美国文学上.docVIP

Colonial America Historical Background 1. At the beginning of the 17th century, probed only slightly by English and European explorersearly in the 17th C, the English settlements in Virginia and Massachusetts began the main stream of what we recognize as the American national history. Almost 100 years earlier, the Spanish occupied the Caribbean Islands, Mexico and other parts of Central and South America. 2. The earliest settlers: Dutch, Swedes, Germans, French, Spaniards, Italians and Portuguese.Swedes along the Delaware, Dutch along the Hudson, Germans and Scotch-Irish in New York and Pennsylvania, and the Spanish in Florida. There were Negroes in New England, the Middle Colonies, and throughout the South; American Indians were everywhere. 3. All contributed to the forming of the American civilization. Greatly influenced by English traditions. 4. The first writings that we call American were the narratives and journals of these settlements. 5. The first permanent English settlement in North America was established at Jamestown, Virginia in 1607. 6. American literature developed in a unique way. III. The first American writer and the early New England literature 1. The first American writer Captain John SmithSending a letter, under the title A True Relation of Such Occurrences and Accidents of Note as Hath Happened in Virginia Since the First Planting of That Colony to the Virginia Company in London, defending the handling of the settlement and proclaiming the merits of the new land. John Smith was considered to be “the first author” in the history of American literatureor “the first American writer”.Published 8 books in all. 2. Early New England literature (1)Although the literature of Virginia and the South displayed little variety in the colonial time, New England had from the beginning a literature of ideas: A. theological B. moral C. historical D. political (2) William Bradford John Winthrop In terms of the narration of the history of the New England, two