英美文學選讀要點下篇：美國文學-資料下載頁

【導讀】第一章美國浪漫主義時期。通過本章學習，了解１９世紀初期至中葉美國文學產生的歷史、文化背景；認識該時期。文學創作的基本待征、基本主張，及其對同時代和后期美國文學的影響；了解該時期主要作。家的文學創作生涯、創作思想、藝術特色及其代表作品的主題思想、人物刻畫、語言風格等；同時結合注釋，讀懂所選作品并了解其思想內容和藝術特色，培養理解和欣賞文學作品的能。Ⅱ.本章重點及難點：。3．分析討論選讀作品。Ⅲ.本章考核知識點和考核要求：。．"應用"內容：清教主義、超驗主義、象征主義、自由詩等名詞的解釋。1．一般識記：歐文的生平及創作主涯。2．識記：《紐約外史》《見聞札記》。Ｂ．拉爾夫·華爾多·愛默生。4．應用：《論自然》節選：愛默生的基本哲學思想及自然觀。《紅字》的主題、心理描寫、象征手法和、小說結構。霍桑對浪漫主義小說的貢獻。惠特曼的《草葉集》的主創意圖、思想感情及詩體形式、語言風格。《騙子的化裝表演》《比利伯德》等

　　

【正文】 a slow anticlimax to his midd1e years, people continued to honor the most influentia1 prophet and the intellectua1 liberator of their age, and his reputation as a family man of conventional life and a decent, solid citizen has remained always. 二．識記內容： His major works: Emerson is generally known as an essayist. During all his life he worked steadily at a succession of essays, usually derived from his journals or lectures he had already given. Nature did not establish him as an important American writer. His lasting reputation began only with the publication of Essays (1841 ). Many of his famous essays are included in Essay, which convey the best of his philosophical discussions and transcendental pursuits, such as The American Scholar, Self Reliance, The Over Soul. The second collection of Emerson39。s essays, Essays: Second Series (1844) demonstrated even more thorough1y than the first that Emerson39。s intellect had sharpened in the years since Nature. The Poet and Exprience are examples, the former a reflection upon the aesthetic problems in terms of the present state of literature in America and the latter a discussion about the conflict between idealism and ordinary 1ife. 三．領會 1. Emersonian Transcendentalism Emersonian Transcendentalism is actual1y a philosophical school which absorbed some ideological concerns of American Puritanism and European Romantic ism, with its focus on the intuitive knowledge of human beings to grasp the absolute in the universe and the divinity of man. In his essays, Emerson put forward his philosophy of the oversou1, the importance of the Individual, and Nature. (1) Emerson39。s philosophy of the oversou1 Emerson rejected both the formal religion of the churches and the Deistic philosophy。 instead he based his religion on an intuitive belief in an ultimate unity, which he called the oversoul. Emerson and other Transcendentalists believed in the transcendence of oversoul. It is an impersonal force that is eternal, moral, harmonious, and beneficient in tendency. They believed that there should be an emotional munication between an individual soul and the universal oversoul, since the oversou1 is an allpervading power from which all things e from and of which a1l are a part. One of the tendencies of the oversoul is to express itself in form, hence the world of nature as an emanation of the world of spirit. Emerson39。s remarkable image of a transparent eyebal1 marks a paradoxical state of being, in which one is merged into nature, the oversoul, whi1e at the same time retaining a unique perception of the experience. (2) Emerson39。s philosophy of the importance of the Individual Emerson is affirmative about man39。s intuitive knowledge, with which a man can trust himself to decide what is right and to act accordingly. The ideal individual should be a selfreliant man. Trust thyself, he wrote in Self Reliance, by which he means to convince people that the possibilities for man to develop and improve himself are infinite. (3) Emerson39。s view on nature Emerson39。s nature is emblematic of the spiritual world, alive with God39。s overwhelming presence. It mediates between man and God, and its voice leads to higher truth。 hence, it exercises a healthy and restorative inf1uence on human mind. Go back to nature, sink yourse1f back into its inf1uence and you39。1l bee spiritually who1e again. By employing nature as a big symbol of the Spirit, or God, or the oversoul, Emerson has brought the Puritan 1egacy of symbolism to its perfection. Emersonian Transcendentalism inspired a whole generation of famous American authors like Thoreau, Whitman, and Dickinson. 39。s Transcendentalism Henry David Thoreau (18171862) is most often mentioned as inspired by Emerson, the most representative of the phi1osophical and literary school which is American Transcendenta1ism. Thoreau embraced his master39。s ideas as a disciple. In 1845 he built a cabin on some land belonging to Emerson by Walden Pond and moved in to live there in a very simple manner for a litt1e over two years, which gave birth to a great transcendentalist work Walden (1854). The book not only fully demonstrates Emersonian ideas of selfreliance but also develops and tests Thoreau39。s own transcendental philosophy. (1)For Thoreau, nature is not merely symbolic, but divine in itself and human beings can receive precise munication from the natural world by way of pure senses. So he was often alone in the woods or by the pond, lost in spiritual munion with nature. (2)Thoreau strongly believed in se1fculture and was eager to identify himself with the Transcendental image of the selfreliant man. To achieve personal spiritual perfection, he thinks, the most important thing for men to do with their lives is to be self sufficient, so he sought to reduce his physical needs and material forts to a minimum to get spiritual richness. (3)His positiveness about the importance of individual conscience was such that he even considered the society fetters of the freedom of individuals. Though Thoreau became more than Emerson39。s disciple eventually, his indebtedness to Nature and its author has never been over1ooked. 3. The style of Emerson39。s essays Emerson39。s essays often have a casual style, for most of them were derived from his journals or lectures. They are usually characterized by a series of short, declarative sentences, which are not quite logically connected but will flower out into illustrative statements of truth and thoughts. Emerson39。s philosophical discussion is sometimes difficult to understand but he uses parisons and metaphors to make the general idea of his work clearly expressed. Wellread in the classics of Western European literature, Emerson often employed these literary sources to make and enrich his own points