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ty and the primacy of historical context, attackingthe very notions of identity and universality asrepressive bourgeois constructs.Jorie Graham and other experimental poets ofself have arrived at similar viewpoints, comingfrom opposite directions. Ultimate or contingent,poems exist at the intersection of word andworld.■135
CHAPTER10CONTEMPORARYAMERICANLITERATUREThe United States is one of the mostdiverse nations in the world. Its dynamicpopulation of about 300 million boasts morethan 30 million foreign-born individuals whospeak numerous languages and dialects. Someone million new immigrants arrive each year,many from Asia and Latin America.Literature in the United States today is likewisedazzlingly diverse, exciting, and evolving.New voices have arisen from many quarters,challenging old ideas and adapting literary traditionsto suit changing conditions of the nationallife. Social and economic advances have enabledpreviously underrepresented groups to expressthemselves more fully, while technological innovationshave created a fast-moving public forum.Reading clubs proliferate, and book fairs, literaryfestivals, and “poetry slams” (events whereyouthful poets compete in performing theirpoetry) attract enthusiastic audiences. Selectionof a new work for a book club can launch anunknown writer into the limelight overnight.On a typical Sunday the list of best-selling booksin the New York Times Book Review testifies to theextraordinary diversity of the current American literaryscene. In January, 2006, for example, the listof paperback best-sellers included “genre” fiction— steamy romances by Nora Roberts, a newthriller by John Grisham, murder mysteries —alongside nonfiction science books by the anthropologistJared Diamond, popular sociology by TheNew Yorker magazine writer Malcolm Gladwell,and accounts of drug rehabilitation and crime. Inthe last category was a reprint of Truman Capote’sgroundbreaking In Cold Blood, a 1965 “nonfictionnovel” that blurs the distinction between high literatureand journalism and had recently beenmade into a film.Books by non-American authors and books oninternational themes were also prominent on thelist. Afghan-American Khaled Hosseini’s searingnovel, The Kite Runner, tells of childhood friendsin Kabul separated by the rule of the Taliban,while Azar Nafisi’s memoir, Reading Lolita inTeheran, poignantly recalls teaching great worksof western literature to young women in Iran. Athird novel, Arthur Golden’s Memoirs of a Geisha(made into a movie), recounts a Japanesewoman’s life during World War II.In addition, the best-seller list reveals thepopularity of religious themes. According toPublishers Weekly, 2001 was the first year thatChristian-themed books topped the sales lists inboth fiction and nonfiction. Among the hardcoverbest-sellers of that exemplary Sunday in 2006, wefind Dan Brown’s novel The DaVinci Code andAnne Rice’s tale Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt.Beyond the Times’ best-seller list, chain bookstoresoffer separate sections for major religionsincluding Christianity, Islam, Judaism,Buddhism, and sometimes Hinduism.In the Women’s Literature section of bookstoresone finds works by a “Third Wave” of feminists,a movement that usually refers to youngwomen in their 20s and 30s who have grown up inan era of widely accepted social equality in theUnited States. Third Wave feminists feel sufficientlyempowered to emphasize the individualityof choices women make. Often associated inthe popular mind with a return to tradition andchild-rearing, lipstick, and “feminine” styles,these young women have reclaimed the word“girl” — some decline to call themselves femi-136
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special songs for children’s game
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Painting courtesy Smithsonian Insti
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he accepted his lifelong job as a m
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solo trip in 1704 from Boston to Ne
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mon, “Sinners in the Hands of an
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CHAPTER2DEMOCRATIC ORIGINSAND REVOL
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should look out for themselves.Bad
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of a Horse the Rider was lost, bein
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translate Homer. Dwight’s epic wa
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Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810)A
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ness, and they became legends inthe
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CHAPTER3THE ROMANTIC PERIOD,1820-18
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physical self-discovery. For the Ro
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great detail, is a concrete metapho
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Whitman’s voice electrifies evenm
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anti-slavery poems such as“Ichabo
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CHAPTER4THE ROMANTIC PERIOD,1820-18
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cratic families: “The truth is, t
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emanates from the Book of Genesis i
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of ratiocination, or reasoning. The
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has become legendary:I have ploughe
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looked until recently. The same can
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the weak or vulnerable individual.S
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falling tree, and every lick makes
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Edel calls James’s first, or “i
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who had lived a century earlier. Pr
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the quiet poverty, loneliness, and
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TWO WOMENREGIONAL NOVELISTSNovelist
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CHAPTER6MODERNISM ANDEXPERIMENTATIO
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more technological, and more mechan
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erary and social traditions for the
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(1935), and Parts of a World (1942)
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themes of Greek tragedy set in ther
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F. Scott Fitzgerald(1896-1940)Franc
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where he lived most of his life.Fau
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John Steinbeck (1902-1968)Like Sinc
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ZORA NEALE HURSTONPhoto © Carl Van
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(1928), a winner of the Pulitzer Pr
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TRADITIONALISMTraditional writers i
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ground melody. It was experimentalp
Page 85 and 86: John Berryman (1914-1972)John Berry
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Page 93 and 94: Acoma, New Mexico.A central text in
Page 95 and 96: Americans, from Harper (a collegepr
Page 97 and 98: At the opposite end of the theoreti
Page 99 and 100: Robert Penn Warren(1905-1989)Robert
Page 101 and 102: was set in Mexico during the revolu
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Page 105 and 106: veiled account of the life ofBellow
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Page 111 and 112: own phrase) in negotiating thechaot
Page 113 and 114: the sweep of time from the end of t
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Page 119 and 120: paths of life in his early years,fl
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Page 127 and 128: moments of spiritual insight rescue
Page 129 and 130: the city in which I love you.And I
Page 131 and 132: loads up steep hills on the Greekis
Page 133 and 134: Billy Collins (1941- )The most infl
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Page 139 and 140: with private lives.Influenced by Th
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Page 145 and 146: Coast. Cotton and the plantationcul
Page 147 and 148: tle, open-ended fiction; recent vol
Page 149 and 150: nature essayist Rick Bass (1958- ),
Page 151 and 152: AMY TANPhoto: Associated Press /Gra
Page 153 and 154: Sherman Alexie (1966- ), aSpokane/C
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Page 159 and 160: GLOSSARYFaust: A literary character
Page 161 and 162: GLOSSARYPoet Laureate: An individua
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Page 165 and 166: INDEXBabbitt (Sinclair Lewis) 60, 7
Page 167 and 168: INDEXCummings, Edward Estlin (e.e.
Page 169 and 170: INDEXGolden Apples, The (Eudora Wel
Page 171 and 172: INDEXKumin, Maxine 90, 130Kushner,
Page 173 and 174: INDEX“Negro Speaks of Rivers, The
Page 175 and 176: INDEXSeascape (Edward Albee) 117Sea
Page 177 and 178: INDEXWaiting (Ha Jin) 155Waiting fo
Page 179: U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE /BUREAU OF
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