The literary traditions of the United States were in large part
inherited from England. Although from the time of the Stuart restoration
in England, in 1660, there are indications of a divergence in social and
political temper, which in the long run must find expression in a
distinct American literature, yet the literary emancipation of America
was much more gradual than the political.
The first literature in America was the product of men educated in other
lands, who happened to be drawn to the New World, and who wrote about
the new country.
The first work of broad interest concerning the colonies that
subsequently became the United States was the famous Captain John
Smith’s _True Relation of Such Occurrences and Accidents of Note as Hath
Happened in Virginia_. This is an interesting and romantic work; but
Smith was in America for three years only of his adventurous life, and
consequently his narrative is highly colored. _The History of the
Plymouth Plantation_, by Governor Bradford, and the _History of New
England_, by John Winthrop, are productions of a colder clime than
Virginia and of a less glowing imagination than Captain John Smith’s.
Aside from such records, more interesting always from the standpoint of
history than from that of literature, the sum of colonial production,
north or south, is very small. In New England, where most books were
written, if not always there published, we find chiefly theological
polemics, often presented with attractive titles but rarely with any
other power to carry them to posterity.
The _Poems_ of Anne Bradstreet were very highly praised in their day,
but almost the only book of lasting value and interest written in the
century was Cotton Mather’s _Magnalia Christi Americana_ (1702). Mather
was one of a great clerical and literary family. He wrote many other
books, but none retains the interest of posterity. The _Magnalia_,
however, is still a noble monument of a wonderful generation.
Franklin’s _Poor Richard’s Almanac_, begun in 1732 and carried on by him
for twenty-five years, was a book of almost literary rank. “Poor
Richard” was a fictitious character in whose mouth Franklin put a
simple philosophy which became as widely popular in its sphere as the
more scholarly utterances of the Spectator.
The two great literary figures of the eighteenth century may be properly
considered together. Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) may represent to us
the passing domination of theology; Benjamin Franklin, the domination
just beginning of politics and secular common sense. They are the first
Americans to make a lasting reputation by letters, and, curiously
enough, with each literature was but a means to an end.
The remarkable effect of the preaching and writing of Jonathan Edwards
came largely from the direct simplicity and clearness which makes his
style almost no style at all. As for Franklin, he learned to write
systematically, as he did everything else, and regarded his power to
express himself chiefly as one of the means whereby he accomplished his
purposes for the good of society. Edward’s great works on the _Freedom
of the Will_ and other theological topics are probably read now by few,
and the same may be said of much of Franklin’s writings. But Franklin’s
_Autobiography_ is still one of the most interesting things of its kind.
Both men belonged to the time and place: America was expressing herself,
whether in literary form or not.
In the years preceding the Revolution another real opportunity opened,
and oratory became one of the genuine modes of national expression.
Patrick Henry, James Otis, John Adams, Joseph Warren, Richard Henry Lee,
Samuel Adams, spoke under the best conditions for literature, because
they had something that had to be said. Yet their eloquence now is more
a matter of fame than of fact. Of some, hardly more than a few slight
reports remain to give us a notion of the powers that fired an earlier
generation. This summary of colonial literature gives an idea of a very
meagre literary production that was but natural. There was little
written in America, and that little was compelled by the practical
issues of the politics or theology of the time.
We shall readily understand that though such a review indicates slight
literary appreciation as we understand the term, it does not imply a
lack of intelligence. If the colonists had been less intelligent they
might have produced more literature. Folk poetry and legend, with which
true literature is apt to begin, is not the result of education.
The Americans were, comparatively speaking, a well-educated people. They
very early provided for that literary scholarship training which comes
from scholastic training. The colleges of the colonies, Harvard (1636),
William and Mary (1693), Yale (1701), Princeton (chartered as the
College of New Jersey, 1746), Columbia (originally King’s, 1754), Brown
(College of Rhode Island, 1764), Rutgers (originally Queens, 1766),
Dartmouth (1769), and the University of Pennsylvania (founded as an
academy by Franklin, 1754; chartered 1779), show a great appreciation of
learning on the part of the colonists.
A somewhat wider if less scholastic culture is evidenced by the
foundation of libraries, the Library Company of Philadelphia (1731),
the Redwood Library of Newport (1747), the Charleston Library (1748),
and the New York Society Library (1754), being the earliest.