American literature

American literature hasn’t so long history as for example the British literature. But of course it is also full of excellent writers and poets. We can divide it into four main parts or periods.
The first period is called COLONIAL  PERIOD. The first writers of this time were the Englishmen. They described the exploration and colonisation of America. These authors were influenced by the Indians and their legends.

The second period is usually called REVOLUTIONARY  PERIOD. It is the period of War to Independence. The writers are called “Founding fathers”. They wrote especially essays. The best known piece of the literature of this time is DECLARATION  OF  INDEOPENDENCE whose main author is THOMAS  JEFFERSON. Another well known representant of the revolutionary period was for example BENJAMIN  FRANKLIN.

The third part is THE  PROSE  AND  THE  POETRY  OF  THE  NINETEENTH  CENTURY. One of the best authors was JAMES  FENIMORE  COOPER. He wrote about thirty novels. His famous work is I think THE  LAST  OF  THE  MOHYCANS. The others famous writers of this period are for example Edgar Allan Poe, Herman Melville, Walt Whitman and Mark Twain. 
EDGAR  ALLAN  POE is a founder of detective story, horror and sci-fi. His best works are THE  PIT  AND  THE PENDRLUM,  THE  FALL  OF  THE  HOESE  OF  USHER, THE  MASK  OF  RED  DEATH or THE  RAVEN which is a poem and if you read it you should hear the raven’s beak hitting the door.
HERMAN  MELVILLE had a tragic view of the life – he was a pessimist. He divided the world into two sides – good and evil. His master piece MOBY  DICK is about a great white whale and a captain Ahab who wanted kill the whale so he attacked the whale but his ship was destroyed and he dies.
MARK  TWAIN is one of the greatest representants of American humour in literature. Maerk twain is his nick name – his real name was Samuel Clemens. He comes from family of a lawyer but his family was quite poor so Twain didn’t get very good education. He left school very soon and he took different jobs for example he was a pilot on the steamboat on the river Mississippi and he used a terminology from the boat as his pseudonym. Many of his books reflect his own experiences from his life. He became famous with a short story called THE  CELEBRATED  JUMPING  FROG. It is about people in a mining camp where ordinary men cheat a frog racer. They fill the frog with small metal balls. His best known stories are called THE  ADVENTURES  OF  TOM  SAWYER, LIFE  ON  THE  MISSISSIPPI and THE  ADVENTURES  OF  HUCKLBERY  FIN. Mark Twin is also considered to be a master of short story. I read his story called DOG.
WALT  WHITMAN was an excellent poets, his most famous piece is called THE  LEAVES  OF  THE  GRASS.

The last period is PERIOD  OF  THE  TWENTIETH CENTURY. In this period we can find a group of authors called lost generation. These authors write about World War. The member of this group was for example ERNEST  HEMINGWAY. He was a reporter, soldier, short-story writer, novelist, playwright and fisherman. Ernest Hemingway came from six children of a small town doctor. He was active in sports and he was an excellent hunter and fisherman. His parents wanted him to be a doctor too but after his graduation from high school he began his writing career as a sports reporter. When the USA entered the first world war  Hemingway left his job and  became an ambulance driver in Italy. In the war he was badly wounded so he spent several weeks in hospital in Milano. This experience hw describes in his piece. He is usually called a man of adventures because he liked adventures very much an a master of short story writing. He is the author of several world known pieces: 
A  FERWELL  TO  ARMS where he describes love story during the First world war. It is about a young nurse and a young soldier who is wounded. Novel FOR  WHOM  THE  BELL TOLLS tell about Spanish Civil War. Hemingway also liked travelling and hunting the animals – his experiences he described in a piece called GREEN  HILLS  OF  AFRICA. THE  OLD  MAN  AND  THE  SEA is his very famous short story, slim book about an old fisherman who wanted to catch a big fish during his life so everyday he went to the sea in his small boat. One day he caught the fish of his dreams but during the journey home the smaller fishes ate his big fish and the old man brought home only its skeleton.
During the last years of his lifeHemingway suffered from depression and finaly he commited suicide.

The representants of the poesy of the twentieth century in American literature are called beat generation. The memberes of this generation were influenced by oriental philosophy and they loved drinking alcohol, taking drugs, sex and fast conversation. They were concentrated in San Francisco. To this group belong for example JACK  KEROAC  and  ALLAN  GINSBERG who visited Prague in nineteen nineties.