Appunti Anglo-american literature

1 di 28 Washington Irving (1783-1859)

1st American writer.

He was born in 1783 in NY city (a Dutch colony) and died in 1859 -> first half of the 19th century that ends with the Enlightenment and the beginning of Romanticism.

He studied law and became interested in historical writing and short fiction.

He was the first American writer to be considered a writer in the old world (he spent 17 years in Europe).

“The sketch book of Geoffrey Crayon” (“Il libro degli schizzi/appunti di Geoffrey Crayon”) is a collection of short stories. By “sketch” it gives the idea of something ri-elaborated.

“Rip Van Winkle” and “The legend of Sleepy Hollow” are part of the collection, his most famous short stories.

“Rip Van Winkle” (1819)

This is a short story which was written in 1817 while Irving was in Birmingham.

One of the first American stories published in Europe!

This short story has 3 different levels of narration:

• Washington Irving: 1. author (he writes more than 30 stories signing them as Geoffrey Crayon).
• Geoffrey Crayon, 2. 2nd level narrator. He found the story and he says that the story is narrated by Diedrich Knickerbocker - He is a fictional character, who has a specific function: he is the narrator. He is a sort of alter ego of Washington Irving, he does that to create a friction between the story/history and the storytelling.
• Diedrich Knickerbocker, 3. a 3rd level narrator.

Plot

Rip Van Wrinkle is a good natured guy that sometimes escapes his wife going to the mountains hunting with his dog. One day he meets a stranger there, carrying a liquor barrel up the mountain, Rip decides to help him and once up to the mountain he meets some dwarfs playing nine pins and drinking liquor.

He enjoys them, drink until he falls asleep. When he wakes up his dog’s no more there, he’s old, his wife’s dead, the village changed completely: his house is now decaying, the old inn (in front of which he used to go to gossip) is now replaced by the union hotel with the US flag in front of it, in addition the old portrait of King George on the inn was now replaced with general Washington’s one.

Rip meets a group of ppl arguing about elections. Someone asks him who’s voting for, he doesn’t understand and replies he’s a “loyal subject of the king” getting called a “tory” by the crowd.

Rip then asks the crowd about his old friends, he finds out they are all dead of killed during the war. Heartbroken, he asks if nobody know Rip Van Wrinkle, someone in the crowd points a ragged boy laying under a tree, his son. A young woman carrying a baby approaches him, identifying herself as the daughter of Rip, a man that 20 years before disappeared together with his dog. => CLIMAX.

Rip realized he’s been sleeping for 20 years and narrates the tale of what happened to him to the crowd. At the end he remains and lives with his daughter’s family, narrating the tale to who was interested on it.

Epigraph

Importance of truth, the first lines of the story are an epigraph that talk about the “the truth is a thing that I’ll bring with me ‘till the coffin”.

It’s a sort of introduction written by Cartwright, an English play-writer. The author use the words of another author to introduce its own narration.

Introduction

Introduction -> focuses on the narrator and on the historical telling. Geoffrey Crayon talks for Irving, he says that his own story is not original, but that was already told by Diedrich Knickerbocker. It talks about Dutch history; Knickerbocker was looking for stories among men, he asked to ppl to tell him.

2nd paragraph -> here we have the temporal element, the reign of Dutch governors. “Scrupulous accuracy” he was a very precise historian. “A book of unquestionable authority”, the truth.

Postscript of “Rip Van Winkle” says “The following are traveling notes from a memorandum book of Mr. Diedrich Knickerbocker Knickerbocker:…” -> D.K. = -> he is a writer, the 3rd level narrator (like a Chinese box).

2 di 28 Setting

1770s and then 20 years later, when the colonies turned to be a new country: the United States.

Characters

• Rip Van Wrinkle: a gentleman, willing to help his neighbor, but he hates to work. He’s insufferable to his wife, he usually runs away from her with his dog, that’s how he ends up meeting the dwarfs. He is an anti-hero because he doesn’t like the basics of the American dream. He does noting for his farm, but everything for the others. It goes against his own wealth -> clash of values.
• Rip’s wife: She’s an harsh, loud, intolerant woman that always speaks her mind. She disappoints her husband’s laziness.
• Dwarfs: dressed as Dutch explorer, they are probably Hudson’s crew, visiting the Catskill Mountains every 20 years, playing nine pins and drinking liquor there.
• Judith: Rip’a daughter, mother of Rick, an infant.

Symbols

• The Catskill Mountains: symbol of mysterious or supernatural forces of change that affect human life.
• The inn VS union hotel: inn symbol of laziness and unproductive life VS the hotel symbol of the new values of commerce, political engagement and money-making.

“The legend of Sleepy Hollow”

The title of the English version of the book focuses on “sleepy hollow”-> “Sleepy hollow and other stories from the sketchbook” (le altre storie passano in secondo piano).

Narrative strategy of framing, 4 authors:

• Washington Irving: author.
• Geoffrey Crayon: 2nd level narrator.
• D. K.: 3rd level narrator.
• Story heard in NYC by a gentleman.

Plot

The narrator, D.K. describes the beautiful setting of the town of Sleepy Hollow (idillic place, frozen in time and graced by the beauty of nature) full of superstitious inhabitants.

D.K. then introduced the main character of the story, an outsider to the region, Ichabod Crane. He’s the schoolmaster, an authoritative man that entertains older students and babysits the younger one and that gains free room and board gossiping around and sharing his superior intellect.

Ichabod begins wooing the beautiful Katrina, to which he gives singing lessons, but he has a rival, Brom Bones the hero of Sleepy Hollow, liked and admired by everyone. He and his gang usually play pranks on Ichabod in the valley at night.

One day Ichabod receives an invitation by a Van Tassel servant, to attend a party at their house the same night. He gets ready and goes to the party on a plow horse named Gunpowder, borrowed from a neighbor.

The evening continues with stories of the Revolutionary war, followed by ghost stories. At the party Ichabod has the chance to eat and dance with Katrina, he asked her to talk privately but he is seen later leaving the party desolate, on his horse.

Running through the valley he notices an horseman following him, it’s the headless horseman carrying his head. The headless rider throws the head through the horseman, hitting his crane. CLIMAX.

The next day Ichabod is disappeared, while Gunpowder is found at his master’s gate.

The villagers stark looking for Ichabod, they find Gunpowder’s saddle, a smushed pumpkin and Ichabod hat, but not his body, believing the headless horseman took it away.

Resolution -> D.K. wrote this story 30 years after he heard it from an unnamed gentleman.

The gentleman reports that Ichabod is alive and well became an attorney politicians and a court justice. He says that From weds Katrina right after Ichabod disappearance.

Characters

• Ichabod Crane: the protagonist, the town’s schoolmaster who’s in love with Katrina.
• Katrina Van Tassel: young, beautiful and rich lady.
• Brom Bones: hero of Sleepy Hollow, prankster with his gang.
• The headless horseman: ghost of an Hessian soldier (mercenaries from Germany that during the Revolutionary war fought for England trying to block the colonies revolution) who’s head was shot off by a cannonball during the Revolutionary war. He’s looking for his head every night.

3 di 28 - He represents the fact that the king of England after the revolution is beheaded.

- He symbolized the fact that the story was set after the Revolutionary War, 40 yrs after the Declaration of Independence.

Themes

• War -> represented through the battle between Ichabod and Brom van Brunt for the love of Katrina van Tassel.
• Unreliability of stories: people need to question them.

The postscript displays a doubt about the story and the storyteller confirms he don’t believe one half of it himself.

“Yankee” -> negative definition of north American people, used by those of the south, used to define someone that tries to make money exploiting a situation.

The Dutch population in the north during the 17th century used to produce milk and cheese.

The sleepy hollow talks about local contests that lead to the definition of a nation -> it suggests that the new nation did indeed have a history of its own, both literally and culturally.

Ghosts and witches are the projection of history because Sleepy Hollow’s inhabitants were still feeling the trauma of the war. (Irving uses a war language).

These two stories are the most American ones.

It’s a honor story but also ironic. We have a double cross because there’s the influence of romantic and gothic traditions + a passage from the enlightenment and romanticism -> clash between what happened and what it is said.

4 di 28 Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864)

Finest American romancer. Considered one of the most important American authors.

He was born in Massachusetts in 1804.

His life was characterized with a strict, puritan education.

He studied 18th century novels: Wordsworth founder of the gothic novel, Scott founder of the historic novel => he wrote a mixture of the two. (Storia e ambientazioni gotiche sono i suoi due paradigmi).

He worked in a costumer house (=economy, travelers…).

He worked on the darkest sides of American history and society.

• “Twice told tales” is the name of his first collection of stories, published in 1837.
• Illusion of life = as a twice told tale (la vita è tediosa come un racconto detto due volte).
• “The scarlet letter” (1850) considered with “Moby Dick” the fundamentals book of the American literature.
• “The house of the seven gables” (1851).
• In Europe, he took inspiration for another novel “The Marble Faun” (1860).

“My kinsman, Major Molineux” (1832)

Titolo invertito in italiano “Il maggior Molineux, mio parente”. L’inglese lo pone così per enfatizzare il fatto che il Major è più importante del fatto che sia parente del narratore/protagonista/uno dei personaggi.

Plot

The story is set in New England before the American Revolution. Young Robin Molineux seeks out his kinsman, a major in the British army, with the hope of gaining access to power. He finds, however, that his kinsman is scorned, and he is advised to make his own way in the world.

Setting

Boston, Massachusetts, che non è però mai esplicitamente scritto.

Time

Not far from a 100 yrs earlier.

Symbols

Moon, boat, church (element of a community).

Themes

• The foundation of a new country, before the revolution took place. When he wrote the story, he lived in the US. We have to consider the chronological gap between 1830, when the story was written, and 1730, before the revolution happened.
• We can consider the short story as a (political) allegory of revolution, Robin represents the changing form one tradition to a new one.

Characters

• Robin symbol of America and it’s new settlers. He’s a young man, 18 years of age, who travels from the country to an unnamed city in search of his father's cousin. Robin is raised in a farming family and unaccustomed to city folk. From the onset of the short story, Robin is described as a rather naive, earnest individual. He is genuinely bewildered by the townspeople's cold reception toward him once they learn that he is related to Molineux. Though greatly shocked to see Molineux at the end of the story, Robin in fact laughs loudest at his relative's undignified plight. He seems to be overtaken by the raucousness of the cruel crowd.
• Major Molineux represents England, the British empire, the aristocracy. Robin's relative, and as an officer of the British colonial government, he has promised Robin a job opportunity. However, he is unable to be found when Robin arrives at his town to seek employment. Later, Robin discovers that the town is leading a procession in which Major Molineux is tarred and feathered. Ostensibly, Major Molineux is tarred and feathered because of his affiliation with the British government, given that the story takes place before the American Revolution.

Various Townspeople. Robin never learns, nor does Hawthorne reveal, the names of the townspeople.

• Ferryman: The ferryman transports Robin from his original destination to this unnamed town. Although it is late (9:00pm), the ferryman is willing to take Robin because he receives extra pay.
• Oldman: he’s the first townsperson whom Robin approaches in order to inquire about Major Molineux. In a preview of what is to come, the Old Man reacts very negatively to Robin's question, demanding he let go of his coat and threatens to put him in the stockades.
• 5 di 28 Innkeeper: Robin enters the Innkeeper's establishment because he is hungry, although he cannot afford any food there. The Innkeeper is initially quite welcoming and friendly. Again, however, once Robin asks about Major Molineux, the Innkeeper's demeanor wholly changes. Later, as the procession goes through the city streets, Robin can hear the Innkeeper's distinctive laughter in the crowd, as they behold the tarred and feathered Molineux.
• Housekeeper: Robin encounters a woman in a scarlet petticoat who converses with him, in a friendlier manner than anyone else, and attempts to persuade him to enter her home/establishment. She claims to be Molineux's housekeeper, but it is hinted that the woman is perhaps a brothel owner or holds a similar profession.
• Stranger (2face): The Stranger is first observed at the inn, as he has a very prominent hooked nose and fiery eyes. Robin encounters the Stranger a second time on the street, when he has painted his face in black and red, colors reminiscent of evil/the devil. In the procession, the Stranger is the only person mounted on a horse.
• Gentleman: he is the sole person in the town who informs Robin that in order to see Major Molineux, he must wait on the street. The two converse pleasantly, and the Gentleman remains with Robin as the procession passes. After the commotion, Robin asks the Gentleman how to return to the ferry. However, the Gentleman advises Robin to remain in town because he can be successful without the help of Major Molineux.

6 di 28 Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

He was born in Boston in 1809, and died in 1849 in Baltimore, Maryland.

His mother died in 1811 and he was taken into the house of John Allan Poe, a merchant from Richmond, Virginia. (Virginia is considered the 1st state of the south).

Unstable personal life.

He attended the university of Virginia, in 1827 he starter writing poems. He travelled around the US.

He wrote gothic and horror stories.

• “Message found in a bottle” (1833) was his first story.
• “The narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym” (1838) the only romance he wrote, a mix of real and invented stories. Some critics consider it an inspiration for “Moby Dick”.
• In 1839 he published the collection of short stories “Tales of grotesque and arabesque” (comic, but with a bloomy background) and part of this collection is “The Fall of the House of Usher” in which we have supernatural and psychological horror. (Theme of the double = 2 different person that have the same points).
• “The crow” (1845).

He invented the modern detective story, a new modality for that style.

He was an important literary critique:

• He said that the poetry had to deal with beauty, not with truth.
• He was able to cross the limits and borders of literary genre.

The style of his stories is:

• Long sentences.
• Meticulous descriptions, sometimes artificial.
• Interior monologue (an “I” talks, and sometimes it speaks to himself).

“Tales of ratiocination” -> In 1846, Poe wrote to a friend about the popularity of what he called his "tales of ratiocination," meaning tales of logical reasoning: “These tales of ratiocination owe most of their popularity to being something in a new key”.

- Ratiocination is used by him as the process of exact thinking: reasoning.

The idea of nothing scares people. Horror and terror don’t come from the world outside, but from the inner-self of the double [Love-death, life-death] -> Clocks, women that die young, self destruction, hallucinations, nightmares.

*Wilderness: ciò che ancora non è condizionato dalla civilizzazione.

“The fall of the House of Usher” (1839)

An unnamed narrator approaches the House of Usher in a cold autumn day, he’s coming to visit his childhood friend Roderick who he’s lost contact with.

The narrator explains that the Usher family and their mansion have become symbolically intertwined.

Inside the house (full of strange decorations/instruments/books) Rodrick is alternatively sullen and lively. He explains that the condition that run in his family makes his senses acute.

His twin sister, Madeline is deathly ill with something unknown, she moves through the room without talking or noticing the narrator.

The next few days the narrator tries to cheer Rodrick up, but he seems to lose his mind, supposing that objects, including the house, possess intelligence.

Madeline soon dies, the narrator and Roderick carry the coffin.