《新编美国文学史（第三卷）》课件lecture 9.pptVIP

* * * * * Holy Sonnet 10 Death, be not proud, though some have called thee?Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so ;?For those, whom thou think'st thou dost overthrow,?Die not, poor Death, nor yet canst thou kill me.?From rest and sleep, which but thy picture[s] be,?Much pleasure, then from thee much more must flow,?And soonest our best men with thee do go,?Rest of their bones, and soul's delivery.?Thou'rt slave to Fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,?And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,?And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,?And better than thy stroke ; ?why swell'st thou then ??One short sleep past, we wake eternally,?And Death shall be no more ; ?Death, thou shalt die.? * Realism and Naturalism, 1865-1900 (II) Lecture 9 * Outline Jamesian Realism Henry James: Life and works The Portrait of a Lady: reading and discussion * background the Civil War “the Civil War marks an era in the history of the American mind. It introduced into the national consciousness a certain sense of proportion and relation, of the world being a more complicated place than it had hitherto seemed, the future more treacherous, success more difficult. At the rate at which things are going, it is obvious that good Americans will be more numerous than ever; but the good American, in the days to come, will be a more critical person than his complacent and confident grandfather. He has eaten of the tree of knowledge.” “The Gilded Age” “the birth of the modern United States” * American Realism Against romanticism “As a practitioner and critic, he sought to hold himself and other writers to a standard of realism that rose above the romantic exaggerations and implausible adventures that characterized popular fiction in his day and, indeed, in ours.” (John Updike) “Realism is nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material”--- Howells “The only reason for the existence of a novel is that it does attempt to represent life.” Hi