2.idea：skeptical about the relationship between man and nature， concerns religion， death， immortality， love， nature

　　3.works：This is my letter to the World； I heard a Fly buzz-when I died； Because I could not stop for Death

　　Theodore Dreiser

　　1.works：Sister Carrie  greatest work： An American Tragedy

　　2.trilogy of desire： The Financier； The Titan； The Stoic

　　3.idea：naturalist

　　（1）heredity and environment are the forces determining man‘s destiny， under what life was ironic， even tragic

　　（2）human beings‘ life was trapped into ’a welter of inscrutable forces‘

　　（3）Darwin‘s idea of “ survial of the fittest” is embodied as “kill or to be killed” in Dreiser’s works

　　（4）explain the insignificance of life and attack the conventional moral standards

　　（5）materialism is the core. man has a meaningless， endless search for satisfaction of his desires，  desires for money

　　（6）sex is another human desire. sexual beauty symbolizes the social status

　　Chapter8 The Modern Period （America）

　　1.age： second half of the 19th century to early decades of the 20th century

　　2.background：

　　（1）the U.S. has become the most powerful country

　　（2）technological revolution

　　（3）a decline in moral standard， a spiritual wasteland， feelings of fear， loss， disorientation and disillusionment

　　3. influencing ideas：

　　（1）the same as English Modern period： Karl Marx， Darwin， Freud

　　（2）stream of consciousness：

　　4.“The Lost Generation” by Gertrude

　　5.John Steinbeck： “The Grapes of Wrath”

　　Allen Ginsberg： “Howl”， the manifesto of Beat Movement

　　Salinger： “The Catcher in the Rye”

　　6.modernism‘s features：

　　literature： convey a vision of social breakdown and moral decay

　　writer： develop techniques that could represent a break with the past. modernistic works are discontinuity and fragmentation

　　7.The differences between Modernism America and England

　　（1）American writers emphasize the concrete sensory images or details as the direct conveyor of experience

　　（2）modern fiction employ the first narration or confine the reader to the “central consciousness” or one character‘s point of view

　　common ground： directness， compression， vividness， sparing of words

　　Ezra Pound

　　1.imagist：

　　（1）direct treatment of poetic subjects

　　（2）eliminate ornamental words

　　（3）rhythmical composition in the sequence of the musical phrase rather than in the sequence of a metronome

　　example：“In a Station of the Metro”

　　2.works：In a Station of the metro； The River-Merchent‘s Wife； A pact（free verse）