BRET HARTE AND FENIMORE COOPER: THE EXPERIENCE OF A PARODICAL RETHINKING OF AMERICAN ROMANTIC HERITAGE

Abstract

The article is devoted to the research of creative peculiarities of the Frencis Bret Harte's «Muck-a-Muck», the parody on Fenimore Cooper's five-part "The Leatherstocking Tales". Using burlesque and travesty hyperboles the parodist creates a comic image of Cooper's artistic style in order to discredit it in the context of literary struggle which was aimed at creating an original American literature in the second half of the XIX century. F. Cooper's creative activity, being a symbol of Romanticism receding into the past, became the main target of Realistic criticism. Bret Harte's parody initiated the anti-Cooper campaign in the American literature.