american realism 1850-1900 the civil war and post-war period thomas charles farrer (1839-1891),...
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Response to Start of the Civil War Rapidly growing cities and slums Factories replacing farms Corruption in politics (slavery, civil rights for women, immigrants) Children in Mullen’s Alley, photograph, Jacob Riis, 1888photographTRANSCRIPT
American Realism1850-1900The Civil War and Post-War Period
Thomas Charles Farrer (1839-1891), Mount Tom, 1865
Realists sought to accurately portray real life, without filtering it through personal feelings, romanticism, or idealism.
Elements of Literature, 6th ed (419)
Response to• Start of the Civil War• Rapidly growing cities
and slums• Factories replacing
farms• Corruption in politics
(slavery, civil rights for women, immigrants)
Children in Mullen’s Alley, photograph, Jacob Riis, 1888
American Realism
• The world is what it is, and that can be awful and frightening• verisimilitude• accepting reality as reality• rejection of the sensational sentimental with
focus on the ordinary man• loss of optimism; no rose-colored glasses• relied on facts and events• opened eyes to the fact that slavery undermined
American values
New Voices, New Subjects• regionalism: added
extreme detail to the setting; the setting was a character symbolically
• naturalism: even more real; extremely detailed; pointed out darkness in our world
• satire: a literary work holding up human vices and follies to ridicule or scorn
satirists like Mark Twain and poets like Walt Whitman tried to ~keep it
real.~