United States

The American Spirit in Literature: A Chronicle of Great Interpreters

CONTENTS Chapter Chapter title Page Introduction I. The Pioneers 1 II. The First Colonial Literature 25 III. The Third and Fourth Generation 43 IV. The Revolution 66 V. The Knickerbocker Group 86 VI. The Transcendentalists 109 VII. Romance, Poetry, and History 143 VIII. Poe an...

Chapters

8. Chapter 8

Moving in and out of the Transcendentalist circles, in that great generation preceding the Civil War, were a company of other men--romancers, poets, essayists, historians--who s...

11. Chapter 11

The changes that have come over the inner spirit and the outward expression of American life since Lincoln's day are enough to startle the curiosity of the dullest observer. Yet...

7. Chapter 7

To understand the literary leadership of New England during the thirty years immediately preceding the Civil War it is necessary to recall the characteristics of a somewhat isol...

10. Chapter 10

"There is what I call the American idea," declared Theodore Parker in the Anti-Slavery Convention of 1850. "This idea demands, as the proximate organization thereof, a democracy...

2. Chapter 2

The United States of America has been from the beginning in a perpetual change. The physical and mental restlessness of the American and the temporary nature of many of his arra...

6. Chapter 6

The Fourth of July orator for 1826 in Cambridge, Massachusetts, was Edward Everett. Although only thirty-two he was already a distinguished speaker. In the course of his oration...

4. Chapter 4

When the eighteenth century opened, many signs of change were in the air. The third generation of native-born Americans was becoming secularized. The theocracy of New England ha...

5. Chapter 5

If we turn, however, to the literature produced in America between the passage of the Stamp Act in 1765 and the adoption of the Constitution in 1787, we perceive that it is a li...

9. Chapter 9

Enter now two egotists, who have little in common save their egotism, two outsiders who upset most of the conventional American rules for winning the literary race, two men of g...

18. Chapter 18

For further bibliographical information the reader is referred to the articles on American authors in The Encyclopœdia Britannica and in The Warner Library (volume 30, The Stude...

3. Chapter 3

The simplest and oldest group of colonial writings is made up of records of exploration and adventure. They are like the letters written from California in 1849 to the "folks ba...

15. Chapter 15

(1902). Longfellow, Works, 11 volumes (1886), Life by Samuel Longfellow, 3 volumes (1891). Whittier, Works, 7 volumes (1892), Life by S. T. Pickard, 2 volumes (1894). Holmes, Wo...

1. Chapter 1

CONTENTS Chapter Chapter title Page Introduction I. The Pioneers 1 II. The First Colonial Literature 25 III. The Third and Fourth Generation 43 IV. The Revolution 66 V. The Knic...

23. Chapter 23

• Page 145: On Page 145, Hawthorne's The Snow-Image contained a hyphen, but the same title on page 148 did not have a hyphen: The Snow Image. • Page 153: Fellow-men was hyphenat...

24. Chapter 24

Index • Page 276: Changed the acute accent to a grave accent in the spelling of Crèvecœur to match the text in index entry: Letters from an American Farmer, Crévecœur, 60, 68. •...

14. Chapter 14

(1908). R. W. Emerson, Works, 12 volumes (Centenary edition, 1903), Journal, 10 volumes (1909-1914), his Life by J. E. Cabot, 2 volumes (1887), by R. Garnett (1887), by G. E. Wo...

21. Chapter 21

• Page 90: Tree-tops is hyphenated and split between two lines for spacing in the clause "watching the birds in the treetops of Elmwood." On page 245, tree-tops was spelled with...

20. Chapter 20

• Page 72: State-papers is hyphenated and split between two lines for spacing in the clause: "orations and pamphlets and state-papers inspired by." On page 67, state papers is w...

17. Chapter 17

Webster, Works, 6 volumes (1851), Life by H. C. Lodge (1883). Rufus Choate, Works, 2 volumes (1862). Wendell Phillips, Speeches, Lectures, and Letters, 2 volumes (1892). W. L. G...

12. Chapter 12

volumes (1856), Thomas Paine, Life by M. D. Conway, 2 volumes (1892), Works edited by Conway, 4 volumes (1895), Philip Freneau, Poems, 3 volumes (Princeton edition, 1902), Thoma...

22. Chapter 22

• Page 133: Poll-tax is hyphenated and split between two lines for spacing. We kept the hyphen. • Page 137: Wolf-like is hyphenated and split between two lines for spacing. We k...

13. Chapter 13

Life and Letters by P. M. Irving, 4 volumes (1862-1864). Fenimore Cooper, Works, 32 volumes (1896), Life by T. R. Lounsbury (1883). Brockden Brown, Works, 6 volumes, (1887). W....

19. Chapter 19

• Page 36: Under-estimate is hyphenated and split between two lines for spacing in the sentence: "It is the present fashion to under-estimate the power of Wigglesworth's verse."...

16. Chapter 16

1894-1895), also 17 volumes (Virginia edition, J. A. Harrison, 1902), Life by G. E. Woodberry, 2 volumes (1909). Whitman, Leaves of Grass and Complete Prose Works (Small, Maynar...