English 2130:  Exam I Study Guide

You should be able to identify and discuss the important ideas found in the following:

q       Christopher Columbus, letters—remember Columbus's excitement regarding the New World (which he continued to believe was a place related to India) as it appears in a letter from his first voyage, in which he tells of claiming and naming the people and places of the New World (12); be aware of the change in mood that comes later in the letter from his fourth voyage, in which he fears that he is losing his religion by being so far from the "Holy Church" (14);  think about how Columbus's excitement and religious depression might somehow—from the very beginning of continual discovery, exploration, and settlement—be indicative of the American experience.

q       William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation—keep in mind the Pilgrims' reasons for leaving England, as well as where they first chose to settle (Holland) and why they left there also; try to understand the giant step of faith the Pilgrims (and Puritans) took in coming to the New World, as well as their ideas of what the natural world was as opposed to the civilized world.

q       John Winthrop, "A Model of Christian Charity"—understand the social implications of the first half of Winthrop's "A Model of Christian Charity"; what do his ideas suggest about Puritan views of equality/democracy or social mobility (at least as far as their early settlement goes)?; remember the Puritan tendency to see themselves as God's new chosen people (typology); above all, perhaps, be familiar with the idea of the covenant that the Puritans felt had been made between themselves and God for the work they set out to do in the New World.

q       Anne Bradstreet, poems—remember that she is considered the first American poet; understand the ways in which her poetry reveals, among other things, important ideas about 1) how Puritan religious beliefs did not necessarily make them a cold and unfeeling people and 2) how they often struggled between their view of Heaven and their attachment to things of this world.

q       Mary Rowlandson, A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson—be aware of what happened to put her in the position her narrative relates; keep in mind how the Puritans came to see God acting in love or anger in both large and small events of their lives, and how even when they felt they were being punished they also saw themselves as being preserved; think about how this captivity narrative—with its careful construction—might have been intended to affect its readers.

q       Benjamin Franklin, Autobiography—be aware of his reasoning behind the writing of his Autobiography; remember his various points made in regards to the differences between and value of appearance in relation to reality; try to understand how he saw his story as "fit to be imitated"; remember Franklin's Deism and think about how that might affect his obvious promotion of self-interest as a viable motivation for an individual (or nation).

q       Thomas Jefferson, draft of the Declaration of Independence—understand Jefferson's draft of the Declaration as a rational document for a rational world, an "enlightened" document that makes no effort toward saying who or what is American.

q       J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer—be familiar with the definition of an American according to Crèvecoeur, as well as his ideas about America as a great melting pot of humanity (or at least the part of humanity that comes from Europe); notice also what mode and location of life he identifies as the best in the New World.

q       Phillis Wheatley, "On Being Brought from Africa to America" and "On the Death of the Rev. George Whitefield, 1770"—keep in mind Wheatley's notions of slavery and Christianity as they appear in her poetry. Remember that her Christianity seems to represent for her the "good" that has come from being enslaved and that somewhere between the lines of her poetry and Christian belief she offers the slave hope of freedom—spiritual and physical—through the ideals of Christian America.

q       Washington Irving, "Rip Van Winkle"—Great changes occurred in America while Rip slept in the mountains.  When he awoke, America was no longer a colony of Great Britain but a country of its own.  The people of the pre-Revolution village—like the sleepy village itself—are focused on rather domestic concerns.  There's little sense of life outside the confines of the family circle or local community.  In the post-Revolution village, the people are busy—perhaps even busybodies—and their talk is full of politics.  Keep in mind the changes that take place in the sign above the inn: from King George III to George Washington; from a red coat to a blue; from a scepter to a sword; from a crown to a simple hat.  But the face remains the same, which suggests two possible interpretations: 1) that only surface changes have been made in the shift to independence; 2) that although Americans are still basically European on a physical level, all the elements that make the person—elements represented here by external items—have changed to something new.  Keep in mind Dame Van Winkle as being an early representation of woman as cultural villain (possibly an allegorical representation of Great Britain as well).  She steps into the American's or man's or artist's world—however you choose to label Rip's world—and prevents Rip from forming or living according to his own character and identity.  In the new world of the post-Revolution United States of America, Rip suffers a momentary confusion of identity, but once he realizes he is free from "petticoat government," he begins to find out who he wants to be, begins to form his own character.

q       Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature—Emerson believed that the Americans of his day lived too much in the past—or, to put it another way, lived life in the "now" according to ideas and principles established in the past.  He wanted his fellow citizens to live according to their own ideas and beliefs instead of those passed down by tradition and history.  The world was just as interesting, just as open to exploration, in the middle of the nineteenth century as it was in the eighteenth or seventeenth.  Emerson also believed that we are part of Nature, that we can find God in Nature, that we can understand the spark of divinity within ourselves through the study of Nature.  All things in the world work together to "nourish man."  But man does not necessarily stand outside Nature and simply be served.  The spirit of Nature is part of us and we of it; we are part of the circle.  People of all times and places should develop their own "original relation to the universe" and not relate to life around them as they have been told to by parents, grandparents, and books; that was the only way there could be true progress.

q       Henry David Thoreau, "Resistance to Civil Government"—Thoreau is something of an exception among his contemporaries.  Many of them avoided direct reference to American society and politics, but Thoreau tackles real, concrete issues in a personal voice addressing a common reader.  He speaks for the power and independence of the individual, who is above the government.  The individual ought to be allowed to think for himself and decide if he wants to support some action the government is taking.  If he decides not to participate—by paying a certain tax, for example—he should be allowed to do so without punishment, because the individual is "a higher and independent power" (867).  The idea that must be understood before this type of action can be realized is that a person should be an individual first and a citizen second.  He should think for himself, not let the government think for him.

q       Nathaniel Hawthorne, "Young Goodman Brown" & "The Birth-Mark"—Hawthorne's stories often explore the extremes of human behavior and ultimately portray these in a negative light.  In "Young Goodman Brown," he sets up Brown as an extremist who doesn't understand the basic concepts of his Puritanism: total depravity (related to the notion of original sin), irresistible grace, redemption, and so on. At one point, Hawthorne's narrator suggest that this fault lies with Brown's education; in memorizing his catechism he never truly learned it. He treks off into the wilderness—leaving behind "faith" and home—only to discover that the people he has revered all his life are human (remember "pink" and how it symbolizes what it means to be human). He lives the remainder of his life with all those essentials that often make a good life—family, community, and so on—but "his dying hour was gloom" because of his inability to accept that those he believed holier than himself are not so in reality. "The Birth-Mark" suggests that man's faith in science can be taken too far, that when it comes to creation—of either perfection or a new race—humans in a fallen world can only make fallen creations.  Perfection can't exist on earth (something Aylmer never understands), and if it is somehow achieved, it must leave the world.

q       Edgar Allan Poe, "The Raven," "Ligeia," and "The Cask of Amontillado"—Poe's narrators are often unreliable for a variety of reasons.  Some, like the speaker in "The Raven," appear to have a hidden agenda that motivates their actions.  It is possible to read Poe's poem as the self-torture of a Romantic spirit.  The speaker knows—without really saying he knows—that the bird can speak only one word.  So, he asks a series of questions, each finally more painful than the one before, and receives the answer, "Nevermore."  Some narrators, like the one in "Ligeia," are powerfully affected by both their internal struggles and the world external to themselves.  His melancholy—an intoxicating and influential character trait—causes him to buy a gothic abbey and decorate it with strange furnishings that in turn affect his already shaky mental and emotional state.  He also abuses substances that further alter his understanding of the world and events that take place—or appear to take place—around him.  The narrator of "The Cask of Amontillado" is also suspect.  His own mental and emotional state is questionable because of his mysterious attachment to honor.  We find his telling of his story somewhat unreliable because he doesn't give us the facts of Fortunato's actions, preventing us from making our own judgments about how much Fortunato might have deserved his horrible death.  What does this mean to us as readers?  I think Poe might say that we can't know what goes on in another individual's mind; thus we can't truly know the motives for another's actions.  Or, similarly, no person's rendition of a story—told casually over coffee or beer or formally on the witness stand—can ever be understood as the absolute truth, colored as it is by point of view, character, prejudices, etc.

Example of a statement of significance:

q       Quote:  "To go into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society.  I am not solitary whilst I read and write, though nobody is with me."

q       Response:  Emerson in Nature.  Emerson is saying here that an individual must learn to think for him- or herself, and this can be done only away from the influence of society and human history.  But it also has to do with Emerson's views of our reliance on the past and our need to be out in nature.  Even away from society, if he is surrounded by his "stuff," he can't be alone.  There are objects to remind him of other people and books full of other people's thoughts.  He has to get out of the house and be alone in nature before he can get in touch with God and his true self.

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