History of American Literature

Lowell's The Vision of Sir Launfal (1848) was finished ten years before Minnesota became a state, that Longfellow's Hiawatha (1855) appeared six years before the admission o

ing Camp (1868) before San Francisco was

nge for quick assimilation. Between 1870 and 1880 the population of Minnesota increased 77 per cent; Kansas, 173 per cent; Ne

dvance guard of the pion

quer this n

s an assemblage of two hundred thousand young men-not simpering, dainty, kid-gloved weaklings, but stalwart, muscular, dauntless young braves, brimful of push and energy, an

s in the country, town, and city, and to plan and execute the other material adaptations necessary for progressive civilized life and trade. It is manifest that such a period of stress is not favorable to the development of literature. Although the population of California increased 60 per cen

mon ground, shared each other's troubles, and assisted each other in difficult work. All were outspoken and championed their own opinions without restraint. At few times in the history

he school of Cervantes and puncture the hypocrisy of pretension in classes or individuals. The Clemens family had believed in the aristocracy of slavery, but the great democratic spirit of the West molded Mark Twain as a growi

ith charity for all." Bret Harte's world-famous short stories picture the rough mining camps. Eugene Field is a poet of that age of univ

retain an Elizabethan enthusiasm and interest in many-sided life. This quality, so apparen

LINCOLN,

ion: ABRAH

f the plain, sincere, strong English that fell from his lips while he was making history demands attention as literature. Passing by his great debates with Douglas (1858), not because they are unimportant, but because they belong more to the domain of politics and history, we come to his Gettysburg Address (1863), which is one of the three grea

elling things in such a way that the most ignorant person could understand them. In his youth he had only little scraps of paper or shingles on which to write, and so perforce learned the art of brevity. Only a few books were accessible to him, and he read and reread them until they became a part of him. The volumes that he thus absorbed were

ught and style. One reason why there is so much weak and ineffective prose written to-day is because books like the Bible and T

any men should dare to ask a just God's assistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let

the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on t

ieces. Simplicity and brevity are next in evidence; to these a

RTE, 18

ver attended an institution of learning higher than a common school. Fatherless at the age of fifteen, he went with his mother to California in 1854. Here he

, were feverishly in search of the buried gold of earth.... It was a land of perfect freedom, limited only by the instinct and the habit of law which prevailed in the mass.... Strong passions brou

RTE (From a painting b

ork, and his idealization of these experiences is wha

, Scotland, the consulship of which he held until his removal by President Cleveland in 1885. These two sentences from William Black, the English novelist, may explain the presidential action: "Bret Harte was to have been back from Paris last night, but he is a wandering comet. The only place

e his Plain Language from Truthful James, known as his "Heathen Chinee" poem, was very popular, his short stories in prose are his masterpieces. The best of t

ck of Roaring Camp. This is our greatest short story of pioneer life. England recognized its greatness as quickly as did Ameri

have been a fight, for in 1850 that was not novel e

out a hundred men. One or two of these were actual fugitives from justice, some were criminal, and

nd the State of California, so help me God.' It was the first time that th

s describing the situa

iver. The only outlet was a steep trail over the summit of a h

, for it heightens the pathetic effect and focuses attention upon the

d until it was lost in the stars above.... Within an hour she had climbed, as it were, that rug

child, how they were unconsciously influenced by it, and how

ere in 'Roaring,' that

vines and flowers roun

selves tw

mphasis and selection, of which Homer and Shakespeare freely availed themselves. The author of The Luck of Roaring Camp, The Outcasts of Poker Flat, and Tennessee's Partner seemed to know almost instinctively what he must emphasize or neglect in order to give his readers a vivid impression of the California argonaut

an qualities, not deflected or warped by convention. He gives us the literature of democracy. In self-forgetfulness

ry well says: "He created lasting pictures of human life, some of which have the eternal outline and pose of a Theocritean idyl. The supreme nature of his gift

FIELD,

He completed the junior year at the University of Missouri, but did not graduate. At the age of twenty-three he began newspaper work there, and he conti

tion: EUG

ittle Boy Blue will be read as long as there are parents who have lost a child. "What a world of little people was left unrepresented in the realms of poetry until Eugene Field came!" exclaimed a noted teach

ittle dream of

and fast the o

t bang, and ti

mpet that

ung, will enjoy reading his poems of childhood. Who, for instance, wi

ynken, and

f in a wo

river of c

sea o

going, and wh

oon asked

to fish for th

in this be

ver and gol

Wyn

yn

d

n laughed an

ked in the

hat sped them

the wave

tory to find out what became of the

was a lit

mer when h

as naturally a humorist, and his humor often caused him to take a right angle turn in the midst of serious thoughts. Parents have for nearly a

ach in the o

each of em

e sun and we

g

*

a bite and

trouble beg

doctor cou

tr

urf where th

John and hi

le souls to th

ho

b Eugene Field of the fa

Tales of

COMB RILEY

n: JAMES WHI

m, in the workshop, and in his home circle, is James Whitcomb Riley. His popularity with this generation

school education. He became a sign painter, and traveled widely, first painting advertisements for patent medicines and then for the leading bu

of rural life. In The Old Swimmin'-Hole and 'Leven

the punkin and the f

w

sniffin' round the

he pastur' is a big

s (1891), as he listens to T

, treesy,

t fer an

of a new democratic flower. In

the lily and

to a man with a

brimmin' full of

ver-blossoms his

uch favorites as The Raggedy Man, Our Hired Girl, Little Orphant Annie, with its b

, their first characteristic is simplicity. Some of his best verse entered the homes of the common people more easily because it

ace, garlande

kingliest sm

ow, diamonde

r need of

his lines from Gr

tin' back to Gr

ch string's a-hang

'round the place is

st to be so hap

rwhiles, there is a rare mingling of

ay, and I w

dead.-He is

smile and a w

red into an

s dreaming

be, since he l

le optimism

ing of lov

rors it f

d many hum

pervasive as the odor of his clover fields. Humor drives home t

s jest glad

d with him,

out the weathe

in's my

hows his power in making a subject pa

e Horace, or state high truths in austere beauty, like Arnold. But only the brother of the common man can tell

CLEMENS,

ation: M

water, was born in Florida, Missouri, in 1835. He says of his birthplace: "The village contained a hundred people, and I increased the population by one per cent. It is

became a printer, and followed this trade in various places for nearly eight years, traveling east as far as the City of New York. He next became a "cub," or under pilot, on the Mississippi River. After an eighteen months' apprenticeship, he was an excellent pilot, and he received two hundred and fifty dollars a month for his services. He says of these days: "Time

he fact is daily borne in upon me, that the average shore employment requires as much as forty years to equip a man with this sort of education.... When I find a well-drawn character in fi

k and of his three great stories (pp. 359-361), which bring us face to face wi

secretary of that territory. Mark Twain intended to stay there but a short time. He says, "I little thought

s rabbits, coyotes, mining camps,-all the varied life of the time-is thrown distinctly on the screen in the pages of Roughing It. While in the West, he caught the mining fever, but he soon became a newspaper reporter and editor, and in this capacity he disc

every part of the United States. A Tramp Abroad (1880), and Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World (1897), are records of other foreign travels. While they are largely autobiographical, and show in an unusua

ty, staggering under a load of debt that would have been a despair to most young men. Like Sir Walter Scott in a similar misfortune, Mark Twain made it a point of honor to assume the whole debt. He lectured, he wrote, he trav

. In 1908 he went to a new home at Redding, Connecticut. His last years were saddened by the death of his daughter and his wif

rience. Even Sir Walter Raleigh's life was no more varied; for Mark Twain was a printer, pilot, soldier, miner, newspaper reporter, edi

ife of the Mississippi Valley are not unlikely to increase in fame as the years pass. He resembles Hawthorne in presenting the early history of a section of our country. New England was old when Hawthorne was a boy, and he imaginative

of a wide-awake boy's impression of the life of that day. The wretched common school, the pranks of the boys, the Sunday school, the preacher and his sermon, the task of whitewashing the fence, the belief in witches and charms, the half-breed Indian, the drunkard, the murder scene, and the camp life

ion: HUCKL

ry Finn," by Sam

entury. Huckleberry Finn, the son of a drunkard, and the friend of Tom Sawyer, is the hero of the book. The reader becomes deeply interested in the fortunes of Jim, a r

worth eight hundred dollars. Huck did not wish to lose his soul, and so he wrote a letter to the owner. Before sending it, however, he, like Hamlet, argued the case with himself. Should he send the letter or forfeit human respect and his soul? The conclusion that Huck reached is thoroughly characteristic of Mark Twain's attitude toward the weak. The thirty-firs

m Lyon Phelps of Yale says: "He has done something which many popular novelists have signally failed to accomplish-he has created real characters. His two wonderful boys, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, are wond

is third story of western life, Pudd'nhead Wilson. interesting for its pictures of the negro

he says, "It is well the alleys are not wider, because they hold as much smell now as a person can stand, and, of course, if they were wider they would hold more, and then the people would die." Incongruity, or the association o

he stranger with a six-shooter, and the

e pioneer days. His humor is often only a means of more forcibly impressing on readers some phase of the philosophy of history. Even careless readers frequently recognize th

t also often reveals the thoughtful philosopher. To confirm this statement, one has on

a historian. Humor will undoubtedly act on his writings as a preservative salt, but salt is valuable only to preserv

other boys to relieve him of the drudgery of whitewashing a fence. That episode was introduced

necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. If he had been a great and wise philosopher, like the writer of this book, he would now

ows that his philosophy does not

only things that are va

time when he meets

had a better time playing hookey than in attending the execrably dull school, Mark Twain is eager to expose the hypocrisy of those who would misrepresent Tom's real attitude toward church an

to defend the Maid of Orleans. Because he loved to protect the weak, he wrote A Dogs Tale

the Adjective: when in doubt, strike it out." He followed this rule. Some have complained that the great humorist's mind, like Emerson's, often worked in a disconnected fashion, but this trait has been exaggerated in the case of both. Mark Twain has certainly made a stronger impression than

h gives a broad and sympathetic delineation of important phases of western life and

MM

ll children. The virtues of humble homes, the smiles and tears of everyday life, are presented in James Whitcomb Riley's poems. Mark Twain, philosopher, reformer of the type of Cervantes, and romantic historian, has, largely by means of his humor, made a vivid impress

ERE

The Winning

ise of the

l Ideals Histo

ol History of the Un

ife on the

's Roug

aham Lincoln

Abraham

the Addresses, Inaugural

n Introduction and Not

ssi

's Bret

The Life o

merican Novelists,

Story in English,

and Cable. (Contains autobiographical matter

Eugene Fi

se and Verse of Eugene Fiel

ween James Whitcomb Rile

agazine, Fe

Sketch of his Life, by Hughes, Beveridge, and O

s Autobi

sm of Mark Twain, in the Introd

odern Novelists. (Ma

wain, in Harpers M

s My Mar

TED RE

Address, part of the S

of Roaring Camp and The Outcasts of Poker Flat, should be read in mature years. These stories may all be fou

e, The Duel, Krinken,

dy. These poems may a

e Eugene F

sson, Away, Griggsby's Station, Little Mahala Ashcraft, Our Hired Girl, Little Orphant Annie. These po

d, the time will probably be found to finish the books. For specimens of his humor at its best, read Pudd'nhead Wilson's Calendar, printed at the beginning of the twenty-one chapters of Pud

S AND SU

ty display on its walls

books helped m

of his short stories? Does he belong to the school of Poe or Hawthorne? Which one of our great short st

en? Which of his poems indicated for reading do you pr

s please you most for their humor, references to rural life, op

development does he describe? Give instances (a) of his humor which depends on incongruity, (b) of his philosophical humor, (c) of his hatred of hypocr