Langston Williams Research Paper

In the period following the French Revolution, European attitudes changed while American ideals remained largely unaffected. As a result, American literature no longer followed the same trends as British and French literature. This divergent evolution helped American literature find a unique voice. A voice that would grow more powerful and influential as decades passed. The years following the Civil War were marked by dramatic changes to nearly every aspect of American life. Naturally, these changes had a striking impact on the nation’s literary voices. Technology was advancing with breakneck speed, and with it, came a growth in industry. The jobs that the industrial revolution created resulted in a mass migration to cities. Newly relaxed…show more content…
In the beginning of the decade, the economy was booming and the nation’s minds were on forgetting about the war and focusing on family values. The poetry that dominated in the early fifties was mostly dull, inhibited, and conservative. As the decade wore on however, attention turned once again to the modernists of the thirties and forties, including previously ignored poets like Langston Hughes and Liz Bishop. At the same time, a young poet was studying objectivist poetry under W.C. Williams. By the middle of the decade, that young man had gone in a completely different direction with his poetry and in nineteen-fifty-five, he shocked the Six Gallery with a controversial…show more content…
A White Heron, Norton Anthology of American Literature Vol. C. Ed. Julia Reidhead. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2003. 597-604

Baym, Nina. Introduction, Norton Anthology of American Literature Vol. D. Ed. Julia Reidhead. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 2003. 1071-1085

Martin, Jay. American Literature 1865-1914. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall Inc., 1967.

Fagin, Larry. New American Poetry, World Poets Vol.3. Ed. Ron Padgett. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2000. 277-279.

Padgett, Ron. New Twentieth-Century Modernist Poetry, World Poets Vol.3. Ed. Ron Padgett. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 2000. 277-279.

Unknown. Thomas Pynchon, Masterplots II Poetry Series Vol.3. Ed. Charles E. May; Frank N. Magill. Pasadena, California: Salem Press Inc., 2001. 2007-2008.

Marchino, Lois A. Muriel Rukeyser, Critical Survey of Short Fiction Vol.5.2nd ed. Ed. Phillip K. Jason; Frank N. Magill. Pasadena, California: Salem Press Inc., 2002. 1172-1174.

Thorp, Willard. American Writing in the Twentieth Century. Ed. Ralph Henry Gabriel. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press,