Notes on Gothic Literature

*Gothic Literature
-is characterized by grotesque characters, bizarre situations, and violent events.
-orginated in Europe
-United States during the 19th Century
-Edgar Allan Poe and Hawthrone (Stephen King Now)
-Age of Reason, Fear of Gods, and Puritans
*Romanticism
-romanticism writers saw: Basic elements of human nature
.limitation of reason
.celebrated the individual spirit (Puritans believed in a whole)
.emotions
.imagination
.splendors of natures than the fear of God
.fasination of supernatural
-Washington Irving: one of the promnant writers in the USA
-romantic preoccupation with atmosphere, sentiment and optimism
*Transcendentalists
-transcendent forms of truth exist beyond reason and experience
-"Every individual is capable of discovering this higher truth on his or her own through intuition" Ralph Waldo Emerson
*Dark Side of Individualism
-gothic architecture
.gothic catherderals
.high stained glass windows
.gargoyes: mascot of gothic
-Imaginative distortion of reality
-Imagination led to the threshold of the unknown
-Shadowy region where the fantastic (dark, great) the demonic (demon) and the insane region
-Gothic tradition can be called the Dark Side of Individualism
-Romantics looked at the individual saw hope
-Gothic looked they saw potential evil
*Poe
-Many of his stories were in medieval castles, decaying ancient estates provied weird and terrifying events for the settings
-Male narrotors are insane
-Female characters are beautiful and dead (or dying)
-Plots are extreme situations-Not just murder
.live burials
.physical and mental torture
.retribution from beyond the grave (coming from the dead)
-Only when put in extremem natures show your true colors which was the dark side.
-Romantics would show the good side
*Hawthorne
-Exmained the human hear under various conditions:
.fear
.greet
.vanity
.mistrust
.betrayal

Gothic Literature

Gothic Literature is a genre of literature that combines elements of both horror and romance. Prominent features of Gothic fiction include terror (both psychological and physical), mystery, the supernatural, ghosts, haunted houses and Gothic architecture, castles, darkness, death, decay, doubles, madness, secrets, and hereditary curses.Gothic_fiction English author, Horace Walpole, was believed to be the founder of Gothic Literature with his novel The Castle of Otranto in 1764.Ann Radcliffe's The Italian; or, The Confessional of the Black Penitents (1797), Mary Shelley's Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818) and Charles Maturin's Melmoth the Wanderer (1820) are cited as the defining parameters of the genre.
http://enwikipedia.org/wiki/Gothic_fiction
http://www.zittaw.com/canon.htm
http://imagecache2.allposters.com/images/152/844.jpg
http://considertheevidence.tripod.com/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/.pond/otranto.jpg.w180h235.jpg


The romance was a tale or ballad of chivalric adventure whose emphasis on individual heroism and on the exotic and the mysterious was in clear contrast to the elegant formality and artificiality of prevailing Classical forms of literature, such as the French Neoclassical tragedy or the English heroic couplet in poetry. Romanticism first orginated in the 18th century in Western Europe. It's the next generation after Gothic times. Romanticism in English literature began in the 1790s with the publication of the Lyrical Ballads of William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The first phase of the Romantic movement in Germany was marked by innovations in both content and literary style and by a preoccupation with the mystical, the subconscious, and the supernatural. In the United States, romantic gothic literature made an early appearance with Washington Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (1820). Romanticism isn't just literature. Various forms were found it. Music and painting were a few.
http://75.24.205.227/guenther-history/westernciv2/Romanticism%20and%20Nature.jpg
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/508675/Romanticism


Trancendentalists are what they were rebelling against, what they saw as the current situation and therefore as what they were trying to be different from.Another way to look at the Transcendentalists is to see them as a generation of people struggling to define spirituality and religion (our words, not necessarily theirs) in a way that took into account the new understandings their age made.Transcendentalism was a group of new ideas in literature, religion, culture, and philosophy that emerged in New England in the early to middle 19th century. In the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson, "We will walk on our own feet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds...A nation of men will for the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired by the Divine Soul which also inspires all men."Transcendentalism was a group of new ideas in literature, religion, culture, and philosophy that emerged in New England in the early to middle 19th century. Emerson and other like-minded intellectuals founded the Transcendental Club, which served as a center for the movement. Its first official meeting was held on September 19, 1836.Emerson published his first essay, Nature. Other people who were to believed trancendentalists are Emily Dickison, men like Theodore Parker- and Thomas Wentworth Higginson- who identified themselves as Transcendentalists, also worked for freedom of the slaves and for women's freedom.
http://www.transcendentalists.com/what.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcendentalism
http://transcendentalismblog.typepad.com/.a/6a00d834c9da8169e201127936cd6428a4-pi

The Crucible

The elements of plot in drama are:
expostion
rising actiong
climax
falling action
resolution

Foil is a minor character who helps better understand of the main character

Speech devices:
monologue- long speech spoken by a single character to himself/herself or to the audience
solioquy- monologus in which a character speaks to be unware of the audience (Scrubs guy)
aside-short speech or comment that is by a character to the audience, but is beyond the hearing of other characters who are present (Zach from Save By The Bell)

Spectral evidence- the testimony of a church member who clamied to have seen a person's spirtit performing witchraft-was enough to sentence the accused to death

Crucible means: a sever test or trial


Act One:
The Crucible is set in Salem, Massachusetts, 1692. The town is ruled by God's way. Rules for everyone and everything. Abigail and all her friends are caught dancing around a fire with Tituba. Reverend Parris cathes them and Betty, his daughter, falls down scared. She gets into a like coma and won't come out of it. Everyone in the town is talking about witchcraft which scares Parris because he doesn't want to get blamed for it. He calls for Reverend Hale to come and look at Betty. All the girls have a meeting about it and Abigail tells all of them that they will blame Tituba about the whole thing. Reverened Hale comes and talks to the girls and everyone else about the whole ordeal. Abigail confesses it was Tituba who was doing the witchcraft. They go to her and she doesn't admit to it until Parris beats her. Then she blames Goody Osborn and Goody Sara. When the girls see that they then they all confess to witchery and yell at random names. John Proctor and Abigail have a talk about the whole thing. They had an affair until Elizabeth found out and fired her.
Act Two
John comes over and Elizabeth questions about his whereabouts. She also talks to him about the affair with Abigail which he gets upset and gets mad at her. Mary Warren comes and John gets mad because he forbid her to go town and watch the court. She gives a doll that has a pin in the stomach to Elizabeth. John begins to whip Mary when she yells that she saved Elizabeth's life today. Abigial accused her of witchery, but Mary tells them that Elizabeth was no such woman. Mr. Hale comes along and talks to them about the whole problem. He doesn't want to believe that Elizabeth is a witch. When Hale is about to leave John comes to him and tells him that the whole witch thing is a lie. Abigail lied to everyone to protect herself. When they are speaking Giles comes along and tells them that his wife was taking by the court. While they are talking Cheever comes along and searches the house because of the warrant that was made against them. He finds the popped that Mary gave Elizabeth. Earlier that day Abigail got hurt by a needle that was stuck in her stomach. Like on the doll. Abigail told the people that it was Elizabeth. Proctor freaks and rips up the warrant. Elizabeth is arrested and leaves the house. Proctor gets upset and tells Mary that she will go against the court the next day and tell what is really going on. She stares to bawl and says she cannot do it.
Act Three
The court is talking to all the women that are charged with witchcraft. When Proctor comes about and tries to stall the court. They tell him that his wife is pregnant, but doesn't believe them. Danforth tells him that if she is really pregnant she can live for a year until she gives birth and then she must die. Francis gives a paper to Danforth showing him ninety one names that believe that these women aren't really witches. Proctor confesses to an affair with Abigail.
Act Four
Everything is different in Salem. Sarah Good and Tituba go home to Barboadoes. Abigail runs off and steals Parris money. The court gives Proctor a choice. He can confess to being a witch and right it down. But he must also tell the names of other people. OR he can die. He starts to right down the confession, but he finds out that they will post it on the door. If he does end up living his name will be put to shamed for the rest of life. He figures this out and gets pissed and rips up the paper. He ends up dying.

Puritans and Salem Witch Trials

The Puritans led their own religious ways from the Church of England. They thought that the Church of England was more about politcal struggles and not about God and his way. They tried to "purfiy" their own lives and God's way. Hence the name Puritans.

The video on the left talks about the general overview of the history of Puritans. It says that Puritans are the ancestors to over eight million Americans.

Another video on the left talks about the general history of the Salem Witch Trials. It talks about who was in it, how it happend, why it happen, and the differents between the Red Scare in the 1950's.

The Salem Witch Trials were because the Puritans thought that something was wrong with the Betty Paris and Abigal Williams because the doctor couldn't find anything wrong with them physicaly. So obvisouly something must be wrong mentally. One of the women named Sarah Osborne was charged with witchery ties because she didn't go to church enough. And not going to church regualary it was known as a Puritan Sin.

Native Americans

Native Americans have gone through a lot over the years. We have beaten, killed and many other cruel ways to banish them from our country. When in fact we were in their country. They have been through a lot and they still love this country and respect it in every way. From what I've learned from the stories that we have read is that Native Americans take pride in what they do. They are very spiritually and rely on help from different gods. Even though we have tried to convert them to our religion they have stayed true to their roots.





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lurvePLcrxs

http://stufffromthelab.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/mayflower-ii.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_baloCb-nM&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Pen8GoXPq0

http://www.gutenberg-e.org/gordon/details/images/Lac-du-Flambeau-School.jpg

http://www.hgtv.com/videos/first-thanksgiving/2523.html