Also called the Age of Reason, classic writers depicted an idealized life as more rational and orderly than it really is. Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and Sir Isaac Newton wrote during this time. In contract to the classicists, the romantics emphasized passion and imagination over reason and logic. Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allan Poe, and James Fenimore Cooper are among the romantic writers. This approach to writing seeks to present life as objectively as possible without distortion caused by the influence of the writers' own feelings.
Realists offer ordinary characters in ordinary situations.
Early realists include Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Henry James, Mark Twain, and Sinclair Lewis. By the twentieth century, writers were expanding these approaches and experimenting with form and technique to create new voices for their thoughts. Their works reflect the social and political conditions of the times. Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Eugene O'Neill are among the many influential writers of this century. English Today Today, we live in an information age, where communication is frequent and immediate, using all forms of electronic media, as well as personal interaction.