Shifting from Romanticism to Realism:

Melville, Davis, Whitman, Dickinson

Fiction:

• Characters are more common, average, every-day people
   
• Settings are more realistic, more recognizable
   
• Plots are more realistic, more every-day life situations
   
• Some shifting toward more “experiments” in form and language

Poetry:

• Much more “experimental” than fiction
   
• More “free” in form and structure (“free verse”)
   
• More “free” in techniques – less insistence on rhyme; less adherence to regular meter and rhythm; idiosyncratic spelling and punctuation
   
• More “common” language – the language of every-day speech
   
• More “commonplace” subjects and more accurate representations (for Whitman, more disorganized and “raw” experiences)