DR. HALBERT'S AMERICAN LITERATURE I (Fall 2009)
Final Exam Preparation
Your final exam will take place on Tuesday, May 12th from 10:15 AM to 12:15 PM. in our normal classroom. You
will have to identify seven out of 13 quotes for the exam (selected from the quotations submitted by you and
redistributed in class by me). You will need to give the title of the piece, the author of the piece, and give two or
three thoughtful sentences on the quote explaining its importance in the context of the course. In addition, you will
need to prepare an essay exam prep card using the following specifications:
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The card may be no bigger than 5" x 8".
Your name must appear in the upper right corner of the card (with a horizontal orientation so that the
longest side is at top).
A clear space at the top left corner should be left blank for stapling.
You may record quotes on the card, but each quote on the card needs to appear in the essay. Listing other
quotes in an attempt to have the answers to the ID section is unacceptable. Quotes are expected in the essay
since you can prepare ahead of time.
You may not write out the essay on the card, but you may outline the key points.
Failure to follow these directions will result in the card not being allowed during the exam.
I will inspect the card before the exam starts. You may wish to show up early to get my approval.
Essay Options for Final Exam
1. The early nineteenth-century period of American literature saw the rise of political and social discussion, satire,
and disdain of government. Find at least three examples from different authors to illustrate the authors'
disenchantment with sociopolitical issues and use your knowledge of each author to explain their gripes.
2. As the first European to encounter the Americas, Christopher Columbus embodies the introduction of European
peoples and cultures into the Western Hemisphere. This pivotal historical moment has since served as moral mirror
for citizens of the United States, reflecting their feelings and concerns about the origins of their national identity.
Using Columbus, Washington Irving, and Whitman as your primary sources, identify at least two attitudes about
Columbus that reflect upon the character of the United States and offer an explanation of what cultural forces helped
shape those attitudes.
3. Along with issues about race, freedom, and egalitarianism, gender issues offer a rich subtext for readings in the
course. From overt calls for gender equality to spirited discussions of traditional and transgressive gender norms,
the question of what it means to be male and female in America to different groups remained a constant struggle.
Using at least three texts, analyze different attitudes about the genders and argue what these attitudes suggest about
the cultural values they represent. You may choose to talk about both genders or focus on either male or female
roles.
4. While the American Revolution literally declared the United States an independent entity, the writers of the
nineteenth century helped to articulate an American attitude about meritocracy, personal independence, self-reliance,
and non-conformity in political, social, and even literary pursuits. Using at least three authors, argue what it means
to be an individual in America and how that attitude evolved.
5. As the United States grew through Manifest Destiny policies, the scope and grandeur of the American landscape
ignited the American imagination on the subject of nature. Using Emerson and at least one other writer, describe
how images of nature have helped define the American character.
6. The early nineteenth century saw the rise of transcendentalism, particularly in the works of Emerson and Thoreau.
What precisely does transcendentalism transcend? Give examples that illustrate how their writings are able to make
universal judgments while remaining isolated from social, cultural, and political struggles.
-------------------------------------------------Potential Quotes For Final Exam Spring 2009
QUOTE: “Let us suppose, moreover, that the aerial voyagers, finding this planet to be nothing but a howling
wilderness, inhabited by us, poor savages and wild beasts, shall take formal possession of it, in the name of his most
gracious and philosophic excellency, the man in the moon.”
SOURCE: Irving, A History of New York (2151)
QUOTE: The Indians improved daily and wonderfully by their intercourse with the whites. They took to drinking
rum, and making bargains. They learned to cheat, to lie, to swear, to gamble, to quarrel, to cut eachother’s throats, in
short, to excel in all the accomplishments that had originally marked the superiority of their christian visitors.
SOURCE: Washington Irving. A History Of New York. Vol B. 2149
QUOTE: QUOTE: what right had the first discoverers of America to land, and take possesion of a country, without
asking the consent of its inhabitants, or yielding them an adequate compensation for their territory?... For, until this
mighty question is totally put to rest, the worthy people of America can by no means enjoy the soil they inhabit, with
clear and right title, and quiet, unsullied consciences.
SOURCE: Washington Irving. A History of New York (Vol. B 2145)
QUOTE: The Indians improved daily and wonderfully by their intercourse with the whites. They took to drinking
rum, and making bargains. They learned to cheat, to lie, to swear, to gamble, to quarrel, to cut eachother’s throats, in
short, to excel in all the accomplishments that had originally marked the superiority of their christian visitors.
SOURCE: Washington Irving. A History Of New York. Vol B. 2149
QUOTE: That--whereas a certain crew of Lunatics have lately discovered and taken possession of that dirty little
planet, called the earth—and that whereas it is inhabited by none but a race of two legged animals, that carry their
heads on their shoulders instead of under their arms; cannot talk the lunatic language; have two eyes instead of one;
are destitute of tails, and of a horrible whiteness, instead of pea green—therefore and for a variety of other excellent
reasons—they are considered incapable of possessing any property in the planet they infest—and the right and title
to it are confirmed to its original discoverers.
SOURCE: Washington Irving. A History of New York. Vol. B Pg. 2152
QUOTE: Most People dislike Vanity in others whatever share they have of it themselves, but I give it fair Quarter
wherever I meet with it, being persuaded that it is often productive of Good to the Possessor and to others that are
within his Sphere of Action: And therefore in many Cases it would not be quite absurd if a Man were to thank God
for his Vanity among the other comforts of Life.
SOURCE: Benjamin Franklin. The Autobiography. Vol. A Pg. 829
QUOTE: I was surpriz’d at the Quantity, but took it, and having no room in my Pockets, walk’d off, with a Roll
under each Arm, and eating the other.
SOURCE: Benjamin Franklin. The Autobiography, Part One. Vol. A. (Pg. 843)
QUOTE: The sun never shined on a cause of greater worth. ‘Tis not the affair of a City, a County, a Province, or a
Kingdom; but of a Continent—of at least one eight part of the habitable Globe. ‘Tis not the concern of a day, a year,
or an age: posterity are virtually involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected even to the end of time, by
the proceedings now.
SOURCE: Thomas Paine. Common Sense. Vol. A Pg. 959
QUOTE: We have boasted the protection of Great Britain, without considering, that her motive was interest not
attachment; and that she did not protect us from our enemies on our account; but from her enemies on her own
account, from those who had no quarrel with us on any other account, and who will always be our enemies on the
same account.
SOURCE: Thomas Paine. from Common Sense, Thoughts on the Present State of American Affairs. Vol. A. (Pg.
960)
QUOTE: These are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldiers and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis,
shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and women.
Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the
more glorious the triumph.
SOURCE: Thomas Paine. The American Crisis. Vol A. Pg.965
QUOTE: I once felt all that kind of anger, which a man ought to feel, against the mean principles that are held by the
Tories: a noted one, who kept a tavern at Amboy, was standing at his door, with as pretty a child in his hand, about
eight or nine years old, as ever I saw, and after speaking his mind as freely as he thought was prudent, finished with
the unfatherly expression, “Well! give me peace in my day.” Not a man on the continent but fully believes that a
separation must take place, and a generous parent should have said, “If there must be trouble, let it be in my day,
that my child may have peace.”; and this single reflection, well applied, is sufficient to awaken every man to duty.
SOURCE: Thomas Paine: The American Crisis. Vol. A. pg. 968
QUOTE: I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of
man, and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavouring to make our fellowcreatures happy. But, lest it should be supposed that I believe many other things in addition to these, I shall, in the
progress of this work, declare the things I do not believe, and my reasons for not believing them. I do not believe in
the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the
Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.
SOURCE: Thomas Paine. The Age of Reason. Vol A. Pg.642
QUOTE: When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to subscribe his professional
belief to things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime. He takes up
the trade of a priest for the sake of gain, and, in order to qualify himself for that trade, he begins with a perjury.
SOURCE: Thomas Paine. The Age of Reason. (Vol. A., 644)
QUOTE: …I had even thought to have lived with you, but for the injustices of one man Col. Cresap, the last spring,
in cold blood, and unprovoked, murdered all the relations of Logan, not sparing even my women and children. There
runs not a drop of my blood in the veins of any living creature. This called on me for revenge. I have sought it: I
have killed many: I have fully glutted my vengeance. For my country, I rejoice in the beams of peace. But I do not
harbor a thought that mine is the joy of fear. Logan never felt fear. He will not turn on his heel to save his life. Who
is there to mourn for Logan?—Not one.
SOURCE: Thomas Jefferson: Notes on the State of Virginia. Vol. A. pg. 997
QUOTE: Millions of innocent men, woman, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt,
tortured, fined, imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. What has been the effect of
coercion? To make one half the world fools, and the other half hypocrites?
SOURCE: Thomas Jefferson, from Notes on the State of Virginia,p. 1008 vol.
QUOTE: I long to hear that you have declared an independency—and by the way in the new Code of Laws which I
suppose it will be necessary for you to make I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and
favourable to them than your ancestors.
SOURCE: Abigail Adams. Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, March 31, 1776. Vol. A. (Pg. 979)
QUOTE: Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the Husbands. Remember all Men would be tyrants if
they could. If particular care and attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a rebellion, and will
not hold ourselves bound by ant laws in which we have no voice, or Representation.
SOURCE: John Adams and Abigail Adams. Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, March 31, 1776. Vol A.
Pg.979
QUOTE: We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men and women are created equal; that they are endowed
by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to
secure these rights governments are instituted, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.
Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of those who suffer from it to
refuse allegiance to it, and to insist upon the institution of a new government, laying its foundation on such
principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and
happiness.
SOURCE: Elizebeth Cady Staton. The Declaration of Sentiments (Vol. B 2113)
QUOTE: After depriving her of all rights as a married woman, if single, and the owner of property, he has taxed her
to support a government which recognizes her only when her property can be made profitable to it.
SOURCE: Elizabeth Cady Stanton. Declaration of Sentiments. Pg. 2114
QUOTE: The influence of women over the minds and character of children of both
greater than that of men.
sexes, is allowed to be far
SOURCE: Sarah Moore Grimke, Letters on the Equality of the Sexes, and the Condition of Woman, Vol. B,
pg.2082
QUOTE: Fashionable women regard themselves, and are regarded by men, as pretty toys or as mere instruments of
pleasure; and the vacuity of mind, the heartlessness, the frivolity which is the necessary result of this false and
debasing estimate of women, can only be fully understood by those who have mingled in the folly and wickedness
of fashionable life….
SOURCE: Sarah Moore Grimke, Letter VIII The Condition of Women in the United States. Vol B. Pg.2082
QUOTE: All I complain of is, that our education consists so almost exclusively in culinary and other manual
operations.
SOURCE: Sarah Moore Grimke. Letters on the Equality of the Sexes, and the Condition of Woman. 2083
QUOTE: The minute she sees her husband coming up the street, she makes for the door, as if she hadn’t another
minute to live, stands in the entry with her teeth chattering in her head till he gets all his coats and mufflers, and
overshoes, and what-do-you-call’-ems off, then chases round(like a cat in a fit) after the boot-jack; warms his
slippers and puts ‘em on, and dislocates her wrist carving at the table for fear it will tire him.
SOURCE: Fanny Fern. Hints to Young Wives. Vol B. Pg. 2101
QUOTE:
‘Twas mercy brought me from my Pagan
Taught my benighted soul to understand
That there’s God, that there’s a Saviour too:
Once I redemption neither sought nor knew.
Some view our sable race with scornful eye,
“Their colour is a diabolic die”
Remember, Christians, Negros, black as Cain,
May be refin’d and join th’angelic train.
SOURCE: Phillis Wheatley. On being brought from Africa to America. Vol. A Pg. 1247
QUOTE: A slaveholder’s profession of Christianity is a palpable imposture. He is a felon of the highest grade. He
is a man-stealer. It is of no importance what you put in the other scale.
SOURCE: Frederick Douglas. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas, an American Slave. Volume B. pg.
1887
QUOTE: I do not remember to have ever met a slave who could tell of his birthday. They seldom come nearer to it
than planting-time, harvest-time, cherry-time, spring-time, or fall-time. A want of information concerning my own
was a source of unhappiness to me even during childhood. The white children could tell their ages. I could not tell
why I ought to be deprived of the same privilege.
SOURCE: Fredrick Douglass, The Narrative of the life of Fredrick Douglas. Vol. B, pg. 1889.
QUOTE: He made her get upon the stool, and tied her hands to the hook. She now stood fair for his infernal
purpose. Her arms were stretched up at their full length, so that she stood upon the ends of her toes. He then said to
her, “Now you d---d b---h, I’ll learn you how to disobey my orders!” and after rolling up his sleeves, he commenced
to lay on the heavy cowskin, and soon the warm, red blood (amid heart-rending shrieks from her, and horrid oaths
from him) came dripping to the floor. I was so terrified and horror-stricken at the sight, that I hid myself in a closet,
and dared not venture out till long after the bloody transaction was over.
SOURCE: Frederick Douglass: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Vol. B. pg.1892
QUOTE: “If you give a nigger an inch, he will take an ell. A nigger should know nothing but to obey his master—to
do as he is told to do. Learning would spoil the best nigger in the world. Now,” said he, “if you teach that nigger
(speaking of myself) how to read, there would be no keeping him. It would forever unfit him to be a slave. He would
at once become unmanageable, and of no value to his master. As to himself, it could do him no good, but a great
deal of harm. It would make him discontented and unhappy.”
SOURCE: Frederick Douglass. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. (Vol. B., 1903)
QUOTE: “As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It
had given me a view of my wretched condition, without remedy.”
SOURCE: Fredrick Douglass. Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass An American Slave. Vol B 1907
QUOTE: As I read and contemplated the subject, behold! that very discontent which Master Hugh had predicted
would follow my learning to read had already come, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish.
SOURCE: Frederick Douglass. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. Vol. B. (Pg.
2083)
QUOTE: Standing on the bare ground-my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space, all-mean
egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all, the currents of the Universal Being
circulate through me; I am part or particle of God.
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emmerson. Nature. Pg.1584
QUOTE: In the woods, we return to reason and faith. There I feel that nothing can befall me in life,-- no disgrace, no
calamity, (leaving me my eyes,) which nature cannot repair.
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Nature Chapter I Nature, p. 1584
QUOTE: “Most persons do not see the sun. At least they have a very superficial seeing. The sun illuminates only
the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child.”
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emerson. Nature. Vol B. Pg. 1583
QUOTE: There is no object so foul that intense light will not make beautiful. And the stimulus it affords to the
sense, and a sort of infinitude which it hath, like space and time, make all matter gay. Even the corpse hath its own
beauty.
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emerson. Beauty. Vol. B. (Pg. 1586)
QUOTE: To the attentive eye, each moment of the year has its own beauty, and in the same field, it beholds every
hour, a picture which was never seen before, and which shall never be seen again.
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emerson Nature. Vol. B Pg. 1587
QUOTE: Life is not intellectual or critical, but sturdy.
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emerson Vol B (Pg 1579)
QUOTE: To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true for you in your private heart, is true for all men,-that is genius. Speak your latent conviction and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes
the outmost,--and or first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the last judgment.
SOURCE: Emerson, Self Reliance, Vol. B, pg. 1622.
QUOTE: Tomorrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the
time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another.
SOURCE: Ralph Waldo Emerson. Self-Reliance. Vol. B. Pg.1622
QUOTE: “Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the
adults prattle with it.”
SOURCE: Emerson, Self Reliance (1623)
QUOTE: The soldier is applauded who refuses to serve in an unjust war by those who do not refuse to sustain the
unjust government which makes the war; is applauded b those whose own act and authority he disregards and sets at
nought; as if the State were penitent to that degree that it hired one to scourge it while it sinned, but not to that
degree that it left off sinning for a moment.
SOURCE: Henry David Thoreau. Resistance to Civil Government. Vol. B. Pg.1743
QUOTE: “That government is best which governs least;” and I should like to see it acted up to more rapidly and
systematically. Carried out, it finally amounts to this, which also I believe, -- “That government is best which
governs not at all;” and when men are prepared for it, that will be the kind of government which they will have.
Government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes,
inexpedient.
SOURCE: Henry David Thoreau, Resistance to Civil Government. Vol B. Pg.1738
QUOTE: Unjust laws exist: shall we be content to obey, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until
we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once?
SOURCE: Henry David Thoreau, from Resistance to Civil Government, p. 1738 vol. B
QUOTE: The only obligation which I have a right to assume, is to do at any time what I think right. It is truly
enough said, that a corporation has no conscience; but a corporation of conscientious men is a corporation with a
conscience.
SOURCE: Henry David Thoreau. Resistance to Civil Government. Pg. 1739
QUOTE: I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell. How, then, am I mad?
Hearken! And observe how healthily -- how calmly I can tell you the whole story.
SOURCE: Edgar Allen Poe. The Tell-Tale Heart. Vol. B. Pg. 2492
QUOTE: I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no
desire. I think it was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture—a pale blue eye, with film over it.
Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees—very gradually—I made up my mind to take the
life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever.
SOURCE: Edgar Allan Poe. The Tell-Tale Heart. Vol B. (Pg.2492)
QUOTE: If still you think me mad, you will think so nolonger when I describe the wise precautions I took for the
concealment of the body. The night waned, and I worked hastily, but in silence. First of all I dismembered the
corpse. I cut off the head and the arms and the legs.
SOURCE: Edgar Allan Poe, The Tell Tale Heart Vol. B, pg. 2494.
QUOTE: …--but, with the first glimpse of the building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded my spirit. I say
insufferable; for the feeling was unrelieved by any of that half-pleasurable, because poetic, sentiment, with which
the mind usually receives even the sternest natural images of the desolate or terrible. I looked upon the scene before
me—upon the mere house, and the simple landscape features of the domain—upon the bleak walls-upon the vacant
eye-like windows—upon a few rank sedges—and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees—with an utter
depression of soul which I can compare to no earthly sensation more properly than to the after-dream of the reveler
upon opium—the bitter lapse into every-day life—the hideous dropping of the veil.
SOURCE: Edgar Allen Poe: The Fall of the House of Usher Vol. B. pg. 2473
QUOTE:
But we loved with a love that was more than love
I and my Annabel Lee
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
SOURCE: Edgar Allen Poe. Annabel Lee. Vol. B. Pg. 2545-2546
QUOTE: I’m the very infant that refused his milk before its eyes were open, and called out for a bottle of old Rye! I
love the women an’ I’m chockfull o’ fight! I’m half wild horse and half cock-eyed alligator and the rest o’ me is
crooked snags an’ red-hot snappin’ turtle.
SOURCE: Mike Fink . Mike Fink’s Brag. Vol B. (Pg.2127)
QUOTE: I can out-run, out-jump, out-shoot, out-brag, out-drink, an’ out-fight, rough-an’-tumble, no holts barred,
ary man on both sides the river from Pittsburgh to New Orleans an’ back ag’in to St. Louiee.
SOURCE: Mike Fink. Mike Fink’s Brag (Vol. B 2127)
QUOTE: I’m half wild horse and half cock-eyed alligator and the rest o’ me is crooked snags an’ red-hot snappin’
turtle. I can hit like the fourth-proof lightnin’ an’ every lick I make n the woods lets in an acroe o’ sunshine. I can
out-run, out-jump, out-shoot, out-brag, out-drink, an’ out-fight, rough-an’ tumble, no holts barred, ary man on both
sides the river from Pittsburg to New Orleans an’ back ag’in to St. Louiee. Come on, you flatters, you bargers, you
milk-white mechanics, an’ see how tough I am to chaw! I ain’thad a fight for two days an’ I’m spilein’ for exercise.
Cock-a-doodle-do!
SOURCE: The Crockett Almanacs. Mike Fink’s Brag. Vol B. Pg. 2127
QUOTE: I then took an’ held him over the airth’s axes an’ squeezed him till I’d thawed ‘em loose, poured about a
ton on’t over the sun’s face, give the arith’s cog-wheel one kick backward till I got the sun loose—whistled “Push
along, keep movin’!” an’ in about fifteen seconds the airth gave a grunt, an’ began movin’. The sun walked up
beautiful, salutin’ me with sich a wind o’gratitude that it made me sneeze. I lit my pipe by the blaze o’ his top-knot,
shouldered my bear, an’ walked home, intorducin’ people to the fresh daylight with a piece of sunrise in my pocket.
SOURCE: Davy Crockett. The Crockett Almanacs. Vol. B Pg. 2124