A Companion to the Regional Literatures of America

Copyright © 2003 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd

A Companion to the Regional Literatures of America

Editor(s): Charles L. Crow

Published Online: 10 DEC 2007

Print ISBN: 9780631226314

Online ISBN: 9780470999080

DOI: 10.1002/9780470999080

About this Book

Product Information

About The Product

The Blackwell Companion to American Regional Literature is the most comprehensive resource yet published for study of this popular field.


  • The most inclusive survey yet published of American regional literature.
  • Represents a wide variety of theoretical and historical approaches.
  • Surveys the literature of specific regions from California to New England and from Alaska to Hawaii.
  • Discusses authors and groups who have been important in defining regional American literature.

Table of contents

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      Frontmatter (pages i–xvi)

    1. Introduction (pages 1–4)

      Charles L. Crow

  3. Part I: History and Theory of Regionalism in the United States

    1. Chapter 1

      Contemporary Regionalism (pages 7–24)

      Michael Kowalewski

    2. Chapter 2

      The Cultural Work of American Regionalism (pages 25–41)

      Stephanie Foote

    3. Chapter 3

      Letting Go our Grand Obsessions: Notes toward a New Literary History of the American Frontiers (pages 42–56)

      Annette Kolodny

    4. Chapter 4

      Region and Race: National Identity and the Southern Past (pages 57–73)

      Lori Robison

    5. Chapter 5

      Regionalism in the Era of the New Deal (pages 74–91)

      Lauren Coats and Nihad M. Farooq

    6. Chapter 6

      Realism and Regionalism (pages 92–110)

      Donna Campbell

    7. Chapter 7

      Taking Feminism and Regionalism toward the Third Wave (pages 111–128)

      Krista Comer

    8. Chapter 8

      Regionalism and Ecology (pages 129–136)

      David Mazel

    9. Chapter 9

      The City as Region (pages 137–153)

      James Kyung-Jin Lee

    10. Chapter 10

      Indigenous Peoples and Place (pages 154–170)

      P. Jane Hafen

    11. Chapter 11

      Borders, Bodies, and Regions: The United States and the Caribbean (pages 171–192)

      Vera M. Kutzinski

  4. Part II: Mapping Regions

    1. Chapter 12

      New England Literature and Regional Identity (pages 195–212)

      Kent C. Ryden

    2. Chapter 13

      The Great Plains (pages 213–230)

      Diane D. Quantic

    3. Chapter 14

      Forgotten Frontier: Literature of the Old Northwest (pages 221–246)

      Bev Hogue

    4. Chapter 15

      The Old Southwest: Humor, Tall Tales, and the Grotesque (pages 247–265)

      Rosemary D. Cox

    5. Chapter 16

      The Plantation School: Dissenters and Countermyths (pages 266–285)

      Sarah E. Gardner

    6. Chapter 17

      The Fugitive-Agrarians and the Twentieth-Century Southern Canon (pages 286–305)

      Farrell O'Gorman

    7. Chapter 18

      Romanticizing a Different Lost Cause: Regional Identities in Louisiana and the Bayou Country (pages 306–323)

      Suzanne Disheroon-Green

    8. Chapter 19

      The Sagebrush School Revived (pages 324–343)

      Lawrence I. Berkove

    9. Chapter 20

      Re-envisioning the Big Sky: Regional Identity, Spatial Logics, and the Literature of Montana (pages 344–362)

      Susan Kollin

    10. Chapter 21

      Regions of California: Mountains and Deserts (pages 363–378)

      Nicolas Witschi

    11. Chapter 22

      Regions of California: The Great Central Valley (pages 379–396)

      Charles L. Crow

    12. Chapter 23

      Los Angeles as a Literary Region (pages 397–411)

      David Fine

    13. Chapter 24

      North and Northwest: Theorizing the Regional Literatures of Alaska and the Pacific Northwest (pages 412–431)

      Susan Kollin

    14. Chapter 25

      Texas and the Great Southwest (pages 432–457)

      Mark Busby

    15. Chapter 26

      Hawai'i (pages 458–476)

      Brenda Kwon

  5. Part III: Some Regionalist Masters

    1. Chapter 27

      Bret Harte and the Literary Construction of the American West (pages 479–495)

      Gary Scharnhorst

    2. Chapter 28

      Mark Twain: A Man for All Regions (pages 496–512)

      Lawrence I. Berkove

    3. Chapter 29

      Willa Cather's Glittering Regions (pages 513–531)

      Robert Thacker

    4. Chapter 30

      “I have seen America emerging”: Mary Austin's Regionalism (pages 532–550)

      Betsy Klimasmith

    5. Chapter 31

      “I have never recovered from the country”: The American West of Wallace Stegner (pages 551–571)

      Richard H. Cracroft

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      Index (pages 573–606)

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