LITR 4232 American Renaissance

Sample Midterm Answers 2004

Part 1. “Identify and signify.” (15-20 minutes)

Choose and analyze a passage from our course readings—and make it matter!

·        Choose a passage. First, consult your memory: Which page or moment in our texts reminds itself to you? Ask yourself why, then start explaining why the passage speaks to you or why you’ve chosen it. Personal reasons are all right for starters, but “universalize” the passage’s appeal or significance. The passage may or may not be one we went over in class, but it should connect to one or more of the course objectives or themes. You might treat two passages as long as they’re intimately and directly connected to each other.

·        Analyze. Midterm samples can provide examples of this process. Describe how the language works to create meaning, appeals to readers, and develops themes or ideas. Analyze the textual passage on its own terms or by comparing it to other texts.

·        Make it matter. Why or how does the passage speak to literary and/or cultural issues in and beyond this course?

Uncle Tom’s Cabin pg(2503)

“She dreamed of a beautiful country,--a land, it seemed to her, of rest, --green shores, pleasant islands, and beautiful glittering water; and there, in a house which kind voices told her was a home, she saw her boy playing, a free and happy child. She heard her husband’s footsteps; she felt him coming nearer; his arms were around her, his tears falling on her face, and she awoke! It was no dream. The daylight had long faded; her child lay calmly sleeping by her side; a candle was burning dimly on the stand; and her husband was sobbing by her pillow.”

            This passage is referring to Eliza’s feeling of relief after she hears about George coming to the Quaker settlement. I chose it because I believe Stowe is using a great deal of Romantic element to relate to a targeted female audience. The reason Stowe targeted the female audience is discussed in the 2002 student presentations, “Primarily, she targets the female audience because women were more likely to respond to family issues and although they could not vote, their opinions did have influence with the men in their lives”

  The language Stowe uses to refer to Eliza’s dream images is remarkable in its Romantic elements. The relationship and reference Eliza feels with nature and the freedom this brings to her when she knows George is coming to her. She is not only encouraged, but released from a little of the bondage she has felt along her journey so far. This is by no means the climax of the story, but Eliza’s feelings give a past adventure of chaos a new orderly and hopeful feeling that women as a targeted audience can easily relate with. This reunion of family is also so bittersweet a feeling that the sublime is present awakens the audience. George, Eliza, and Harry are finally united together again only to turn out into their dangerous escape to freedom. The feelings alerted by this use of romantic element in the female audience are again so intense an immediate feeling of sympathy is expressed. [AC]

Emerson’s Nature starts off with a ringing plea for independence from the past. No more, he says, should we trust blindly in the religion, philosophy, and tradition handed down to us by previous generations. No more should we linger in the thoughts of others and not of ourselves. No more should we hear about the sun; it is time to see the sun for ourselves.

This first paragraph is full of the romantic, the gothic, and the sublime. The traditions of the past are seen as decadent and lifeless, indeed dark. Emerson speaks of the “dry bones of the past” and the “sepulchers of the fathers”, rather gothic images.

However, the past itself is not to blame; the problem is when we become enslaved to it. “The sun shines today also,” implying that it also shone in the past. In fact, Emerson blames his own generation for the enslavement, saying “Our age is retrospective.” Some previous generations sought truth for themselves, and here catch a brief glimpse of the romantic view of the past. Emerson wishes to return to that earlier spirit of discovering truth for oneself. “There are new lands, new men, new thoughts,” he says, “Let us demand our own works and laws and worship.” The possibilities of the future are nearly unlimited.

We also seem examples of the sublime in this passage. Nature’s “floods of life stream around and through us,” which is both beautiful and terrifying. “The foregoing generations beheld God and nature face to face,” which means there is nothing to separate you from divine beauty, but also nothing to protect you from divine power. Finally, Emerson suggests that his generation “demand our own works and laws and worship.” In other words, we should strike out from the comfortable and decayed and seek the untamed, the unexplored, and the untranslated. [BL]

The passages that stood out to me the most in all of our readings were the mysterious noise passages (one in chapter 6 and the other in chapter 9) of Last of the Mohicans, and I would like to discuss the obvious gothic element there. Initially when I first read this passage, it stood out to me is as similar to some passages in the Lord of the Rings I just read this summer, where the Fellowship hear strange screechings coming from the unseen Nazgul flying in the night. The emotion I get when I read these passages in the two different books is the same, that of the Uncanny, thus they stood out to me as being remarkable gothic.

Although, in class we have associated the union of “joy” and “pain” as an element of the sublime these elements often overlap elements of the gothic and are closely associated with “light” and “dark.” I bring up both contrasts (joy versus pain and light versus dark) because this passage doesn’t use any of these exactly but the emotions we feel when we read this passage closely imitate these unions. The two mysterious noises (that from the horse and that from the Indians) are treated remarkably similar by Cooper. In both cases the first sounds we hear are not the horrible noise but instead the soothing sounds of the water fall and the beautiful song either sung by Major Heyward himself or the chorus of the group as a whole. The songs are so moving they bring multiple characters to tears. The language Cooper uses to describe the songs, exalts them into a higher realm; its beauty is as if an angels are singing it. “The melody, which no weakness could destroy, gradually wrought its sweet influence on the senses of those who heard it.” Even the “miserable travesties” were temporarily forgotten and the emotion in the cave experienced by everyone can most simply be described as “joy.”

Then the horrible yell is heard, through out the cave. One should point out how closely together these two contrary states are aligned by Cooper. Cooper does not even wait until the song is over, no the horrible noise interrupts it, placing the darkness directly in contact with the light. In the second noise passage, Alice yells, “We are lost,” and the story moves from and exalted realm of everlasting life, drastically to the fear of death. It is the unification of these two opposite emotions (Joy and Pain) that gives this passage an undoubtedly gothic feel, more than if Cooper had simply inserted mysterious noise at random. [BP]

     The passage I have chosen is from the book, The Last of the Mohicans by James Fenimore Cooper.  The reason I chose this passage is due to the fact that it caught my attention as being the gothic, which we have discussed in class . . . From Sherry Mann’s presentation on the gothic, she points out Hawk-eye’s journey as he enters into the thicket, “crossed a babbling brook, and halted in a narrow dell, under the shade of a few water elms”(119).  She points out the brook as being “personified, typical of the gothic style and the forest as being dark and shaded and a symbol of “a place of terror and fear”.  . . .

It is here that I will bring the passage I have chosen into play (beginning on page 174).  For in this passage we will see what “comes hither” from the wilderness and who crosses the “dark boundary of the wooded banks”.  As the British surrender to the French, gathering all the personnel from the fort, the dark and evil that has resided in the forest crosses the boundary and now we, as readers, personally encounter the gothic evil that Cooper has alluded to in his novel.  Setting us up for this is the phrase “an enormous cloud seemed to pass suddenly above their heads” (p174).  We know that something terrible is going to happen as Fenimore cites the weak, the wounded and the terror of the women and children.  . . . [Magua’s] cry and the yells of the oncoming savages (demons) as they “break from the forest” and cross the boundary that had previously restrained them brings gothic life to Magua and he become the beast, the devil incarnate finally coming to claim his victims.  This can be confirmed by Cooper’s use of related words and terms such as “”many among them…and drank freely…hellishly, of the crimson tide (p176).  As “on every side arose shrieks, groans, exhortations, and curses” (176) one begins to feel that hell is here, in this parcel of land which Gamut describes as the “jubilee of devils”(177).  The devil (Magua) now has his victims and “gothic-like” he moves into the darkness of the woods (as a devil returns to his hell) and “entered the woods through a low ravine…and plunged deeper into the forest” (178).  . . . [MB]

The passage I chose is from Emerson’s “Self-Reliance,” on page 1560 of our textbook. The passage begins, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin…,” and it ends with, “to be great is to be misunderstood.” I chose this passage specifically for the last line, because it sparked in me a realization of its truth, for that is what it is, a truth. The men he lists, Socrates, Luther, Galileo and the rest…all were very great men, and each has been misunderstood or misinterpreted. Throughout all of history, those men and women who have aspired to greatness have lived with this curse. It has proven to be almost unavoidable. I expanded beyond this sentence to look at the rest of the paragraph, and to my surprise and delight, found more than I expected.

            The third of our course objectives revolves around using literature to discuss aspects of American culture, such as “the individual and the community.” Emerson does that here in this passage. He talks about how “foolish consistency” within an individual can keep us from self-trust, or self-reliance. Emerson says, “speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words, though it contradict every thing you say to-day.” It is not the consistency of the individual that is truly important, but the conviction with which you hold your beliefs. True, this may confound the community the individual lives in, for “the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts” (two paragraphs above current passage), but if an individual is to be him- or herself, continuing to do something you do not believe in, merely for the sake of “consistency” is, well, foolish, even if it means that you are misunderstood.

            Taking a closer glimpse at this short bit of text, I also noticed some literary elements we’ve discussed in class, though they may not be all that prominent. In the first sentence, Emerson calls consistency a “hobgoblin of little minds.” Though it seems merely passing, there is a faint essence of the gothic in this, as hobgoblins are little, mischievous phantoms. “Every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh,” seems to me to pull a little on Emerson’s Transcendentalist nature, while the last line, “to be great is to be misunderstood,” reminds me of the sublime. There are those who say that some forms of fear are merely results of misunderstanding the nature of what it is you fear, and were not great men like Jesus feared in their time, because they were misunderstood? We fear what is great, because we misunderstand it. [JD]

Immediately Frederick Douglass comes to my mind.  As he stands above the bay and yearns for the freedom that he cannot reach, he articulates an amazing dialogue between his dreams, his fears and his reality.  The progression of this inner monologue is reminiscent of Hamlet’s “To be, or not to be” soliloquy.  One can see the longing for the satiation of the deepest thirst in Douglass’ soul. It begins with the realization of his own plight. “Oh that I were free! Oh, that I were on one of your gallant decks, and under your protecting wings” he laments watching the boats sail freely.  Douglass educated himself by any means necessary and became aware of the injustice that he was enduring with every passing day in the bonds of slavery.  With his education came frustration for he had little hope of freedom, but unlike most slaves, he was aware of the dream of it.  Douglass then appeals to a higher power for help.  “Oh God, save me!  Oh God, deliver me! Let me be free!” then something scares him, perhaps occurs to him for the first time, “Is there any God?”  Douglass is brought to the point of despair that makes him question the most basic piece of his own beliefs.

This is significant because most people who live full lives are brought to this point.  And it is at this point that the roads diverge and the paths that follow become ever more dissimilar as time goes by.  It is at this point that people hold on to faith, or abandon it as nonsense.  Douglass paints this moment in his own life in such a way that one can feel his conflict.  This question is immediately followed by a resolution to act.  “I will run away…God helping me I will.” So Douglass does not give up his faith, instead he uses the highest authority for the motivation of his action.  At this point the reader becomes enveloped in the ideas of freedom.  As I was reading plans of escape began to run through my head, it couldn’t be so hard could it?  This is where this text is quite romantic, hope breaking down the barriers of injustice.  Douglass is not writing a romance, however. He immediately quiets his own soul and the pounding hearts of the reader by closing this segment “thus I used to speak to myself; goaded almost to madness at one moment, and the next, reconciling myself to my wretched lot.”  He is writing reality.  He is writing his own frustrations and, though I cannot imagine the life he led, there are points in my life where I had dreams of greatness or transcendence that never came to fruition. So this is where reality and romance meet incompatibly.  Where hope meets an unchanging reality. [DD]

In a particular passage from The Last of the Mohicans by Cooper, it employed gothic and sublime almost simultaneously, a prevalent usage in the novel. I chose this passage not only because it contains romantic element studied in our American Renaisance course, but because these elements are interesting and emphasize the dark and strange moments in history. In this scene, Heyward, Hawkeye, Chingagook, Uncas, Munro, are taking a break as they “light their fire” after having searched for Alice and Cora. What’s gothic in this scene is seclusion and especially the contrast and use of light, dark, and red in that the clouds are “gathering in black masses while the lighter scud still hurried above the water” and the men are surrounded by an “impenetrable darkness” in a deserted area (190). In the scene “a red and fiery star struggled through the drifting vapour,” which produced a “lurid gleam of brightness to the dull aspect of the heaven”  (190). In addition, the fiery star is personified with a human feature, struggling. The effect of the gothic makes the audience a little uneasy producing some anxiety and fear. What’s sublime in this passage is that a beautiful bright glowing star is present but it’s redness signifies anger and possibly blood.

It’s very probable that Cooper is alluding to the “red” Indians when he refers to the red fiery star. The emphasized quote in bold perfectly aligns the whites and the Indians. A red and fiery star equals Indians, the minority either struggling to join the melting pot or resist such as Magua. On the other hand the “drifting vapour” equals whites, the dominant culture. Looking back at the effect of the sublime, Cooper may be trying to produce an innovative view of the Indians as a sublime figure that though they had to remain dark, fiery, and rebellious to achieve a better life, what makes them beautiful and elevated are the unique struggles and experiences courageously faced in order to achieve a better life. [SM]

I chose a passage in Frederick Douglass’ Narrative of the life of Frederick Douglass, the first paragraph on page 1856.  I chose this passage for personal reasons at first, but after careful consideration, realized how much it took from the romantic genre.  At first, I really felt a sensation of being free, along with Douglass after his realization that he was just a slave in name, and that he was free in his own mind and heart.  Recently, I moved out of my parent’s house, and though my parents aren’t slaveholders (they’re the best parents ever), I can feel almost the same type of freedom he had.  Upon closer inspection, however, I really came to realize how much of the romantic genre was being used to write it.  Douglass’ “rekindled the few expiring embers of freedom, and revived within me a sense of my own manhood.”  He “repelled the bloody arm of slavery” and was “resurrect[ed] from the tomb of slavery, to the heaven of freedom.”  He feasts upon the romantic genre, specifically the gothic subgenre.  The interplay between the darkness of slavery (tomb of slavery, bloody arm) and his blinding light of freedom (Rekindled embers, heaven of freedom) is fascinated and very well structured.  He also minutely delves into the sublime, saying that he would die for his thoughts that he was just a slave in name only.  He would go through the pain of death just so his pleasure of being free in his mind is startling, but must of ran through every slave’s head during that time.  He creates a work in which the gothic moved away from the forest, as displayed by other major American authors, and put it the house, in the fields, right in front of every slave-holder.  This passage is ripe with many different ideas, and struck me as one of the most influential passages so far this year. [JL]

In making a study of the American Renaissance, a student will uncover a great variety of authors and works belonging to the period.  This semester we have been asked to evaluate many of these, and, due to time constraints, the class has been unable to make an in-depth, in-class analysis of each.  For the purposes of this essay, we will explore one such overlooked piece, entitled Speech of Chief Seattle. 

            Initially, Chief Seattle’s speech strikes the reader as a profound example of representative literature.  As a Native American educated in Catholic mission schools, Seattle concentrates on the illumination of his under-represented people.  Comparing the cultural traditions of his race with that of the White Man, the Chief indicates the prevalence of oral tradition: “Our religion is the traditions of our ancestors—the dreams of our old men, given them in the solemn hours of night by the Great Spirit; and the visions of our sachems, and is written in the hearts of our people (p.1420).”  Also typical of representative literature, the Speech of Chief Seattle indicates problems of authenticity.  Our version comes from the written notes of Dr. Henry Smith, who claimed to understand the Suquamish language, but admits his translation is a shadow of the original.  Later developments have also involved several altered versions, leaving both the reader and the author himself with very little control over the text. 

            Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, than the representative nature of the piece, is the universal emotional appeal employed by the Chief.  While taking measured steps to indicate the separateness of his race, Seattle manages to speak respectfully and fairly of the White Man, engendering the sympathies of the reader.  The transcendent spirit of the Indian, even in the face of annihilation, resounds throughout the piece and appeals to all human suffering: “Dead, did I say?  There is no death, only a change of worlds (p. 1422).”  Even after establishing that “we are two distinct races with separate origins and separate destinies,” Chief Seattle makes his most powerful appeal to both the past and present by unifying all of mankind.  “But why should I mourn at the untimely fate of my people?  Tribe follows tribe, and nation follows nation like the waves of the sea.  It is the order of nature, and regret is useless.  Your time of decay may be distant…for even the White Man…cannot be exempt from the common destiny.  We may be brothers after all.  We will see (p. 1421).”   One of the savage minority he may well be, but there is not one modern reader who could argue the historical factuality of Chief Seattle’s theory of civilizations.  I found this piece particularly moving due to these insights, and while the “Vanishing Indian” may well have come to pass, Chief Seattle reminds all Americans that the spirits of the past walk with us even in the 21^st century.  [MT]

The passage I chose is from Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and starts at the very bottom in the last paragraph of page 1968 and continues on to page 1969. In this paragraph, Linda talks about the house that Dr. Flint is going to build for her and how she is disgusted at the thought of it. I think this paragraph has elements of the gothic, sublime, and romantic. . . .

Also, the passage is gothic. First, the idea of the house being something loathsome is gothic. Linda sees the house as something evil and so vows to “never enter it.” The house may not be haunted, but in Linda’s mind, it might as well be because so much evil is associated with it. Also, she says, “I had rather toil on the plantation from dawn till dark; I had rather live and die in jail, than drag on, from day to day, through such a living death.” This passage also sounds very gothic. The color scheme of “dawn” and “dark” invoke a gothic feeling. The part about the “living death” also sounds very gothic because while her body is alive, her mind is dead, which is a scary and mysterious thing. This part could also be sublime because, like I said, Dr. Flint sees the house as a wonderful thing, but she sees it as a “living death.” Also, the part about living and dying in jail sounds very gothic, and it could also be romantic because she is dying for what she believes in: to be free of Dr. Flint.

            Finally, the passage ends on a romantic note. She says, “What could I do? I thought and thought, til I became desperate, and made a plunge into the abyss.” This last part about plunging “into the abyss” sounds very romantic. The reader can see that she is jumping into something scary that is her last resort. It also sounds gothic because the “abyss” brings up feelings of darkness and the unknown. She goes on to explain what she does, but when one stops at this sentence, it makes one feel scared for Linda yet interested in what she is going to do next. [NC]