1. A Growing Nation American Renaissance 1800-1870
Unit 2
A Growing Nation
American Renaissance

2. 1870
Industrialism, population growth, economic changes, and the Civil War had aged a youthful nation’s spirit, but also gave way to great American writers like Irving, Poe, Emerson, Thoreau, Dickinson, and Whitman

3. 19th Century American inventions
1807 – Steamboat
1814 – Iron-tipped plow
1835 – Sewing Machine
1845 – Porcelain false teeth
1857 – Passenger elevator
1863 – Roller skates
Typewriter

4. The American Renaissance
The European Renaissance was the rebirth of classical art and learning in the 14th-16th Centuries
The American Renaissance was NOT a rebirth but more of a flowering or growing of literary and cultural maturity
Capital moved to Washington, D.C. from Philly
Library of Congress founded

5. Steam, Steel, and Spirit Physical and technological growth
1803 – Louisiana Purchase doubled nation’s size
National pride and self-awareness
Canals, turnpikes, and railroads expanded
1849 – Gold Rush in California
Factories and Industry in the Northeast created jobs
Steel plow and telegraph

6. Slow March of Democracy
1828 – Andrew Jackson – the People’s President
No land ownership required to vote
Women still not permitted to vote
1838 – Trail of Tears forces many Native Americans west as their tribal lands were confiscated

7. World Stage
1812 – War of 1812 convinced Europe that the US was on the world Stage
1823 – Monroe Doctrine warns Europe not to interfere with Latin America
1830s – Conflict with Mexico over Texas
1845 – Texas joins Union (Florida becomes a state too)
1861 Civil War

8. Relationship between Place and Literature
Americans inspired by land – size of nation and vast differences in landscapes
Americans realized that continent held many commercial possibilities
Physical grandeur inspired Americans to reach for vast possibilities
Explorers and writers create American Mythology in the vast wilderness and forests

9. Winds of Change Prosperity brings problems
Child Labor
Unsafe working conditions
Fierce competition
Slavery – still a huge issue of contention
Builds to Civil War in 1861

10. Renaissance Literature
American Classics – writers such as Poe, Hawthorne, Melville, Emerson, Thoreau, and Dickinson
American Mythology – writers such as Irving, Cooper and Longfellow

11. Authors Poe, Hawthorne, and Melville – dark side of human spirit
Emerson and Thoreau – nature
Dickinson – local landscape
Whitman – self and nation

12. Literature reflecting society
Technology – bigger, better, faster, and stronger – Americans want MORE
America is moving towards a different democracy – all WHITE MEN can vote
Slavery is a contentious issue
Americans still reading British classics like Dickens and Scott, but American authors are gaining ground

13. Three Visions Social – How the New World rivaled the Old World
Frontiersman
Romantic – exploration of private self was as important as land expansion (imagination over reason)
Individualist
Transcendental – real truth is outside sensory experience (nature and spiritual merge)
Seeker

14. What makes American literature American?
Local dialects emerged and local grammar and syntax change as British English, Spanish, French, Dutch, and Native American languages merged
Colloquial English becomes common – more informal than stuffy British English
“Barbaric Yawp” – Whitman’s style that incorporated all of the languages and dialects of various areas of the country
Frontiersmen like Daniel Boone and Davey Crocket become topics of folktales

15. Romanticism
Emphasizes the individual over the institution – Ex. Hester Prynne vs. Church, Captain Ahab vs. logic and safety
American myth started with “a city upon a hill” (Boston) and eventually becomes a garden as western expansion makes writers realize there is a vast canvas of possibility
Romanticism has two faces
Bright and optimistic – humans are fundamentally good
Dark and shadowed by evil – humans resort naturally to crime, cruelty, and self-destruction
Self-reliance – Thoreau and Emerson urged Americans to trust themselves and think for themselves