《美国文学》练习问答题.docxVIP

Questions For American Literature Week 1. Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790)1. Is Franklin a man of religious principles? Why does he stop attending public service? 2. Explain 13 virtues Franklin chooses for his moral improvement.3. What is Franklin’s attitude towards moral perfection? 4. What are significance of the moralistic self- discipline, according to Franklin? 5. What virtues does Franklin think he has never achieved?6. Comment on the Criticism that some authors made on Franklin, such as Hawthorn, Lawrence. (History p.53-54)Week 2:RalphWaldo Emerson (1803-1882)What does “whim” mean in the “Self-reliance”? and why does Emerson call consistency “foolish”? What is an acrostic or Alexandrian stanza character like, according to the Self-relaince?Explain “to talk of reliance is a poor external way of speaking. Speak rather of that which relies, because it works and is.” and the context that gives rise to this statement in the Self-reliance.What are Emerson’s comments on Jesus Christ in “The Divinity School Address”? Please compare it with Thomas Paine’s in The Age of Reason.Week Three：Henry David Thoreau (1817--1862)What is the analogy between that striped snake lying on the bottom of the pond and theman in the early spring?How is a stray goose like the spirit of the fog?What is Thoreau’s understanding of the beauty of an architecture? And what does he think of the architectural ornaments? In what cases will a “carpenter” be a “coffin-maker”?Why does Thoreau say “Those things for which the most money is demanded are never the things which the student most wants”?What is your comment on Thoreau’s idea of higher education?Is Thoreau a quietist or a hermit in the woods of Walden? Why or why not?Week four: Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864): What did the boy, at nightfall, hear when he was playing with the scattered fragments of marble? And how did he respond?What does author compare the kiln with?What question struck Ethan Brand’s mind on that portentous night18 years ago?