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American Literature

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 A.A. Fakoya and G.O. Osoba (eds.), The English Compendium 1 & 2, Department of
English, Lagos State University, Lagos, 2001, 334-341

AMERICAN LITERATURE

Harry Olufunwa
Department of English
University of Lagos, Akoka

When considered in relation to other political entities in the world, the United States stands
out in the sheer uniqueness of her history and socio-political growth. First “discovered” by
European adventures and explorers in the fifteenth century, the U.S. represented the crown
jewel in a New World which encompassed North and South America and the Caribbean
islands. The country soon became the preferred destination for oppressed religious sects
(such as the Pilgrim Fathers and the Puritans) and victimised ethnic groups and nationalities
(such as the Irish and European Jews). America ultimately became the land of opportunity
where dreams could be fulfilled and aspirations met. Her literature is essentially a delineation
of the ways in which American both a symbol and a concrete realisation of such a possibility.
Any study of themes and techniques in U.S. literature depends crucially on how
American literature is itself defined. This is vital because it can be categorised in a variety of
ways through the utilisation of different criteria. Using historical periods, for example, U.S.
literature may be split into six broad groups which correspond with significant periods of the
country in history. These groups are: Colonial Literature, written between 1620 and 1770
when what was to eventually become the United States of America was under British imperial
rule; Revolutionary Literature, which was produced during the American war of
independence between 1772 and 1776; Antebellum Literature, produced before the American
Civil War of 1861 to 1865; Civil War Literature, and the literature produced between the end
of the Civil War and the end of the First World War in 1918; literature produced between the
First World War and the end of the Second World War in 1945: literature produced between
1945 and the present.
American literature can also be categorised along ideological lines, reflecting the way
in which literary texts portray the major philosophical, religious and other concerns of
specific eras. Thus, it can be defined according to the ways in which it was influenced by
concepts like Puritan Christianity, transcendentalism, realism, naturalism and
humanitarianism, as well as the more recent ideas of race, gender and political issues.
Specifically, ethnic criteria represent another way in which U.S. literature can be
categorized. Many American writers can be identified as belonging to specific racial and
ethnic groups, and their writings can consequently be classified according to ethnic origin.
Utilising such criteria, American literature can be classified into Native American Jewish,
Hispanic, African American and Asian American literatures.
The fact that U.S. literature can be classified according to differing (and sometimes
contradictory) criteria makes the task of canon-formation necessary to the selection of major
American authors difficult. Questions of “appropriateness”, however defined, immediately
become apparent. For example, some of the best-known works of American revolutionary
literature fail to acknowledge the injustice of slavery. Also, much of the literature produced
by ethnic minorities is often considered a relatively unimportant tributary to the so-called
mainstream, and as a result, is often assessed according to the critical expectations of the
mainstream rather than on its own terms.
Taking these factors into consideration, therefore, it can be said that the following
works constitute some of the major texts of America Literature. They are: The Scarlet Letter
by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, Leaves of
Grass by Walt Whitman, A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway, A Raisin in the Sun by
Lorraine Hansberry, and Beloved by Toni Morrison.
The above selection omits some of the best-known texts of American literature, but it
does serve to exemplify some of the main themes and trends that have characterised U.S.
literature over nearly three centuries.

The Scarlet Letter

Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804-1864) was the first American author to make extensive use of
historical material. Like his predecessor, James Fenimore Cooper, he was attempting to find
and utilise distinctively American material, and in going back to the past, had appeared to
have done it in a more genuine way, for American history could not but be American. Such
development of a historical sense, that is, the notion that the past was in some way different
from the present, marks an important turning-point in U.S. literature. It was an indication that
the country was beginning to develop a literary tradition of its own, as opposed to the
continued imitation of the literary tradition of the European countries from which many of the
first settlers had emigrated.

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 Hawthone’s favourite themes are sin, guilt, secrecy, the individual conscience,
unwarranted moral and intellectual pride, as well as repentance and gradual moral
degeneration. His sense of the tragedy which seemed to underpin all human existence placed
him at odds with the inherent optimism of the Transcendentalist beliefs of the day.
Along with his contemporary, Edgar Allen Poe, Hawthorne advanced the development
to the short story, emphasising its moral significance in stores like ‘The Minister’s Black
Veil’, ‘Young Goodman Brown and ‘Rappaccini’s Daughter’ (all published in 1837).
The Scarlet Letter is his greatest work. Set in seventeenth-century Boston, the novel
examines the consequences of concealed guilt, the true nature of morality and the effects of
punishment on the punished and the punisher. Hawthorne’s main approach to these issues lies
in utilising the sub-genre of romance, a form situated midway between realism and fantasy.
He also makes extensive use of symbolism which enables him to portray characters and
objects as being ultimately representative of qualities that transcend a particular place and
time. Hawthorne’s symbols are often open to different interpretations, and consequently, are
never quite clear. What he appears to be implying is that there are many ways of looking at
things whereas the Puritans simplify complex issues by seeing them solely in terms of good
and evil.
The major character is a woman called Hester Prynne, and the novel begins with her
punishment for adultery. She has been condemned to wear the letter ‘A’ (for “adultery”) for
the rest of her life. Her lover, the Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale is not exposed, but Hester’s
husband, Roger Chillingworth, embarks on an obsessive search for the man responsible.
Hawthorne emphasises the psychological trauma of Hester’s punishment, suggesting
that its lifelong nature is totally out of proportion to the crime committed. Its consequence is
to take Hester out of membership of Puritan society, both in the sense of being an outcast and
in the sense of no longer sharing the beliefs of her community.
As Hester’s unidentified lover, Dimmesdale is the focus of irony in the novel. Very
early on, he urges her to reveal her partner in crime, stressing that it is better for the person to
be exposed than to “hide a guilty heart” through life. When she refuses, he praises the
generosity of her love. Apart from this, Dimmesdale’s action offers Hawthorne the
opportunity to reveal his essentially human complexity. He cannot be dismissed as a hypocrite
but must be pitied as well as condemned; such is the ambiguity of his position in the novel
The major character, Roger Chilingworth, is symbolic of Hawthorne’s notion of
shallow virtue. He pretends to have forgiven his wife, but requests that she conceal his
identity as her husband and embarks on a search for her lover. He soon discovers that it is

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Dimmesdale and proceeds to torture him mercilessly with oblique references to his sin.
Chillingworth is guilty of what Hawthorne considers a terrible crime – deliberately seeking to
penetrate into the secrets of someone else. Unlike Hester and Dimmesdale, whose sin is that
of passion, Chillingworth acts are deliberate and calculated.
After about seven years, the effects of sin on the three principal characters are
revealed. While Dimmesdale and Chillingworth have both disintegrated morally, Hester’s
thinking has developed and she assumes a freedom of speculation. She questions more things,
including Puritan religion and the meaning and worth inherent in a woman’s life. Although
Dimmesdale’s sense of guilt has made him an effective preacher with great sympathy for
sinners, his mind has not grown and he is continually tormented by his negative perceptions
of himself. For his part, Chillingworth has been completely warped and distorted by his
obsessive desire for revenge, and he becomes a devil in the sense that he thrives on the misery
of others.
Alarmed by Chilllingworth’s actions, Hester tries to persuade Dimmesdale to come
with her to Europe. Dimmesdale is trapped by his Puritan frame of mind, but is swayed by her
love and self-belief. Chillingworth, who arranges to take the same ship, foils this plan. After
preaching his greatest sermon, Dimmesdale confesses and dies in Hester’s arms. In making
his confession, he is able at last to escape the restrictiveness of Puritan thinking because he
chooses to acknowledge God’s mercy rather than the notion of eternal damnation.

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

U. S. Fiction may be said to have truly arrived with the emergence of Mark Twain (1835-
1910), the pseudonym for Samuel Langhorne Clemens. His work symbolised a breaking-away
from the hitherto dominant influence of the eastern U.S. and transcendentalist philosophy, and
thereby provided the impetus for the further development of American literature.
Twain’s life is demonstrative of the sense of possibility inherent in America. Before
he began to write seriously in 1866, he had worked as an apprentice printer, a steamboat pilot,
a soldier, a miner, a journalist and a public lecturer. His wide range of occupations provided
him with a rich store of experience from which to draw material for his later novels and
sketches.
His main themes include attacking the hypocrisy and vice of his day, particularly the
greed and selfishness of the post-civil war era, contrasting the innocent American with the
corrupt European, often in such a way as to show that the American was not as innocent as he

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seemed to be. Twain’s growing pessimism in the 1890s led to increasingly harsh attacks on
humanity as a whole for what he saw as its inherent depravity.
Twains’s most famous work is The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884). It is based
on his memories of his own childhood and was written at a transitional point, midway
between the easy-going humour for which he was famous and the bitter pessimism that
shaped his outlook for the rest of his life.
The Adventure Huckleberry Finn is significant for three main things. It is the first
book in American literature to take a consistent and believable child’s view in fiction. It is
remarkable for its stylistic innovation, especially the accurate and extensive use of Western
dialect which had never before been utilised in a work of serious fiction. The novel is
significant for its sustained use of Western humour, that is, the collection of jokes, tall tales
and “boasts” which characterised the culture of the rapidly-expanding states and territories of
the American West.
Twain’s technique combines dialect speech with the use of rustic and uneducated
characters, as well as a tendency to select unusual points of view and perspectives in order to
bring new insights to the familiar and thereby provide opportunities for satirical comment.
The novel is about a young boy called Huck who seeks freedom from the restrictive middle
class existence into which he has been recently introduced. He flees and is joined by an
escaped slave, and together they float down the Mississippi River, the adventure they undergo
providing an often-unflattering portrayal of American frontier life.
At the novel’s beginning Huck is seen chafing against the restrictions of middle class
life. His adoptive another tries to enlighten him on the virtues of Christianity, but only
confuses him the more. His good friend Tom sawyer also tries to help “sivilize” him, but it is
seen that most of his ideas are unrealistic because they are derived from adventure stories. In
contrast to these conventional characters, Huck stands out as an individualistic person for
whom self-conviction is more important than conformity.
He is kidnapped by his father, a social outcast who wishes to gain control of his son’s
money. Huck escapes but does not return to the society of his adoptive parent. His ideal is
freedom with dignity, and the rest of the novel is taken up with showing how he achieves this.
A pattern of intermittent freedom and captivity emerges, with Huck continually discovering
that freedom in society is illusory and that be must return to the river which is symbolic of
true freedom in nature.
The novel suggests that the flaws that are inherent in human nature are worsened by
social institutions which seem to encourage the manifestation of these flaws in their worst

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aspects. For example, social norms allow white citizens to regard slaves as non-human and,
therefore, subject to ill-treatment. The novel also reveals a parallel between Huck’s quest for
dignity and the slave Jim’s quest for freedom.
Huck and Jim are seen to share several similarities. Both are socially marginalised,
both are kind, humane and, though superstitious, independent thinkers. Initially, Huck is
conscious of his apparent racial superiority and seeks to patronise Jim, but after playing a
cruel trick on him, he realises that he has human feelings which are just as inviolate as his
own. As Jim develops from a stereotypical slave into a fully-realised character, a major crisis
occurs. Huck is compelled to choose between returning Jim to his owner or helping him to
escape. When he assesses his situation in conventional social terms, he feels that he is
committing a great crime, but despite his anguish, he decides to follow his own instincts and
help Jim escape.
This decision is crucial for Huck’s development as a person, because he has finally
realised that life is not a game, and that one’s actions are likely to have unforeseen
consequences. Unlike Tom for whom life is merely a means to re-enact episodes from
adventures stories, Huck’s vision expands and he began to see that even the adults he
encounters are like Tom in that they allow their own desires to blind them to reality. This is
seen in the feud which is carried on by the Grangerford and the Shepherdson families and is
seen as worthwhile activity despite the pointless killing it involves.
The novel’s ending is somewhat controversial. It appears to lose its seriousness as the
main characters become stereotypes and the humour degenerates into a farce. Jim is captured
by a family that mistakes Huck for Jim. Huck and Jim are unable to rise beyond the status of
mere pawns in Tom’s hands, in spite of their superior moral sense. The pointlessness of the
charade becomes even clearer when Tom announced that Jim had been freed a long time ago.
Aware that he is to be adopted again, Huck decides to escape to the western territories.
This makes the ending essentially pessimistic, for it has been repeatedly demonstrated that
society will always impinge on the freedom to be found in nature, and that its vices are self-
perpetuating.

Leaves of Grass
Walt Whitman stands out as one of the first American poets to focus almost entirely upon
themes and subjects that were quintessentially American. The status of the United States as a
democracy created out of a variety of often-contradictory elements is reflected in his poetry.
In ‘The Song of the Broad Axe’ (1856), he examines the ways in which the axe as a tool of

6
development symbolises American expansion and democratic progress, as compared to its use
as a weapon in former times. His Leaves of Grass (1855) celebrates the multiplicity of
impulses to which he is subject, demonstrating the essential universality and equality of all
things.
Such these and ideas grow out of a paradoxical assertion of the democratic principles
of equality and the individualistic celebration of the right to defy convention. ‘Song of Myself’
for example, is both individualistic and communal:
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I shall assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
Whitman, in essence, appears to be trying to answer his own question “how best can I express
my own instinctive era and surroundings, America, Democracy?”
Such uniquely American views are supplemented by a technical flexibility in his
poetry, which is itself a reflection of his extensive reading. Deliberately choosing to write in a
seemingly simple, conventional style, he employs repetition, parallelism, rhetorical
mannerism and free verse.
His poetry represents one of the clearest influences of transcendentalism in U.S.
literature. Transcendentalism holds that God is immanent in the world. It was an essentially
optimistic philosophy, and in his review of Leaves of Grass when it was first published in
1855, Whitman saw himself as a person who was totally at one with his country: “ As
American bard at last! … his voice bringing hope and prophecy to the generous races of
young and old.”
In using the natural rhythm of the speaking voce rather than metrical categories as the
standard unit of his poetry, Whitman was establishing his independence of long-established
poetic conventions brought over from Europe. Although this was criticized as “formlessness,”
he saw them as symbolic of the inventiveness and flexibility that characterized America itself.
As he claims in his preface of Leaves of Grass, “The United States themselves are essentially
the greatest poem.”

A Farewell to Arms
During his lifetime, Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) was the most famous and popular of all
American writers. His novels seem to symbolize the distinctions between the American novel
and the novel in the rest of the world. His subjects revolve around war, injury and death. His
principal characters often suffer injuries from which they are unable to recover, paralleling the

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spiritual damage that they have sustained. Like A Farewell to Arms (1929), many of his
novels are about a young man who has gone through a great trauma which has rendered him
impotent in some important way. Such a character may often join an ongoing conflict or war
in an effort to prove his manhood, but ultimately learns a new set of values, particularly
stoicism.
As an author who was predominantly interested in the predicament of modern man,
Hemmingway’s outlook was essentially pessimistic. He felt that humans lived in a corrupt
world in which they could attain a limited form of freedom if they refused to be dehumanized
by circumstances. This could be achieved by cultivating dignity, unselfishness and individual
morality.
Hemmingway’s technique is famous for its spare style, particularly the elimination of
descriptive passages and the extensive use of dialogue which replicated the disjointed manner
in which people speak in real life.
Such themes and techniques have enhanced common perception of him as a major
spokesman of the “lost generation” of Europeans and Americans living through the cynicism,
disillusionment and hopelessness of social, political and economic collapse.
A Farewell to Arms is set during the First World War and deals with the human
response to the death and destruction of warfare, and the possibilities of love, hope and
growth. The principal character is Frederick Henry, an American medical volunteer serving
on the Italian front. When he is introduced, he is portrayed in a way that contrasts him with
others. Unlike them, he is not there as a fighter but as a healer; he is not a conscript but a
volunteer who joined the war before his country did.
Such distinctions point to the noble intentions with which he had volunteered to serve.
Initially, he thought that he could make a positive contribution but begins to think that nothing
really matters anymore. He seeks solace in alcohol and sex, but neither seems to provide the
escape from reality that he so desperately wants.
The war continues and disillusionment spreads. While Henry and his friends are
discussing the possibilities of pacifism as an end to all wars, they are hit by a mortar round
and many are killed. Henry is wounded but is saved due to the prompt medical treatment he
obtained as a non-Italian. Somehow, he is perceived as a hero even though he does nothing to
merit that status, and this, for him, is symbolic of the emptiness of pacifism.
In hospital, Henry is given two points of view concerning love. One, from a soldier,
sees love as lust, and it is a point of view that demonstrates the manner in which war has led

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to the collapse of values. The other comes from a priest who is Henry’s friend, and he speaks
of a moral life which is characterized by unselfish love.
It is in these circumstances that he falls in love with an English nurse, Catherine
Barkley. Although their relationship is consummated in typically sexual terms, it also
represents a way in which they become closer, and represents a kind of healing and recovery
for both of them. Proof of this is seen in their ability to converse on several levels at the same
time. They conceive of their relationship as a spiritual marriage which stands in positive
contrast to the conventional marriages they observe.
However, the circumstances in which they find themselves begin to impinge on them,
and this is made clear by Catherine’s pregnancy. Apart from the demands of society and the
war, both find that their freedom is restricted by female biology and male responsibility.
As a consequence of this, a new set of ideals begin to emerge. The heroic ideal is no
longer seen in one who conforms to social expectations, but in the person who is able to resist
pressures from the outside world and live the life that he or she wants to live. The change in
Henry from disillusionment to hope is seen in his purchase of a gun now that he has
something to live for he is prepared to kill to survive.
Back at the front, Henry demonstrates an entranced vision, which can be seen in the
development of his own sense of morality and the rejection of hypocrisy of pretending by the
chaos at the front. As panic and desertion became rife, Henry leaves the fighting, determined
to get back to Catherine.
Back in Milan, Henry and Catherine remain as close as ever, but his desertion and her
unwed pregnancy alienate them from society. Henry now begins to perceive the world as an
enemy which tries to break morally courageous people.
They flee to neutral Switzerland and are able to enjoy a brief respite from war.
However, complications arise in Catherine’s pregnancy, and Henry begins to experience an
increasing sense of foreboding that the world has eventually caught up with them. Catherine
has similar feelings of despair. She and the baby die. Henry leaves the hospital, accusing God
of indifference.

A Raisin in the Sun

Lorraine Hansberry’s (1930-1965) play, A Raisin in the Sun (1959), represents a major
contribution to American drama. The three-act play is a classic example of American realist
drama and captures the spirit of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s.
Hansberry’s first and most successful play, it is in many ways a reflection of her life, beliefs

9
and experiences. Although she was born into a wealthy African American family, her parents
instilled in her a love of African-American tradition and a sense of solidarity with black
working people. Much of her writings is a reflection of her view that art is social and
consequently must portray the concerns of society, especially those sections that are
vulnerable to the excesses of capitalism.
The play dramatizes the hopes, aspirations, complexes and fears of a multigenerational
African-American working-class family in the late fifties. Its principal themes include social
and economic progress, intergenerational friction, racism, feminist issues, personal racial
identity, and human worth. The play’s dramatis personae consists of Mama Lena Younger,
the family’s head; Walter Lee Younger, her son: his wife, Ruth; Beneatha, Mama’s daughter;
Joseph Asagai and George Murchison, friends of Benetha; and Travis, Walter’s young son.
The play’s action is set in Chicago’s South Side ghetto and covers a time span of a few weeks.
The location of all the action within the family’s living room places A Raisin in the
Sun within the sub-category of the so-called “kitchen sink dramas,” which may be defined as
dramatic pieces in which important social issues are examined within a narrowly domestic
setting. However, it is within this restricted framework that Hansberry is able to treat some of
the most fundamental ideas that shape the nature of U.S. society. The play’s plot turns upon
how the family will spend the insurance money, but the real dramatic interest is centered upon
how the prospect of imminent prosperity reveals the inner nature of a family blighted by
poverty and racial oppression. Every member of the family sees the money as offering a better
life, but their differing opinions over how it is to be spent bring out the difficulties and
frustrations of African American life. This is especially true of Walter, who is the play’s
clearest expression of the belief in the power of money as a redemptive force. As he
obsessively recounts his dreams and plans, it is seen that his restricted circumstances have
engendered a sharp frustration which only the money can ameliorate. For the other characters,
the money is regarded as a great benefit, but they are also aware that is not a solution to all of
life’s problems, and certainly not a substitute for love and dignity. This is why the money
loses its conventional significance as a measure of wealth and ultimately becomes the
yardstick by which the characters are able to assess their human worth and potential in a
society that has made life so difficult for them.

Beloved
Toni Morrison (1931 to the present) occupies a very special place in U.S literature. As an
African American and as a woman, she symbolizes ethnic and gender minorities that have

10
often been ignored in discussions of the development and growth of American literature. At
the same time, however, she draws upon the unique literary heritage of the nation that is the
legacy of every American writer.
In a more specific sense, Morrison’s work tackles the central problems of identifying
the ways in which history memory survives and overcoming the traumas that have
characterized African American life. Her novels examine the essence of human relationships,
often focusing upon those whose shape the outlook and fate of African American women. Her
technique reflects the African American oral tradition, especially its characteristic
improvisation, flexibility and musicality. She also has a tendency to utilize magical realism, in
which normal spatial and temporal categories are moulded to meet specific plot requirements.
Beloved (1987) deals with the impact of slavery and its aftermath upon the psyche of
an African American individual, and by extension, upon her community. It shows how
history, perception and memory work together to define notions of good and evil, and how
they evoke widely-differing responses in a variety of individuals.
At the start of the novel, an escaped slave, Sethe Suggs, is living in a house with her
daughter, Denver. They are isolated from the rest of the black community because of the
popular belief that the house is haunted, allegedly by Sethe’s dead infant daughter.
Sethe has responded to this isolation by trying to build an independent, self-containing
life for herself and her daughter. Both try to accommodate the supernatural presence in their
midst. One day, they are visited by Paul D, an acquaintances from Sweet Home, the farm
from which Sethe escaped. His first act is to expel the ghost, an action which incurs Denver’s
hostility. Soon after, they meet a homeless young black girl who says her name is Beloved,
the exact word engraved on the headstone of Sethe’s dead daughter.
Through Paul D, details of Sethe’s life at Sweet Home emerge: how their master had
encouraged a freedom of thought and action unusual in slavery; how this changed with the
arrival of a new master with fixed ideas of black inferiority; the traumatic circumstances of
Seth’s departure. Beloved’s presence in the house creates tension, with Paul D scheming to
get her out in opposition to the wishes of Sethe, and especially Denver, who is convinced that
Beloved is her dead sister come back to life. This conflict is exacerbated by Paul D’s learning
of the circumstances of the death of Sethe’s daughter, who was killed by Sethe herself in
order to avent her being taken back into slavery. He confronts Sethe with this information
and, rejecting Sethe’s explanation of her actions, moves out of the house.
Beloved becomes the centre of attraction for Sethe, who regards her return as proof
that she has been forgiven. Even Denver, who had sought to protect Beloved against a

11
 possible recurrence of infanticide, begins to realize that Beloved has become ever more
demanding of Sethe’s attention. Sethe stops working and the family comes ever-nearer to the
prospect of starvation. To avert this, Denver who has never ventures beyond their home, is
compelled to seek the assistance of the black community.
Rumours of the situation begin to spread, and eventually the women of the community
decide upon mass action to confront what they see to be the evil spirit that is slowly killing
Sethe. In the ensuing confrontation, Beloved disappears. The novel ends with Paul D pledging
renewed loyalty to Seth and Denver’s emergence as an articulate and responsible young
woman.

REFERENCES
Williams L. Andrews, et. al. (eds.), The Oxford Companion to African American Literature
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1997).
Samuel Langhorne Clemens, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884; New York:
Macmillan Inc., 1962).
Norman Foster, American Poetry and Prose, vol. 2 (1957; Boston Houghton Mifflin
Company, 1962).
Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun: A Drama in Three Acts (New York: Random House,
1959)
Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter (1850; London: Dent and Co., 1957).
James D. Hart, The Oxford Companion to American Literature (1941; New York: Oxford
University Press, Inc. 1948).
Ernest Hemmingway, A Farewell to Arms (1929; London: Jonathan Cape Ltd, 1957).
Geoffrey Moore (ed.), American Literature: A Representative Anthology of American Writing
From Colonial Times to the Present (London: Faber and Faber Ltd, 1964).
Toni Morrison, Beloved (New York: Random House, 1987).
George M. Michael, et. al. (eds.), Concise Anthology of American Literature (1974; New
York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1985).
Robert E. Spiller, et. al. (eds.), Literary History of the United States: History (1946; New
York: The Macmillan Company, 1963).
Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, Edwin H. Miller, editor (1855; New York: AHM Publishing
Co., 1970).

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