1. Background Information
1) About the authors
Horton and Edwards are joint authors of the book Backgrounds of American Literary Thought, from which this text is taken.
Rod W. Horton (1910-?), born in N.Y. worked in New York University and Colorado University. In addition to Backgrounds of American Literary Thought (1952), he, together with Vincent F. Hopper, published Backgrounds of European Literature (1954).
2) The Sad Young Men & the Lost Generation
The term “Sad Young Men” was created by F. Scott Fitzgerald in his book All the Sad Young Men, whilethe term “Lost Generation” was first used by Gertrude Stein when she was addressing to Hemingway.
Both are used to refer to the disillusioned intellectuals and aesthetes of the years after World War I, who rebelled against former ideals and values, but could replace them only by despair or a cynical hedonism.
The representatives are Earnest Hemingway, William Faulkner, F Scott Fitzgerald, etc.
3) Representative writers of the Lost Generation
(1) Gertrude Stein (1874 - 1946)
American author and patron of the arts. A celebrated personality, she encouraged,
aided, and influenced - through her patronage as well as through her writing –
many literary and artistic figures.
In 1902 she went abroad and from 1903 until her death lived chiefly in Paris.
During the 1920s she was the leader of a cultural salon, which included such writers as Hemingway, Sherwood Anderson, F. Scott Fitzgerald, all of whose works she influenced. It was she who first coined the phrase "lost generation" for those post-war expatriates.
Some of her best known works are: Three Lives (1909), The Making of Americans (1925),Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas ( 1933) (her own autobiography presented as that ofher secretary companion).
(2) John Dos Passos (1896-1970)
A radical American novelist and artist active in the first half of the twentieth century. In 1920 he had his first novel published, One Man's Initiation. He is best known for his U.S.A. (a trilogy) which consists of the novels The 42nd Parallel (1930), 1919 (1932), and The Big Money (1936).
(3) Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)
World-famous American novelist and short story writer. His novels include: The Sun Also Rises, A Farewell to Arms, For Whom the Bell Tolls, and The Old Man and the Sea and many others. In 1954 he was awarded the highest prize a writer can receive, the Nobel Prize in Literature.
(4) F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)
American novelist and short-story writer. He is considered the literary spokesman of the Jazz Age. Among his famous works are: This Side of Paradise,
The Beautiful and Damned, The Great Gatsby, Tales of Jazz Age, All the Sad Young Men, etc.
(5) Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941)
American novelist and short story writer, best known for his novel Winesburg, Ohio. His well-know short stories are: Departure, Death in theWood, The Poor White.
(6) T. S. Eliot (1888-1965)
American-English poet, playwright, and literary critic, a leader of the modernist movement in literature. Eliot was awarded the Nobel Prize in literature in 1948. Some of his important works include: The Wasteland, Murder in the Cathedral, The Sacred Wood, etc.
(7) Eugene O’ Neill (1888-1953)
American dramatist. Widely acknowledged as America’s greatest playwright, winner of the Nobel Prize in literature in 1936. Among his best-known plays are Beyond the Horizon, Anna Christine, DesireUnder the Elms, The Emperor Jones, and The Iceman Cometh, etc. O'Neill's plays range in style from satire to tragedy.
(8) William Faulkner (1897-1962)
American novelist. In American literature, William Faulkner is a giant. He was
awarded the Nobel Prize in 1949. His best-known novels are: The Sound and the Fury, As I lay Dying, Sanctuary; A Fable, Go Down, Moses, etc.
(9) Sinclair Lewis (1895-1951)
American novelist, playwright, and social critic who gained popularity with satirical novels. Sinclair Lewis won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1930, the first American NovelPrize winner. His best-known novels are: Main Street, Babbitt , Sinclair Lewis’s classic commentary on middle-class society), Arrowsmith , etc.
4) Greenwich Village
It is a section of New York, on the lower west side of Manhattan notedas a center for artists, writers etc., formerly a small village of quaint houses, crooked streets, and old barns. It is known as the living center for artists and writers after WWI and several generations of writers and artists have lived and worked there.
5) American Culture in the 1920s
The 1920s is also called the “ Roaring Twenties”. It is a period of American prosperity and optimism, a period of great advance as the nation became urban and commercial, a period of rising intolerance and isolation, a period of great contradiction of rising optimism and deadening cynicism, of increasing and decreasing faith, of great hope and great despair. The young lived a unconventional life by drinking, hedonism and merry-making.
6) Jazz Age and the Roaring Twenties
Jazz Age (or the Roaring Twenties) refers to the 1920s, also the Age of the Lost Generation. It a rich period of American writing, distinguished by the works of such authors as Sinclair Lewis, Willa Cather, William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Carl Sandburg and Ernest Hemingway
At the beginning of the Roaring Twenties, the US was converting from a wartime to peacetime economy. Weapons for World War I were no longer needed, there was a temporary stall in the economy. Only after a few years, the country prospered and became the richest nation on Earth.
7) Victoria & Victorian Gentility
Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 1837-1901, her reign(63 years) was the longest in British history. Great Britain reached the height of its power during this period, in which science and technology made great advances, a particularly strict set of moral standards, which are often applied hypocritically. It is also known as a period of many contradictions: in spite of the prosperity of the Victorian Age, factory and farm workers lived in terrible poverty.
8) Puritanism and Puritan Morality
Puritanism started in the sixteenth century as a movement to reform the Church of England. Puritanism accepted the interpretations of John Calvin (1509-64) on the nature of man, free will (自由意志)and predestination（预定论）, and other basic concepts, which had a profound influence on the social, political, ethical, and theological ideas of England and America.
Puritan morality comes from their belief that God predetermines who is to be chosen and who is predestined to be damned to hell. Only those who lead a poor and simple life and have no much desire can be chosen as the God’s selected.So everyone must work hard, spend little and invest for more business. Working hard and living a moral life were their ethics. Therefore, Puritan morality refers to the extreme or excessive strictness in matters of morals. Strict Puritans even regard drinking, gambling and participation in theatrical performances as punishable offences.
9) Bohemians
Bohemians, as depicted in most popular forms of entertainment are care-free, poor and worshipful of their art. The term Bohemian, as it refers to lifestyle, began in France with the term La Boheme. It started as a way of describing bands of care-free “gypsies” that came from Romania; possibly originating in India.
The tradition of Bohemian “experiments in living” flourished in Britain from 1900-1950. The group of artist was part of the tradition, some of whose lives ended in suicide, fatal illness, alcoholism, drug addiction or the despair of late middle age.
Today, Bohemian is used to describe free-thinking, free-living people , usually artist. Bohemian style manifests itself in dress, personal adornment, house decoration, etc.
2. Text Analysis
The text is taken from Background of American Literary Thought (1967), a book written jointly by Horton and Edwards. The two American writers explain a certain period in American literary and social history. It focuses especially on the attitudes and revolt of the young people who returned from World War 1, disappointed and disillusioned. The authors explain the reasons and process of the revolt, saying that the lost generation was uprooted for a time, bitter, cynical, rebellious, iconoclastic, experimental, but never lost.
3. Structure of the Text
The text is divided into three parts:
Part1 (paragraph1): introducing the topic— the rebellion of the young in 1920s
Part 2 (paragraph 2-9): the body—reasons and process of the revolt of the young
Part 3 (paragraph 10-11 ): Conclusion—the lost generation was never lost
4. Key words and expressions
nostalgic, speakeasy, denunciation, parked sedan, flask-totting, sheik, flapper, drugstore cowboy, see…in perspective, code, fashion, catalytic agent, mores, orgies, reveller, stalemate, insolence, strenuous, jingoism, magnolia-scented, fracas, carnival, distinction, bombast, whip up, Babbittry, pulpit, obliquely, boobery, keep up with the Jones, almost to a man, write off, flay
5. Analysis of Rhetorical Devices
metaphor, metonymy, transferred epithet, synecdoche
6. Writing Techniques
1) Long complicated sentences with clear meaning and clear logic: for example, the last paragraph of the text containing three long sentences, which are clear in meaning and clear in logic.
2) Americanism: the authors use a lot words which are typical of American English, such as sheik, flapper, drugstore cowboy, Babbittry, boobery, etc.
3) Typical expository writing with effective use of topic sentences and simple, clear structure: The two authors clearly explain the reasons and process of the revolt of the young Americans in 1920s and draw a conclusion at the end of the essay.
Almost each paragraph has a topic sentence, from which different ideas develop logically.
