3）文学翻译的基础：本课程通过对文学作品的细读向学生介绍文字背后的人文、历史、政治、哲学及美学等因素，可为文学翻译课程提供较好的材料，并做好前期准备。 三、课程基本信息和内容要求
Literary terms这部分的答案均来自星火《英美文学》一书，质量高 1.Transcendentalism: is literature，philosophical and literary movement that flourished in New England from about 1836 to1860. It originated among a small group of intellectuals who were reaching against the orthodoxy of Calvinism and the rationalism of the Unitarian Church, their own faith centering on the divinity of humanity and the natural world instead. Transcendentalism derived some of its basic idealistic concepts from romantic German philosophy, and from such English authors as Carlyle，Coleridge, and Wordsworth. The ideas of transcendentalism were most eloquently expressed by Ralph Waldo Emerson in such essays as Nature and Self-Reliance and by Henry David Thoreau in his book Walden. 2.American naturalism：this term was created by Emile Zola. Charles Darwin’s evolutionary theory played an important role in naturalism. In the works off naturalism，characters were conceived as complex combinations of inherited attributes and habits conditioned by social and economic forces. At the end of the 19th century，this pessimistic form of realism appeared in America. Naturalism attempted to achieve extreme objectivity and frankness. Characters in the works of naturalism were dominated by their environment and heredity. Naturalism emphasized：the world was around；men had no free will；religious “truth” were illusory；the destiny of human beings was misery in life and oblivion in death. The dominant figures in naturalism were Stephen crane，Frank Norris, Jack London and Theodore Dreiser. 3.The lost generation: included the young English and American expatriates as well as men and women caught in the war and cut from the old value and yet unable to come to terms with the new era when civilization had gone mad. These writers adopted unconventional style of writing and reacted against the tendencies of the older writers in the 1920s. The term came from Gertrude Stein who said in Hemingway's presence that “you are all a lost generation.” 4.Jazz age: the novelist F. Scott Fitzgerald coined the term "Jazz Age" retroactively to refer to the decade after World War I and before the stock market crash in 1929, during which Americans embarked upon what he called "the gaudiest spree in history". Jazz Age is inextricably associated with the wealthy white "flappers" and socialites immortalized in Fitzgerald's fiction. 5.Free verse: is a poetry that has an irregular rhythm and line length and that attempts to avoid any predetermined verse structure, instead, it uses the cadences of natural speech. While it alternates stressed and unstressed syllables as stricter verse forms do, free verse does so in a looser way. Whitman's poetry is an example of free verse at its most impressive. It has since been used by Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot and other major American can poets of the 20th century. 6. The iceberg analogy: The Iceberg Theory is a writing theory by American writer Ernest Hemingway, as follows：if a writer of a prose knows enough about what he is writing about he may omit things that he knows and the reader，if the writer is writing truly enough, will have a feeling of those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. 这部分来自星火的为：3,7,8, 来自课本为：1,4,9 来自网络为：2,5,6大家自取之 1.Poe's Poetic Ideas A.His conviction that the function of poetry is not to summarize and interpret earthly experience, but to create a mood in which the soul soars toward supernal beauty. B.He insists that poetry must be disembarrassed of that moral sense. C.Poe believes that the elevation of excitement of the soul should be “the poetic principle” thus poetry must concern itself only with “supernal beauty”. D.Poe defines poetry as “the rhythmical creation of beauty” a definition gi ving unexampled emphasis upon the importance of the rhythmical or musical element in poetry.