Introduction ... 3 SectionⅠ. 17th Century(1607 - 1700) : The Colonial Period : the Puritan Age Chapter 1. European Backgrouds ... 15 Chapter 2. The First Three English Colonies ... 26 Chapter 3. The Earliest Writers - Travelers and Historians ... 33 Chapter 4. Religious Writings and Poetry ... 43 Chapter 5. Overview and Summary of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries in American Literature ... 54 SectionⅡ. 18th Century(1700 - 1800) : The Revolution and the New Nation : Neoclassicism Chapter 6. Four Typical Writers of the Eighteenth Century ... 79 Chapter 7. Eighteenth Century ... 90 Chapter 8. Benjamin Franklin(1706 - 1790) ... 98 Chapter 9. Writers Before the Revolution ... 110 Chapter 10. The Revolutionary Period(1775 - 1783) ... 117 Chapter 11. The Critical Period for the New Century(1783 - 1800) ... 124 Chapter 12. Eighteenth Century - Imginative Writing ... 131 SectionⅢ. Early 19th Century(1800 - 1870) : National Expansion : The Romantic Movement Chapter 13. Conditions at the Beginning of the Nineteenth Century ... 161 Chapter 14. Washington Irving(1783 - 1859) ... 170 Chapter 15. James Fenimore Cooper(1789 - 1851) ... 175 Chapter 16. William Cullen Bryant(1794 - 1878) ... 181 Chapter 17. Ralph Waldo Emerson and Transcendentalism ... 187 Chapter 18. Henry David Thoreau(1817 - 1862) ... 197 Chapter 19. John Greenleaf Whittier(1807 - 1892) ... 204 Chapter 20. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow(1807 - 1882) ... 208 Chapter 21. Edgar Allan Poe(1809 - 1849) ... 214 Chapter 22. Oliver Wendell Holmes(1809 - 1894) ... 221 Chapter 23. James Russell Lowell(1819 - 1891) ... 226 Chapter 24. Nathaniel Hawthorne(1804 - 1864) ... 232 Chapter 25. Herman Melville(1819 - 1891) ... 238 Chapter 26. Walt Whitman(1819 - 1892) ... 243 Chapter 27. A Backward Look(1800 - 1870) ... 252 SectionⅣ. Later 19th Century(1870 - 1900) : Reconstruction : Realism Chapter 28. The Beginnings of Realism ... 289 Chapter 29. Mark Twain(1835 - 1910) ... 297 Chapter 30. Emily Dickinson(1830 - 1886) ... 304 Chapter 31. Henry James(1843 - 1916) ... 311 Chapter 32. The Beginnings of Naturalism ... 316 SectionⅤ. 20th Century(1900 - 1965) : A World Power Science and Technology : Naturalism and Social Concern Chapter 33. Robinson and the Poetic Revolt(1890 - 1920) ... 339 Chapter 34. The Height of Naturalism ... 346 Chapter 35. Twentieth Century Women Novelists ... 354 Chapter 36. Twentieth Century Poets ... 359 Chapter 37. T. S. Eliot and Modern Poetry ... 367 Chapter 38. Five American Novelists of the 1920's and 1930's ... 373 Chapter 39. American Drama and Eugene O<FONT face ... serif Chapter 40. Ernest Hemingway(1899 - 1961) ... 389 Chapter 41. William Faulkner(1897 - 1962) ... 396 Chapter 42. John Steinbeck(1902 - 1968) ... 403 Chapter 43. A Brief History of the American Short Story ... 407 Conclusion ... 439