American Literary Realism 1870 1910

Some vols. accompanied by separate issues called special number.

This handbook offers students and researchers a compact introduction to the nineteenth-century American novel in the light of current debates, theoretical concepts, and critical methodologies. The volume turns to the nineteenth century as a formative era in American literary history, a time that saw both the rise of the novel as a genre, and the emergence of an independent, confident American culture. A broad range of concise essays by European and American scholars demonstrates how some of America‘s most well-known and influential novels responded to and participated in the radical transformations that characterized American culture between the early republic and the age of imperial expansion. Part I consists of 7 systematic essays on key historical and critical frameworks ― including debates aboutrace and citizenship, transnationalism, environmentalism and print culture, as well as sentimentalism, romance and the gothic, realism and naturalism. Part II provides 22 essays on individual novels, each combining an introduction to relevant cultural contexts with a fresh close reading and the discussion of critical perspectives shaped by literary and cultural theory.

Addressing US literature from 1876 to 1910, this volume aims to account for the period's immense transformations while troubling the ideology of progress that underwrote much of its self-understanding. This volume queries the various forms and formations of post-Reconstruction American literature. It contends that the literature of this period, most often referred to as 'turn-of-the-century' might be more productively oriented by the end of Reconstruction and the haunting aftermath of its emancipatory potential than by the logic of temporal and social advance that underwrote the end of the century and the beginning of the Progressive Era. Acknowledging that nearly all US literature after 1876 might be described as post-Reconstruction, the volume invites readers to reframe this period by asking: under what terms did post-Reconstruction American literature challenge or re-consolidate the 'nation' as an affective, political, and discursive phenomenon? And what kind of alternative pasts and futures did it write into existence?

The Damnation of Harold Frederic is a finely honed work of literary criticism. Bennett examines how Frederic both directly and indirectly manipulated his own personal experiences to craft his literary pieces. (His life involved two families: one with his wife, and one with a lover, who eventually was tried for manslaughter in his sensational death.) Her book provides a critical reading of The Damnation of Theron Ware, as well as a close look at his oeuvre, including his final novel, The Market-Place, a pioneering work that paved the way for works of socioeconomic commentary such as Dreiser's Trilogy of Desire and Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. Drawing on material previously unavailable to scholars, Bennett engages readers in exploring how an author's private life and public works intersect.

This Companion examines a number of issues related to the terms realism and naturalism. The introduction seeks both to discuss the problems in the use of these two terms in relation to late nineteenth-century fiction and to describe the history of previous efforts to make the terms expressive of American writing of this period. The Companion includes ten essays which fall into four categories: essays on the historical context of realism and naturalism by Louis Budd and Richard Lehan; essays on critical approaches to the movements since the early 1970s by Michael Anesko, essays on the efforts to expand the canon of realism and naturalism by Elizabeth Ammons; and a full-scale discussion of ten major texts, from W. D. Howell's The Rise of Silas Lapham to Jack London's The Call of the Wild, by John W. Crowley, Tom Quirk, J. C. Levenson, Blanche Gelfant, Barbara Hochman, and Jacqueline Tavernier-Courbin.

Realistic writers seek to render accurate representations of the world, and their novels contain authentic details and descriptions of their characters and settings. Like Realistic authors, Naturalistic ones similarly try to portray the world accurately, but they tend to depict the darker side of life. Realism was born in Europe in the nineteenth century and soon became popular in the United States, while Naturalism became prominent at the beginning of the twentieth century. Both traditions have continued in one form or another to the present day, and Realistic and Naturalistic novelists include some of America's most significant authors, such as Sherwood Anderson, Saul Bellow, Ambrose Bierce, Willa Cather, Theodore Dreiser, Ralph Ellison, and Jack London. This reference includes biographical and critical entries for more than 120 American Naturalistic and Realistic novelists. An introductory essay discusses the history of the Realistic and Naturalistic traditions, points to the difficulty of defining them, and surveys the many authors who have been associated with the two movements. The entries that follow are arranged alphabetically to facilitate use. Each includes basic biographical information and a narrative overview of the writer's educational background, professional career, and published works. The writer's works are briefly discussed in relation to the Realistic and Naturalistic traditions. Entries include primary and secondary bibliographies, and the volume closes with a list of works for further reading.

This series presents a comprehensive, global and up-to-date history of English-language prose fiction and written ... by a international team of scholars ... -- dust jacket.

The American Critical Archives is a series of reference books that provide representative selections of contemporary reviews of the main works of major American authors. Specifically, each volume contains both full reviews and excerpts from reviews that appeared in newspapers and weekly and monthly periodicals, generally within a few months of the publication of the work concerned. This 1999 book is a systematic, comprehensive gathering of the reviews (primarily in the United States and Britain) of Mark Twain's books published up until 1917. The reviews collected here are essential reading for anyone interested in Twain criticism and reception. In addition, by devoting attention to each individual work, the volume provides the broadest possible perspective on Twain's career.