American Literature Field List 2020

Instructions
The American field list, created by the student out of the works listed below, consists of 100
books or book equivalents, derived from five modules.

When constructing a list for the examination, the student begins by choosing any two consecutive
historical periods from the five listed below. This constitutes the core of the reading list. Next, the
student chooses any three supplementary modules. These can be historical periods or themed
lists. A module is comprised of both primary texts and the associated criticism.

Students can also either follow department guidelines for substitutions from these modules, e.g.,
substitute up to 20% of the works for other works or design an “open module” of their own as
one of the three supplementary modules. For the purposes of calculation, five short stories, five
essays, or two plays constitute the equivalent of a book. Consult with your advisor if certain
works seem to justify a different numerical value.

Here are some examples of lists a student could construct: 1) Antebellum Literature and Realism
and Naturalism (two consecutive historical periods), American Environmental Writing, Native
American Literature, and the open module; 2) Modernism and Post-War Literature (two
consecutive literary periods), Early American Literature, Transnational American Literature, and
Ethnic American literature.

Students need to do one other thing in constructing their list. A certain portion of works from
each module is a selection of literary criticism, which provides overviews of the period or topic
and foundational critical essays. In order to make sure the critical portion of each module has the
most up-to-date material, students, in consultation with their advisor, will supplement the listed
critical works in each module with two books or book-equivalents of recent scholarship on that
period or area.

There are a few duplications of texts across modules. Once students choose a set of five modules,
if any duplications exist, students will, in consultation with their advisor, substitute appropriate
texts to eliminate the replication.

Historical Periods
(20 books each)

Early American Literature: Primary Texts

1. Native American Oral Narratives and Poetry. Selections of narrative and poetry from The
Heath Anthology of American Literature (5th ed., Vol. A) and The Norton Anthology of American
Literature (9th ed.; Vol. A)
2. de Vaca, Álvar Núñez Cabeza. Excerpts from the Relation of Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca
(1542) from either The Heath Anthology of American Literature (5th ed., Vol. A) and The
Norton Anthology of American Literature (9th ed.; Vol. A)
3. de Villagrá, Gaspar Pérez, Excerpt from The History of New Mexico (1610) from The Heath
Anthology of American Literature (5th ed., Vol. A)
4. de Champlain, Samuel, Excerpts from The Voyages of Samuel de Champlain, Heath
Anthology (5th ed., Vol. A) (1604-1615)
5. William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation, Excerpts from The Norton Anthology of American
Literature (9th ed., Vol. A) (written between 1630-1651; publ. 1856)
6. Winthrop, John. “A Model of Christian Charity” (delivered 1630)
7. William, Roger. A Key into the Language of America (1643)
8. Bradstreet, Anne. Selections from The Tenth Muse (1650) and The Works of Anne Bradstreet,
ed. Jeannine Hensley (2010): "Epistle to the Reader by John Woodbridge; Introductory verses by
Nathaniel Ward, John Rogers, and John Woodbridge; “The Prologue”; “In Honour of Du
Bartas”; “In Honour of Queen Elizabeth”; “The Author to Her Book”; “To Her Father With
Some Verses”; “Before the Birth of One of Her Children”; “To My Dear and Loving Husband”;
“The Flesh and the Spirit”; “Upon the Burning of Our House, July 10th, 1666”; “As Weary
Pilgrim”
9. Rowlandson, Mary. A Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson
(1682)
10. Byrd, William. History of the Dividing Line (1728)
11. Edwards, Jonathan. “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” (delivered 1741)
12. Occom, Samson. “A Short Narrative of My Life” (written 1768, first publ. 1982) and “A
Sermon at the Execution of Moses Paul, an Indian” (1772)
13. Wheatley, Phillis. “On Being Brought from Africa to America” (1773), “To the Right
Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth” (1773); “Thoughts on the Work of Providence” (1773);
“To His Excellency General Washington” (1776); Letters to John Thornton (written 1772) and to
Rev. Samson Occom (1774) [printed in The Norton Anthology of American Literature (9th ed.;
Vol. A)]
14. Paine, Thomas. Common Sense (1776)
15. Jefferson, Thomas. “Declaration of Independence” (1776) and Notes on the State of Virginia
(1785)
16. de Crevecoeur, J. Hector St. John. Letters from an American Farmer (1782)
17. Tyler, Royall. The Contrast (1787)
18. Equiano, Olaudah. Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (1789)
19. Murray, Judith Sargent. "On the Equality of the Sexes” (1790)
20. Rowson, Susanna. Charlotte Temple (1791)
21. Franklin, Benjamin. “Way to Wealth” (1758) and Autobiography (1793) [We recommend
the Norton Critical Edition, ed. by Lemay and Zall]
22. Foster, Hannah Webster. The Coquette (1797)
23. Brown, Charles Brockden. Wieland (1798)

Early American Literature: Criticism

1. Bercovitch, Sacvan. “Introduction: The Puritan Errand Reassessed” and “Epilogue: The
Symbol of America” from The American Jeremiad (1978)
2. Cathy Davidson. Chapter 1 (“Introduction: Toward a History of Texts”), Ch. 2 (“The Book in
the New Republic”) and Ch. 6 (“Privileging the Feme Covert: The Sociology of Sentimental
Fiction”) from Revolution and the Word: The Rise of the Novel in America (1986)
3. Ivy Schweitzer. Ch. 1 (“Introduction”), Ch. 4 (“Anne Bradstreet: ‘In the place God had set
her”; and Ch. 5 (“ Roger Williams’s Key: A Gynesis of Race”) from The Work of Self-
Representation: Lyric Poetry in Colonial New England (U of North Carolina P, 2000)
4. Wiget, Andrew. “Reading Against the Grain: Origin Stories and American Literary History”
(1991)
5. Pratt, Mary Louise. “Arts of the Contact Zone” (1991)
6. Elliott, Emory. “The Emergence of the Literatures of the United States” from A Companion
to American Literature and Culture (2010), ed. Paul Lauter
7. Giles, Paul. “Introduction” and Ch. 1, “Augustan American Literature” from The Global
Remapping of American Literature (2011)

Antebellum Literature: Primary Texts

1. Cooper, James Fenimore. The Pioneers (1823)

2. Sedgwick, Catherine Maria. Hope Leslie (1827)
3. Stone, John Augustus. Metamora (1829)
4. Apess, William. “An Indian’s Looking-Glass for the White Man” (1833)
5. Poe, Edgar Allan. “Ligeia” (1838), “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839), “The Man of
the Crowd” (1840), “The Raven” (1845), “Annabel Lee” (1849)
6. Hawthorne, Nathaniel. “The Birth-Mark” (1834), “Young Goodman Brown” (1835)
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. “Nature” (1836), “The American Scholar” (1837), “The Divinity
School Address” (1838), “Self-Reliance” (1841)
7. Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845)
8. Fuller, Margaret. “The Great Lawsuit” (1843)
9. Thoreau, Henry David. “Resistance to Civil Government” (1849); Walden (1854)
10. Melville, Herman. Moby Dick (1851); or “Bartleby, the Scrivener,” (1853), Benito Cereno
(1855), and Billy Budd, Sailor (1891)
11. Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852-3)
12. Northrup, Solomon. Twelve Years a Slave (1853)
13. Hannah Craft. The Bondwoman’s Narrative (mostly likely written between 1853-1861, publ.
2002)
14. Fern, Fanny. Ruth Hall (1855)
15. Whitman, Walt. “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” (1856), Democratic Vistas (1871), “In Paths
Untrodden” (1860), “Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking” (1859), Preface to the 1855
edition of Leaves of Grass, “Song of Myself” (1891, the deathbed edition), “When Lilacs
Last in the Dooryard Bloomed” (1865-66), “Whoever You Are Holding Me Now in Hand”
(1860)
16. Dickinson, Emily. “I never lost as much but twice” (1858), “I taste a liquor never brewed”
(1860), “Success is counted sweetest” (1859), “Safe in their Alabaster Chambers” (1859),
“Some keep the Sabbath going to” (1860), “I’m wife–I’ve finished that” (1860), “I’m
Nobody! Who are you?” (1861), “Wild Nights - Wild Nights!” (1861), “There’s a certain
Slant of light” (1861), “I felt a Funeral in my Brain” (1861), “I like a look of Agony” (1861),
“After great pain, a formal feeling” (1862), “The Soul selects her own Society” (1862), “This
 World is not conclusion” (1862), “I died for Beauty - but was scarce” (1862), “I dwell in
Possibility” (1862), “I heard a Fly buzz - when I died” (1862), “The Brain - is wider than the
Sky” (1862), “I’ve seen a Dying Eye” (1862), “Much Madness is divinest Sense” (1862),
“Because I could not stop for Death” (1863), “Tell all the Truth but tell it slant” (1868), “My
Life had stood - a Loaded Gun” (1863), “She rose to his Requirement” (1863)
17. Jacobs, Harriet. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)
18. Stoddard, Elizabeth The Morgesons (1862)

Antebellum Literature: Criticism

1. Packer, Barbara. “The Transcendentalists” from Vol. 2 of the Cambridge History of

American Literature (2005)
2. Sayre, Gordon. “Slave Narrative and Captivity Narrative: American Genres” from A
Companion to American Literature and Culture, ed. Paul Lauter (2010)
3. Jones, Gavin and Judith Richardson. “Emerson and Hawthorne; or, Locating the American
Renaissance”from The Cambridge Companion to Literature of the American
Renaissance (2018), ed. Christopher N. Phillips
4. Brady, Jennifer. “Fern, Warner, and the Work of Sentimentality” from The Cambridge
Companion to Literature of the American Renaissance (2018), ed. Christopher N. Phillips
5. Levine, Robert. “Reading Slavery and ‘Classic’ American Literature”from The Cambridge
Companion to Slavery in American Literature (2016), ed. Ezra Tawil
6. Tompkins, Jane “Sentimental Power: Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Politics of Literary
History” from Sensational Designs (1985)
7. Berlant, Lauren. “Poor Eliza” (1998)
8. Deborah McDowell. “In the First Place: Making Frederick Douglass and the Afro-American
Tradition” (1997)
9. Wai Chee Dimock. “Introduction” and Ch. 1: “Global Civil Society: Thoreau on Three
Continents” from Through Other Continents: American Literature Across Deep Time (2006)

Realism and Naturalism: Primary Texts

1. Collection of writings in the section entitled “Realism and Naturalism,” incl. Howells, James,
Gilman, from The Norton Anthology of American Literature (9th ed.; Vol. A)
2. Davis, Rebecca Harding. Life in the Iron Mills (1860)
3. Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women (1869)
4. Woolson, Constance Fenimore, “Miss Grief” (1880)
5. James, Henry. Portrait of a Lady (1881)
6. Howells, William Dean. The Rise of Silas Lapham (1885)
7. Twain, Mark. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885)
8. Chesnutt, Charles. “The Goophered Grapevine” (1887) and The Marrow of Tradition (1901)
9. Mary E. Wilkins Freeman. “The Revolt of ‘Mother’” (1890) and “A New England Nun”
(1891)
10. Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper” (1892)
11. Crane, Stephen. Maggie (1893)
12. Chopin, Kate. “Desiree’s Baby” (1893) and The Awakening (1899)
13. Norris, Frank. McTeague (1899)
14. Sarah Orne Jewett, The Country of Pointed Firs (1896)
15. Cahan, Yekl (1896)
16. Watana, Onoto (Winifred Eaton), “A Half Caste” (1898)
17. Dreiser, Theodore. Sister Carrie (1900)
18. Washington, Booker T., Up from Slavery (1901)
19. Dubois, W.E.B, The Souls of Black Folk (1903)
20. Wharton, Edith. The House of Mirth (1905)

Realism and Naturalism: Criticism

1. Trachtenberg, Alan. Ch. 2 “Mechanization Take Command” and Ch. 5 “The Politics of
Culture” from The Incorporation of America:Culture and Society in the Gilded Age (1982)
2. Howard, June. “Casting Out the Outcast: Naturalism and the Brute” from Form and History
in American Literary Naturalism (1985)
3. Kaplan, Amy. “Introduction,” Ch. 1 (“The Mass Mediated Realism of William Dean
Howells”), and Ch. 6 (“The Sentimental Revolt of Sister Carrie”) from The Social
Construction of American Realism (1988)
4. Brodhead, Richard. “Introduction,” Ch. Three (“Starting Out in the 1860s: Alcott,
Authorship, and the Postbellum Literary Field”) and Ch. Four (“The Reading of Regions”)
from Cultures of Letters: Scenes of Reading and Writing in Nineteenth-Century America
(1993)
5. Lutz, Tom. “Discipline and Hubris” from Cosmopolitan Vistas: American Regionalism and
Literary Value (2004)
6. Bentley, Nancy. “Introduction,” Ch. 1 (“Literature and the Museum Idea”), Ch. 2 (“Realism
and the Gordian Knot of Aesthetics and Politics,” and “Ch. 5 “Black Bohemia and the
African American Novel”) from Frantic Panoramas: American Literature and Mass Culture,
1870-1920 (2009)
7. Harris, Susan K. “American Regionalism” from A Companion to American Literature and
Culture (2010), ed. Paul Lauter
8. Richards, Phillip M. “Realism and Victorian Protestantism in African American Literature”
(2010) from A Companion to American Literature and Culture, ed. Paul Lauter
9. Barrish, Phillip. “Introduction” to The Cambridge Companion to Realism and Naturalism
(2011)

Modernism: Primary Texts

1. James, Henry. The Ambassadors (1903)

2. Stein, Gertrude. Three Lives (1909), Section I (“Objects”) from Tender Buttons (1914), “A
Valentine to Sherwood Anderson” (1922), “If I told him: a completed portrait of Picasso”
(1923), selections from Making of Americans (1925) in the latest Norton Anthology of
American Literature
3. Pound, Ezra. “The Seafarer” (1911), “Portrait d’une Femme” (1912), “In a Station of the
Metro” (1913), The Pisan Cantos (1948); Homage to Sextus Propertius (1919) or Hugh
Selwyn Mauberley (1920)
4. Cather, Willa. O Pioneers! (1913)
5. Frost, Robert. “Mending Wall” (1914), “The Woodpile” (1914), “After Apple Picking”
(1914), “The Road Not Taken” (1916), “Birches” (1916), “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy
Evening” (1923), “Acquainted with the Night” (1928), “The Gift Outright” (1942)
6. Doolittle, Hilda (HD). “Sea Rose” (1916), “Helen” (1924), “Oread” (1924), Book I of the
“Pallinode” from Helen in Egypt (1954)
7. Glaspell, Susan. Trifles (1916)
8. Williams, William Carlos. “The Young Housewife” (1916), “Queen-Anne’s-Lace” (1921),
“Spring and All” (1923) , “The Red Wheelbarrow” (1923), “Death” (1930, 1934), “This Is
Just to Say” (1934), “Burning the Christmas Greens” (1944), “A Sort of a Song” (1944),
from Paterson Book 1 “The Delineaments of the Giants” (1946), “Pictures from Brueghel”
(1962)
9. Eliot, T. S. “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” (1917), The Waste Land (1922), “The
Hollow Men” (1925), Four Quartets (1935-42)
10. McKay, Claude. “If We Must Die” (1918), “The Lynching” (1920), “America” (1922),
“Africa” (1922), “The Harlem Dancer” (1922)
11. Stevens, Wallace. “Anecdote of the Jar” (1919), “The Emperor of Ice-Cream” (1923),
“Sunday Morning” (1923), “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” (1923), “The Idea of
Order at Key West” (1936), “The Man with the Blue Guitar” (1937), “Of Modern Poetry”
(1940)
12. Hughes, Langston. “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” (1921), “The Weary Blues” (1925), “Let
America Be America Again” (1936), “Three songs about Lynching” (1936), “Theme for
English B” (1959)
13. Toomer, Jean. Cane (1923)
14. Cummings, E. E. “in Just- spring” (1923), “the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished
souls” (1923), “i sing of Olaf glad and big” (1931), “anyone lived in a pretty how town”
(1940), “my father moved through dooms of love” (1940), “l(a)” (1958), “next to of course
god” (1926), “Buffalo Bill’s” (1920, 1923), “somewhere i have never travelled” (1931)
15. Fitzgerald, F. Scott. The Great Gatsby (1925)
16. Hemingway, Ernest. In Our Time (1925)
17. Faulkner, William. The Sound and the Fury (1929) or As I Lay Dying (1930)
18. Larsen, Nella. Passing (1929)
19. Crane, Hart. From The Bridge (1930): “To Brooklyn Bridge,” “Ave Maria,” “The Tunnel,”
“Atlantis”
20. Roth, Henry. Call It Sleep (1934)
21. McNickle, Darcy. The Surrounded (1936)
22. Barnes, Djuna. Nightwood (1936)
23. Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
24. Steinbeck, John. Grapes of Wrath (1939)

Modernism: Criticism

1. Bradbury, Malcolm and James McFarlane. “The Name and Nature of Modernism,” from
Modernism: A Guide to European Literature 1890-1930 (1976/1991)
2. Huyssen, Andreas. “Mass Culture as Woman” from After the Great Divide (Indiana UP,
1986)
3. Mao, Douglas and Rebecca Walkowitz. “The New Modernist Studies.” PMLA vol. 123, no.
3, 2008, pp. 737-48
4. Friedman, Susan Stanford. “Introduction,” “Chapter 2,” and “Conclusion” from Planetary
Modernisms (Columbia UP, 2015)

Postwar and Contemporary American Literature: Primary Texts

1. Williams, Tennessee. Any one of the following: Glass Menagerie (1944), Streetcar Named
Desire (1947), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1955)
2. Brooks, Gwendolyn. “Kitchenette Building” (1945), “The Children of the Poor” (1949), “We
Real Cool” (1960), “The Bean Eaters” (1960), “A Bronzeville Mother Loiters in Mississippi.
Meanwhile a Mississippi Mother Burns the Bacon” (1960), “The Last quatrain of the Ballad
of Emmett Till” (1960), “The Blackstone Rangers” (1968), “Riot” (1969), “The Life of
Lincoln West” (1981)
3. Bishop, Elizabeth. “The Fish” (1946), “Invitation to Miss Marianne Moore” (1955), “At the
Fishhouses” (1955), “Visits to St. Elizabeths” (1959), “Filling Station” (1965), “Questions of
Travel” (1965), “In the Waiting Room” (1976), “One Art” (1976)
4. Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man (1947)
5. Miller, Arthur. Death of a Salesman (1949)
6. Pynchon, Thomas. Crying of Lot 49 (1966) or Gravity’s Rainbow (1973)
7. Barth, John. Lost in the Funhouse (1968 or 1988 edition)
8. Ashbery, John. “Soonest Mended” (1970), “Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror” (1975), “The
One Thing that Can Save America” (1975), “Paradoxes and Oxymorons” (1981)
9. Rudolfo Anaya, Bless Me, Ultima (1972)
10. Reed, Ishmael. Mumbo Jumbo (1972) or Flight to Canada (1976)
11. Kingston, Maxine Hong. Woman Warrior (1976)
12. Mamet, David. Glengarry Glen Ross (1982)
13. DeLillo, Don. White Noise (1985) or Underworld (1997) or Falling Man (2007)
14. Lee, Li-Young. “The Gift” (1986), “Persimmons” (1986), “Eating Alone” (1986), “Eating
Together” (1986)
15. Morrison, Toni. Beloved (1987)
16. Mukherjee, Bharati. Jasmine (1989)
17. O’Brien, Tim. The Things They Carried (1990)
18. Roth, Philip. American Pastoral (1997)
19. Yamashita, Karen Tei. The Tropic of Orange (1997)
20. Powers, Richard. Gain (1998)
21. Díaz, Junot. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007)
22. Hamid, Mohsin. The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007)

Postwar and Contemporary American Literature: Criticism

1. Baudrillard, Jean. “The Precession of Simulacra” from Simulations (1983)

2. Jameson, Frederic. “Postmodernism, or, the Cultural Logic of Late Capitalism.” New Left
Review (1984)
3. Best, Stephen and Douglas Kellner. Chapter 4 (“Postmodernism in the Arts”) of The
Postmodern Turn (Guilford Press, 1997)
4. McGurl, Mark. “Introduction” from The Program Era (2009)
5. Jay, Paul. “Introduction: The Transnational Turn in Literary Studies” and Chapter 4 (“Border
Studies”) from Global Matters: The Transnational Turn in Literary Studies (2010)
6. Robbins, Bruce. “The Worlding of the American Novel” from Cambridge History of the
American Novel (2011)
7. Duvall, John. “Introduction: A Story of the Stories of American Fiction after 1945” from
Cambridge Companion to American Fiction after 1945 (2012)
8. Goyal, Yogita. Introduction to The Cambridge Companion to Transnational American
Literature (2017)
9. James, David. “Transnational Postmodern and Contemporary Literature” from Cambridge
Companion to Transnational American Literature, edited by Yogita Goyal, 2017, pp. 122-40.

Thematic Options
(20 books each)

Transnational American Literature and the Literature of Empire: Primary Texts

1. de Vaca, Alvar Nunez Cabeza. Excerpts from Relation of Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca
(1542) in Norton or Heath anthologies
2. Equiano, Olaudah. Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (1789)
3. Cooper, James Fenimore. The Last of the Mohicans (1826)
4. Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick (1851)
5. Delany, Martin. Blake (1859)
6. Twain, Mark. A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court (1889)
7. Martí, José. “Our America” (1891)
8. Turner, Frederick Jackson. Significance of the Frontier in American History (1893)
9. Twain, Mark. “To the Person Sitting in Darkness” (1901)
10. Bourne, Randolph. “Trans-national America” (1916)
11. McKay, Claude. “If We Must Die” (1918), “The Lynching” (1920), “America” (1922),
“Africa” (1922), “The Harlem Dancer” (1922)
12. Faulkner, William. Absalom, Absalom! (1936)
13. Kingston, Maxine Hong. Woman Warrior (1976)
14. McCarthy, Cormac. Blood Meridian (1985)
15. Mukherjee, Bharati. Jasmine (1989)
16. Yamashita, Karen Tei. The Tropic of Orange (1997)
17. Abani, Chris. GraceLand (2004) or Cole, Teju. Open City (2011)
18. Díaz, Junot. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007)
19. Hamid, Mohsin. The Reluctant Fundamentalist (2007)

Transnational American Literature and the Literature of Empire: Criticism

1. Gilroy, Paul. “The Black Atlantic as a Counterculture of Modernity” from The Black Atlantic
(1993)
2. Kaplan, Amy. “Introduction” to Cultures of US Imperialism (1993), Anarchy of Empire
(2002)
3. Nwankwo, Ifeoma Kiddoe. Introduction and chapter 2, “The View from Next Door: Plácido
Through the Eyes of U.S. Black Abolitionists” from Black Cosmopolitanism: Racial
Consciousness and Transnational Identity in the Nineteenth-Century Americas (2005)
4. Giles, Paul. “The Deterritorialization of American Literature” from Dimock and Buell’s
Shades of the Planet: American Literature as World Literature (2007)
5. Jay, Paul. Introduction and chapter 4 (“Border Studies”) from Global Matters: The
Transnational Turn in Literary Studies (2010)
6. Pease, Donald. “American Exceptionalism(s): A Brief Critical Genealogy” from Globalizing
American Studies (2010)
7. Dimock, Wai-chee. “War in Several Tongues” from Globalizing American Studies (2010)
8. Goldstein, Alyosha. Introduction to Formations of United States Colonialism (2014)
9. Lowe, Lisa. Introduction to Intimacies of Four Continents (2015)
10. Goyal, Yogita. Introduction to The Cambridge Companion to Transnational American
Literature (2017)

American Environmental Writing: Primary Texts

1. Thoreau, Henry David. Walden (1854)

2. Muir, John. “A Wind-storm in the Forests” (1894)
3. Stevens, Wallace. "Anecdote of the Jar" (1919); “The Snow Man” (1921); "Thirteen Ways of
Looking at a Blackbird” (1923); "The Idea of Order at Key West” (1936)
4. Leopold, Aldo. A Sand County Almanac (1949)
5. Carson, Rachel. Silent Spring (1962)
6. Abbey, Edward. Desert Solitaire (1968) or The Monkey-Wrench Gang (1975)
7. Dillard, Annie. Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974)
8. Snyder, Gary. The Practice of the Wild (1990)
9. White, Evelyn. “Black Women and the Wilderness” (1990)
10. Yamashita, Karen Tei. Through the Arc of the Rain Forest (1990)
11. Robinson, Kim Stanley. Pacific Edge (1990), or any of the books in the Science in the
Capital trilogy (2004-2007), or New York 2140 (2017)
12. Silko, Leslie Marmon. Almanac of the Dead (1991)
13. Hogan, Linda. Solar Storms (1995)
14. Ray, Janisse. Ecology of a Cracker Childhood (1999)
15. Williams, Terry Tempest. Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place (2001)
16. McCarthy, Cormac. The Road (2006)
17. Kingsolver, Barbara. Flight Behavior (2012)
18. Powers, Richard. The Overstory (2018)
19. Kimmerer, Robin Wall. Braiding Sweetgrass (2020)

American Environmental Writing: Criticism

1. Buell, Lawrence. The Environmental Imagination (1995), Introduction to The Future of

Environmental Criticism: Environmental Crisis and Literary Imagination (2005)
2. Clark, Timothy. Introduction to The Cambridge Introduction to Literature and the
Environment (2011)
Gender and Sexuality: Primary Texts

1. Fuller, Margaret, “The Great Lawsuit” (1843)

2. Howe, Julia Ward. The Hermaphrodite (ca. 1846)
3. Jacobs, Harriet. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)
4. Melville, Herman. Billy Budd, Sailor (published in 1924 but written in 1891)
5. Whitman, Walt. Calamus poems from Leaves of Grass (1881)
6. Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. “The Yellow Wallpaper” (1892) and Herland
7. James, Henry. The Beast in the Jungle (1903)
8. Gertrude Stein, Three Lives (1909)
9. Glaspell, Susan. Trifles (1916)
10. Cather, Willa. My Antonia (1918)
11. Anzia Yezierska, Bread Givers (1925)
12. Hemingway, Ernest. The Sun Also Rises (1926); “Hills Like White Elephants” (1927)
13. Larsen, Nella, Passing (1929)
14. Baldwin, James. Giovanni’s Room (1956)
15. Plath, Sylvia. “The Applicant” (1962), “Morning Song” (1966), “Lady Lazarus” (1966),
“Ariel” (1966), “Daddy” (1966), “Words” (1966), “Blackberrying” (1971)
16. Rich, Adrienne. “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers” (1951), “Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law”
(1963), “A Valediction Forbidding Mourning” (1970), “Power” (1974), “Diving into the
Wreck” (1973), “North American Time” (1983), “Living Memory” (1988), “XIII
(Dedications)” in Atlas of a Difficult World (1991)
17. Cisneros, Sandra. The House on Mango Street (1984)
18. Kushner, Tony. Angels in America (1992)
19. Bechdel, Fun Home (2006)
20. Emezi, Akwaeke. Freshwater (2018)
21. Machado, Carmen Maria. In the Dream House (2019)

Gender and Sexuality: Criticism

1. Baym, Nina. “Melodramas of Beset Manhood” (1981)

2. McDowell, Deborah. “That Nameless . . . Shameful Impulse: Sexuality in Nella Larsen’s
Quicksand and Passing” (1988)
3. Sedgwick, Eve. Ch. 2 (“Some Binarisms I: Billy Budd: After the Homosexual”) from
Epistemology of the Closet (1990)
4. Rotundo, E. Anthony. American Manhood (1993)
5. Foster, Travis. “Nineteenth-Century Queer Literature” from The Cambridge Companion to
American Gay and Lesbian Literature, ed. Scott Herring (2015)
6. Stallings, L. H. “Gender and Sexuality” from The Cambridge Companion to American Gay
and Lesbian Literature, ed. Scott Herring (2015)
7. Tompkins, Kyla. “Intersections of Race, Gender, and Sexuality” from The Cambridge
Companion to American Gay and Lesbian Literature, ed. Scott Herring (2015)

Native American Literature: Primary Texts

1. Pontiac. “Speech at Detroit” (1763)

2. Occom, Samson. A Short Narrative of My Life (written 1768, first published 1982)
3. Logan. “Chief Logan’s Speech” (1774)
4. Boudinot, Elias, “Address to the Whites” (1826)
5. Apess, William. A Son of the Forest (1829)
6. Schoolcraft, Jane Johnston. “Sweet Willy” (nd), “To the Pine Tree” (nd), “Lines Written at
Castle Island, Lake Superior” (1838), “Moowis, the Indian Coquette” (1827), “The Little
Spirit, or Boy-Man” (ca. 1839)
7. Copway, George. The Life, History, and Travels of Kah-ge-gah-gah-bowh (1847)
8. Ridge, John Rollin. The Life and Adventures of Joaquin Murieta (1854)
9. Winnemucca, Sarah. Life among the Paiutes (1884)
10. Zitkala Ša (Gertrude Bonnin). “Impressions of an Indian Childhood,” “School Days of an
Indian Girl,” “An Indian Teacher among Indians” (1900)
11. Eastman, Charles. From the Deep Woods to Civilization (1916)
12. Mourning Dove. Cogewea the Half-Blood (1927)
13. McNickle, Darcy. The Surrounded (1936)
14. Momaday, N. Scott. House Made of Dawn (1968) or The Way to Rainy Mountain (1969)
15. Ortiz, Simon. “Passing through Little Rock” (1976), “Earth and Rain, the Plants and Sun”
(1977), “Vision Shadows” (1977), “Travelling” (1977), excerpt from From Sand Creek
(1981) in latest Norton Anthology of American Literature
16. Welch, James. Winter in the Blood (1974) or Fools Crow (1986)
17. Silko, Leslie Marmon. Ceremony (1977) or Almanac of the Dead (1992)
18. Harjo, Joy. “Call It Fear” (1983), “White Bear” (1983), “Summer Night” (1990), “The
Flood” (1994), “When the World As We Knew It Ended—” (2003)
19. Erdrich, Louise. Love Medicine (1984), or Tracks (1988), or LaRose (2016)
20.
21. Allen, Paula Gunn. Life is a Fatal Disease: Collected Poems 1962-1995 (1997)
22. Vizenor, Gerald. Father Meme (2008), or Chair of Tears (2012), or Blue Ravens (2014)

Native American Literature: Criticism

1. Lincoln, Kenneth. Introduction to Native American Renaissance (1983)

2. Womack, Craig. Introduction to Red on Red: Native American Literary Separatism (1999)
3. Cox, James and Daniel Heath Justice. “Introduction: Post-Renaissance Indigenous American
Literary Studies.” Oxford Handbook of Indigenous American Literature (2014)
4. Weaver, Jace. Introduction to The Red Atlantic (2014)
5. 3-5 essays from Routledge Companion to Native American Literature (2016) or Oxford
Handbook of Indigenous American Literature (2014)

Black American Literature: Primary Texts

1. Wheatley, Phillis. “On Being Brought from Africa to America” (1773), “To the Right
Honourable William, Earl of Dartmouth”; Letters to John Thornton and to Rev. Samson
Occom (1774), “To His Excellency General Washington” (1776)
2. Equiano, Olaudah. Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (1789) Douglass,
Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845)
3. Brown, William Wells. Clotel (1853) or Harriet Wilson, Our Nig (1859)
4. Jacobs, Harriet. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)
5. Harper, Frances. Iola Leroy (1892) or Hopkins, Pauline. Contending Forces (1900)
6. Chesnutt, The Conjure Stories, a Norton Critical Edition, ed. Robert B. Stepto and Jennifer
Rae Greeson (2012), [stories originally published in the 1880s and 1890s]
7. DuBois, The Souls of Black Folk (1903)
8. Johnson, James Weldon, Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (1912)
9. Cullen, Countee. “Yet Do I Marvel” (1925), “Incident” (1925), “Heritage” (1925)
10. Larsen, Nella. Passing (1929)
11. Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)
12. Wright, Richard. Native Son (1940)
13. Petry, Ann. The Street. (1946)
14. Hansberry, Lorraine. Raisin in the Sun (1959)
15. Baraka, Amiri. “An Agony. As Now” (1964), “Poem for Willie Best” (1964), “Will They
Cry When You’re Gone, You Bet” (1969); “Black Art” (1965)
16. Audre Lorde, “A Litany for Survival” (1978), “Poetry is Not a Luxury” (1985), “The
Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House” (1984)
17. Morrison, Toni. Beloved (1987)
18. Jones, Edward P. The Known World (2003)
19. Rankine, Claudia. Citizen: An American Lyric (2014)
20. Whitehead, Colson. The Underground Railroad (2016)

Black American Literature: Criticism

1. Gould, Philip. “The Economies of the Slave Narrative” from A Companion to African
American Literature (2013), ed. Gene Andrew Jarrett
2. Levine, Robert S. “African-American Literary Nationalism” from A Companion to African
American Literature (2013), ed. Gene Andrew Jarrett
3. Ross, Marlon B. “Racial Uplift and the Literature of the New Negro” from A Companion to
African American Literature (2013), ed. Gene Andrew Jarrett
4. Stephens, Michelle Ann. “The Harlem Renaissance: The New Negro at Home and Abroad”
from A Companion to African American Literature (2013), ed. Gene Andrew Jarrett
5. Dubey, Madhu. “Neo-Slave Narratives” from A Companion to African American Literature
(2013), ed. Gene Andrew Jarrett
6. Smethurst, James and Howard Ramsby II. “Reform and Revolution, 1965-1976: The Black
Aesthetic at Work” from The Cambridge History of African American Literature, ed.
Maryemma Graham and Jerry W. Ward, Jr.
7. Gates, Henry Louis, Ch. 1 (“Literary Theory and the Black Tradition”) and Ch. 9 (“The
‘Blackness of Blackness’: A Critique of the Sign and the Signifying Monkey” from Figures
in Black (1989)
8. Morrison, Toni. “Unspeakable Things Unspoken: The Afro-American Presence in American
Literature” (1989)
9. Gilroy, Paul. Ch. 1 (“The Black Atlantic as a Counterculture of Modernity”) from The Black
Atlantic (1993)

Ethnic American Literature: Primary Texts

1. Antin, Mary. “The Lie” (1913)
2. Yezierska, Anzia. Bread Givers (1925) or Henry Roth, Call It Sleep (1934)
3. Rølvaag, O. E. Giants in the Earth (1927)
4. Reznikoff, Charles. “The Moon Shines in the Summer Night” (1934), “A Short History of
Israel, Notes and Glosses” (1941), “Kaddish” (1941), “The Lamps are Burning in the
Synagogue” (1977)
5. Zukovsky, Louis. “Poem beginning ‘The’” (1928), “A-12” (1959)
6. Bulosan, Carlos. America Is in the Heart (1946)
7. Ginsberg, Allen. “Footnote to Howl” (1956), “Kaddish” (1959)
8. Okada, John. No-No Boy (1957)
9. Paley, Grace. “The Loudest Voice” (1959)
10. Bellow, Saul. Henderson the Rain King (1959) or Adventures of Augie March (1953)
11. Roth, Philip. Portnoy’s Complaint (1969) or The Plot Against America (2004)
12. Levine, Philip. “Zaydee” (1974), “On a Drawing by Flavio” (1979)
13. Kingston, Maxine Hong. Woman Warrior (1976)
14. Soto, Gary. “Braly Street” (1977), “The Cellar” (1978), “Mexicans Begin Jogging” (1981),
“How Things Work” (1985)
15. Valdez, Luis. Zoot Suit (1979)
16. Anzaldúa, Gloria and Cherríe Moraga. This Bridge Called My Back (1981) or Gloria
Anzaldúa, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza (1987)
17. Rodriguez, Richard. The Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez (1982) or
Brown: The Last Discovery of America (2002)
18. Cha, Theresa. Dictee (1982)
19. Cisneros, Sandra. The House on Mango Street (1984) or Woman Hollering Creek (1991)
20. Rich, Adrienne. “Yom Kippur 1984” (1986)
21. Hwang, David Henry. M. Butterfly (1988)
22. Mukherjee, Bharati. Jasmine (1989)
23. Hagedorn, Jessica. Dogeaters (1990)
24. Pinsky, Robert. “Visions of Daniel” (1990), “The Night Game” (1990), “Avenue” (1996)
25. Spiegelman, Art. Maus I and II (1991)
26. Espada, Martín. “Alabanza” (2003)
27. Nguyen, Viet Thanh. The Sympathizer (2015)

Ethnic American Literature: Criticism

1. Sollors, Werner. Beyond Ethnicity: Consent and Descent in American Culture (1986)
2. Mukherjee, Bharati. “Immigrant Writing: Give Us Your Maximalists!” (1988)
3. Palumbo-Liu, David. “Introduction” from The Ethnic Canon (1995)
4. Lowe, Lisa. Immigrant Acts: On Asian American Cultural Politics (1996) or The Intimacies
of Four Continents (2015)
5. Franco, Dean. “Introduction” from Ethnic American Literature (2006)
6. Douglas, Christopher. Introduction to Genealogy of Literary Multiculturalism (2009)

Popular and Genre Literature: Primary Texts

1. Poe, Edgar Allan. “The Purloined Letter” (1844)

2. Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. “Slave Singing at Midnight” (1842), Evangeline (1847),
“Jewish Cemetery at Newport” (1854), Song of Hiawatha (1855), “Cross of Snow” (1886)
3. Stowe, Harriet Beecher. Uncle Tom’s Cabin (1852)
4. Alcott, Louisa May. Little Women (1868-9)
5. Alger, Horatio. Ragged Dick (1868)
6. Grey, Zane. Riders of the Purple Sage (1912)
7. Lovecraft, H. P. “The Call of Cthulhu” (1928)
8. Chandler, Raymond. The Big Sleep (1939)
9. Bradbury, Ray. Fahrenheit 451 (1953) or Ursula LeGuin, Ursula The Left Hand of Darkness
(1969)
10. King, Stephen. Carrie (1974)
11. Butler, Octavia. Kindred (1979)
12. Walker, Alice. The Color Purple (1982)
13. Spiegelman, Art. Maus I and II (1986)
14. Hoklotubbe, Sara Sue. Deception on All Accounts (2003)
15. Meyer, Stephenie. Twilight (2005)
16. Thomas, Angie. The Hate U Give (2017)
17. Adeyemi, Tomi. Children of Blood and Bone (2018)

Popular and Genre Literature: Criticism

1. Jane Tompkins, Ch. 5 (“Sentimental Power: Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Politics of Literary
History”) from Sensational Designs (1985)
2. Radway, Janice. Introduction, Conclusion, and Chap. 4 (“The Ideal Romance: The Promise
of Patriarchy”) from Reading the Romance (1984) or Modleski, Chaps. 1-2 (“Mass-Produced
Fantasies for Women” and “The Disappearing Act: Harlequin Romances”) from Loving with
a Vengeance (1982)
3. Warhol, Robyn. Ch. 1 (“Introduction: Effeminacy, Feelings, Form”) and Ch. 2 (“The Cry:
Effeminate Sentimentalism”) from Having a Good Cry: Effeminate Feelings and Pop
Cultural Forms (2003)
4. James, P.D. Ch. 4 “Soft-Centred and Hard-Boiled” from Talking about Detective Fiction
(2009)
5. Vint, Sherryl. “Science Studies” in The Routlege Companion to Science Fiction (2009), ed.
Mark Bould et al.
6. Viehmann, Martha, “Wests, Westerns, Westerners” from A Companion to American
Literature and Culture (2010), ed. Paul Lauter
7. Nicola Humble, “The Reader of Popular Fiction” from The Cambridge Companion to
Popular Fiction (2012), ed. David Glover;
8. Luckhurst, Roger. "The Weird: A Dis/Orientation" (2017)
9. Cates, Isaac. “The Graphic Novel,” in Comics Studies: A Guidebook, edited by Charles
Hatfield and Bart Beaty (2020)