“The man who does not read has no advantage over the man who cannot read.”

What is literature?

• written works

• drama

• poems

• prose ​

Early American Literature

​Native American Period

• Pre-1600s

• No written works (no writing at all) ​

• Oral tradition of songs and stories

• Mostly about nature ​and history

​Anne Bradstreet (1612-1647)

Early "real" American Literature

Washington Irving (1783 –1859)

"Rip Van Winkle", short story, 1819.

It follows a Dutch-American villager in colonial America named Rip Van Winkle who falls asleep in the Catskill Mountains (New York). He awakes 20 years later to a very changed world, having missed the American Revolution.

Romanticism

19th century​

​Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

• One of the most important American writer.

• ​Some say he invented detective fiction.

• ​https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLiXjaPqSyY

​Harriet Beecher Stowe

• Daughter of a rich and famous family who wrote about the harch life of American slaves.

​Mark Twain (1835-1910)

• Author and humorist.

• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

• ​The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

​Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)

• One of the most important American poet​s.

• ...and basically that's it. ​

20th century

The Lost Generation

​Earnest Hemingway

The old man and the sea​

One of the most important 20 century writer​

F. Scott Fitzgerald

The Great Gatsby​

Dramatists

• A Streetcar Named Desire

• A streetcar is a tram... there's no tram in the drama.

• But it's still a cool story. ​

Tennesse Williams

• The Crucible (About Salem witch hunt)

• Death of a Salesperson (Hungarian title is cooler: The Death of the Agent) ​

Arthur Miller

" To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment." 

Thank you for your attention.

Now get a book from the English Library and start reading.