Companion to the American Novel

Alfred Bendixen is Professor of English at Texas A & M University, and Founder and Executive Director of the American Literature Association. His books include Haunted Women (1985), an edition of the composite novel, The Whole Family (1986), The Amber Gods and Other Stories by Harriet Prescott Spofford (1989), Edith Wharton: New Critical Essays (1992), A Companion to the American Short Story (co-edited with James Nagel, Wiley-Blackwell, 2010), and The Cambridge Companion to American Travel Writing (co-edited with Judith Hamera, 2009).

“In addition to the various groups of essays, the book features a substantial chronology of American novels (from 1752 to 2000) and a series of lists of representative works in some of the most important traditions and genres discussed.”  (Poetics Today, 1 May 2014)“As a consolidation of prior scholarship and a spur to further investigation, it makes a meaningful and substantial contribution to the ongoing scholarly conversation about the American novel.”  (Review 19, 1 April 2013)“Summing Up: Recommended.  Upper-division undergraduates and above.”  (Choice, 1 November 2012)

• Notes on Contributors ix Preface xixAcknowledgments xxiA Chronology of the American Novel xxiiPart I: Historical Developments 11 The Development of the American Novel: The Transformations of Genre 3Alfred Bendixen2 The American Novel: Beginnings Through the American Renaissance 19Maria Karafilis3 The American Novel: Realism and Naturalism (1860-1920) 42Jeanne Campbell Reesman4 Modernism and the American Novel 60Peter L. Hays5 Beyond Modernism: The American Novel Between the World Wars 76Alfred Bendixen6 The Cold War Novel: The American Novel Between 1945-1970 90Sharon Becker and Wendy Martin7 The Novel in a Changing America: Multiculturalism and Other Issues (1970-Present) 109Martha J. CutterPart II: Genres and Traditions 1278 Fear, Ambiguity, and Transgression: The Gothic Novel in the United States 129Charles L. Crow9 The American Historical Romance: From James Fenimore Cooper and Nathaniel Hawthorne to Toni Morrison, Louise Erdrich, and E. L. Doctorow 147Emily Miller Budick10 Making This Whole Nation Feel: The Sentimental Novel in the United States 170Marianne Noble11 Social Protest, Reform, and the American Political Novel 187Chip Rhodes12 The American War Novel Tradition and the Individual Soldier 206James H. Meredith13 From the Sublime to the Ridiculous: Comic Traditions in the American Novel 218Judith Yaross Lee14 Plotting a Way Home: The Jewish American Novel 241Derek Parker Royal15 Chicano/a Traditions in the American Novel 259Juan J. Alonzo16 African American Traditions and the American Novel 274Melvin Donalson17 The American Novel of Mystery, Crime, and Detection 291Leonard Cassuto18 O Brave New Worlds: Science Fiction and the American Novel 309Eric S. Rabkin19 Dreaming of a White Future: Mary E. Bradley Lane, Edward Bellamy, and the Origins of the Utopian Novel in the United States 323Jean Pfaelzer20 Queer Theory and the American Novel 342Deborah Carlin21 The American Short-Story Cycle: Out From the Novel's Shadow 357Robert M. LuscherPart III: Major Texts 37322 The Woman's Law in Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter 375Monika Elbert23 Writ in Water: The Books of Melville's Moby-Dick 394Wyn Kelley24 Wonder of Wonders: Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin 408Susan Belasco25 Citational Strategies and Literary Traditions: Placing Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady 422Greg W. Zacharias26 Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: A Child's Search for Comfort and Peace 443Michael J. Kiskis27 What Women Want: Kate Chopin's The Awakening 454Emily Toth28 Private Fleming's Various Battles: Stephen Crane's The Red Badge of Courage 465James Nagel29 Lily's Story: Edith Wharton's House of Mirth 475Kathy Fedorko30 The Confessional Narration of Ernest Hemingway's The Sun Also Rises 488James Nagel31 Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby and the Myth of the Land 499Richard Lehan32 Ground Zero: Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury 510Philip Weinstein33 A Bigger Vision: Richard Wright's Native Son and the Great American Novel 525Andrew Warnes34 Our Invisible Man: The Aesthetic Genealogy of US Diversity 537John Carlos Rowe35 The Visionary Exuberance of Saul Bellow's The Adventures of Augie March 554Ben Siegel36 The Flesh and the Word: Toni Morrison's Beloved 570Valerie Smith37 A Different Kind of Love Story: Cormac McCarthy's The Road 582Olivia Carr EdenfieldSelected Readings in the Genres of the American Novel 598Index 610