Thursday, June 28, 2012

The British & American Literature


Maybe, taking a look at what elementally is the difference between the American and British English can't be an easy job to further fathom the framework of two different styles of the same language. The demand to understand each of the above forms of English is certainly large. The use & nativity, history, metric framework, complexity of writing, theme & the spellings are predominant entities of the linguistic structure that any language will embrace.

A rise of thought that brought in a want of a new literature is indeed the brainchild of Ralph Waldo Emerson. He can be referred to as an essayist, preacher, philosopher.According to Americans, Any term that defines positive, philosophical & ethical education will definitely represent Emerson. His essays and poems incorporated a taste of new touch to the old language making it plain and simple with not much of mythical references, breaking the myth of being "a Typical European Muse". Novelists like Alice walker, Edward Albee & Eugene O’Neill portrayed the essence of abuse done to numerous cadres; physically, mentally and economically. Alice Walker reflected the slavery of black women In The Color Purple, where Albee & O’Neill depicted absurdity of American life & the harassment of blue collared workers in Who is Afraid of Virginia Woolf? & The Hairy Ape correspondingly.

The British launched their format of literature in the early 14th century. Geoffrey Chaucer was the man. With his Canterbury Tales, the wide stage to incorporate various poets & essayists was successfully set. His Language isn’t so clear, as it has that deep tinge of Northern Dialect with the interference of rustic idioms and expressions. The work is a pervasive image of the British society, people & their behavioral aspects,clothing,Class distinctions, food and happening stuff of the era. Until now, many novelists and poets praise him the direct father of British Literature, where the prospect of becoming his poetic son was an honor to Edmund Spenser, the guy behind the famous twin spousal verses, Epithalamion & Prothalamion. With profound commonsense, clarity in the verbal writing, employment of an ending refrain in a stanza which usually summed up the theme & enclosing inflated verbal modes into a shell of soothing rhyme & rhythm was a stunning accolade that Spenser received.

With Novelists, Thomas More penned Utopia, a concept that the author envisioned, essentially on fetching a civilized society and kind people like the Utopians; thus calling it a kind of reform. This is a direct hit on the socialist classes & the way in which those functioned. In Kyd’s Spanish Tragedy & Webster’s The duchess of Malfi, the idea behind is Revenge depicted in different styles. The Cruel nature of human mind is clearly portrayed in the above. In case of Middleton’s The changeling, a psychological imbalance of a coy woman, who uses murder as a tool to the fulfillment of sexual desire is pictured with a sub plot that sensibly attaches to the principal plot.

Sidney’s An Apology For Poetry is similar to that of Emerson’s The American Scholar. Both works throw light on similar ideas, however, the former is a mildly written response to Stephen Gosson’s School Of Abuse in which he caustically censures the art of poetry. A lot of similarities are what we see in these two forms of Literature, nevertheless, the diction & metric entities taking huge deviations.

Not always, a topic will need the usual description presented in a unique style of writing. Stepping further, deep down the notion of differentiation, in languages, a thoughtful analysis is definitely required. Without the interference of the conventional ideologies like spellings and accents, this post is a linguistic perspective of the two forms. 

-- Sashank Franklin Sargunaraj & Roopa   :)