Warm-up –Answer these Essential Questions
1. Name a genre of the Realism period of
literature?
2. How did a Realist writer tell a story?
3. What was happening in America during
the Realism period?
4. Name a writer from the Realism period.
5. Name a story or book from the period.
6. What period of literature was an
outgrowth of the Realism period?
Time Periods of Literature
Lesson 40
Realism/Naturalism
These literary periods happened
during the Civil War and the years
following the war (post-war years).
Georgia Performance Standard
• ELAALRL3: The student deepens
understanding of literary works by
relating them to their contemporary
context or historical background, as well
as to works from other time periods.
b. The student relates a literary work to
the characteristics of the literary time
period or historical setting;
– ii. Realism
– iii. Naturalism
Genre & Style of the Realism Period
style
genre
Realism
• Realism authors tried to tell it like it
really was in real life. They did not
try to “sugar-coat” things or try to
make things sound better than they
really were.
Historical Context of Romanticism
• Civil war brought a demand for a
“true” type of literature that did
not idealize people or places (that
did not seek to make them sound
perfect).
• The Civil War and the years after
the war make up the historical
context.
The harsh reality of frontier life, coupled with artists’
reactions to the Civil War gave rise to Realism. (People were
still moving westward.)
Examples:
Ambrose Bierce’s “Incident at Owl Creek Bridge” and
Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage
Ambrose Bierce
Stephen Crane
Red Badge of Courage – click black area to start video clip (1:43)
Red Badge of Courage – click picture to start video clip (2:50)
Red Badge of Courage – click picture to start video clip (1:05)
Willa Cather
was a Realist noted for
her portraying the
loneliness and cultural
isolation of life on the
prairie. She wrote “A
Wagner Matinee” in
which she contrasted this
isolation with the cultural
richness (plays, concerts,
exhibits, etc.) of an
eastern city.
Edith Wharton
She wrote fiction about the
Eastern high society into
which she had been born. In
The House of Mirth (1905),
for example, she wrote about
conflicts between the newly
rich and the old aristocracy
and about how social customs
can prevent individuals from
fulfilling themselves.
NATURALISM
An important literary offshoot of
Realism was Naturalism. Naturalist
writers also depicted real people in real
situations, but they believed that forces
larger than the individual – nature, fate,
heredity – shaped individual destiny.
Jack London (Naturalism)
• He set much of his fiction in Alaska, where
the environment was cruel and unforgiving.
The theme of human endurance in the face
of overwhelming natural forces pervades his
fiction, including the short story “To Build a
Fire” and the novel, The Call of the Wild.
Georgia Performance Standard
• ELAALRL3: The student deepens
understanding of literary works by
relating them to their contemporary
context or historical background, as well
as to works from other time periods.
b. The student relates a literary work to
the characteristics of the literary time
period or historical setting;
– ii. Realism
– iii. Naturalism
Warm-up –Answer these Essential Questions
1. Name a genre of the Realism period of
literature?
2. How did a Realist writer tell a story?
3. What was happening in America during
the Realism period?
4. Name a writer from the Realism period.
5. Name a story or book from the period.
6. What period of literature was an
outgrowth of the Realism period?
1. Name a genre of the Realism
period of literature?
• Short story
• novel
2. How did a Realist writer tell a
story?
• He made it like real life
and did not fantasize
about it
3. What was happening in America
during the Realism period?
• Civil War
4. Name a writer from the
Realism period.
•
•
•
•
Bierce
Crane
Cather
Wharton
5. Name a story or book from
the period.
•
•
•
•
Red Badge of Courage
A Wagner Matinee
The House of Mirth
Incident at Owl Creek
6. What period of literature was
an outgrowth of the Realism
period?
• Naturalism
Play the Jeopardy game on the
other PPT for today.