Alice McDermott is the author of the forthcoming novel Someone and six previous novels, including After This; Child of My Heart; Charming Billy, winner of the 1998 National Book Award; and At Weddings and Wakes, all published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. That Night, At Weddings and Wakes, and After This were all finalists for the Pulitzer Prize. McDermott lives with her family outside Washington, D.C.

Lance E. Newman is Professor of English and Environmental Studies at Westminster College in Salt Lake City, where he teaches Early American Literature, Environmental Literature, and Creative Writing. He has also worked as a river guide for more than two decades, leading rafting trips in Southeastern Utah and in Grand Canyon. He is the author of The Grand Canyon Reader (University of California Press, 2011) and Our Common Dwelling: Henry Thoreau, Transcendentalism, and the Class Politics of Nature (Palgrave, 2005). With Joel Pace and Chris Keonig-Woodyard, he co-edited Transatlantic Romanticism: An Anthology of British, American, and Canadian Literature, 1767-1867 (Longman, 2006). He co-produced the documentary film Canyonlands: Edward Abbey and the Great American Desert (2011) with Roderick Coover. Newman’s poems have appeared in many print and web magazines, and he is the author of two poetry chapbooks, Come Kanab (Dusi-e/chaps Kollectiv, 2007) and 3by3by3 (Beard of Bees, 2010), both available free on the Web.

Hilary E. Wyss is Hargis Professor of American Literature at Auburn University, where she teaches courses in early American literature, American studies, and Native American studies. She is the author of over a dozen articles and book chapters as well as three books, including English Letters and Indian Literacies: Reading, Writing, and New England Missionary Schools, 1750-1830 (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012);  Early Native Literacies in New England: a Documentary and Critical Anthology (University of Massachusetts Press, 2008, co-edited with Kristina Bross); and Writing Indians: Literacy, Christianity, and Native Community in Early America (University of Massachusetts Press, 2000). She has won teaching awards at Auburn University as well as national research grants to support her work.  She has served on the editorial board of the journal Early American Literature and was most recently the President of the Society of Early Americanists.

                     Century

To the Reader

Samuel L. Clemens (Mark Twain) (1835-1910)

        Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County

        Fenimore Cooper’s Literary Offenses

        Context and Response: Artemus Ward, from Artemus Ward (His Travels) Among the Mormons

Bret Harte (1836-1902)

        The Outcasts of Poker Flat

W. D. Howells (1837-1920)

        Editha

Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914?)

        Chickamauga

        The Devil’s Dictionary: selections

        Context and Response: The poetry of Dorothy Parker

William James (1842-1910)

        Pragmatism

Henry James (1843-1916)

        The Pupil

Joel Chandler Harris (1848-1908)

        The Wonderful Tar-Baby Story

Emma Lazarus (1849-1887)

        The New Colossus

Sarah Orne Jewett (1849-1909)

        A White Heron

Kate Chopin (1850-1904)

        Désirée’s Baby 

        The Storm

Mary E Wilkins Freeman (1852-1930)

        The Revolt of “Mother”

Booker T. Washington (1856?-1915).

        Up From Slavery: Chapter XIV. The Atlanta Exposition Address

        Context and Response: Olaudah Equiano, Excerpt from Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah

            Equiano; or, Gustavus Vassa, the African, Written by Himself

Charles W. Chesnutt (1858-1932)

        The Sheriff’s Children

Hamlin Garland (1860-1940)

        Under the Lion’s Paw

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935)

        The Yellow Wall-paper

Edith Wharton (1862-1937)

        The Other Two

Sui Sin Far (Edith Maude Eaton) (1865-1914) 

        Leaves from the Mental Portfolio of an Eurasian

W. E. B. Du Bois (1868-1963).

        The Souls of Black Folk: Chapter III. Of Mr. Booker T. Washington and Others

Theodore Dreiser (1871-1945)

        Old Rogaum and His Theresa

Stephen Crane (1871-1900)

        An Experiment in Misery

        An Episode of War

        War Is Kind

Jack London (1876-1916)

        To Build a Fire

Gallery 1: The South Since Reconstruction

Frederick Douglass: The Future of the Negro

George Washington Cable: The Freedman’s Case in Equity (excerpt)

Henry W. Grady: The New South (excerpt)

U.S. Supreme Court: Plessy v. Ferguson (excerpt)

Pauli Murray: Proud Shoes (excerpt)

Marion Post Wolcott, Entrance to a Movie House, Mississippi Delta

H. L. Mencken: The Sahara of the Bozart (excerpt)

Lizzie Woodworth Reese: A War Memory (1865)

Donald Davidson: A Mirror for Artists (excerpt)

Arthur Rothstein, Southern Movie Theater

Part Two: Modern American Literature

To the Reader

Edgar Lee Masters (1868-1950)

        Lucinda Matlock

        Davis Matlock

Edwin Arlington Robinson (1869-1935)

        Richard Cory

        Miniver Cheevy

        Eros Turannos

James Weldon Johnson (1871-1938)

        Lift Every Voice and Sing

        O Black and Unknown Bards

        Image: James Weldon Johnson

Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)  

        Sympathy

        We Wear the Mask

Willa Cather (1873-1947)

        Paul’s Case

Gertrude Stein (1874-1946)

        The Gentle Lena

Amy Lowell (1874-1925)

        The Captured Goddess

        Venus Transiens

        Madonna of the Evening Flowers

        September, 1918

        New Heavens for Old

        The Taxi

Robert Frost (1874-1963)

        The Pasture

        Mending Wall

        Home Burial

        After Apple-Picking

        The Wood-Pile

        The Road Not Taken

        Birches

        “Out, Out–“

        Fire and Ice

        Nothing Gold Can Stay

        Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

        Desert Places

        Design

        Neither out Far nor in Deep

Sherwood Anderson (1876-1941)

        Winesburg , Ohio : Hands

        Image: Sherwood Anderson

Susan Glaspell (1876-1948)

        Trifles

Carl Sandburg (1878-1967)

        Chicago

Wallace Stevens (1879-1955)

        The Snow Man

        Sunday Morning

        Anecdote of the Jar

        Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

        The Death of a Soldier

        The Idea of Order at Key West

        Of Modern Poetry

        The Plain Sense of Things

William Carlos Williams (1883-1963)

        The Young Housewife

        Portrait of a Lady

        Spring and All

        To Elsie

        The Red Wheelbarrow

        Death

        This Is Just to Say

        The Dance (“In Brueghel's great picture, The Kermess”)

        Landscape with the Fall of Icarus

Ezra Pound (1885-1972)

        Portrait d’une Femme

        A Pact

        In a Station of the Metro

        The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter

        The Cantos: I (“And then went down to the ship”)

H.D. (Hilda Doolittle) (1886-1961)

        Oread

        Leda

        Helen

Marianne Moore (1887-1972)

        Poetry

        A Grave

        To a Snail

John Crowe Ransom (1888-1974)

        Piazza Piece

T.S. Eliot (1888-1965)

        The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.

        The Waste Land

        Gerontion

        The Hollow Men

        Four Quartets: Burnt Norton

Eugene O’Neill (1888-1953)

        The Emperor Jones

Claude McKay (1889-1948)

        If We Must Die

        America

Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980)

        Flowering Judas

Zora Neale Hurston (1891-1960)

        The Gilded Six-Bits

Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950)

        Recuerdo

        I Think I Should Have Loved You Presently

        [I, being born a woman]

        Apostrophe to Man

        I Too beneath Your Moon, Almighty Sex

        Spring

        I Forgot for a Moment

Context and Response: The poetry of Lisel Mueller

Archibald Macleish (1892-1982)

        Ars Poetica

Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)

        General Review of the Sex Situation.

e.e. cummings (1894-1962)

        in Just--

        Buffalo Bill’s

        the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls.

        “next to of course god america I”

        if there are any heavens my mother will (all by herself) have

        somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond

        anyone lived in a pretty how town

Jean Toomer (1894-1967)

        Georgia Dusk

        Fern

F. Scott Fitzgerald (1896-1940)

        Babylon Revisited

Louise Bogan (1897-1970)

        Medusa

William Faulkner (1897-1962)

        That Evening Sun

Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)

        The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber

        Context and Response: Pío Baroja, excerpt from The Chasm

Hart Crane (1899-1932)

        At Melville's Tomb

        Voyages: I (“Above the fresh ruffles of the surf”)

        III (“Infinite consanguinity it bears-”)

        V (“Meticulous, past midnight in clear rime”)

        The Bridge: Poem: To Brooklyn Bridge

Allen Tate (1899-1979)

        Ode to the Confederate Dead

Sterling A. Brown (1901-1989)

        He Was a Man

        Break of Day

        Bitter Fruit of the Tree

Langston Hughes (1902-1967)

        The Negro Speaks of Rivers

        Mother to Son

        The Weary Blues

        The South

        Ruby Brown

        Let America Be America Again

        Poet to Patron

        Ballad of the Landlord

        Too Blue

        Theme for English B

        Poet to Bigot

        I, Too

Countee Cullen (1903-1946)

        Yet Do I Marvel

        Incident

Richard Wright (1908-1960)

        Long Black Song

        Image: Negro Tenant Farmer

Muriel Rukeyser (1913-1980)

        Effort at Speech Between Two People

        Poem

Gallery 2: American Writers and the Great Depression

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address (excerpt)

Mary Heaton Vorse, School for Bums (excerpt)

Anonymous, Letter to Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt

Robert Johnson, Cross Road Blues

Thomas Wolfe, You Can’t Go Home Again (excerpt)

Alfred Kazin, Starting Out in the Thirties (excerpt)

Agnes Smedley, China Fights Back (excerpt)

Kenneth Fearing, Devil’s Dream

John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath (excerpt)

Dorothea Lange, Mexican Field Worker’s Home, California

Woody Guthrie, This Land Is Your Land

Dorothea Lange, The Mochida Family

Part Three: American Prose Since 1945

To the Reader

Eudora Welty (1909-2001)

        A Worn Path

Tennessee Williams (1911-1983)

        Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

        Context and Response: Carson McCullers, from The Member of the Wedding

John Cheever (1912-1982)

        The Sorrows of Gin

Ralph Ellison (1914-1994)

        Battle Royal

Grace Paley (1922-2007)

        The Loudest Voice

James Baldwin (1924-1987)

        Notes of a Native Son

Flannery O’Connor (1925-1964)

        Revelation

Toni Morrison (b. 1931)

        Recitatif

John Updike (1932-2009)

        Separating

Philip Roth (b. 1933)

        Defender of the Faith

        Context and Response: Saul Bellow, excerpt from Herzog

Amiri Baraka (b. 1934)

        Dutchman

Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938)

        Where are you going, where have you been?

Raymond Carver (1938-1988)

        Cathedral

Toni Cade Bambara (1939-1995)

        The Lesson

Terrance McNally (b. 1939)

        Andre’s Mother

Alice Walker (b. 1944)

        Everyday Use

Tim O’Brien (b. 1946)

        The Things They Carried

Mark Helprin (b. 1947)

        White Gardens

Leslie Marmon Silko (b. 1948)

        Lullaby

Edward P. Jones (b. 1951)

        Blindsided

Amy Tan (b. 1952)

        Two Kinds

Louise Erdrich (b. 1954)

        The Red Convertible

David Henry Hwang (b. 1957)

        The Sound of a Voice

Jhumpa Lahiri (b. 1967)

        Hell-Heaven

Gallery 3: Post-Modernism

Carl Andre, Equivalent VII; Frank Gehry, Walt Disney Concert Hall; Michael Heizer, Levitated Mass

Fredric Jameson, Postmodernism and the Consumer Society (excerpt)

Sherrie Levine, After Walker Evans: 4; Batman and the Joker; Madonna at Super Bowl XLVI

Jonathan Franzen, On Rainer Maria Rilke

Cindy Sherman, Untitled

Diane Williams, Human Being

Charles Bernstein, thinking i think i think

Mitch Stevens, OMG! I just got born!

Alan Kirby, The Death of Postmodernism and Beyond (excerpt)

Andy Warhol, Campbell’s Soup Cans; Mark Tansey, The Innocent Eye

Test; Jeff Koons, New Hoover Convertibles

Part Four: American Poetry Since World War II

To the Reader

Robert Penn Warren (1905—1989)

        Bearded Oaks

        Mortal Limit

Theodore Roethke (1908—1963)

        Frau Bauman, Frau Schmidt, and Frau Schwartze

        My Papa’s Waltz

        The Waking

        Night Crow

        I Knew a Woman

        In a Dark Time

Charles Olson (1910—1970)

        Maximus, to Himself

Elizabeth Bishop (1911—1979)

        The Fish

        Sestina

        In the Waiting Room

        The Moose

        One Art

Robert Hayden (1913—1980)

        Homage to the Empress of the Blues

        Those Winter Sundays

        Frederick Douglass   

William Stafford (1914-1993)

        Traveling Through the Dark

Randall Jarrell (1914—1965)              

        The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner

        The Woman at the Washington Zoo

John Berryman (1914—1972)

        Dream Songs (excerpts)

        14 ("Life, friends, is boring. We must not say so")

        29 ("There sat down, once, a thing on Henry’s heart")

        40 ("I’m scared a lonely. Never see my son")

        45 ("He stared at ruin. Ruin stared straight back")

        385 ("My daughter’s heavier. Light leaves are flying")

Robert Lowell (1917—1977)

        Mr. Edwards and the Spider

        Memories of West Street and Lepke

        Skunk Hour

        Night Sweat

        For the Union Dead

Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000)

        We Real Cool

        Martin Luther King, Jr.

Lawrence Ferlinghetti (b. 1919)

        Constantly Risking Absurdity

Robert Duncan (1919—1988)

        Often I Am Permitted to Return to a Meadow

        Interrupted Forms

Richard Wilbur (b. 1921)

        Years-End

        Love Calls Us to the Things of This World

James Dickey (1923-1997)

        Drowning with Others

        The Heaven of Animals

Mitsuye Yamada (b. 1923)

        To the Lady

Denise Levertov (1923-1997)

        In Mind

        September 1961

        What Were They Like

        Zeroing In

A. R. Ammons (1926-2001)

        Corsons Inlet

James Merrill (1926—1995)

        The Broken Home 

Robert Creeley (1926-2005)

        For Love

        The Messengers

Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997)

        Howl

Frank O’Hara (1926—1966)

        To The Harbormaster

        The Day Lady Died

Galway Kinnell (b. 1927)

        The Porcupine

John Ashbery (b. 1927)

        Illustration

        The Lament Upon the Waters

W. S. Merwin (b. 1927)

        For the Anniversary of My Death

        For a Coming Extinction

James Wright (1927—1980)

        Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio

        To the Evening Star: Central Minnesota

        A Blessing

Philip Levine (b. 1928)

        Starlight

Anne Sexton (1928—1974)

        The Truth the Dead Know

        Sylvia’s Death

Adrienne Rich (1929-2012)

        Storm Warnings

        Diving into the Wreck

Gary Snyder (b. 1930)

        Riprap

        August on Sourdough, A Visit from Dick Brewer

        Ripples on the Surface

Sylvia Plath (1932—1963)

        Morning Song

        Lady Lazarus

        Ariel

        Daddy

Linda Pastan  (b. 1932)

        Marks

Amiri Baraka (b. 1934)

        A Poem for Black Hearts

Mary Oliver (b. 1935)

        The Black Snake

        Hawk

Marge Piercy (b. 1936)

        A Work of Artifice

Lucille Clifton (1936-2010)

        In the inner city

Michael S. Harper (b. 1938)              

        Dear John, Dear Coltrane

        Martin’s Blues

        “Bird Lives”: Charles Parker in St. Louis

Frank Bidart (b. 1939)  

        Self-Portrait, 1969

Billy Collins (b. 1941)

        Sonnet

        The Names

Gloria Anzaldua (1942-2004)

        To live in the Borderlands means you

Joseph Bruchac III (b. 1942)

        Ellis Island

Sharon Olds (b. 1942)

        Rites of Passage

        The Victims

Dave Smith (b. 1942)

        Tide Pools

Nikki Giovanni (b. 1943)

        Nikki-Rosa

Louise Glück (b. 1943)

        The Drowned Children

        Gretel in Darkness

Kay Ryan (b. 1945) 

        A Certain Kind of Eden

        Home to Roost

Yusef Komunyakaa (b. 1947)

        Facing  It

C. D. Wright (b. 1949)

        Tours

        Personals

Jorie Graham (b. 1950)

        Sea-Blue Aubade

Joy Harjo (b. 1951)

        Call It Fear

        White Bear

        Eagle Poem

Andrew Hudgins (b. 1951)

        Death and Doom

Jimmy Santiago Baca (b. 1952)

        Cloudy Day

Rita Dove (b. 1952)

        Daystar

        Adolescence–I

        Adolescence–II

        Straw Hat

        Missing

Judith Ortiz Cofer (b. 1952)

        My Father in the Navy

Alberto Rios (b. 1952)

        Wet Camp

        Advice to a First Cousin

Mark Doty (b. 1953)

        Golden Retrievals

        At the Gym

Aurora Levins Morales (b. 1954)

        Child of the Americas

Lorna Dee Cervantes (b. 1954)

        Refugee Ship

Cathy Song (b. 1955)

        The White Porch

        Chinatown

        Heaven

Li-Young Lee (b. 1957)

        The Gift

        Mnemonic

        This Room and Everything in It

Martin Espada (b. 1957)

        Bully

Sherman Alexie (b. 1966)                  

        On the Amtrak from Boston to New York City

Gallery 4: Americas Sings the Blues: A Collection of Songs

Child with Tambourine Accompanying Guitarist, 1930s

W. C. Handy: St. Louis Blues

Bessie Smith: Thinking Blues

Robert Johnson: Walkin’ Blues

W.H. Auden: Funeral Blues

Johnny Cash: Folsom Prison Blues

Folsom State Prison, cell door, 1960s

Merle Haggard: Working Man Blues

Linda Pastan: Mini Blues

Allen Ginsberg: Father Death Blues

Charles Wright: Laguna Blues

Marilyn Chin: We Are Americans Now, We Live in the Tundra

Sherman Alexie: Reservation Blues

Indian photographing tourist photographing Indians, Crow Fair, Montana, 1991

Arrested Development: Tennessee

Chronology

Credits           

Index 

Map of the United States 

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