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American
Romanticism Sample Student Final Exam Answers 2010 |
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Veronica Ramirez
“Quest” for Romantic Knowledge:
Fall 2010
The American Romanticism course, LITR 5431, this semester has been my favorite
course up to this point in my graduate studies in Literature (no flattery
intended). I am not a teacher, but I am going to use American Romanticism as an
influence for text selection in the future.
I have tried to get my husband and friends into reading but I think that
one of the reasons I have failed, is because of the literature I had
recommended. This time around, I am
going to consider texts from this course and from this time period to recommend,
as some of the main Romantic qualities in our texts, are widely enjoyed and
understood such as the “quest”.
If an educated person where to ask me
what I gained from this course, I would be tempted to point to the syllabus in
order to show the large and varied selection of texts and all of the Romantic
devices used by the authors that we covered.
I would tell them that I gained an expanded vocabulary that I had
previously heard used in other courses, but did not understand, and more
importantly I gained a perspective of the American Romantic Literature period. I
would sincerely suggest taking the course, and look at it from whatever their
own particular perspective may be, for my friend, it would be historical, since
you can learn a lot about American life or politics etc., and for my husband,
just for entertainment.
Placing American Romantic Literature, in a historical sense, has also been one
of the major impacts to my education this semester. When I first looked at the
syllabus, I was a little bit concerned about the amount of literature outside of
the Romantic such as the texts in the sections of Pre-Romantic Writings and Post
Romantic Literature: Realism & Modernism. I
was very surprised at the way they were tied into the course and how useful it
was to read pre Romantic texts and also to see how elements and themes persisted
in Realism and Modernism. This
especially helped in my accompanying course Austen and Wharton, since I could
see some remaining Romantic notions in Wharton’s work.
Another highlight of the semester was reviewing the differences between American
and European Romanticism such as the Gothic. I have always had a love for
British Literature because of the romantic gothic settings and themes.
The settings such as
American Romanticism covers a vast
variety of texts and even forms of literature that it can be enjoyed as
“escapism” literature or seriously studied in regards to the several subjects
and themes. My new interest in American
Literature may push me towards a more balanced study plan to include more
American Literature instead of mostly British and my quest for knowledge about
the American Romantic period will continue.
