Journal 2 - Reader Response

It surprises me that when the printing press came out, most of the books or pamphlets being written were about politics or religion. Also it gets me to thinking of how today’s “press” got its name. It was because of the printing press and that most people printed the news about what was happening with taxes and Britain. Most everything that was printed was newspapers. Other than that most of the things that got printed were news related. The played a central role in people’s lives, circulation news and made a big contribution to the first presidential election.

            The printing of books increased slowly after the Revolution. There were some books of poetry that were printed like that of Phillis Wheatley’s Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral, the first published by an African American. There were also a few biographies like Some Account for the Fore Part of the Life of Elizabeth Ashbridge, which was a biography about a spiritual Quaker “The war and its heroes provided ready materials for American writers…” (p. 329) Biographies of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin were wildly famous, although the most read books by common people were almanacs and the Bible.

            All of the pamphlets, almanacs, book and newspapers printer were facts, but none were really fictitious. Although there was the story of George Washington not lying about cutting down the apple tree that could be fiction. Other than that most stories were the truth or viewed as such and this intrigues me. When did the genre of Fiction surface? Is it an older genre or did it start later in history like the 1800’s or 1900’s? I guess they didn’t really have time for fiction. With the great craze of the printing machine came the circulation of news and people wanted to hear what was going on in the real world rather than what could be made up.

Journal 1 - The American

Everyone has his or her own interpretation on what an American is and what makes a person an American. De Crevecoeur believes that an American is an Englishman who came from England who discovered and settled here. He is excluding, of course, the women and children. He also excludes anyone not from England and slaves. Furthermore, by saying “discovered and settled” he is claiming that there was no one on this land when they came here, which is very wrong. De Crevecoeur’s definition is very exclusive and narrow. This is in no way what I believe an American to be. For me an American is anyone, no matter his or her race, gender, or age who is loyal to this country and the foundation on which it stands.

There are others who believe that only Christians are Americans. “Unguarded Gates” by Thomas Bailey Aldrich talks about Lady Liberty as a sort of guardian over America. Aldrich believes she should gate American and not let all the free loaders, invaders, and intruders in, believing that they will contaminate or disgrace the land of the free. In the poem he uses phrases like “clustered stars be torn and trampled into dust” and “waste the gift of freedom”. In other words he thinks that these people who penetrate our borders will not appreciate what this country has to offer. Although there might be some truth to some of the things Aldrich says, all in all I believe that anyone can become an American as long as they are patriotic and believe in this country and what it has to offer. Americans today come from every background imaginable and there is no room for people who segregate and say others can’t be American because of what they look like or their gender or age.

blogging

This will be my first time ever blogging. So we will see how it goes.