Writers such as Poe, Herman Melville, and Nathaniel Hawthorne became known as the key figures in the Dark Romantic sub-genre that emerged out of Transcendentalism.
American literature also found its voice through poetry during the 19th century, particularly in the works of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson. The two poets produced remarkably dissimilar bodies of work. Whitman rose to prominence during the American Civil War with his free verse extolling the virtues of democracy and the
Dickinson, on the other hand, lived a sheltered, introverted life, and her verse reflects this. She was more obsessed by morbid, unusual themes than Whitman, and she utilized a distinctive style of punctuation that continues to beguile critics and scholars to this day.
The late 19th century would give rise to Realism, a style of fiction writing that intended to capture the way people in America actually spoke and lived.
Mark Twain was one of the key figures in this movement. His
literary style was in many ways influenced by the direct speech of
journalism, and he helped capture a distinctly American vernacular through such famous works as the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Henry James was another major American realist. Although he spent most of his life in
Europe, he wrote about Americans like him who were either traveling or living in Europe, and attempted to explore their psychological states in a realistic fashion.
