Genesis and Evolution, And the Defining Myths Of American Literature PDF

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The primitive lifestyle and barbaric customs of the tribes were viewed with curiosity and disdain by Spanish and French encounters with them, resulting in travel and ethnographic accounts. These accounts are dominated by the underlying intentions of conversion to Christianity and civilization. Some ...

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GENESIS AND EVOLUTION, AND THE DEFINING MYTHS OF AMERICAN LITERATURE The primitive lifestyle and barbaric customs of the tribes were viewed with curiosity and disdain by Spanish and French encounters with them, resulting in travel and ethnographic accounts. These accounts are dominated by the underlying intentions of conversion to Christianity and civilization. Some of these accounts were also heroic conquest tales that extolled the conquering nation's glory. The arrival of the English settlers, backed by their faith in a providential plan to reclaim a "lost" Eden, is another watershed moment in American literature. Their vision of a 'New England' reflected their desire to civilise the people through settlement. Captain John Smith, whose name is often associated with New England, based the colony on English precedents. John Winthrop's sermon titled "A Model of Christian Charity," delivered to his congregation as they set sail on the Arabella for the New World, stands out among the Puritan narratives. Puritan poets such as Elizabeth Bradford (1663-1731) and John Saffin influenced the development of poetry in the seventeenth century (1626-1710). Their poems were heavily influenced by the classical poets Ben Jonson, John Donne, John Milton, and John Dryden, and were mostly based on their work. In seventeenth-century America, theological verse, particularly by Michael Wigglesworth (1631-1705), became very popular. The Day of the Doom, written by Wiggleworth, became one of the most popular poems in colonial America, selling over a million copies. Through a dialogue between Christ and the sinners, the epic-poem expresses some of the most prominent Puritan beliefs. The Bay Psalm Book and The New England Primer are examples of other popular theological texts printed by the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Throughout the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the books were in high demand and underwent numerous revisions. Anne Bradstreet (1612-72), a member of John Winthrop's group who arrived with her husband, wrote some of the best poems of her time. Her poems are notable for their gentle interrogation of orthodoxies and the mild tone of protest, which were collected in The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America, which was published in London in 1630. In her poem "The Prologue," she expresses her complete awareness of her creative inferiority as a woman writer: My foolish, broken, blemished Muse, so sings; And this to mend, alas, no art is able, ‘Cause nature made it so, irreparable. Some of her poems use the epistolary form, and are addressed to her husband and children, evoking images of domesticity, familial bonding, and sense of community. In poems like "To My Dear and Loving Husband" and "A Letter to Her Husband, Absent upon Public Employment," where marital love and conjugality are celebrated, there is an unmistakable tone of intimacy. Edward Taylor, whose The Poetical Works of Edward

Taylor was published posthumously in 1939, was another contemporary of Bradstreet's. His final verse is full of biblical imagery and has a didactic tone to it. His work is part of the meditative writing tradition, in which a series of recurring spiritual motifs are used to explore man's relationship with God. Poetic utterances were the best way for Anne Bradstreet and Edward Taylor to express their Puritan faith. The American Revolution, also known as the United States War of Independence, took place between 1775 and 1783 and is still remembered as one of the most significant events in late-eighteenth-century literature. Thirteen of Great Britain's North American colonies gained political independence and formed the United States of America as a direct result of the Revolutionary War. The war thwarted British attempts to increase surveillance and control over their American colonies, and it became an international event when France and Spain joined forces against British forces. Thomas Jefferson's (1724-1826) A Summary View of the Rights of British America, published in 1774, Thomas Paine's (1737-1809) Common Sense, published in 1776, and J. Hector St Jean de Crevecoeur's (1735–1813) Letters from an American Farmer, published in 1782, all express the need for America to become an independent nation. The United States Declaration of Independence (1776) is one of the most significant events in the country's history. The chief architect of this foundational document, Thomas Jefferson, envisioned a country where man's rights and dignity would be protected. The Declaration expressed the urgency with which the United States sought to free itself from what it saw as the British Crown's "tyranny" and "oppression": When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands that have bound them to another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect for mankind's opinions demands that they declare the reasons for their separation. The American Declaration of Independence is one of the earliest and most powerful declarations of the country's intended autonomy. It asserted that political and administrative independence were unavoidable if the ideals of equality, liberty, life, and happiness were to be promoted. The document is widely regarded as containing the genesis of the modern American nation, and it has sparked a number of patriotic myths about its claimed glory. City on a Hill: The phrase "City on a Hill" comes from John Winthrop's sermon "A Model of Christian Charity" delivered at Holyrood Church in Southampton on March 21, 1630, just before the first group of Massachusetts Bay colonists set sail on the ship Arabella for Boston. "City upon a Hill," a phrase borrowed from Jesus' "Sermon on the Mount" parable of Salt and Light, was cited near the end of Winthrop's treatise. He warns his Puritan brethren that they will be "as a city on a hill, all people's eyes are upon us." "So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken and thus cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a storey and a byword throughout

the world," he says, sternly reminding the colonists of their covenant with God and sense of duty. The phrase expresses Winthrop's vision of a society that would serve as a model for all other Christian societies to follow. He purposefully defined his society as a monument from which others could seek guidance. This sermon, along with Winthrop's vision of New England, has become pivotal in the formation of the United States of America. The Frontier Spirit In the American context, the myth of the frontier refers to the spirit of territorial expansionism that dates back to the 17th century. It was a sign of the advancing border, which Europeans colonised and converted into settlements as they moved westward. The historian Frederick Jackson Turner defined the frontier as "the temporary boundary of an expanding society at the edge of substantially free lands" in his influential work on the subject, The Significance of the Frontier in American History. It refers to the process of exposing the untamed wilderness to European civilization. Turner attributes America's distinct national character to the frontier spirit, claiming that "the frontier owes its striking characteristics to the American intellect." The American Dream: The American Dream is an egalitarian ideal that shapes how people think about the American experience. It represents a national ethos, encompassing concepts such as equal opportunity, justice, liberty, and upward social mobility. Although the concept of such an ideal can be found in documents such as the American Declaration of Independence, it became popular after James Truslow Adams' book The Epic of America was published in 1932. The novel was a veiled response to Theodore Dreiser's novel An American Tragedy (1925), in which the protagonist seeks upward social mobility at all costs. Throughout the twentieth century, especially during World Wars I and II and the Great Depression of the 1930s, the term was crucial in shaping the nationalist psyche. Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884), Willa Cather's Myntonia, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby (1925), Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy (1925), and Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon all have thematic repercussions of the American Dream (1977).

Manifest Destiny: The phrase "Manifest Destiny" first appeared in an editorial in The Democratic Review's July-August 1845 issue. The phrase was coined as a justification for territorial expansion and the exploration of previously uncharted territory in Northern America. Native Americans were evicted in droves as the country moved westward, towards the Pacific

and beyond. The phrase encapsulates the widespread belief in the nineteenth century that the United States was destined by Providence to expand its dominion and spread democracy and capitalism across the entire continent of North America. The intensification of debates over slavery as a result of this ideology led to the Civil War between the Northern and Southern states of America. E pluribus Unum: The national motto of the United States of America is E pluribus unum, which translates to "Out of many, one." It is prominently featured in the United States' Great Seal, which was approved by Congress in 1782. The term refers to the thirteen colonies coming together to form a single country. It has come to be regarded as one of the nation's defining myths, as well as an expression of the country's underlying national spirit. The term appears on the Great Seal alongside the Latin terms "Annuit coeptis," which means "he approves the undertaking," and "Novus ordo seclorum," which means "New order of the ages." One of the most remarkable periods in literary history is that of American literature. It was credited with bringing about significant changes in American attitudes. It purchased secularism, which enhanced its Literary History. It also served as a marker for the advancing border, which Europeans colonised and converted into settlements as they moved westward. As we learn more about this unit, we discover that it discusses all of the advancements and changes in American history that are depicted in the literary works of American writers. This unit also discusses the American Dream of Egalitarianism, which is crucial in understanding the American Dream....