American Literary Centers (from Literature and Life) E-Book

William Dean Howells

• Herausgeber: DigiCat
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

In "American Literary Centers," part of his influential collection "Literature and Life," William Dean Howells examines the pivotal hubs of American literary culture during the late 19th-century. Howells' prose is marked by clarity and meticulous observation, blending critical analysis with a rich historical context. He scrutinizes the sociocultural environments that nurtured literary production, particularly focusing on urban centers like Boston and New York. Through this exploration, Howells delineates the interplay between regional identities and the broader national narrative, emphasizing the importance of place in shaping literary expression. William Dean Howells, often dubbed the "Dean of American Letters," was a prominent novelist and literary critic whose career coincided with the American literary renaissance. His extensive background in both literature and journalism, coupled with his friendships with literary giants like Mark Twain and Henry James, informed his insights into the dynamics of the literary scene. Howells championed realism in literature, positioning himself as a voice for the emerging American narrative through the examination of societal themes. This scholarly work is essential for anyone interested in the development of American literature, as it offers invaluable insights into the factors that shaped the literary canon. Howells' analysis not only illuminates the foundational literary centers but also encourages readers to reflect on how geography, community, and culture interact to inspire literary innovation.

Leseprobe

William Dean Howells

American Literary Centers (from Literature and Life)

 

EAN 8596547364306

DigiCat, 2022 Contact: [email protected]

Table of Contents

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PG EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS

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Table of Contents

Here, if I cut my coat according to my cloth, t should have a garment which this whole volume would hardly stuff out with its form; and I have a fancy that if I begin by answering, as I have sometimes rather too succinctly done, that we have no more a single literary centre than Italy or than Germany has (or had before their unification), I shall not be taken at my word. I shall be right, all the same, and if I am told that in those countries there is now a tendency to such a centre, I can only say that there is none in this, and that, so far as I can see, we get further every day from having such a centre. The fault, if it is a fault, grows upon us, for the whole present tendency of American life is centrifugal, and just so far as literature is the language of our life, it shares this tendency. I do not attempt to say how it will be when, in order to spread ourselves over the earth, and convincingly to preach the blessings of our deeply incorporated civilization by the mouths of our eight-inch guns, the mind of the nation shall be politically centred at some capital; that is the function of prophecy, and I am only writing literary history, on a very small scale, with a somewhat crushing sense of limits.

Once, twice, thrice there was apparently an American literary centre: at Philadelphia, from the time Franklin went to live there until the death of Charles Brockden Brown, our first romancer; then at New York, during the period which may be roughly described as that of Irving, Poe, Willis, and Bryant; then at Boston, for the thirty or forty years illumined by the presence of Longfellow, Lowell, Whittier, Hawthorne, Emerson, Holmes, Prescott, Parkman, and many lesser lights. These are all still great publishing centres. If it were not that the house with the largest list of American authors was still at Boston, I should say New York was now the chief publishing centre; but in the sense that London and Paris, or even Madrid and Petersburg, are literary centres, with a controlling influence throughout England and France, Spain and Russia, neither New York nor Boston is now our literary centre, whatever they may once have been. Not to take Philadelphia too seriously, I may note that when New York seemed our literary centre Irving alone among those who gave it lustre was a New-Yorker, and he mainly lived abroad; Bryant, who was a New Englander, was alone constant to the city of his adoption; Willis, a Bostonian, and Poe, a Marylander, went and came as their poverty or their prosperity compelled or invited; neither dwelt here unbrokenly, and Poe did not even die here, though he often came near starving. One cannot then strictly speak of any early American literary centre except Boston, and Boston, strictly speaking, was the New England literary centre.