In America Literary Elements

In America Literary Elements

Genre

Historical Fiction / Utopian Fiction

Setting and Context

Set in the United States during the 19th-century.

Narrator and Point of View

The novel is majorly narrated in third-person omniscience.

Tone and Mood

Intense, Affected, Impassioned

Protagonist and Antagonist

The protagonist is Maryna Zalezowska while the antagonist is the hurdles towards achieving the American dream.

Major Conflict

The major conflict is the pursuit of the American dream which seems elusive to the protagonist once she sets up a utopian society. Through reinvention and romanticism, Maryna embarks on a path of fame and prosperity in theater acting that gradually corrupts her true essence.

Climax

The climax occurs when Maryna leaves the commune for San Francisco after the community begins to fail.

Foreshadowing

The failed commune set up in Poland foreshadows the unsustainability of their utopian community in America.

Understatement

N/A

Allusions

The novel alludes to the story of the Polish actress Helena Modrzejewska who emigrated to America and pursued a successful stage career.

Imagery

“The high mountains now were still covered with snow—winters are long and harsh in the Tatras—but as the wagon passed along green meadows carpeted with purple crocuses, purple with a dash of dark blue”

Paradox

The Poles leave their homeland to seek a utopian lifestyle but find the same restraints in America that hindered their vision in Poland.

Parallelism

There is a parallel drawn between Poland and the United States in how both nations and also its people hold the idea of a higher destiny.

Metonymy and Synecdoche

“On the Fourth of July, they listened to vehement oratory and music and watched the parading and the fireworks…”

Fourth of July is a synecdoche for U.S. Independence Day

Personification

“The wind had risen, and the silent forest seemed to thrum and whisper.”

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