History of American Literature

The history of American Literature starts well before this land was even called America. It has been a great evolution to come from tribal symbols and drawings to today's Stephen King and Danielle Steele. Literature has gone through many phases and was impacted by great events and ideas in American history.

The earliest form of literature in what would one day be known as America were far from what modern day people would consider "Literature". The Natives who inhabited this land first had unwritten ways of passing on experiences, beliefs, and stories. Natives relied heavily on the verbal telling of these stories to younger generations. The same stories, fables, or belief structures were told repeatedly, each time identical to the last, and were memorized by the listeners so they would be able to pass these on to the next generation. They also used pictures, carvings, or special mementos such as bones, teeth, feathers, or skins as reminders of great hunts or wars. If an entire tribe and all its descendants were killed off, the specific stories and history of that tribe would also be gone. Other tribes may speak of the first, but never in the same detail or with the same perspective as the original tribe members.

Long before settlers arrived in America, explorers reported on their voyages to the continent. Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci provided some of the earliest European descriptions of the American continent. Before 1600 Sir Walter Raleigh, Richard Hakluyt, Thomas Harriot, and John White had published accounts of discoveries.

The writings of Captain John Smith, an explorer whose travels took him up and down the eastern seaboard of America, represent a shift from exploration narrative toward early history. Early histories, however, were written mostly by settlers rather than by explorers. William Bradford, the first governor of the Plymouth Colony, wrote his Of Plymouth Plantation from 1620 to 1647 . Another important historian of early America was Thomas Morton, whose New English Canaan used humor in portraying what he considered to be the overbearing and intolerant qualities of the Puritans .

Histories of early America, especially in New England, were filled with references to the Bible and to God's will. Nearly all events could be explained from this religious perspective: Foul weather and diseases were perceived as God's wrath; a bountiful harvest represented God's blessing. Given the Puritans' relationship with God, it is not surprising that sermons and other religious writings dominated literature in America in the 1600s. John Cotton, Thomas Hooker, Roger Williams, and John Winthrop were among the most prominent religious writers.

A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mary Rowlandson (1682). This work is a firsthand account by a colonist who was taken captive by Indians during King Philip's War. It presents a dramatic tale of suffering and of Rowlandson's efforts to make sense of that suffering. Her story became the model for a new genre of early American literature: captivity narratives. Such accounts became staples of American literature and eventually provided material for American fiction. While still religious in tone and purpose, captivity narratives emphasized the experiences of individuals. They also incorporated many of the fundamentals of fiction, making use of characters, dramatic action and setting.

The Salem witch trials of 1692 were another period in early American history that affected literature. As accusations of witchcraft in a Massachusetts town resulted in the execution of 14 women and 6 men, Cotton Mather's The Wonders of the Invisible World (1693) documented the events of the witch trials.

Cotton Mather remained an important literary figure in the 18th century. His Magnalia Christi Americana (The Great Works of Christ in America, 1702) is a history of New England that celebrates the founding generation of Puritans. Like his earlier works, it is religious; however, its interest in the human side of the Puritan founders marked a new achievement in American literary history. Mather's rewarding career included writings on science and medicine as well as theology and history. His Sentiments on the Small Pox Inoculated (1721) was instrumental in introducing the smallpox vaccine to New England.

A new genre for American writers, the travel narrative, would become especially influential late in the 1700s. Travel narratives include Travels Through the Interior Parts of North America (1778) by Jonathan Carver and Travels Through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee Country, etc (1791) by William Bartram . Travel stories often blended observations on nature and landscape with tales of personal courage and achievement.

The first American newspaper, the Boston News-Letter, was founded in 1704, and joined by the Boston Gazette in 1719. At a time when newspaper journalism was concerned primarily with reporting political events, the New-England Courant, started by James Franklin in 1721, became the first newspaper to include literary entertainment. Franklin's younger brother Benjamin Franklin published humorous social commentary in the Courant under the pen name of Silence Dogwood . Magazines also appeared for the first time in the colonies during the mid-1700s. Before 1800 magazines were concerned primarily with measuring America's developing culture against the British model.

During the 1700s Boston and Philadelphia became centers of publishing in addition to being political and commercial centers. Benjamin Franklin was key in establishing a writing community in Philadelphia. In 1727 he and a group of friends established a men's reading club in Philadelphia called the Junto . Members shared printed works and discussed topics of the day. Such reading and discussion clubs became an important part of American culture.

Women organized literary circles in the 1750s and 1760s. These groups, known as salons, resembled men's reading clubs. They also encouraged members to compose their own work, mainly poetry, but very few of these works were preserved.

By the mid-1700s American writing was primarily political. In America the 18th century was known as the Age of Enlightenment. Americans held a growing belief in the supremacy of reason over church; they also stressed the importance of the individual and freedom over authorities and institutions. America's great Enlightenment writers included Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson, who also played important roles in the American Revolution.

Thomas Paine became a leading figure in the cause of American independence with the pamphlet Common Sense (1776). This enormously popular political document stated that the American colonies