21. American literature

21. American literature

American literature is much younger than British literature. American literature began in the 17th century. Most of the books were religious.
In the second half of the 18th century, when America was fighting for its independence, political text were typical. Some of famous writes included Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.

Edgar Allan Poe was a poet, editor, critic, short-story writer and essayist. He was influenced by romantic tradition. He became an orphan at the age of two was taken to home of a rich businessman. When he married his wife, she was only 13, but died after 10 years. His best poem is the Raven. One stormy midnight a raven visits a student who has lost his love and student ask if he can ever meet her again. But the raven, who represents the symbol of death in the poem, can only say nevermore. Poe wrote horror stories The Fall of the House Usher, The Pit and the Pendulum and he established the technique for modern detective story in The Murders in the Rue Morgue.

Nathaniel Hawthorne was a novelist and short-story writer. His masterpiece is The Scarlet Letter. It presents the problems of moral evil and guilt. It is a novel set in Boston in 17th century. It tells about a woman, her name is Hester and her daughter in puritan society. Her daughter is illegitimate child with reverend, she has to wear letter A on her chest. A mean adultery. It was made into a movie and the main character was played by Demi Moore.

Mark Twain is the most famous representative of the Gilded Age. He was an excellent writer and journalist whose works are full of American humour. His most appreciated novels are those based on his own experiences along the Mississippi, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Life on the Mississippi. In the novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Twain describes the adventures of his boyhood. All the characters in the book are based on real individuals.

Jack London wrote about American wilderness. His most popular stories are those connected with Alaska and the time of the gold rush.
The Call of the Wild is the best known of his novels. In the story about Buck, a sled dog, who loves his master. After his master is killed by Indians, he escapes from civilization to become the leader of a wolf pack.
The White Fang is novel about the friendship between a hunter and a dog.

After the World War I., a group of writers as the Lost Generation entered literature. They were influenced by the war.

Ernest Hemingway is main representative of the Lost Generation. He worked as a reporter. In World War I., he went to Europe as a volunteer and worked as an ambulance driver. He himself was much interested in fishing, boxing and bullfighting. He committed suicide. He wrote many excellent short stories. Hemingway was awarded the Nobel Prize for his famous book The Old Man and the Sea. It tells about the battle between an old, experienced fisherman Santiago and a giant marlin. Santiago catches the marlin and after long fight he win and ties the marlin. During way home he has to fights with the sharks that have almost eaten whole marlin. Only its skeleton left. Finally, Santiago gets home and falls into a deep sleep. It is a story of man who can be destroyed bud not defeated.
Another famous novel is For Whom the Bells Tolls and it is a psychological picture from Spanish Civil War. (A Farewell to Army)