Civil wars
Subtitle: American novelists and manners, 1880-1940
By: Susan Goodman.
Publisher: Johns Hopkins University Press
Published: 2003
Place of publication: Baltimore
Language: eng
Number of pages: 198
Subjects: American fiction -- 20th century -- History and criticism.; Manners and customs in literature.; Literature and society -- United States -- History -- 20th century.; Literature and society -- United States -- History -- 19th century.; American fiction -- 19th century -- History and criticism.
Description: "Observers from Alexis de Tocqueville to Lionel Trilling have found the United States wanting in what it takes to produce a novelist of manners - namely, a rich enough past and sufficiently stratified classes. In a work that recovers the broader meaning of "manners" for past generations, Susan Goodman demonstrates that American writers have consistently tied the subject of national identity to the norms and behaviors of everyday life - that, in fact, the novel of manners is a dominant form of American fiction." "Goodman concentrates on a cluster of writers - William Dean Howells, Henry James, Edith Wharton, Willa Cather, Ellen Glasgow, and Jessie Fauset - whose analyses of manners offer several distinct social histories. Under her scrutiny, these writers' works allow us to view the creative interaction of individual lives, social dynamics, and historical legacies - what might be called the panorama of manners themselves - as well as the development of American fiction. Above all, Goodman shows that novels of manners are central to American literature, and that these novels speak in a large cultural way about who and what composes America."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [179]-189) and index.
Table of contents: title: William Dean Howells : the lessons of a master; title: Henry James : the final paradox of manners; title: Edith Wharton : a backward glance; title: Willa Cather : after 1922 or thereabout; title: Ellen Glasgow : the social history of America; title: Jessie Fauset : the etiquette of passing.