Transcript Final Naturalism

Naturalism
1880-1940
Colten Leonard, Noah Smith, Ryan Townsend, Matthew Southerland
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Dark view of the world
Unpredictable universe
Free will is an illusion
Characters' lives shaped by forces
they can't control ( Nature)
• Dominant themes: survival, fate,
violence, nature as an indifferent
force
• Influenced by Darwin & Marx
(Survival of the Fittest
&Money/Class)
• Civil War brings “truer literature”
Question & Answer
Q: Naturalism is an offshoot of
what literary period?
A: It is an extension of the Realism Period.
What did the naturalists seek to
explain?
Naturalists wanted to explain the underlying
forces of nature that influence our
decisions and actions as human beings.
“None of them knew the color of the
sky. Their eyes glanced level, and
were fastened upon the waves that swept
toward them. These waves were of
the hue of slate, save for the tops, which
were of foaming white, and
all of the men knew the colors of the sea.
The horizon narrowed and
widened, and dipped and rose, and at all
times its edge was jagged with
waves that seemed thrust up in points like
rocks. Many a man ought to
have a bath-tub larger than the boat which
here rode upon the sea. These
waves were most wrongfully and
barbarously abrupt and tall, and each
froth-top was a problem in small-boat
navigation.” -Stephen Crane, excerpt
from “The Open Boat”
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Response:
• This excerpt is relative to the period because the
writer’s of this period liked to focus on the nature
and how it had dominance over man. Stephen
Crane used imagery to make nature look even that
much more menacing. This excerpt uses such
imagery to make the waves and rocks more
treacherous than if he just said the waves and rocks
were dangerous.
Focus of Crane’s Work
• Extreme experiences
that are confronted by
ordinary people
• looks in without
knowing the outcome
of the novel.
• The works contain vivid
imagery.
• Nature possesses
dominance over man
Origin
• Begins getting popular around 1890 and stays
popular for about 20 years.
• Its most famous & influential authors include:
Stephen Crane (The Red Badge of Courage;1895),
Theodore Dreiser (Sister Carrie;1900), & Upton
Sinclair (The Jungle;1906).
“When Caroline Meeber boarded the afternoon
train for Chicago, her total outfit consisted of a
small trunk, a cheap imitation alligator-skin
satchel, a small lunch in a paper box, and a
yellow leather snap purse, containing her
ticket, a scrap of paper with her sister's
address in Van Buren Street, and four dollars
in money. It was in August, 1889. She was
eighteen years of age, bright, timid, and full of
the illusions of ignorance and youth. Whatever
touch of regret at parting characterized her
thoughts, it was certainly not for advantages
now being given up. A gush of tears at her
mother's farewell kiss, a touch in her throat
when the cars clacked by the flour mill where
her father worked by the day, a pathetic sigh
as the familiar green environs of the village
passed in review, and the threads which bound
her so lightly to girlhood and home were
irretrievably broken.”
-Theodore Dreiser
Response:
• It basically talks about
how her memories and
home have been
“irretrievably broken”.
• It mentions how the
realism of life is not
what people always
expect.
• The pain is natural all
throughout the writing
of this period.
Upton Sinclair
• Exposed possible or real
corruption
• Social Activist
• Essayist
• Won the Pulitzer Prize
for “The Jungle”
They put him in a place
where the snow could not
beat in, where the cold
could not eat through his
bones; they brought him
food and drink—why, in
the name of heaven, if
they must punish him, did
they not put his family in
jail and leave him
outside—why could they
find no better way to
punish him than to leave
three weak women and
six helpless children to
starve and freeze?
Response:
• Exposed corruption in
the meat packing
industry.
• Corruption is present
in our world
(Government)
• Alters the view of
America and damages
• Impacted political/social
the American Spirit
reforms
• Life doesn’t always
• Public uproar
live up to what you
• Contributed to 1906 Food
expect.
and Drug Act & the Meat
Inspection Act