The Norton Anthology of American Literature: Literature to 1820

The Norton Antology of American Literature #A

by Nina Baym (General Editor)

The Norton Anthology of American Literature is the classic survey of American literature from its sixteenth-century origins to its flourishing present.
This volume, Volume A, covers American Literature from its beginning to 1820.

Genres: Reference, Classics, Fiction, Literature, Anthologies, Poetry, Short Stories

956 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 1979

About the author

Nina Baym (born 1936) was an American literary critic and literary historian. She is best known as the General Editor of the renowned The Norton Anthology of American Literature, from 1991 - 2018. She was professor of English at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign for over 40 years, from 1963 to 2004.

Baym was a scholar who asked why so few women were represented in the American literary canon, and subsequently spent her career working to correct that imbalance.

While teaching as English professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1975, Baym was writing a book about Nathaniel Hawthorne when she began to wonder why 19th-Century American literature was so male-dominated.
It was Hawthorne himself who helped pique her curiosity: in 1855, he had famously complained that "a damned mob of scribbling women" was cutting into his sales.

“I wanted to know where these women were,” she recalled in an interview with The New York Times in 1987.

She went searching through library bookshelves and 19th-century newspapers and magazines, looking for information about the absent women writers. She found plenty of novels written by women in the 1800's, and though they varied in quality, she concluded that many deserved more than obscurity.

Baym went on to author and edit of a number of groundbreaking works of American literary history and criticism, beginning with Woman's Fiction (1978), and including Feminism and American Literary History (1992), American Women Writers and the Work of History (1995), and American Women of Letters and the Nineteenth-Century Sciences (2004).
Elaine Showalter called Baym's Women Writers of the American West, 1833-1927 (2011), "The first comprehensive guide to women's writing in the old West," and proclaimed it an "immediately standard and classic text."
The book uncovers and describes the western-themed writing in diverse genres of almost 350 American women, most of them unknown today, but many of them successful and influential in their own time.

Baym was active in many professional associations, such as the American Literature Section of the Modern Language Association and the American Studies Association, as well as serving as Director of the School of Humanities at the University of Illinois from 1976-1987. She served on panels for the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Fulbight Foundation.
Among her numerous literary prizes, fellowship, and honors are the 2000 Jay B. Hubbell Award for lifetime achievement in American literary studies (from the Modern Language Association) and fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Association of University Women, and the Mellon Foundation.

Baym was born in Princeton, New Jersey in 1936; her father was the eminent mathematician Leo Zippin, and her mother was an English teacher. She received her B.A. from Cornell University, an M.A. from Radcliffe, and a Ph.D. from Harvard University.
She died in 1971.

Reviews

[Kate♡ · Rating 2 out of 5]

2/5stars

yah... i still hate american lit i think i only made it through my class cause my professor was WONDERFUL

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m done I’m done I’M DONE!!!! **Happy Dance**

Okay had to get that out of the way first. Okay so it is really difficult to rate this book a) because it was a “work” book rather than a “for fun” book but mostly, b) because it is an anthology therefore containing many works for which my enjoyment varied greatly. So what I will do is give a quick review of how I felt about the anthology as a whole and then for fun and anyone who is interested I’ll briefly comment on some of the individual works.

So overall I am very pleased with this the 7th edition of the Norton Anthology of American Literature. I had originally borrowed the 6th edition from my public library (6th was published roughly 30 years prior to 7th), but I did a little research and discovered that where the 6th edition begins with the Puritans and the very first piece of writing is John Winthrop's A Model of Christian Charity. The 7th edition starts by discussing the Spanish and other early settlers and the first piece of writing is a Native American creation story. John Winthrop doesn't come in until page 147. So yeah, kinda a big difference. The 7th edition also features 34 new authors (many of the new authors are women who were previously not included), 36 complete longer texts, and 12 new contextual clusters. Over all what my research showed was that there has been a significant shift in what is considered to be part of the Canon of Early American Literature and since I am reading these anthologies in order to prepare for the GRE subject test, I felt it was important for me to be reading the works which are most currently considered to be significant.

*one thing I found rather odd was the use of footnotes. Many of them were helpful and would contextualize or explain something alluded to in the text, but where it got somewhat weird was where they would define words which no longer carry the same meaning. Now some of these definitions were entirely understandable, I personally knew a lot of them just because my area of interest in English has probably familiarized me with a different set of words from the average college student who might be using this book. However, some were just odd for instance I think I counted at least 4 times where a footnote was attached to the word “sable” to explain that it meant black. Now to me that one is pretty straight forward, if you don’t know that sable means black you should either be able to figure it out from the context of the sentence or look it up. Do that many people really not know that sable means black? Actually this is my main complaint about the footnoting I felt that there were a good number of words which may not carry the exact same meaning anymore, but should be pretty easy to figure out from context. While some others which I felt were a bit less obvious weren’t given a footnote at all. It’s really not a big deal and most people probably won’t even notice it let alone be bothered by it.

Okay now down to the bits and pieces.
The Indian creation stories were pretty interesting I remember some of them from when I was a kid although the ones you hear when you’re a kid are clearly censored to contain less talk of excrement and phalluses (plural of phallus?). They got a bit repetitive, but it was a good sampling.

The Spanish mostly complained about “the savages” and were prone to extreme embellishment to make themselves sound like big fancy heroes.

THE PURITANS ARE THE MOST GOD AWFUL BORING LOT OF WRITERS. You would think that with perilous journeys across the ocean, religious persecution, Indian wars, being kidnapped by Indians, and witch trials there would be a lot of interesting stuff to read about. Not so. While I do find this time period interesting the Puritans themselves wrote horrendously boring stuff. The writings from this time period are mostly letters and journals and consist mainly of talking about a) how hard life is, b) how much they love God and Jesus, c) people dying, d) how much they love God and Jesus for helping them through the tough times, e) people of whom they disapprove and f) “did we mention how great our lord and savior is? Cause he’s pretty awesome!” *Michael Wigglesworth’s Day of Doom was kinda fun is a super morbid apocalyptic sort of way.

I was deeply thankful when I finally made it past the Puritans (page 449) and reach the writings of Benjamin Franklin. First of all good old Benji is just an interesting guy, but more importantly he had flair. He knew how to engage the reader’s attention, he was clever, funny and you know didn’t go on and on about god. He was a breath of fresh air and I was quite happy to spend almost 150 pages with him.

Franklin also marks the point at which we begin to get into revolutionary writing which I find quite interesting. People are writing less about surviving the winter and Indian attacks and are instead discussing the ideas which shaped our country; they’re passionate about the subjects and still engaging today. This is due in large part to the fact that the writers of the revolution were writing to publication in pamphlets and news papers and they were writing to persuade people to their cause which means they had to be engaging. This includes Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, the Federalist Papers and so on. This section also includes some of the letters between John and Abagail Adams. I just adore Abagail, what an awesome lady.

Thomas Paine is pretty dry, but I’ve read him before so I skimmed through his bit pretty fast.

Then there are a whole bunch of lady writers, which is pretty cool.

Judith Sargent Murry “On Equality of the Sexes” and a few of her other writings. An early feminist and a gal after my own heart, I found myself reading her and thinking “hell yeah you tell em Judy!”

Royall Tyler’s play The Contrast is provided in full. I found it to be an interesting example of early American dramatic writing and also it contained one of the very best stage directions I have ever come across “Discovered at a Toilet, reading.” This is of course the old meaning of the word toilet which is a dressing table, but I still burst out laughing when I read it.

Hannah Webster Foster’s The Coquette I thought this was going to be tedious because it is an entire novel done in letters to and from its characters, and in the intro given by the editors it pretty much tells you exactly how it will end. But I actually got really into it and was interested in the characters and everything so that was pretty awesome.

The last bit was Tabitha Tenney and excerpts from her book Female Quixotisms, it was mildly entertaining, if a bit silly. Satire is the intent so silly isn’t bad I just didn’t find it as interesting a read as The Coquette which preceded it.

So glad it's over. now on to volume B......

[Mert · Rating 3 out of 5]

3/5 Stars (%60/100)

We all know Norton anthologies and we all love them. It is no wonder that many universities use these books when teaching. I've used this one for 4 years together with other volumes. Even today, as a post-grad student, I still go back and check out my notes. This is the first volume, volume A, and it starts from literally the beginning of American history, and literature continues to 1820.

[Abby · Rating 5 out of 5]

The tip of the iceberg, a diverse collection to wet the palate and kindle an interest in American literature

Encountering this anthology helped inspire a love of literature within me. And it demonstrates how incredibly wrong Europeans have always been and always will be, when they consider Americans as uncultured or inferior in the arts to themselves. Each volume in this set reveals the incredible diversity and achievements of American literature. It was the required textbook for an American lit. class, one of the best electives I ever chose. Begin with an open mind, take your time, embrace the challenge of difficult literature and opposing positions.

The strengths of the anthology are:
* you will discover authors and works with which you're unfamiliar
* the works themselves are well-edited with plenty of helpful footnotes
* the typography is crisp and clear
* there are fascinating mini-biographies for each author

It's not without weaknesses:
* obviously not every important work or author can be included
* those which are may be only excerpts
* not every work will appeal to everyone's tastes
* it's somewhat daunting to consider tackling a set of this length

In my opinion, the strengths far outweigh the weaknesses, and this is the most thorough introduction to American literature that I've encountered.

-----

That doesn't do the 900 page, 300 year-spanning first volume any justice, so now the long review for those wanting to know more...

In my American lit. class, I recall we covered the years 1865-1945, which I assumed would be far more interesting to study than the dry, difficult works of earlier periods that I vaguely remembered from high school. Volumes C, D, and E were required for the class, which I enjoyed so thoroughly that I not only kept the books, but years later purchased volumes A and B to complete the set. Now I've decided to read the entire anthology, not neglecting a single work, if I can manage it.

The first volume contains works from a few distinct, overlapping contexts: (1) Native American creation and trickster tales, (2) early European explorers of the Americas, and (3) literature from those living in America, from the first European settlers to 1820.

The inclusion of Native American stories might seem strange to some, or the result of political sensitivity gone awry. They can't be strictly classified as literature, and were in most cases not recorded until long after European contact. However, as they were long inhabitants of the Americas, it's worth giving some space to these peoples who had so much influence on early American history. I would say further that the study of Native American oral traditions is no less valuable than study of Finnish traditions as recorded by the Kalevala, but touches more deeply the vague shared experience of being an "American."

I admit to not fully appreciating the trickster tales. Whether it be the translation to English, the static presentation in print of an originally dynamic oral performance, or the obvious difference of cultures. The creation tales are more interesting; while intended to preserve knowledge and traditions, they address the basic question that all people and cultures have: where do we come from, where did the world begin?

Moving onto the explorers, it's remarkable to me how, as an educated American and lover of history, I had never encountered the written works of Columbus, nor heard of Bartolomé de las Casas, Bernal Díaz del Castillo, and others. Instead I've possessed a few dates (e.g. 1492) and a vague, perhaps inaccurate view of Columbus' voyages. This may be partly due to a language barrier, though translations have long been available, or it may be that much of the action occurs in the West Indies and Central-South America, beyond the modern U.S. boundaries. Maybe some past history is not pleasant to recall.

But these works are truly fascinating and far from being apologist justifications of Spanish actions. Some take a critical view of the conqueror's excesses, while not failing to mention atrocities commited by the native people. They also show how exploration evolved through enterprise to conquest, from a time of innocence and wonder (Columbus' descriptions of the beauty of the West Indies are quite moving, almost idealist and naive, sentiments echoed for centuries afterward), to greed, conflict, and tyranny. They are most powerful when they closely concern humanity, the hardships of individuals caught in conflicts they feel powerless to control.

English and French explorers are featured as well, including [autor:John Smith|5618875] who has been immortalized by the story of Pocahontas. These writings are surveys and historical records, but they also put a brave face on the sometimes hostile and unfriendly nature of the Americas, to attract more European settlers and funding. They also hint at the many trials, natural and manmade, awaiting new settlements.

The anthology begins tracking American English literature with the Puritans in New England. Despite being extremely religious and conservative, they clearly had their share of intellectuals, though much of their intellect was devoted to spiritual concerns and their energy to the establishment and survival of their colonies. The most rivetting accounts are those of William Bradford who describes the motivations of the first Puritans leaving England, their voyage to America, and the circumstances they encountered here. To Americans who value history, the details of the first Thanksgiving are particularly moving.

The Puritan fixation with religion may seem tiring to us, who live in a more secular society, but to them everything in life was a preparation for the greater life ahead, and nothing was worth consideration unless it advanced that end. Indeed there was a reason why they experienced persecution and fled to a new land, they were essentially the insufferable extremists or radicals of their day, whose views clashed with mainstream society. (While their views quickly fragmented and became outmoded as apparent this volume, the conservatism of the Puritans was a quality shared by many other Americans, which continues to this day.)

By the 17th century, American literature was already diverse. The poetry of Anne Bradstreet shows that, even among Puritans, literacy was not confined to men alone. Her work reveals a solid classical education, at times a tenderness not often associated with the Puritans, and even a rare hint of indignation at the assumption that women were intellectually inferior in "The Prologue":

I am obnoxious to each carping tongue Who says my hand a needle better fits,
A poet's pen all scorn I should thus wrong, For such despite they cast on female wits:
If what I do prove well, it won't advance, They'll say it's stol'n, or else it was by chance.

Nor was all early American literature of Puritan or English origin. Thomas Morton's New English Canaan reads like a mockery of Puritan rigidity, and his colony must have been quite an affront to their convictions. Roger Williams was a dissenter among dissenters, but his writings on the now-extinct Narragansett language are fascinating to me. Dutch writers Jacob Steendam and Adriaen van der Donck extolled the praises of "New Netherlands" (later New York) and America's natural bounty, anticipating much later patriotic works such as "America the Beautiful". Francis Daniel Pastorious gives an early German immigrant's perspective on the fledgling colonies and their interactions with native people.

Edward Taylor's poetry and prose may be the most difficult reading in this volume, and if a reader was going to despair of understanding or finishing the book, it would probably begin at this point. However, it's worth making the attempt and reading the copious footnotes, to appreciate just how important religion was to many inhabitants of America at this time - almost an unhealthy obsession. Michael Wigglesworth's poem The Day of Doom and Jonathan Edwards' sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" manage to be more entertaining, through the images of terror and despair they conjure. Edwards was profoundly intelligent and capable of using his gifts to great effect, as seen in this passage from "Sinners":

Were it not for the sovereign pleasure of God, the earth would not bear you for one moment; for you are burden to it; the creation groans with you; the creature is made subject to the bondage of your corruption, not willingly; the sun does not willingly shine upon you to give you light to serve sin and Satan; the earth does not willingly yield her increase to satisfy your lusts; nor is it willingly a stage for your wickedness to be acted upon; the air does not willingly serve you for breath to maintain the flame of life in your vitals, while you spend your life in the service of God's enemies.

Imagine hearing that some Sunday afternoon!

Again I found the journals and diaries of early Americans to be most captivating, whether Mary Rowlandson] recording her captivity by natives, Sarah Kemble Knight describing the perils of a cross-colony journey in 1704, Samuel Sewall revealing the intricacies of well-heeled 17th century courtship, or William Byrd showing the contradictions between the religious duty and social life of a gentlemen. You see that these were real people like us, living real lives, with much of the ideals and affectations stripped away.

Not to be ommitted are the well-known figures from the founding of the United States, including Benjamin Franklin, John and Abigail Adams, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson. Franklin's autobiography is a fascinating, tragically unfinished, account of surely one of the more interesting men to have ever lived in America. The Adams' letters reveal not only an intimate relationship between the later President and his wife, but some of the intrigues surrounding the Revolutionary War and the Declaration of Independence.

Thomas Paine is of course the famous American provocateur during The Revolution, possessing natural gifts for rebellion and fiery emotional writings. His "Common Sense" has experienced somewhat of a resurgence lately in American politics via the Tea Party movement (along with other works of the time), and no wonder as he relies more heavily on emotion and shaming his opponents, than sound logical reasoning - reflective of current American politics. But make no mistake, reading his pamphlets would have spurred any American patriot to the cause of liberty.

An excerpt of Jefferson's autobiography provides again a rivetting glimpse of The Revolution and Declaration of Independence, including his original draft. Worth noting is that a lengthy criticism of The Crown's supporting slavery was originally part of The Declaration, but was removed to placate the southern colonies, as were some particular criticisms directed at the English people. Some excerpts from "The Federalist" featuring Alexander Hamilton and James Madison are also included. It would do well for modern Americans to read this work and others, to understand the basis on which The U.S. Constitution was founded, and the delicate balance between democracy and republic that the framers sought to achieve (many Americans and the media continue to misuse the term democracy).

A few works perhaps unknown to most Americans are those by Samson Occom, Moses Bon Sàam, Olaudah Equiano, and Briton Hammon. Occom's story tells in imperfect English the life of a Mohegan who converted to Christianity, and who despite his best efforts as a missionary, was subjected to the endemic racial inequality of the colonies. Bon Sàam was purportedly a free slave from Jamaica, who rails against the indignity of slaveholder abuses in the West Indies with provocative language. Published as early as 1735, one can't be sure of its authenticity or even its intent, but it does show the contentious nature of slavery at the time.

Equiano's story begins with his childhood in Africa, to his being captured and sold as a slave, the many interesting tales he had on various continents, to his quest for freedom, and ending with purchasing his freedom to face an uncertain life ahead. Briton Hammon presents a much briefer tale involving his capture by natives in Florida and his subsequent imprisonment in Cuba, before also regaining his freedom.

Annis Boudinot Stockton, Judith Sargent Murray, Phillis Wheatley, and Sarah Wentworth Morton are four more female writers who found their voice in America. Stockton and Morton were very much privileged, their poetry shows the potential of women when provided opportunities for education. Wheatley was not only a woman but an African slave; her poetry demonstrates a keen intellect and is some of the more proficient offerings in this volume. Some of their poetry is hard to digest for the modern reader, being out of fashion, with its grandiosity and many allusions to classical mythology. Murray, on the other hand, is instantly relevant with her poetic and prose discourse on women and their place among men. However one feels about the modern feminist movement, it's undeniable that these women possessed and demonstrated intellectual prowess.

Philip Freneau and Royall Tyler evidence the struggle to establish the American artistic scene. Freneau's poetry is some of the most interesting of this period, and it's quite a shame that he died in poverty and obscurity. His "House of Night" potrays a tragic scene in which Death personified meets his end, evoking vivid imagery along the way. "On Observing a Large Red-Streak Apple" is a very melancholic work drawing parallels between nature and the lives of men. Tyler is the only playwright featured in this volume. The Contrast shows not only a glimpse of 18th century social life but provides a comedic moral lesson on the triumph of virtue over fashion: dealing fairly and honestly with others will eventually be rewarded.

The growing importance of the novel is indicated by the works of Susanna Rowson and Charles Brockden Brown. Rowson's Charlotte: A Tale of Truth is a disturbing look into the perils awaiting young women. No doubt intended to reinforce conventional 18th century views on the place of women in society and the price of violating these precepts, it nonetheless shows how a person's life can change drastically from comfort and ease to abandonment and squalor. It's difficult to read this novel and not feel deeply for the sufferings of Charlotte Temple, the tragic main character, as well as her family.

Brown's Wieland is excerpted in an almost surreal nocturnal encounter between a young woman and a disturbed acquaintance of the family. The style is strange but intriguing and should appeal to those who enjoy darker literature and even the horror genre. Indeed it's one of many works from the anthology that I'd like to read in full, though not my favorite.

That's it, over 300 years of American literary history presented in this first volume of the anthology. I could wish, as I often do with great literature, that it was even longer and more complete, since I have the time and interest to explore it. Fortunately, the biographies of each author hint at additional published works and for an even more complete list of resources, there is the Selected Bibliographies at the end.

Ultimately the Norton Anthology represents the tip of the iceberg, a diverse collection to wet the palate and kindle an interest in the whole of American literature. It certainly doesn't represent the whole of American literature, not every perspective is included, nor every author or work of importance. But let's be honest, if you appreciate and enjoy literature, if you're knowledgeable about it, can you not seek out others works yourself?

In my opinion, this is rather for the uninitiated, the skeptic, or those who feel there is no value in classic literature and are unaccustomed to analyzing it. In that sense, the anthology presents something of potential interest to every literate American, as a fantastic resource and an excellent value.

[Tori · Rating 3 out of 5]

I love the trivial bits of information included in the glosses and introductory essays. Like the fact that Thomas Paine's earthly remains' whereabouts are unknown. Or the irony of Jonathan Edwards's death following an inoculation taken to prove the positive good of inoculations. The pieces of literature are themselves not all that engrossing, though...Though they do illuminate some interesting aspects of early American consciousness and the narrative for our nation with its burgeoning ideologies of freedom and commerce and whatnot.

[Mary]

Let's not talk about it too much.
With lots of skipping (obviously), I've finished the first half. The second half will be saved for a later semester.
Highlights: the captivity narratives, Irving, the bits of Emerson that didn't make me want to smack him, Judith Sergeant Murray, Fuller (again), Bartleby (again), and Douglass. Lowlights: Basically everything else.

[J · Rating 4 out of 5]

900 pages of fascinating stuff. Can't say I read every word, but I managed quite a few chunks and skimmed the rest, quite possibly to return another day when time permits. A lot of fascinating voices from the past here in letters, poems, pamphlets and diaries, and the editors' section introductions and author biographies were particularly illuminating -- concise, nicely written, judicious, and showing a fairly decent sensitivity to the sincerity of and subtle differences between the largely Christian beliefs of most of the authors. A few of the footnotes and glosses were not accurate, but my quibbles are very tiny by comparison with the achievement of this volume (which is one of five).

This was the first time I had encountered Native American "orature", rendered in English on a page. The sensitive prefaces and discussion of translation/formatting issues aside, the traditional creation stories and trickster tales were fascinating and fun, though the guy (the Winnebago "Trickster") who kept his penis in a box was a bit of a surprise. The later speeches by dignified and beleagured chiefs responding to the European invaders were deeply moving, as was the excerpt from Samson Occom's autobiography. He was a Mohican convert to Christianity and a noted preacher, who visited England in the 1760s and spoke extensively as part of fund-raising efforts for Indian education (upon Occam's return to America this cause and Occam's part in it were betrayed by his mentor, and the institution later became Dartmouth College), before and after serving as a rural pastor and teacher. These very different responses to the ways and prejudices of the colonists opened up to me yet more of the beauty and tragedy of humanity.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me roughly a year and a half from first picking this book up to read before going on to finish it. For anybody who's interested in American history or wants to learn more about how America came to be, this book is a must. Though dry and heavy reading material at times (hence why I took so long finishing it), it is full of detail and practical insight into how people lived, what it took to survive and spans the length of the inevitable rise and falls of this nation all the way up to the early nineteenth century.

I annotated most of the pages in this book because it's so dense and thick that, if I ever want to flick through in the future, I can grasp more easily what's going on without having to reread from front to back. It sounds like a bore, but I really enjoyed reading this and learned a hell of a lot too.

Perfect for anyone wanting to learn a little more about American history. Now onto Volume B!

[Amber F. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this for my Piracy and Criminality in Early U.S. Literature class. The stories were not the most fun to read, but I recognize that isn't the fault of the anthology. Wish there were more stories from people other than just old, white men, but overall an okay read.

[Courtney · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't read this whole book, but I feel we read enough of it in my class to have a pretty good understanding. I thought it was okay for the most part. There were sections that i really liked, and there were others that I just sort of skipped over. A lot of these stories and readings made sense, but they were easier to understand after my professor explained things or my class had discussions. I would recommend this for an overall awareness of early American literature. I don't like reading most texts from this period, mostly because I hate history, but these were easy enough to get into and understand, so i don't have much complaints about it.

[Leann · Rating 3 out of 5]

Emphasis on religion, can be a bit tedious to read some texts (this is one of those books that helps to talk to a professor about passages, because some can go over your head).

The overall reaction my class had to this book was that it was tedious and difficult to analyze, and Volume B was preferred for it's entertainment value. But educationally, it's worthwhile to read both volumes and analyze them.

[Alexandria · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book because it was on the required list for several classes, but I kept it because I liked having a good collection of classic American works around. It appeases the literary snob in me, plus makes a handy reference for any fiction writing I do that's set in the early American time period.

[Logan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This anthology is great! I have never been one to really dive into America Literature (especially early colonial writings), but I am really enjoying this and how each piece has shaped our country in some way. I think the writings and excerpts are the perfect amount, providing a solid foundation for further reading.

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had to read these for my Lit class but I enjoyed them very much. They are not complete novels, they are parts of speeches and books by famous authors. But none the less, I learned a lot from these books. I've kept them and gone back to them several times.

[BookScout · Rating 5 out of 5]

Totally indispensable guide to American Lit. Everything worth reading from the early years, from poetry, stories, essays and even the occasional novel. Weighs a tonne with tissue thin pages. Love this book.

[Lena · Rating 4 out of 5]

As always, the norton intros are insightful and totally relevant, so that was an obvious plus.
Not too thrilled with the material, but it's just not my genre. I have no doubts the period is well represented by this volume and have loved all my other norton anthologies as well! <3

[Jennifer Cunningham · Rating 4 out of 5]

Selections for American Literature class, taken as an elective, with readings and assignments tailored to my minor in Gender Studies and Sexuality. Wish that I could afford to have bought and kept my own copy of this text and Volume B!

[Angela · Rating 4 out of 5]

Along with all the amazing pieces of literature that are included within this anthology, I was also pleased with the informative contextual material. Definitely a really good literature textbook that I will not be selling back.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great anthology

[Karis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Most of the Literature is amazing! There were a few that were not so good, but the whole book was an incredible experience and well worthwhile.

[Paige Duff · Rating 5 out of 5]

We read this in three weeks for school, now on to Volume B.

[Maryam AL-Ghafri]

Reading without pleasure just for Study

[Meredith Links · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of three books I had to read for my American literature class. Some of the stories were eh and other I enjoyed.

[McKenzie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I don't generally enjoy old (pre-founding fathers) American Lit. it wasn't always bad, but I didn't love it.

[Aidy]

Seventh Edition

[Melissa Nestico · Rating 3 out of 5]

I basically read this for school. It was okay full of history about literature .

[Stacey Rice · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some works I really enjoyed others not so much. Overall it makes for a good reading of literature.