Design in Puritan American Literature
Design in Puritan American Literature

Author: William J. Scheick

Publisher: University Press of Kentucky

Published: 2021-12-14

Total Pages: 204

ISBN-13: 0813194938

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Puritan American writers faced a dilemma: they had an obligation to use language as a celebration of divine artistry, but they could not allow their writing to become an iconic graven image of authorial self-idolatry. In this study William Scheick explores one way in which William Bradford, Nathaniel Ward, Anne Bradstreet, Urian Oakes, Edward Taylor, and Jonathan Edwards mediated these conflicting imperatives. They did so, he argues, by creating moments in their works when they and their audience could hesitate and contemplate the central paradox of language: its capacity to intimate both concealed authorial pride and latent deific design. These ambiguous occasions served Puritan writers as places where the threat of divine wrath and the promise of divine mercy intersected in unresolved tension. By the nineteenth century the heritage of this Christlike mingling of temporal connotation and eternal denotation had mutated. A peculiar late eighteenth-century narrative by Nathan Fiske and a short story by Edward Bellamy both suggest that the binary nature of language exploited by their Puritan ancestors was still a vital authorial concern; but neither of these writers affirms the presence of an eternal denotative signification hidden within the conflicting historical contexts of their apparently allegorical language. For them, appreciation of the mystery of a divine revelation possibly concealed in words yielded to puzzlement over language itself, specifically over the inadequacy of language to signify more than its own instability of design. This book is a tightly focused study of an important aspect of Puritan American writers' use of language by one of the leading scholars in the field of early American literature.

Authority and Female Authorship in Colonial America
Authority and Female Authorship in Colonial America

Author: William J. Scheick

Publisher: University Press of Kentucky

Published: 2014-10-17

Total Pages: 164

ISBN-13: 0813158591

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Should women concern themselves with reading other than the Bible? Should women attempt to write at all? Did these activities violate the hierarchy of the universe and men's and women's places in it? Colonial American women relied on the same authorities and traditions as did colonial men, but they encountered special difficulties validating themselves in writing. William Scheick explores logonomic conflict in the works of northeastern colonial women, whose writings often register anxiety not typical of their male contemporaries. This study features the poetry of Mary English and Anne Bradstreet, the letter-journals of Esther Edwards Burr and Sarah Prince, the autobiographical prose of Elizabeth Hanson and Elizabeth Ashbridge, and the political verse of Phyllis Wheatley. These works, along with the writings of other colonial women, provide especially noteworthy instances of bifurcations emanating from American colonial women's conflicted confiscation of male authority. Scheick reveals subtle authorial uneasiness and subtextual tensions caused by the attempt to draw legitimacy from male authorities and traditions.

American Colonial
American Colonial

Author: Wendell Garrett

Publisher:

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 276

ISBN-13: 9783822882788

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Tracing some of the finest buildings and historic interiors of the American east coast, the entire range of Colonial design is covered, from the Puritan simplicity of the early days to the Georgian elegance of classic architecture and interiors.

The Puritans in America
The Puritans in America

Author: Alan Heimert

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2009-07-01

Total Pages: 458

ISBN-13: 0674038495

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The whole destiny of America is contained in the first Puritans who landed on these shores, wrote de Tocqueville. These newcomers, and the range of their intellectual achievements and failures, are vividly depicted in The Puritans in America. Exiled from England, the Puritans settled in what Cromwell called “a poor, cold, and useless” place—where they created a body of ideas and aspirations that were essential in the shaping of American religion, politics, and culture. In a felicitous blend of documents and narrative Alan Heimert and Andrew Delbanco recapture the sweep and restless change of Puritan thought from its incipient Americanism through its dominance in New England society to its fragmentation in the face of dissent from within and without. A general introduction sketches the Puritan environment, and shorter introductions open each of the six sections of the collection. Thirty-eight writers are included—among these Cotton, Bradford, Bradstreet, Winthrop, Rowlandson, Taylor, and the Mathers—as well as the testimony of Anne Hutchinson and documents illustrating the witchcraft crisis. The works, several of which are published here for the first time since the seventeenth century, are presented in modern spelling and punctuation. Despite numerous scholarly probings, Puritanism remains resistant to categories, whether those of Perry Miller, Max Weber, or Christopher Hill. This new anthology—the first major interpretive collection in nearly fifty years—reveals the beauty and power of Puritan literature as it emerged from the pursuit of self-knowledge in the New World.

The Oxford Handbook of Early American Literature
The Oxford Handbook of Early American Literature

Author: Kevin J. Hayes

Publisher: OUP USA

Published: 2008-02-06

Total Pages: 653

ISBN-13: 019518727X

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Organized primarily in terms of genre, this handbook includes original research on key concepts, as well as analysis of interesting texts from throughout colonial America. Separate chapters are devoted to literary genres of great importance at the time of their composition that have been neglected in recent decades.

A study guide for American Literature to 1900
A study guide for American Literature to 1900

Author: Mª Teresa Gibert Maceda

Publisher: Editorial Universitaria Ramon Areces

Published: 2009-01-27

Total Pages: 225

ISBN-13: 8480047488

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Esta guía esta pensada para utilizarse conjuntamente con el libro American literature to 1900 de la misma autora y editado por la misma editorial. Ofrece los siguientes recursos adicionales como un extenso material complementario que ayuda y guía al alumno a lo largo de las 24 unidades, una colección de veinte ejemplos de exámenes y un glosario con una lista de los términos más importantes de la literatura en general y de la literatura americana en particular.

American Literature Before 1880
American Literature Before 1880

Author: Robert Lawson-Peebles

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2003-11-13

Total Pages: 353

ISBN-13: 1317870387

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

American Literature Before 1880 attempts to place its subject in the broadest possible international perspective. It begins with Homer looking westward, and ends with Henry James crossing the Atlantic eastwards. In between, the book examines the projection of images of the East onto an as-yet unrecognised West; the cultural consequences of Viking, Colombian, and then English migration to America; the growth and independence of the British American colonies; the key writers of the new Republic; and the development of the culture of the United States before and after the Civil War. It is intended both as an introduction for undergraduates to the richness and variety of American Literature, and as a contribution to the debate about its distinctive nature. The book therefore begins with a lengthy survey of earlier histories of American Literature.

From Puritanism to Postmodernism
From Puritanism to Postmodernism

Author: Richard Ruland

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-04-14

Total Pages: 438

ISBN-13: 1317234146

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Widely acknowledged as a contemporary classic that has introduced thousands of readers to American literature, From Puritanism to Postmodernism: A History of American Literature brilliantly charts the fascinating story of American literature from the Puritan legacy to the advent of postmodernism. From realism and romanticism to modernism and postmodernism it examines and reflects on the work of a rich panoply of writers, including Poe, Melville, Fitzgerald, Pound, Wallace Stevens, Gwendolyn Brooks and Thomas Pynchon. Characterised throughout by a vibrant and engaging style it is a superb introduction to American literature, placing it thoughtfully in its rich social, ideological and historical context. A tour de force of both literary and historical writing, this Routledge Classics edition includes a new preface by co-author Richard Ruland, a new foreword by Linda Wagner-Martin and a fascinating interview with Richard Ruland, in which he reflects on the nature of American fiction and his collaboration with Malclolm Bradbury. It is published here for the first time.

A History of American Literature
A History of American Literature

Author: Richard Gray

Publisher: John Wiley & Sons

Published: 2011-09-23

Total Pages: 933

ISBN-13: 1444345680

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Updated throughout and with much new material, A History of American Literature, Second Edition, is the most up-to-date and comprehensive survey available of the myriad forms of American Literature from pre-Columbian times to the present. The most comprehensive and up-to-date history of American literature available today Covers fiction, poetry, drama, and non-fiction, as well as other forms of literature including folktale, spirituals, the detective story, the thriller, and science fiction Explores the plural character of American literature, including the contributions made by African American, Native American, Hispanic and Asian American writers Considers how our understanding of American literature has changed over the past?thirty years Situates American literature in the contexts of American history, politics and society Offers an invaluable introduction to American literature for students at all levels, academic and general readers