Realism

Sentimentalism (literally, appealing to the sentiments, also called maudlinism), as a literary and political discourse, has occurred much in the literary traditions of all regions in the world, and is central to the traditions of Indian literature, Chinese literature, and Vietnamese literature (such as Ho Xuan Huong).
The term sentimentalism is used in two senses: (1) An overindulgence in emotion, especially the conscious effort to induce emotion in order to enjoy it. (2) An optimistic overemphasis of the goodness of humanity (sensibility), representing in part a reaction against Calvinism, which regarded human nature as depraved. The novel of sensibility was developed from this 18th century notion, manifested in the Sentimental novel.


REALISM
o Realism is the literary term applied to compositions that aim at a faithful representation of reality, interpretations of the actualities of any aspect of life. As a reaction against romanticism it is free of subjective prejudice, idealism or romance and often deals with representing the middle class. Unlike naturalism, however, it does not focus on the scientific laws that control life, but the specific actions and their consequences.
Renders reality closely and in comprehensive detail. Selective presentation of reality with an emphasis on verisimilitude, even at the expense of a well-made plot.

CHARACTERISTICS of REALISM
1.Describes reality in comprehensive detail
2.Characters are more important than the plot and action
3.Complex ethical choices are often the subject of the literature
4.Characters are related to nature, to each other, to their social class and to their own past. This relation makes up the complexity of their temperament and motive.
*Characters appear in their real complexity of temperament and motive; they are in explicable relation to nature, to each other, to their social class, to their own past.
5. Class is important (usually describes the middle class)
*Class is important; the novel has traditionally served the interests and aspirations of an insurgent middle class. (See Ian Watt, The Rise of the Novel)
Events will usually be plausible. Realistic novels avoid the sensational, dramatic elements of naturalistic novels and romances.

6. Events are usually plausible
7. Diction is natural, not heightened or poetic
*Diction is natural vernacular, not heightened or poetic; tone may be comic, satiric, or matter-of-fact.
Objectivity in presentation becomes increasingly important: overt authorial comments or intrusions diminish as the century progresses.

Interior or psychological realism a variant form.
In Black and White Strangers, Kenneth Warren suggests that a basic difference between realism and sentimentalism is that in realism, "the redemption of the individual lay within the social world," but in sentimental fiction, "the redemption of the social world lay with the individual."
The realism of James and Twain was critically acclaimed in twentieth century; Howellsian realism fell into disfavor as part of early twentieth century rebellion against the "genteel tradition."

o PRACITIONERS of REALISM
1. Mark Twain
2. William Dean Howells
3. Rebecca Harding Davis
4. John W. DeForest
5. Henry James

American literature 1800-1890

American literature 1800-1890
Nationalism: a call for a national literature
Three different points of view:
1. One wanted books that expressed special characters of the nation, not books which were based on European literature.
2. Another group felt that American literature was too young to declare it’s independence from the British literary tradition.
3. The third group felt that the call for a national literature was a mistake. To them, good literature was universal, always rising above time and place where it was written.

Novels
* Novels were the first popular literature of the newly independent United States.
* There were almost no American novels written before the revolution
*The Novel was considered dangerous form of literature by the American Puritans. Novels put “immoral” ideas in the heads of young people.

Modern Chivalry (1792) by Hugh Henry Brackenridge. He wanted to achieve a reform in morals and manners of the people


Brockden Brown (Wieland): had the ability to describe complicated and often cruel minds. Wrote psychological gothic novels.

Washington Irving: Rip Van Winkle and The Legend of Sleepy Hollow.



An American Renaissance:
In the 1830s and 1840s there was a call for the “new spiritual era.” The young intellectuals of Boston were dissatisfied with the old patriotism. America’s power and wealth did not interest them. They wanted to explore the inner life. They studied the Greek, German, and Indian philosophers. Many kept diaries about their life and feelings. Others became vegetarians and nudists.
Transcendentalism: a movement of feeling and beliefs rather than a system of philosophy. Transcendentalist rejected both the conservative Puritanism of their ancestors and the newer, liberal faith of Unitarianism (a branch of Christian church which does not believe in the Trinity [the union of Father, Son and Holy Spirit in one God].)
They saw both religions as “negative, cold, lifeless.” Although they respected Christ for the wisdom of his teachings, they thought of the works of Shakespeare and the great philosophers as equally important.
The Transcendentalists tried to find the truth through feeling and intuition rather than through logic. They found God everywhere, in man and nature. In many ways nature was their Bible:

Sea, earth, air, sound, silence
Plant, quadruped, bird
By one music enchanted,
One deity stirred.
(Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Major literary figures:
1. Ralph Waldo Emerson(1803-1882):
He founded the “Transcendental Club.” It’s magazine, The Dial, was the true voice of their thought and feelings.
and Henry David Thoreau
The Transcendentalists divided into two groups:
1. Those who were interested in social reform
2. Those interested in the individual (such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau).

Melodrama

Melodrama: In a melodrama the characterizations will accordingly be somewhat more one-dimensional: heroes will be unambiguously good and their entrance will be heralded by heroic-sounding trumpets and martial music; villains will be unambiguously bad, and their entrance will be greeted with dark-sounding, ominous chords.
Melodramas tend to be formulaic productions, with a clearly constructed world of connotations: A villain poses a threat, the hero escapes the threat and/or rescues the heroine. The term is sometimes used loosely to refer to plays situations in which action or emotion is exaggerated and simplified for effect. As against tragedy, melodrama can have a happy ending, but this is not always the case.

Lyrical Ballads

Lyrical Ballads: is a collection of poems by William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge, first published in 1798 and generally considered to have marked the beginning of the English Romantic movement in literature. In the preface to the second and third editions of this book, Wordsworth Laid down the principles on which he thought the composition of poetry should be founded. He was insistent that the language of poetry should be the language of ordinary men and women, found at its unspoilt in the speech of rural people. He was against ‘poetic diction.’ He was also against the rationalist content of the Augustan poets: he wanted a return to imagination, legend, the human heart,
One of the main themes of "Lyrical Ballads" is the return to the original state of nature, in which people led a purer and more innocent existence. Wordsworth subscribed to Rousseau's belief that humanity was essentially good but was corrupted by the influence of society. This may be linked with the sentiments spreading through Europe just prior to the French Revolution.

Augustan Poetry

Augustan poetry is the poetry that flourished during the reign of Caesar Augustus as Emperor of Rome, most notably including the works of Virgil, Horace, and Ovid. This poetry was more explicitly political than the poetry that had preceded it, and it was distinguished by a greater degree of satire. In English literature, Augustan poetry is a branch of Augustan literature, and refers to the poetry of the eighteenth-century, specifically the first half of the century. The term comes most originally from a term that George I had used for himself. He saw himself as an Augustus. Therefore, the British poets picked up that term as a way of referring to their own endeavors, for it fits in another respect: 18th century English poetry was political, satirical, and marked by the central philosophical problem of whether the individual or society took precedence as the subject of verse.