regionalism and local color realism and naturalism
TRANSCRIPT
THE AGE OF REALISM (1880-1914)
Regionalism and Local ColorRealism and Naturalism
HENRY JAMES ONCE WROTE…
“What is character but the determination of incident? What is incident but the illustration of character?”
POLITICAL AND SOCIAL EVENTS
1883: The Brooklyn Bridge opens 1885: The first skyscraper opens in
Chicago 1893: The World’s Columbian
Exposition showcases American technology and industry
1898: Spanish-American War 1903: Wright Brothers make first
airplane flight 1913: Henry Ford announces the
assembly line
WORLD EVENTS
1881: Pasteur develops vaccine for rabies 1885: Benz produces first gasoline-operated car 1895: X-Rays discovered 1899: Aspirin is patented 1905: Einstein formulates theory of relativity 1910: Sigmund Freud publishes Psychoanalytic
book 1912: The Titanic sinks 1914: World War I begins
EFFECTS OF EXPANSION
Population grows by 50% Endless supply of workers and
resources Westward expansion
Land, farms, ranches, mines Frontier declared “closed” by consensus
(1890) Where to expand now?
Building cities, forging industrial empires, finding distant international outposts to plant the US flag
NATIVE AMERICANS
US Army soldiers kill more than 200 Sioux men, women, and children
Native Americans confined on reservations
LITERATURE
Romanticism wilted after Civil War “Realists” were a reaction to this
disillusionment Focused on everyday life Ordinary human behavior
“Local Color” writing reflected true-to-life… Customs Speech Character…of people in different regions of the country.
PROSPERITY
New inventions Airplanes, skyscrapers, motion pictures
Corporations grew into monopolies Controlled wages Fixed prices Lack of competition
Concentrated power in the hands of the few
Gap between rich and poor became a canyon
REALISTIC NOVELS
Relied on emerging sciences of biology, psychology, and sociology
Showed an interest in human motivation/ psychology– interior issues
Realistic settings presenting adversity Battlefields, lifeboats, slums, cityscapes
Realistic Authors Henry James Stephen Crane Kate Chopin
REFORMS
Overcrowded cities, social inequalities led to reform
Roosevelt became a “trustbuster” (monopoly regulator)
Labor movement Hours, working conditions, working conditions
Niagara movement (W.E.B. DuBois) Female suffrage (Susan B. Anthony) Landscape and wildlife protection (John Muir)
NATURALIST WRITING
Relied on scientific understandings to dissect human behavior Inspired by Darwin and Freud’s recent
theories Focus on environmental forces that
determine human fate Jack London (Call of the Wild) Theodore Dreiser (Sister Carrie)
REGIONALISM AND LOCAL COLOR
Credit: Artist, Gary R. Lucy.
CHARACTERISTICS OF REGIONALISM
Desire to record, celebrate, and mythologize the many different and unique geographical regions
Attention to recording accurately the speech, mannerisms, behavior, and beliefs of people in specific locales
Local color writing “painted” the local scenes and tends toward humorous or sentimental tones
MAJOR REGIONALIST AUTHORS
Mark Twain Mississippi River Small river towns
Bret Harte Gold-mining camps of the West Western pulp fiction Gamblers, gunfighters, gold
MARK TWAIN: AUTHOR FOCUS
You will understand…tall talesvernacularwriter’s purposecomic devices