Referred to as the Romantic Era in both America and Europe, the late eighteenth century and the early nineteenth century gave rise to phenomenon writers that made massive contributions to the American literary canon. At the time, these new forms of literature were considered to be forms of large scale rebellion against the ideas being perpetuated by the Enlightenment era in which logic and science ruled the literary world. Several authors chose to go against the norm and adopted unique approaches through which they …show more content…
Some of the writers that made a huge impact on the American literary canon include Washington Irvin, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Edgar Allan Poe.
Born in 1783, Washington Irvin is highly revered as one of the significant contributors to the modern-day American literacy. His debuted into the writing scene in 1802 after writing a number of observational letters that he sent to the Morning Chronicle (Panetta 76). While mourning the death of his fiancé in 1809, Irvin completed his first major literary work; a book titled A History of New-York from the Beginning of the World to the End of Dutch Dynasty, by Diedrich Knickerbocker. This was a stature of self-significant contemporary politics and local history. Before this book was published, Irvin commended a hoax similar to the modern day viral marketing campaigns by placing a number of mission person advertisements in New York newspapers that sought for information about a Diedrich …show more content…
As a poet, writer, critical writer and editor, Poe managed to not only influence American literature but also international literature. Together with Washington Irvin and Nathaniel Hawthorne, Poe was among the first writers to come up with a genre that involved both horror and fiction. His stories such as The Black Cat, The Pit and the Pendulum and poems such as Raven distinguished him from the other writers of his time (Poetry Foundation, 2015). He is also regarded as one of the pioneer critics to primarily focus on the impact of structure and style in any given literary work. Almost every prominent American writer is influenced by Poe, especially when it comes to working with grotesque humor and gothic mode. Poe also had a significant impact on other prominent writers in America. He had a hug influence on Charles Baudelaire who played a huge role in translating most of Poe’s literary works into the English language. Best known for his poetry collection tiles Les Fleurs du Mal (Flowers of Evil), Baudelaire idolized Poe. Poe was recognized for his focus on the dark side of human nature. He is regarded as the father of detective writing, and had a direct influence on the writer of Sherlock Holmes, Arthur Conan Doyle (Poetry Foundation, 2015). Since Poe’s writing were recognized in America, he has had a huge impact on hundreds of detective and horror novels which have been published all over the world. Given that