Hand out in class on general information on American Literature prior to 1750. Read: quiz on this material Wednesday.
In class: poetry of Anne Bradstreet.
We are reading and analyzing Anne Bradstreet's poem. See copy below and questions for which you will reponsible for as class work. If you are absent, be prepared on your own and discuss with me any questions you might have.
Here followes some verses upon the burning of our house, July 10th, 1666.
By Anne Bradstreet
In silent night when rest I took,
For sorrow neer I did not look,
I waken'd was with thundring nois
And Piteous shreiks of dreadfull voice.
That fearfull sound of fire and fire,
Let no man know is my Desire.
I, starting up, the light did spye,
And to my God my heart did cry
To strengthen me in my Distresse
And not to leave me succourlesse.
Then coming out beheld a space,
The flame consume my dwelling place.
And, when I could no longer look,
I blest his Name that gave and took,
That layd my goods now in the dust:
Yea so it was, and so 'twas just.
It was his own: it was not mine;
Far be it that I should repine.
He might of All justly bereft,
But yet sufficient for us left.
When by the Ruines oft I past,
My sorrowing eyes aside did cast,
And here and there the places spye
Where oft I sate, and long did lye.
Here stood that Trunk, and there that chest;
There lay that store I counted best:
My pleasant things in ashes lye,
And them behold no more shall I.
Under thy roof no guest shall sitt,
Nor at thy Table eat a bitt.
No pleasant tale shall 'ere be told,
Nor things recounted done of old.
No Candle 'ere shall shine in Thee,
Nor bridegroom's voice ere heard shall bee.
In silence ever shalt thou lye;
Adieu, Adeiu; All's vanity.
Then streight I gin my heart to chide,
And didst thy wealth on earth abide?
Didst fix thy hope on mouldring dust,
The arm of flesh didst make thy trust?
Raise up thy thoughts above the skye
That dunghill mists away may flie.
Thou hast an house on high erect
Fram'd by that mighty Architect,
With glory richly furnished,
Stands permanent tho' this bee fled.
It's purchased, and paid for too
By him who hath enough to doe.
A Prise so vast as is unknown,
Yet, by his Gift, is made thine own.
Ther's wealth enough, I need no more;
Farewell my Pelf, farewell my Store.
The world no longer let me Love,
My hope and Treasure lyes Above.
Text notes:
Line 5: fire and fire, Fire! and Fire!
Line 11: beheld a space, watched for a time
Line 14: I blest his name that gave and took, see Job 1:21
Line 24: Sate, sat
Line 40: Arm of flesh, see 2 Chron. 32:8; Isa. 9:18-20; Jer. 17:4-7
Line 42: Dunghill mists, see Ezra 6:9-12.
Line 43: House on high erect, see 2 Cor. 5:1; Heb. 11:10
Line 48: Enough to doe, ie. enough to do it
Line 52: Pelf, property, possessions
Line 54: Treasure lyes Above, see Luke 12:34
Upon the Burning of Our House
July 10th, 1666
What does the speaker do when she can no longer look at her burning house?
What does the speaker see when she passes by her house?
In the end, where do the speaker’s “hope and treasure” lie?
Interpreting:
Why does the speaker bless God as her house is burning down?
With what emotions is the speaker filled when she passes by the ruins of her house?
To what is the speaker referring when she speaks of the “house on high”?
On the basis of this poem, what generalization would you make about the Puritan attitude toward worldly goods?
What is the theme of the poem?
Point out three basic, plain words referring to everyday items.
The following is the reading material handed out in class.
The New Land to 1750
Let England know our willingnesse,
For that our worke is good:
Wee hope to plant a nation,
Where none before hath stood
Thomas Dale
Governor of the Jamestown Colony
More than a century after European explorers discovered North America, there were no permanent settlements in the New World north of St. Augustine, Florida. By 1607, however, a small group of English settlers was struggling to survive on a marshy island in the James River in the present state of Virginia. In 1611, Thomas Dale, governor of the colony, wrote a report to the king expressing the colonist’s determination to succeed. Despite disease and starvation, Jamestown did survive.
The first settlers were entranced by the presence and, to them, the strangeness of the native inhabitants. They did not at first realize that these earlier Americans, like Europeans, had cultural values and literary traditions of their own. The literature was entirely oral, for the tribes of North America had not yet developed writing systems. This extensive oral tradition, along with the first written works of the colonists forms the beginning of the American literary heritage.
The Historical Setting:
When Christopher Columbus reached North America in 1492, the continent was already populated, though sparsely, by several hundred Native American tribes. Europeans did not encounter these tribes all at once. Explorers from different nations came into contact with them at different times. As we now know, these widely dispersed tribes of Native Americans differed greatly from one another in language, government, social organization, customs, housing and methods of survival.
What we do know is that the Native Americans usually, but by no means always, greeted the earliest Europeans as friends. They instructed the newcomers in New World agriculture and woodcraft, introduced them to maize, beans, squash, maple sugar, snow shoes, toboggans and birch bark canoes.
A small group of Europeans sailed from England on the Mayflower in 1620. The passengers were religious reformers, who were critical of the Church of England. Having given up of or “purifying” the church from within, they chose instead to withdraw from the church. This action earned them the name Separatists. We know them as Pilgrims. They established a settlement at what is now Plymouth, Massachusetts. Eventually, it was engulfed by the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the much larger settlement to the north.
Religion affected every aspect of Puritan life, although the Puritans were not always as stern and otherworldly as they are sometimes pictures. Their writings occasionally reveal a sense of humor, and the hardships of daily life forced them to be practical. In one sense, the Puritans were radical, since they demanded fundamental changes in the Church of England. In another sense, however, they were conservative. They preached a plain, unadorned Christianity that contrasted sharply with the cathedrals, vestments, ceremony and hierarchy of the Church of England.
What exactly did the puritans believe? Their beliefs were far from simple, but they agreed that human beings exist for the glory of God and the Bible is the sole expression of God’s will. They believed in predestination--John Calvin’s doctrine that God has already decided who will achieve salvation and who will not. The elect, or saints, who are to be saved, cannot take election for granted, however. Because of that, all devout Puritans searched their soul with great rigor and frequency for signs of grace. The Puritans believed in original sin and felt that they could accomplish good only through continual hard work and self-discipliner. When people speak of the “Puritan ethic,” that is what they mean.
It was an oddly assorted group that established the foundations of American literature: the Native Americans with their oral traditions, the Puritans with their preoccupation with sin and salvation and the Southern planters with their busy social lives. Indeed, much of the literature that the colonists read was not produced in the colonies. It came from England. Yet by 1750 there were the clear beginnings of a native literature that would one day be honored throughout the English-speaking world.
Note: The Puritans in general had a theory of literary style. They believed in the plain style of writing, one in which clear statement is the highest goal. An ornate or clever style would be a sign of vanity and, as such, would not be in accordance with God’s will.
The important literature of the pre-Revolutionary South can be summed up in one name-William Byrd. Byrd lived at Westover, a magnificent plantation on the James River bequeathed to him by his wealthy father. Commissioned in 1738 to survey the boundary line between Virginia and North Carolina, he kept a journal of his experiences. That journal, never intended for publication, was found among his papers after his death. Published nearly a century later as The History of the Dividing Line, it was immediately recognized as a minor humorous masterpiece.
No comments:
Post a Comment