Introduction to American Literature

By King Meera -
Walt Whitman’s famous question- what exactly is a thousand acres- began this lecture. Reckoning a thousand acres was likened to exploring American Literature or any literature. What do we do with literature, for instance; contextually, what is America? What is its issue with identity?

America is a land or rediscovery and of lies simultaneously. It is imposing and with a multiplicity of terrain (multiplicity means varied and multi-faced; it was diverse and tricky) and at any point in its history the POV of the pilgrims and the motives must be considered.

For the Pilgrims, America was a strange and dangerous virgin land. They were migrating, not on holiday. The early settlers had no intention of political or military invasion. There are tales told of the attacks on their covered wagons, by the ‘Indians’ whose superior horses could take them into their paths in the mountains- at a vantage point. The Native Americans were wary of the settlers. They thought the white man dangerous, as well documented in the Disney movie Pocahontas. The early Englishmen were quite harmless but they gradually began to take over. The English began with trade in every nation they colonized.

They traded glass beads, metal spearheads, eagle feathers- for land, gold and other resources, the value of which the Natives where unaware of. Chief Seattle is known to have given away everything- his land, wealth, power and even family, in exchange for alcohol.

We see here the origin of America.

Now, a comparison of British and American Literature:
British Literature is stately. Its texts assert a sense of superiority over the reader. They are authoritarian; monolithic. British Literature is a Literature of control. It is not literature that questions or offers choices. There is an attitude that concerns itself with conspiracy between Church and State, hegemony- where the readers are at the mercy of the text. British literary texts have captured our imagination, ideas, poetry- basically our thinking.

American Literature represents the truth that colonies can be destroyed- it is an unpleasant reminder of the same. It is liberating. American literary texts portray delusions of grandeur. (Americans were the first to fight the British Empire.)
America was rediscovered with every invasion in its history.

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