Major American Literary Movements

This is basically from a paper we got in english class. Thought it might be helpful to some other people out there.

The Beats Led by William S. Burroughts, Jack Kerouac, and Allen Ginsberg, the beats of the 1950s attempted to convey pure emotion to break through what they saw as the sterility of the times.

The Confessional Poets Led by Sylvia Plath, Anne Sexton, and Robert Lowell, the confessional poets of the 1950s and 1960s dealt with deeply personal, emotional, and psychological matters. They used the anguish of their own lives to explore America's hidden despair.

Modernism This 20th-century literary movement, spearheaded by exra pound and T.S. Eliot, used fragmentation, aluusions, symbols, irony, and shifting points of view to respond to the social breakdown of the early 20th century.

Harlem Renaissance Led by Langston hughes, Countée Cullen, Zora Neale Hurston, Jean Toomer, and Claude McKay, the Harlem Renaissance was an outpouring of African-American literature centered in Harlem, New York, in the 1930s.

Imagism Led by Ezra Pound, and Amy Lowell from 1913-17, the imagist poets wrote short poems that used everyday language and free verse to create precise and concentrated word pictures.

Local Color The local color writers of the 1800s preserved the customs and culture of their region. Notable writers included Bret Harte, Mary Wilkins Freeman, Sarah Orne Jewett, Kate Chopin, and Willa Cather.

Naturalism A literary movement that flourished among the novelists and short story writers from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century. The naturalists viewed people as helpless victims of heredity and environment, adrift in an indifferent universe. Stephen Crane, Frank Norris, Jack London, and Theodore Dreiser were the primary naturalists.

Oral Tradition The passage of songs, stories, and poems from generation to generation by word of mouth. The oral tradition in America has preserved many Native-American and African-American myths, folktales, and spirituals.

Realism A literary movement that advocated the presentation of the details of actual life in art. Realists such as Mark Twain and Henry James wrote objectively and truthfully about American life.

Romance A romance deals with plots and people that are exotic, remote in time or place from the reader, and abviously imaginary. The romance grants the author a certain leeway for melodrama and emotionality. Romances flourished in the 1800s, notably in the work of Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Romanticism A 19th-century literary movement that supported individual worth, the goodness of humanity, the glory of communion with nature and individual freedom of expression. Cooper, Dickinson, Emerson, Thoreau, Hawthorne, Poe, and Melville used elements of romanticism in their writing.

Puritanism A 17th-century religious, social, political, and literary movement that stressed original sin, the doctrine of election, predestination, limited atonement, and irresistible grace. Bradford, Bradstreet, Taylor, and Mather were the major Puritan writers.

Symbolism A 19th-century literary movement that used symbols to suggest meaning. The poems of T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound show the influence of symbolism.

Transcendentalism An early 19th-century philosophical movement that stressed individualism, intuition, nature, and self-reliance. By contemplating objects in nature, people can transcend the world and discover union with the "over-soul" that unites us all. Emerson and Thoreau were the major transcendentalists.

**Again, I did not write this. It came from some teachers thing somewhere and if I knew where it came from, I'd give them credit. I hope this will be helpful to people.**