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Possible American Pieces for MLA Research Paper Colonial Period- Nonfiction John Smith- The General History of Virginia, New England, and the Summer Isles William Bradford- Of Plymouth Plantation Thomas Morton- The New English Canaan William Byrd- Histories of the Dividing Line Betwixt Virginia: and North Carolina Ben Franklin- The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Thomas Paine- The Crisis (all 16), The Rights of Man, The Age of Reason Cotton Mather- Magnalia Christi Americana J. Hector St. John De Crevecoeur- Letters From an American Farmer Mary Rowlandson- The History of the Captivity and Restoration of Mary Rowlandson Olaudah Equiano- The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, or Gustavus Vassa, the African Romantic Period-Fiction Washington Irving- Diedrich Knickerbocker's History of New York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty, The Sketch Book ( a collection of short stories, including “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”) James Fenimore Cooper- Any novel from the Leatherstocking Tales (Last of the Mohicans, The Deerslayer, etc.) Edgar Allan Poe- The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym, any of his short stories or poems Harriet Beecher Stowe- Uncle Tom’s Cabin Louisa May Alcott- Little Women or Little Men Herman Melville- Moby-Dick, Billy Budd ( I would suggest the Penguin Classic edition of Billy Budd with an introduction by Fredrick Busch), Red Jacket, Typee, Omoo, The Confidence-Man, Mardi, Pierre Hugh Henry Brackenridge- Modern Chivalry Containing the Adventures of Captain John Farrago and Teague O'Reagan, His Servant William Hill Brown- The Power of Sympathy (considered the first American novel by many) Charles Brockden Brown- Wieland; or The Transformation or Edgar Huntly or Arthur Mervyn William Wells Brown- Clotel; or the President’s Daughter Richard Henry Dana- Two Years Before the Mast Nathaniel Hawthorne- The Scarlet Letter, The House of the Seven Gables, The Bithedale Romance, The Marble Faun Romantic Period-Nonfiction The Federalist Papers Thomas Paine- The Rights of Man or The Age of Reason Alexis (Charles Henri Maurice Clerel) de Tocqueville- Democracy in America Ralph Waldo Emerson- His essays- include these: “Self-Reliance,” “Nature, “The American Scholar,” “The Divinity School Address,” “The Over-Soul,” and “The Transcendentalist” (I would recommend Penguin Classics Nature and Selected Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson with an introduction by Larzer Ziff) Henry David Thoreau- Walden; or Life in the Woods Margaret Fuller- Woman in the Nineteenth Century James Russell Lowell- The Writings of James Russell Lowell Fredrick Douglass- Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass Sojourner Truth- The Narrative of Sojourner Truth Oliver Wendell Holmes- The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table Realism/Naturalism/Regionalism Period-Fiction George Washington Cable- The Grandissimes, Old Creole Days: A Story of Creole Life (a collection of short stories) Bret Harte- a short story from any collection of his short stories, most famous being "The Outcasts of Poker Flats" and "The Luck of Roaring Camp" William Dean Howells- The Rise of Silas Lapham Theodore Dreiser- An American Tragedy Henry James-The American, Daisy Miller, The Europeans, Washington Square, The Portrait of a Lady, The Bostonians, The Turn of the Screw, The Wings of the Dove, The Ambassadors, The Golden Bowl Stephen Crane- Maggie: A Girl of the Streets, The Red Badge of Courage, or any single story from a collection of his short stories. The most well-known are "The Blue Hotel," "The Open Boat," and "The Bride Comes to Yellow Sky" Sarah Orne Jewett- The Country of the Pointed Firs (actually a collection of connected short stories) Mark Twain- The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court, The Prince and the Pauper, The Gilded Age, The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson Jack London- The Call of the Wild, The Sea-Wolf, White Fang, Martin Eden, The Iron Heel Frank Norris- McTeague, The Octopus, The Pit Charlotte Perkins Gilman- Herland Kate Chopin- At Fault, The Awakening Hamlin Garland- Main-Traveled Roads (a collection of short stories) Edith Wharton- The Age of Innocence, The House of Mirth Ambrose Bierce- any short story from a collection of short stories by Bierce. Most famous is "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" Sherwood Anderson- Winesburg, Ohio (actually a collection of inter-connected short stories) Upton Sinclair- The Jungle Willa Cather- My Antonia or O Pioneers! Realism/Naturalism/Regionalism Period-Nonfiction Mark Twain- Life on the Mississippi, The Innocents Abroad, A Tramp Abroad Black Elk- Black Elk Speaks W.E.B. Du Bois- The Souls of Black Folk Ida Tarbell- The History of the Standard Oil Company Booker T. Washington- Up From Slavery, An Autobiography Marcus Garvey- any work by Garvey Charlotte Perkins Gilman- Women and Economics Modernism Period-Fiction Ernest Hemingway- The Sun Also Rises, For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Old Man and the Sea, A Farewell to Arms, Across the River and into the Trees, In Our Time F. Scott Fitzgerald- The Great Gatsby, Beautiful and Damned, Tender is the Night, This Side of Paradise William Faulkner- Light in August, Intruder in the Dust, As I Lay Dying, The Unvanquished, Sanctuary, The Wild Palms, The Sound and The Fury, The Reivers, Flags in the Dust, The Mansion, Soldier’s Pay, Mosquitoes; Absalom, Absalom; Go Down, Moses, any short story Eudora Welty- The Robber Bridegroom, Delta Wedding, The Ponder Heart, Losing Battles, The Optimist’s Daughter, A Curtain of Green and Other Stories,The Collected Short Stories of Eudora Welty John Steinbeck- Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, The Red Pony, Cannery Row, The Moon is Down, East of Eden, The Pearl, The Short Reign of Pippin IV, In Dubious Battle, Tortilla Flat, The Winter of Our Discontent Zora Neal Hurston- Their Eyes Were Watching God John Dos Passos- Three Soldiers, Manhattan Transfer Sinclair Lewis- Main Street, It Can’t Happen Here, Arrowsmith, Babbitt, Elmer Gantry, Dodsworth Sherwood Anderson- Winesburg, Ohio (A Collection of short stories but with a common thread running through it) Pearl S. Buck- The Good Earth, Dragon Seed, Peony Willa Cather- My Antonia, Death Comes for the Archbishop, O Pioneers! Edgar Rice Burroughs- Tarzan of the Apes, Pellucidar, A Princess of Mars, The Land That Time Forgot William Saroyan- The Human Comedy Nathanael West- Miss Lonelyhearts, The Day of the Locust Thomas Wolfe- Look Homeward, Angel; Of Time and the River, You Can’t Go Home Again Richard Wright- Native Son, The Outsider H. P. Lovecraft- The Case of Charles Dexter Ward, At the Mountains of Madness Ring Lardner- You Know Me, Al James T. Farrell- Studs Lonigan (a series, and perhaps too long; I would read Young Lonigan if nothing else) Ellen Glasgow- The Romantic Comedian, They Stooped to Folly, The Sheltered Life, The Deliverance, Virginia, Life and Gabriella, Barren Ground Erskine Caldwell- Tobacco Road, God’s Little Acre Katherine Ann Porter- Noon Wine, Old Mortality; Pale Horse, Pale Rider; Ship of Fools, The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter Robert Penn Warren- All the King’s Men Anzia Yezierska- Bread Givers Oliver LaFarge- Laughing Boy MacKinlay Kantor- Andersonville Post-Modernism Period-Fiction James Agee- A Death in the Family Sherman Alexie- Reservation Blues, Indian Killer James Baldwin- Go Tell It on the Mountain John Barth- The Sot-Weed Factor, Giles Goat-Boy Donald Barthelme- Snow White, The Dead Father, The King, City Life Saul Bellow- Henderson the Rain King, The Adventures of Augie March, Seize the Day, Humboldt’s Gift, Herzog, Mr. Sammler’s Planet Paul Bowles- The Sheltering Sky Ray Bradbury- Fahrenheit 451, Dandelion Wine, The Martian Chronicles, Something Wicked This Way Comes Richard Brautigan- Trout Fishing in America, A Confederate General from Big Sur Raymond Carver- Cathedral, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love Raymond Chandler- The Big Sleep, Farewell, My Lovely John Cheever- The Wapshot Chronicles, Falconer Sandra Cisneros- The House on Mango Street, Caramelo Don Delillo- White Noise, Libra, End Zone James Dickey- Alnilam, To the White Sea Joan Didion- Play It As It Lays, A Book of Common Prayer E. L. Doctorow- Ragtime, Loon Lake, The Book of Daniel, Billy Bathgate Ralph Ellison- Invisible Man Louise Erdrich- Love Medicine, The Bingo Palace, The Beet Queen, The Master Butcher’s Singing Club, The Plague of Doves Joseph Heller- Catch 22, God Knows John Hersey- A Bell for Adano Gish Jen- Typical American, Mona in the Promised Land, The Love Wife Jack Kerouac- On the Road Ken Kesey- One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Sometimes a Great Notion Barbara Kingsolver- The Bean Trees, The Poisonwood Bible, Pigs in Heaven Maxine Hong Kingston- Tripmaster Monkey: His Fake Book Harper Lee- To Kill a Mockingbird Ursula K. Le Guin- any of her novels Norman Mailer- The Naked and the Dead, Harlot’s Ghost Bernard Malamud- The Natural, The Assistant, The Fixer, The Magic Barrel Cormac McCarthy- All the Pretty Horses, The Road, No Country for Old Men, Child of God, The Crossing, Cities of the Plain, Blood Meridian, Suttree, The Outer Dark Carson McCullers- The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, The Member of the Wedding, The Ballad of the Sad Café and Other Stories N. Scott Momaday- House Made of Dawn Toni Morrison- The Bluest Eye, Sula, Tar Baby, Beloved, Song of Solomon Tim O’Brien- Going After Cacciato, In the Lake of the Wood, The Things They Carried (actually a collection) Flannery O’Connor- Wise Blood, The Violent Bear It Away, A Good Man is Hard to Find, The Complete Short Stories of Flannery O’Connor John Gardner- Grendel, Mickelsson’s Ghost, Nickel Mountains John O’Hara- Appointment in Samarra, Butterfield 8 Cynthia Ozick- The Puttermesser Papers Ann Petry- The Street, The Narrows Thomas Pynchon- Gravity’s Rainbow, Vineland Ayn Rand- Anthem, Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead, We, the Living J. D. Salinger- The Catcher in the Rye Leslie Marmon Silko- Ceremony, Almanac of the Dead Wallace Stegner- Angel of Repose, The Spectator Bird William Styron- The Confessions of Nat Turner, Sophie’s Choice, The Long March Amy Tan- The Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, Saving Fish from Drowning Walker Percy- The Moviegoer, The Last Gentleman, The Second Coming John Kennedy Toole- A Confederacy of Dunces John Updike- any of his novels Gore Vidal- Burr Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.- Slaughterhouse Five, Player Piano, Cat’s Cradle, Deadeye Dick, Mother Night, Jailbird, Slapstick, Welcome to the Monkey House Alice Walker- The Color Purple, The Temple of My Familiar Margaret Walker- Jubilee Tom Wolfe- Bonfire of the Vanities David Foster Wallace- Infinite Jest Richard Yates- Revolutionary Road James Jones- From Here to Eternity Isaac Bashevis Singer- Gimpel the Fool and Other Stories Tillie Olsen- Tell Me A Riddle Jean Stafford- Collected Stories of Jean Stafford Richard Ford- The Sportswriter, Independence Day, Rock Springs (a collection of short stories) Modernism/Post-Modernism Period-Nonfiction Ernest Hemingway- A Moveable Feast Black Elk- Black Elk Speaks Studs Terkel- Working Gertrude Stein- The Autobiography of Alices B. Toklas John Steinbeck- Travels With Charley in Search of America Richard Wright- Black Boy Maya Angelou- I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings John Agee- Let Us Now Praise Famous Men Truman Capote- In Cold Blood John Hersey- Hiroshima Jack Kerouac- The Dharma Bums N. Scott Momaday- The Way to Rainy Mountain John Gardner- On Moral Fiction, On Becoming a Novelist Richard Rodriguez- Hunger of Memory Rachel Carson- Silent Spring Mike Rose- Lives on the Boundary, Possible Lives, Why School Tom Wolfe- Radical Chic and Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers, The Right Stuff, The Pumphouse Gang Malcolm X (as told to Alex Haley)- The Autobiography of Malcolm X H. L. Mencken-The American Language William Carlos Williams- In the American Grain Joseph Campbell- The Hero with a Thousand Faces Annie Dillard- Pilgrim at Tinker Creek Michael Herr- Dispatches M. F. K. Fisher- The Art of Eating Vine Deloria, Jr.- Custer Died for Your Sins bell hooks- Aint’ I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism Joan Didion- Slouching Toward Bethelem Maxine Hong Kingston- The Woman Warrior: Memoirs of a Girlhood Among Ghosts Li-Young Lee- The Winged Seed: A Remembrance Gore Vidal- The United States: Essays 1952-1992 Truman Capote In Cold Blood American Poets from the Various Literary Periods Anne Bradstreet- The Tenth Muse Lately Sprung Up in America or any of her poems Phillis Wheatley- Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral or any of her poems Walt Whitman- Leaves of Grass (might want to single out a specific section) John Greenleaf Whittier Emily Dickinson Henry Wadsworth Longfellow Sidney Lanier Paul Lawrence Dunbar Hart CraneEdgar Allan Poe- any poem William Cullen Bryant Langston Hughes Amy Lowell Robert Frost Carl Sandburg Sylvia Plath Wallace Stevens William Carlos Williams Countee Cullen Ezra Pound H.D. Robinson Jeffers Robert Frost Marianne Moore Elizabeth Bishop Jean Toomer T. S. Eliot Edna St. Vincent Millay Louise Bogan Hart Crane Allen Tate John Berryman Randall Jarrell Gwendolyn Brooks Robert Lowell James Dickey Richard Wilbur Denise Levertov A. R. Ammons Allen Ginsberg W. S. Merwin James Wright Anne Sexton Adrienne Rich Amiri Baraka Wendy Rose Joy Harjo Rita Dove Cathy Song Billy Collins Ishmael Reed Simon Ortiz Maya Angelou e.e. cummings Gary Snyder Galway Kinnell Robert Bly Archibald MacLeish Dana Gioia Alan Dugan Stephen Vincent Benet Nikki Giovanni Charles Bukowski Robert Creeley William Stafford Theodore Roethke Lawrence Ferlinghetti Naomi Shihab Nye ****These are representative of their day and times. There are many others, and you should investigate them. It would be neat to see you pick some lesser-known authors or some up-and-coming new writer; the only problem remains that perhaps there are not enough academic/scholarly sources to write a successful paper on that lesserknown or fairly recent work. Come to me and we'll work through it. Mr. Kirby