Periods in American Literature

For AP Literature and Composition

Phillis Wheatley

Colonial Period (1607–1775)

Anne Bradstreet

Colonial Period (1607–1775)

Thomas Jefferson

Revolutionary Age (1765–1790)

Thomas Paine

Revolutionary Age (1765–1790)

Alexander Hamilton

Revolutionary Age (1765–1790)

James Madison

Revolutionary Age (1765–1790)

Royall Tyler

Early National Period (1775–1828)

William Hill Brown

Early National Period (1775–1828)

Washington Irving

Early National Period (1775–1828)

Edgar Allen Poe

Early National Period (1775–1828)

Walt Whitman

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Ralph Waldo Emerson

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Henry David Thoreau

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Nathaniel Hawthorne

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Edgar Allan Poe

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Herman Melville

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Harriet Beecher Stowe

American Renaissance / Romantic Period (1828–1865)

Mark Twain

Realistic Period (1865–1900)

Emily Dickinson

Realistic Period (1865–1900)

Walt Whitman

Realistic Period (1865–1900)

Kate Chopin

Realistic Period (1865–1900)

Jack London

Naturalist Period (1900–1914)

Edith Wharton

Naturalist Period (1900–1914)

Robert Frost

Modern Period (1914–1939)

T.S. Eliot

Modern Period (1914–1939)

Langston Hughes

Modern Period (1914–1939)

F. Scott Fitzgerald

Modern Period (1914–1939)

Ernest Hemingway

Modern Period (1914–1939)

William Faulkner

Modern Period (1914–1939)

John Steinbeck

Modern Period (1914–1939)

Eugene O’Neill

Modern Period (1914–1939)

Jack Kerouac

Beat Generation (1944–1962)

Allen Ginsberg

Beat Generation (1944–1962)

Toni Morrison

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Sylvia Plath

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Arthur Miller

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Tennessee Williams

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

James Baldwin

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Maya Angelou

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Alice Walker

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Sandra Cisneros

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)

Amy Tan

Contemporary Period (1939–Present)