相关阅读：
1.age： second half of the 19th century to early decades of the 20th century
2.background：
(1)the U.S. has become the most powerful country
(2)technological revolution
(3)a decline in moral standard， a spiritual wasteland， feelings of fear， loss， disorientation and disillusionment
3. influencing ideas：
(1)the same as English Modern period： Karl Marx， Darwin， Freud
(2)stream of consciousness：
4.“The Lost Generation” by Gertrude
5.John Steinbeck： “The Grapes of Wrath”
Allen Ginsberg： “Howl”， the manifesto of Beat Movement
Salinger： “The Catcher in the Rye”
6.modernism‘s features：
literature： convey a vision of social breakdown and moral decay
writer： develop techniques that could represent a break with the past. modernistic works are discontinuity and fragmentation
7.The differences between Modernism America and England
(1)American writers emphasize the concrete sensory images or details as the direct conveyor of experience
(2)modern fiction employ the first narration or confine the reader to the “central consciousness” or one character‘s point of view
common ground： directness， compression， vividness， sparing of words
Ezra Pound
1.imagist：
(1)direct treatment of poetic subjects
(2)eliminate ornamental words
(3)rhythmical composition in the sequence of the musical phrase rather than in the sequence of a metronome
example：“In a Station of the Metro”
2.works：In a Station of the metro; The River-Merchent‘s Wife; A pact(free verse)Robert Lee Frost
1.works：The Road Not Taken， Mountain Interval， uncertainty of the speaker‘s choice between safety and unknown(meditative)
Stopping by Woods on a snowy Evening-New Hampshire
After Apple-Picking，a man‘s best efforts ever satisfy God?
2.idea：a momentary stay against confusion， like Wordsworth
3.The Road Not Taken： took the one less traveled by and that has made all the difference
