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1、1. American RomanticismThe romantic period stretched from the end of the eighteenth century through the outbreak of the Civil War. It is a term that is associated with imagination and boundlessness, as contrasted with classicism, which is commonly associated with reason and restriction. A romantic a
2、ttitude may be detected in literature of any period, but as an historical movement it arose in the 18th and 19th centuries, in reaction to more rational literary, philosophic, artistic, religious, and economic standards. The most clearly defined romantic literary movement in the U. S. was Transcende
3、ntalism. Characteristics of the romantic movement in American literature are sentimentalism, primitivism and the cult of the noble savage; political liberalism; the celebration of natural beauty and the simple life; introspection; the idealization of the common man, uncorrupted by civilization; inte
4、rest in the picturesque past; interest in remote places; antiquarianism ; individualism; morbid melancholy; and historical romance. Tanscendentalism was a spiritual, philosophical and literary movement and is located in the history of American Thought as Post-Unitarian（一神教） and free thinking in reli
5、gious spirituality, Kantian and idealistic in philosophy and romantic and individualistic in literature. New England Transcendentalism was the product of a combination of foreign influences and the native American Puritan tradition. The most important American Transcendentalists are Ralph Waldo Emer
6、son and Henry David Thoreau, whose representative works are Nature and Walden respectively. Transcendentalists generally agreed that the intuitive faculty, instead of the rational or sensical, became the means for a conscious union of the individual psyche with the world psyche also known as the Ove
7、rsoul, life-force, prime mover and God . The basic premises include: First, an individual is the spiritual center of the universe - and in an individual can be found the clue to nature, history and, ultimately, the cosmos itself; Second, the structure of the universe literally duplicates the structu
8、re of the individual self - all knowledge, therefore, begins with self-knowledge; Third, transcendentalists accepted the neo-Platonic conception of nature as a living mystery, full of signs - nature is symbolic; Fourth, The belief that individual virtue and happiness depend upon self-realization - t
9、his depends upon the reconciliation of two universal psychological tendencies: the expansive or self-transcending tendency and .the contracting or self-asserting tendency.2. Free verse：Free verse is a form of poetry that refrains from consistent meter patterns, rhyme, or any other musical pattern.So
10、me poets have explained that free verse, despite its freedom, must still display some elements of form. Most free verse, for example, self-evidently continues to observe a convention of the poetic line in some sense, at least in written representations, thus retaining a potential degree of linkage,
11、however nebulous （模糊的）, with more traditional forms. Donald Hall goes as far as to say that the form of free verse is as binding and as liberating as the form of a rondeau （回旋诗）. and T. S. Eliot wrote, No verse is free for the man who wants to do a good job. Some poets have considered free verse res
12、trictive in its own way. Robert Frost later remarked that writing free verse was like playing tennis without a net.Walt Whitman, who based his verse approach on the Bible, was the major precursor for modern poets writing free verse, though they were reluctant to acknowledge his influence.Form and St
13、ructure：Although free verse requires no meter, rhyme, or other traditional poetic techniques, a poet can still utilize them to create some sense of structure. A clear example of this can be found in Walt Whitmans poems, where he repeats certain phrases and uses commas to create both a rhythm and str
14、ucture.Because of a lack of predetermined form, free verse poems have the potential to take truly unique shapes. The poet is given more license to express and, unrestrained by traditional bounds, has more control over the development of the poem. This could allow for a more spontaneous and essential
15、ly individualizing factor.3. American realismIn American literature, the term realism encompasses the period of time from the Civil War to the turn of the century during which William Dean Howells, Rebecca Harding Davis, Henry James, Mark Twain, and others wrote fiction devoted to accurate represent
16、ation and an exploration of American lives in various contexts.Characteristics： Renders reality closely and in comprehensive detail. Selective presentation of reality with an emphasis on verisimilitude （似真，逼真）, even at the expense of a well-made plot Character is more important than action and plot; complex ethical （伦理的） choices are often the subject. Characters appear in their real complexity of temperament （性情）and motive; they are in ex
