Characteristics
-Next, we are going to talk about the most important characteristics of this movement :
During the period of the American Renaissance, the United States' preoccupation with national identity (or New
Nationalism) was expressed by modernism and technology, as well as academic classicism. It expressed its self-
confidence in new technologies, such as the wire cables of the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City..Americans felt that
their civilization was uniquely the modern heir, and that it had come of age. Politically and economically, this era
coincides with the Gilded Age and the New Imperialism.
-the writers were looking for a big change so they decided to start to write different things apart from politics and
religion , which were the main common topics of literature before that when they were under the British influence and
domination , so they were looking for freedom using the powerful resource of literature.
-They had a very interesting point of view about how the corruption of the society damaged the human being .
-They also over value the imagination over the reality
-As all the things that happened to them before the movement they decided to make an emphasis in freedom over
authoritarianism.
-They get inspiration of the daily life Sources
The renaissance of the stories
The story as we know it today reaches maturity thanks to the numerous publications that appeared in literary
magazines, which often reflect the main fashions of the time. Until the arrival of this century, the story has as its main
element the narration of certain events. From this moment on, writers are more interested in the motivations of the
characters than in the events themselves. Simultaneously, their attention is directed towards an elaborate structuring
narrative economy of the facts, exclusion of all secondary material, strict control of the point of view and conciseness.
The new north American poetry
Rhyme loses importance in favor of its own rhythm created by processes of lexical and syntactic repetition. He has a
great wealth of vocabulary, uses geographical terms and uses words from other languages. Use different linguistic
records, from the cult to the most colloquial.
Detective stories
an interest is generated in the plot for what is suspected extraordinary, although reality shows later that it is the facts
that count and not our imagination, and that what cannot be demonstrated is excluded from scientific interest.
CRITICS
There are many criticisms associated with the American Renaissance, and some critics wonder if it ever really took
place. One of the most prominent criticisms is that the authors of this period are considered simply by taking styles
and ideas of past movements and cultures and reforming them into new and contemporary works.
Some critics say that the authors do not address the main political problems during this period, such as slavery, even
if they had a great influence on the writing of the time. The fact that the authors and women's issues were generally
not discussed or published is also criticized.
The notion of an American Renaissance has been criticized for overly emphasizing a small number of white male
writers and artifacts from high culture. William E. Cain noted the "extreme white male training" of Matthiessen's list of
authors and stated that "by dedicating hundreds of pages of analysis and celebration to five white authors,
Matthiessen involuntarily foreshadowed in his book what subsequent readers would dispute and work on. for correct. ”
Some critics argue that the literature written by women during this period was not as popular as it was first thought,
and that it took a distant second place in popularity for works written by men. It is even known that Matthiessen and
other academics exclude women and minority authors, especially African Americans. Critics also argue that there is
no separate style or genre, such as sentimental domestic fiction, which is distinguished by gender. However, other
critics point out that the most widely read authors of the time were women, such as Harriet Beecher Stowe and Fanny
Fern, and criticize Matthiessen for not including women in the original canon.
The demographic exclusivity of the American Renaissance began to erode among academics towards the end of the
20th century. They have included Emily Dickinson in the canon; she began writing poetry in the late 1850s. Uncle
Tom’s Cabin (1852) of Harriet Beecher Stowe achieved a prominent reputation in the late 1970s. African-American
literature, including the slave narratives of masters such as Frederick Douglass, and the first novels of William Wells
Brown, have gained increasing recognition.