Their names are written into colonial American literature as prestigiously as this historical period itself. American writers of the colonial era contributed novels, short stories, poetry, essays, scripts and historical works.
Literary Giants of the Colonial Era
Two New England writers, Cotton Mather and Jonathan Edwards were also clergymen who produced literary works based on religious issues. Benjamin Franklin, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, was a prolific writer of Autobiography and Poor Richard's Almanac, a literary work still considered popular reading. Among the political writers of this period was Thomas Paine who wrote Common Sense. US President Thomas Jefferson is credited with writing the Declaration of Independence.
Historians of Literary Works
Many writers of the Colonial period specialized in the historical genre for their written works. As an example, John Motley wrote The Rise of the Dutch Republic, which was a study of the struggle for Dutch independence from Spain. Francis Parkman focused his writing on conflicts between the French and English in their drive for control of North America. George Bancroft was the first to write a History of the United States, emphasizing the virtues of democracy in his ten-volume literary work. Many of the historical references in these works are contained in present day history books.
Colonial Novelists and Short Story Writers
The Colonial period of American history shows a wealth of novelists and short story writers some of whom include writers of the early 19th Century. Writers of renown were Edgar Allen Poe, Herman Melville, Washington Irving, James Fennimore Cooper, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Frank Norris and Ralph Waldo Emerson as well as Henry David Thoreau and later, Oliver Wendell Holmes, William Dean Howells, Stephen Crane and Bret Harte, near the end of the Colonial period.
The Colonial Poets
One of these colonial poets, William Cullen Bryant, a lover of nature, wrote Thanatopsis and To A Waterfowl. He would later become owner of the New York Evening Post. Other poets of literary fame of the colonial era were Walt Whitman, John Greenleaf Whittier and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. From these poets came some of the most treasured American poems like "Evangeline," "Barbara Frietchie," "Snowbound," "Biglow Papers," "Leaves of Grass," "The Courtship of Miles Standish," "The Courtship of Hiawatha," "O Captain My Captain" and "The Barefoot Boy."
Essays of the Colonial Era
Although many writers of the Colonial period wrote their works in a philosophical genre, others were lighthearted and full of witticisms, giving balance to some of the more dramatic works. Ralph Waldo Emerson is credited with his philosophy on individualism and nature's beauty. He wrote attacks on the effects of the Industrial Revolution, which he believed placed too much emphasis on materialism.
Like Emerson, Henry David Thoreau's essays concentrated on freedom and individualism. Thoreau dedicated two years to his study of nature by living the rural life. Oliver Wendell Holmes, on the other hand, wrote several essays in a much lighter genre. However, he is most often recognized for his work, Old Ironsides, which drew public arousal of the intent to scrap a War of 1812 battleship, The Constitution.
Literary Women of the Colonial Period
Although few women of the early colonial days had sufficient education, many toiled at issues in a less public position given their diminished freedoms of the era in which they lived. One of the first notable female writers of the late 1700's was Susanna Rowson. Many literary women of the Colonial era wrote under pen names in order to effect publication of their work. Toward the end of the Colonial period, Margaret Fuller, Harriet E. Wilson and Harriet Beecher Stowe contributed literary works, with Emily Dickinson gaining prominence in the mid 1800's with her poetry.
References: Rise of the American Nation, Harcourt, Brace, Jonanovich; America Enters The World, Page Smith, McGraw Hill, Vol. VII, Reviewing American History, Irving L. Gordon, Amsco School Publications
Eleanore Whitaker - Staff writer for RITRO.com, former newsletter contributor to League of Women Voters, Editor of "Timepiece Magazine for Thomas Warne Museum ...
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