num_pages: 678
description: This text has taken its place as the definitive treatment of the most distinguished age of American literature. Centering the discussion around five literary giants of the mid-nineteenth century-Emerson Thoreau Hawthorne Melville and Whitman. Matthiessen elucidates their conceptions of the nature and function of literature and the extent to which these were realized in their writings.
language: English
title: American Renaissance: Art and Expression in the Age of Emerson and Whitman
publisher: Oxford University Press