"This is my letter to the world"

Such is the first verse of one of Emily Dickinson's poems. Her poetry, written in her native Amherst (Massachusetts) acquires a universal voice in her preoccupation with the themes of immortality, the soul, God, nature, and human relations, all expressed in a highly personal way. Her poems are brief but intense, charged with emotion and thought. Syntax and punctuation are idiosyncratic, to allow her to express so much in her tight stanzas. In the selection we are reading in this course, many of the poems express her views on poetry, the pot's task and the difficult road to poetry. "To learn the transport by the pain" probably best summarizes the idea that writing poetry is a craft that requieres de poet's pain, effort (you may compare this to Dylan Thomas' "In my craft or sullen art", a beautiful poem). Yet, the words reach readers and they may make a change in our lives, as they did for the man in "He ate and drank the precious words." As we said in class, some of the notions in this poem resemble what we saw in "The fantastic flying books of Mr Morris Lessmore." Her writing amounts to 1775 poems; each of them hides a pearl of beauty. Read and re-read over time, they will certainly tell us something new in every encounter, as they say so much in such few verses. Activity (to be handed in on Wednesday, May 2nd) Choose one of the following poems by Emily Dickinson: * "Much madness is divinest sense" * "The past is such a curious creature" * "Heaven is what I cannot reach!" * "If I can stop one heart from breaking" Write a 100-word paragraph in which you explain the poet's message in relation to life / human existence / human relations / individuality / or the theme you detect. Use your own words, write your own interpretation, without doing any Internet search to guide you. What will be considered in this activity is the way the poem speaks to you, not to anyone else.

The Scarlet Letter. Study Guide

“In a moment, however, wisely judging that one token of her shame would but poorly serve to hide another, she took the baby on her arm, and with a burning blush, and yet a haughty smile, and a glance that would not be abashed, looked around at her townspeople and neighbours. On the breast of her gown, in fine red cloth, surrounded with an elaborate embroidery and fantastic flourishes of gold thread, appeared the letter A.” (Ch. II)

Hawthorne’s novel represents one of the major novels of American Literature. His romance shows the rigidity and cruelty of Puritanism. The protagonist, Hester Prynne, finds herself in an inescapable suffering after committing a sin. Is there in the whole world such a sin that cannot be pardoned?


Study Guide

1.Who is the narrator of the story?

2.What’s the function of the preface in relation to the whole narrative?

3.Identify the setting in time and place.

4.Compare and contrast Hester Prynne and Arthur Dimmesdale.

5.Explain Pearl’s wildness. How does she change towards the end of the novel?

6.Why is Roger Chillingworth called a “leech” (1)?
7.Explain the climax (2) of the novel.

8.How does the meaning of the Scarlett Letter change towards the end of the novel?

9.The Scarlet Letter is an historical romance as well and as an allegory, says Luciana Piré in her introduction to the novel. Explain the two characteristics in relation to the novel.(3)

10.Choose one of the following quotations and explain it:

“No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself, and another to the multitude, without getting bewildered as to which may be the true”. (Ch. XX)

“The scarlet letter was her passport into regions where other women dared not tread. Shame, Despair Solitude! These had been her teachers –stern and wild ones- and they had made her strong, but taught her much amiss.” (Ch. XVIII)

“It kept him down, on a level with the lowest; him, the man of ethereal attributes, whose voice the angels might have listened to and answered! But this very burden it was, that gave him sympathies so intimate with the sinful brotherhood of mankind” (Ch. XI)

Allegory: a more or less symbolic fictional narrative that conveys a secondary meaning not explicitly set forth in the literal narrative. Literary allegories typically express situations, events or abstract ideas in terms of material objects, persons and actions or interactions.

Notes
1) 1. Any of various chiefly aquatic bloodsucking or carnivorous annelid worms of the class Hirudinea, of which one species (Hirudo medicinalis) was formerly used by physicians to bleed patients and is now sometimes used as a temporary aid to circulation during surgical reattachment of a body part. 2. One that preys on or clings to another; a parasite. 3. Archaic A physician.
2)Climax: crisis, decisive moment. The point of highest dramatic tension or a major turning point in the action of a play, story or other literary composition.
3)Historical novel: a novel that has as its setting a period of history and that attempts to convey the spirit, manners and social conditions of a past age with realistic detail and fidelity to historical fact. The work may deal with actual historical personages […] or it may contain a mixture of fictional and historical characters.


BIBLIOGRAPHY USED:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com
Merriam Webster’s Reader’s Handbook, Massachusetts, Merriam-Webster Incorporated: 1997.
Nathaniel Hawthorne. The Scarlet Letter. Firenze, Giunti Gruppo Editoriale: 2005. (Edited with and Introduction by Luciana Piré)

Hawthorne: the context and his style

1798, the year of the publication of Wordsworth and Coleridge's Lyrical Ballads marks the beginning of the Romantic movement in England. The movement, relying strongly on the power of the imagination, euqlity of all men and women, and the belief in the possibility of continuous improvement, was a literary, social, political and artistic response to a background in which industrialization, rationalism, unequal treatment and unfair conditions for many, characterized the turn of the century.

In general terms, Romanticism meant:
*a return to nature
*a renewed interest in the past
*an idealization of the simple, pure states of humanity
*exaltation of the imagination
*rejection of material reality in favor of intuition

American Romanticism was not an imitation of its European counterpart. On the contrary, it developed its own traits. Its novelty lay on the abounding strangeness of this continent. The return to nature was effectively put into practice by people like Henry David Thoreau, who recounted his experience in Walden. The interest in the past was directed not to the distant Medieval Era, but to what Americans considered their own past: the Colonial Period. There was also an idealization of pure life, as seen in Native Americnas. Yet, they were presented in literary works as fictionalized, idealized charcacters, far from the harsh realities that politics and history show. 

The rebellious spirit typical of the Romantics was set to work on reform movements that overflew with optimistic expectations of improvement. At the beginning, there was a belief in the possibility of uninterrupted human progress. Yet, towards the mid-century, the catastrophe of the Civil War showed otherwise.

In this context, the work of Nathaniel Hawthorne shows the complexities of the Romantic movement, its interest in the Colonial past as an explanation of the causes for the 19th century present, the dark and luminous sides alike of the human soul, and the first example of symbolic fiction in America, namely, The Scarlet Letter (1850).

His style is marked by the following characteristics:

* Rich, ambivalent allegory.
* Reference to his Puritan past.
* Investigation of the problems of moral and social responsibility.
* His enemies are intolerance, hypocrisy (which hides true sin), withdrawal from humanity, the greed that kills joy, cynical suspicion, arrogance.
* His remedy is in nature and in a world free from the corrosive sense of guilt.

Nathaniel Hawthorne and his Scarlet Letter

Poe: the poet and the critic

Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849), a passionate poet from Boston, hides a mystery both in his biography and literary career. His unstable life mingles with his melancholy poems and his grotesque tales. He published his first book of poetry when he was eighteen and he continued a prolific career as a poet, wit, gambler and heavy drinker! In 1845 he wrote his most famous work “The Raven”, in which “the most poetical topic in the world” is presented (according to Poe’s own words).
As we said in class, "The Raven" is a beautiful, musical, complex poem that can be read accompanied by Poe's own words in "The Philosophy of Composition", which throws light into the poetic text.
The diction, rhyme (both internal and external -at the end of lines), repetitions and alliterations, the refrain in the last line of each stanza, are some of the procedures that Poe used to convey a strong musicality. We should also consider that the poetic persona is obssessed, and transmits this state of mind through the repetitions, and the overwhelming presence of the black raven.
All these issues contribute to the creation of effect, one of the main topics in the essay "The Philosophy of Composition".

Activities to do at home
Read the poem “The Raven”, and listen to the musicality produced in these verses. Which different elements contribute to build this musicality?
Accompany your reading of the poem with the essay “The Philosophy of Composition”, by the same author, and underline the main ideas in the text. What does Poe want to demonstrate with this essay?

"I went to the Woods..."

Thoreau and his fellow Transcendentalists regarded Nature as a source of wisdom, purity, and life. Considered by many an extremist, a genius by others, a true representative of the Romantic spirit and, above all, of the so deeply American value of individualism, his account of the 2-year experience in the woods near Walden Pond remains one of the freshest, most true-to-life while consciously artistic 19th-century literary pieces.

Blog Assignment 2
Read the chapter "Where I Lived and What I Lived for" looking for instances in which Thoreau tells readers about his experience, and instances of the message / suggestions / pieces of advice / general thoughts he gives. Then, concentrate on his aesthetic use of language: How does he create beauty thorugh language? Go over the text again, and choose your favorite phrase or sentence, the one in which you find a powerful message expressed in a beautiful language. Copy your favorite statement in the Comments section below. Try to avoid repeating the same phrase as your classmates. (You may also send the assignment via e mail) Due Monday, March 25th

Echoes of Frederick Douglass, an African American writer

Frederick Douglss' Narrative of the Life... is a crucial text to understand not only his life, but slavery, and the painful conditions in which a whole race lived for centuries. His book is not only a narrative, as the title puts it, but also an argument against slavery, written while most African Americans were unable to enjoy the equality and freedom preached by the American Declaration of Independence.

Most slaves were denied an education (together with an identity, clothing, food, fair treatment, and other basic human rights). Yet, they developed a body of oral literature, in which music and songs were a central part. At the end of chapter 2 of The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, he makes a reference to slaves' singing and its meaning.

The following activities are to be written down (or printed) and handed in on Wednesday, April 4th

Activity 2
Below you can read the lyrics of a worksong, originated in the Southern plantations, following the traditional "call-and-response" pattern typical of African culture, which the captured slaves brought with them ton America. One of them wpuld sing a line, and the rest would answer, collectively.
Write a short paragraph in which you give your own interpretation of this song, considering Frederick Douglass' explanation of what music and songs meant to slaves (this is one of those songs, actually).

I Wonder What’s the Matter

from Negro Work Songs and Calls

Leader: I wonder what the matter

Chorus: Oh – o, Lawd!

All: Well, I wonder what’s the matter with my long time here

Leader: Boys, I woke up early this mornin’.

Chorus: Hey, Lawd!

All: Boys, I woke up early this mornin’.

‘Bout the break of day

(The break of day. Hear it, hear it.

Leader: Well, the big bell sho was tonin’.

Chorus: Oh – o, Lawd!

All: Well, the big bell sho was tonin’.

Sho was. Good Lawd

Just a while fo’ day.

Judge right. Oh, yah! Everybody talk.

Leader: Well, the bully turn over in the bed a-grumblin’.

Chorus: Oh – o, Lawd.

All: Bully turn over in the bed a-grumblin’.

‘Bout that night so short.

Oh, Lawd.

Don’ hurt nobody.

Night so short.

Leader: Well, it look like it been one hour.

Chorus: Oh – o, Lawd.

All: Well, it look like it been one hour.

Oh, Lawd.

Pardner, since I lay down.

Oh, Lawd, since I lay down….

(Source: http://www.library.pitt.edu/voicesacrosstime/come-all-ye/ti/2006/Song%20Activities/0405PekarWhittakerWorkSongs.html

Activity 3

In the 20th century, an African American writer called Langston Hughes got his inspiration from the roots of these worksongs and spirituals, and recreated them in beautiful poems. Read the pone below, and in a short paragraph explain how his individual poem, written in the 20th century, recreates the songs of the period of slavery, in content, theme, style, language, etc.

Bound No’th Blues

Goin’ down the road, Lawd,
Goin’ down the road.
Down the road, Lawd,
Way,way down the road.
Got to find somebody
To help me carry this load.

Road’s in front o’ me,
Nothin’ to do but walk.
Road’s in front of me,
Walk…an’ walk…an’ walk.
I’d like to meet a good friend
To come along an’ talk.

Hates to be lonely,
Lawd, I hates to be sad.
Says I hates to be lonely,
Hates to be lonely an’ sad,
But ever friend you finds seems
Like they try to do you bad.

Road, road, road, O!
Road, road…road…road, road!
Road, road, road, O!
On the no’thern road.
These Mississippi towns ain’t
Fit fer a hoppin’ toad.

(Langston Hughes)