E-Book Overview
From a Modernist/Postmodernist perspective, this title addresses questions of literary and cultural nationalism. The authors reveal that since the seventeenth century, American writing has reflected the political and historical climate of its time and helped define America's cultural and social parameters. Above all, they argue that American literature has always been essentially 'modern', illustrating this with a broad range of texts: from Poe and Melville to Fitzgerald and Proud, to Wallace and Stevens, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Thomas Pynchon.
E-Book Content
PENGUIN BOOKS
FROM PURITANISM TO POSTMODERNISM Richard Ruland is a professorof English and American literature at \WashingtonUniversity in St. Louis. He has lived and lectured abroad as-aGuggenheimfellow, and taught at the University of Leeds and, as a Fulbrighr fellow, it the universitiesof Groningen and EastAnglia. His books include The Rediscoueryof American Literatrit, Premisesof Critical Taste,1900-7940, America in Modern EuropeanLiterature: From Image to Metapltor, and a two-volume collection with commentaryof theoriesof American literature from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries,Tbe lrlatiueMuse andA StoriedLand. Malcolm Bradbury is a novelist, critic, television dramatisr, Trd professor of American Studiesar the University of Easi 4lgliq. His novels include Eating PeopleIs \wrong (L959); The History Man (1975),which was made into a iajor Tv series;Rates of Exchange(1982),which was shortlisied for the Booker Pfize; and Doctor Criminale (1992), Critical works include TheModern American I'louel(revisededition, 1992),l{r, I'lot Bloomsbury(L987),The Modern World: Ten Great Writers (1989), and Dangerous pilgrimages: Transatlantic Mytbologiesand the l,loiel (1996). U. Iru, edited Modernism (I97 6), An Introduction to American Studies (1981), The I'{ouelToday (revisededition 1990),and The , PenguiruBook of Modern Short Stories (L987). Among his television successesis an adaptation of Tom Sharpe's PorterhouseBlue,which u/on an InternationalEmmv Award.
PENGUINBOOKS Published by the Penguin GrouP Penguin Books USA Inc., 375 Hudson Sueet, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A. Penguin Books Ltd, 27 vrights Lane, Londgl \7s 5TZ, England P"enguin Books Australia Ltd, Ringwood, Victoria, Australia Penguin Books Canada Ltd, 10 Alcorn Avenue, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4V 382 \Wairau Road, Penguin Books (N.2.) Ltd, I82-t90 Zealand New Auckland 10, Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: Haimondsworth, Middlesex, England First published in the United Stat.s !V Viking Penguin, dirrision of Penguin Books USA Inc., I99I " Published in Penguin Books L992 910 Copyright O Richard Ruland and Malcolm Bradbury, I99I A11rights reserved AS Follo$trs: HAS oF CONGRESS rHE LTBRARY 5:trffi5:i;r;:HARDcovER From Puritanism to postmodernism: a history of American literature / Richrid R.tland and Malcolm Bradbury. p. cm. ISBN 0-670-83592-7(hc.) ISBN 0 14 0L4435 8 (Pbk.) L. American literature-History and criticism. I. Bradbury, II. Title. Malcolm. 1932PS88.868 rggr 9t'20944 810.9- dc20 Printed in the United Statesof America Set in Simoncini Garamond Designed by Victoria Hartman Except in the United Statesof America, this book is sold subiect to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or othenrise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding ot .o'o.t other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent Purchaser.
These arethe Gardensof the Desert,these The unshornfields, boundlessand beautiful, For which the speechof Englandhas no name . -\il7rrl.rAM CunEN BnyANT Why shouldnor we alsoenjoyan original relation to the universe? . Americais a poem in our eyes.. . . -RerpH \WeLDoEvrnnsoN And things are as I think they are And sayt