l The Rise of Realism: The Civil War and Postwar Period (408-422)


l What was the news headline on April 12,
1861?

“Confederate attack on Fort Sumter; beginning of Civil War”

Name the sport invented in 1891

basketball by James Naismith in Springfield, Mass

Name the purpose of the thirteenth amendment, ratified in 1865

outlaw slavery

Name the place and date of the first Olympic Games
Athens, Greece in 1896


l Name the organizer and date of organization of the American Red Cross
l Clara Barton (1821 – 1912) American Humanitarian
l Angel of the Battlefield, American Red Cross Founder

l Name two important inventions in 1876 and 1878
l first telephone – Alexander Graham Bell; first phonograph – Thomas Edison
l Name the school Booker T. Washington founded in 1881
l Tuskegee Institute (believed black interests best served by a vocational education – not an academic one and not by participation in politics

What was the name and date of the last major victory of the Sioux (Lakota)?

Little Bighorn in Dakota Territory in 1876 when US forces under General George A. Custer were defeated – also called Custer’s Last Stand
How did people’s response to the war change? Why?

Began idealistically but after the north lost the Battle of Bull Run, they realized that it would be a long war and were disillusioned. Also, lack of supplies, medicine, doctors.

l Why did photographs of the war not appear in newspapers?
l Newspapers could not yet reproduce photos, so photographers sold directly to the public

l Name the most famous Civil War photographer.

l Matthew Brady
•Give two reasons why “very little important poetry and fiction issued directly from the Civil War.”Why did few American writers saw the war firsthand – 1)Poe (’49), Thoreau (’62), and Hawthorne (’64) were dead; Melville and Emerson fascinated but too old to see it firsthand; the younger generations of writers – William Dean Howells, Henry James, and Henry Adams were in Europe 2) no genre appropriate for such strong material; realistic novel had not been fully realized

l Compare and contrast romanticism and realism.
l Romanticism – idealistic, larger-than-life heroes
l Realism – accurate portrayal of real life without idealizing or romanticizing Also, why people behave as they do, so they began to focus on behavioral science, biology, psychology, sociology


Realism

l Often defined as “the faithful representation of reality” or “verisimilitude”
l An accurate representation and exploration of American lives in various contexts
l Became dominant after the Civil War because of the Industrial Revolution, the rise of middle class, literacy, and education
l Diction is natural vernacular
l Tone may be serious, satiric, humorous
l Subjects are people living in society and their relationships:
l Mixed characters, not idealized -- both good & bad, strong & weak elements
l Conflicts: protagonist (not “hero”) vs. antagonist (not “villain”)



Name the best-known regional writer and the novel considered his best.
Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] / The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
What compliment did Ernest Hemingway pay to this regional writer and this novel?
“All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain called Huckleberry Finn.





l Explain the three requirements of the “smiling realism” of William Dean Howells, the editor of the influential magazine The Atlantic Monthly.
l 1. deal with the lives of ordinary people
l 2. be faithful to the development of character – even to the
l 3. discuss social questions bothering AmericansAlso, although people may act foolishly, their good qualities have to win out in the end.


l What is the subject of Frank Norris’s novel The Octopus?
l Struggles between wheat farmers and the railroad monopoly in California


l Define naturalism.
l Extension of realism – claimed to portray life exactly as is. Human behavior formed by forces beyond a person’s control -- heredity and environment; humans subject to laws of nature. Relied heavily on psychology and sociology.


What is the focus of a psychological novel?
Focused on character motivation in complex social and psychological situations
What does an ironist contrast or juxtapose?Human pretensions (claim to attention or right to attention) with the indifference of the universe

l P 408 Crane’s poem -- What effect of Civil War on America?