Chapter One The Literature of Colonial America
Ⅰ.Early American and Colonial Period to 1776
1.1 introduction
1.2 The Literature of Exploration
Ⅱ.The Colonial Period in New England
2.1 John Smith（1580—1631）
2.2 William Bradford （ 1590—1657）
2.3 John Winthrop（1588—1649）
2.4 John Cotton（1585—1652）
2.5 Roger Williams（1606—1683）
2.6 Anne Bradstreet（1613—1672）
2.7 Edward Taylor（1644—1729）
Ⅲ.American Puritanism
3.1 Definitions of Puritans
3.2 Basic Puritan Beliefs
3.3 The Function of Puritan Writers
3.4 The Style of Puritan Writing and Common Themes
3.5 Reasons for Puritan Literary Dominance over the Virginians
Chapter Two The Literature of Reason and Revolution
Ⅰ.The American Enlightenment
Ⅱ.Democratic Origins and Revolutionary Writers, 1776—1820
Ⅲ.Benjamin Franklin（1706—1790）
Ⅳ.Thomas Paine （1737—1809）
Ⅴ.Thomas Jefferson（1743—1826）
Ⅵ.Philip Freneau（1752—1832）
Chapter Three The Literature of Romanticism
Ⅰ.The Origin of Romantic American Literature
Ⅱ.its Social,Historical and Cultural Background
Ⅲ.The important Concepts of American Romantic Literature
Ⅳ.New England Transcendentalism
Ⅴ.Washington irving（1783—1859）
Ⅶ.William Cullen Bryant（1794—1878）
Ⅷ.Edgar Allan Poe（1809—1849）
Chapter Four The Lifterature of Realism
Chapter Five Twentieth Century Literature
Reference Books and Resources