A History of American Literature 1900 - 1950

A look at the first five decades of 20th century American literature, covering a wide range of literary works, figures, and influences A History of American Literature 1900-1950 is a current and well-balanced account of the main literary figures, connections, and ideas that characterized the first half of the twentieth century. In this readable, highly informative book, the author explores significant developments in American drama, fiction, and poetry, and discusses how the literature of the period influenced, and was influenced by, cultural trends in both the United States and abroad. Considering works produced during America’s rise to prominence on the world stage from both regional and international perspectives, MacGowan provides readers with keen insights into the literature of the period in relation to America’s transition from an agrarian nation to an industrial power, the racial and economic discrimination of Black and Native American populations, the greater financial and social independence of women, the economic boom of the 1920s, the Depression of the 1930s, the impact of world wars, massive immigration, political and ideological clashes, and more. Encompassing five decades of literary and cultural diversity in one volume, A History of American Literature 1900-1950: Covers American theater, poetry, fiction, non-fiction, memoirs, magazines and literary publications, and popular media Discusses the ways writers dramatized the immense social, economic, cultural, and political changes in America throughout the first half of the twentieth century Explores themes and influences of Modernist poets, expatriate novelists, and literary publications founded by women and African-Americans Features the work of Black writers, Native Americans, Asian Americans, and Jewish Americans A History of American Literature 1900-1950 is essential reading for all students in upper-level American literature courses as well as general readers looking to better understand the literary tradition of the United States.

Preface vii 1 American Literature in 1900 1 Prose and Fiction: Taking on the New Century 3 Regional Fictions: Austin, Glasgow, Cather, and Roberts 23 Black Writing: The Washington and Du Bois Debate 33 American Theater in the First Decades 39 Native American Literature in the Early 1900s 43 Poetry Before the Modernists 47 The Chicago Renaissance: Masters, Lindsay, and Sandburg 49 The Poetry of Feeling: Teasdale, Millay, Wiley, and Bogan 57 The Poetry of Place: Jeffers, Robinson, and Frost 64 2 The Twenties: Becoming International 72 Innovation and American Theater in the 1920s 73 Prose in the American Grain: Lewis, Anderson, Faulkner 82 The Expatriates: “Being Geniuses Together” 96 “Making It New” Modernist Poetry and the 1920s 115 The South: Fugitives and Agrarians 139 The Harlem Renaissance 142 3 The Thirties: Depression and a Prelude to War 163 Poetry: Some Legacies of Modernism 168 Drama in the 1930s: After O’Neill 178 Fiction in the 1930s: A National and International Canvas 197 Black Writing in the 1930s 226 Immigrant Writing in the First Decades 234 Proletarian Literature 246 American Writers and the Spanish Civil War 263 4 WAR: “Thus dawn the 1940s…” 270 The Media: Books, Hollywood, and Television 270 Literature and the War: Fiction and Nonfiction 276 Literature and the War: Poetry 290 Literature and the War: Theater 302 5 Into Mid-Century 304 Native American Literature 1920–1950 304 Postwar Theater: The Early Careers of Inge, Williams, and Miller 317 Poetry into Mid-Century: Evaluating the Modernist Legacy 333 Black Writing into Mid-Century 356 Fiction in the 1940s 377 J. D. Salinger and Vladimir Nabokov 377 Southern Writing 382 Jewish American Fiction 394 Urban Fiction: Tales of Three Cities 402 Los Angeles 402 New York 408 Chicago 412 And Other Places: Past, Present, and Future 415 Past 415 Present 417 Future 424 References 434 Index 463