The Civil War Era and Its Aftermath

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The Civil War Era and Its Aftermath

• (1850-1890)
• A house divided against itself cannot stand. I
  believe this government cannot endure,
  permanently half slave and half free
• -Abraham Lincoln

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WHAT WERE SOME OF THE MAJOR DIFFERENCES BETWEEN
THE NORTH AND SOUTH PRIOR TO THE CIVIL WAR?
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• AGRICULTURE (SOUTH) VS. ________ (NORTH)
• The North regarded _________________ as primary
  authority, while the South championed _____
  rights.
• CONTROVERSY OVER __________!!

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• Although the Northern and the Southern states
  disagreed on slavery and states rights, the
  Civil War itself was universally regarded as a
  hellish, terrifying time of pain and sacrifice.
  The destruction and bloodshed of the war awakened
  Americans to a dark side of the national
  character. The number of soldier deaths was
  nearly as many as in all the other wars that this
  country has fought. In the end, the Union was
  preserved, but a fragile republic now had to find
  a future.

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• The disillusionment of the war gave way to a new
  genre of literature called _________ that focused
  on detailed descriptions of real ______ and
  _______.
• TPQ Why do you suppose there was no longer a
  place for Romantic writers like Emerson and
  Thoreau?

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POPULAR LITERATURE OF THE TIMES

• SLAVE NARRATIVES
• SOLDIERS _____ AND ________
• JOURNALS
• Some poetry (Whitman Dickinson)
• INTERESTING FACT Overall, there was a scant
  literary output during this era. Why do you
  suppose an event of such magnitude as the Civil
  War produced so little literature?

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The only famous writer who did experience the war
first-hand was Walt Whitman, who volunteered at a
hospital during the war. Whitman, however,
derived an optimistic view of the American
character, of the actual soldier of
1862-1865with all his ways, his incredible
dauntlessness, habits, practices, tastes,
language, his fierce friendship, his appetite,
rankness, his superb strength-and a hundred
unnamed lights and shades.
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SLAVE NARRATIVES

• Tisnt he who has stood and looked on that can
  tell you what slavery is- tis he who has
  endured
• CHARACTERISTICS
• Firsthand accounts written or recounted by slaves
• Tales of harrowing journeys from _______ in the
  South to _________ in the North
• Detailed records of mental as well as ___________
  of the narrator
• TPQ Aside from opening the publics eye to the
  true horrors of slavery, what else do you suppose
  was the slave narrator trying to prove through
  the publication of his/her narrative?