Description
Book SynopsisReimagines the origins of "American" identity by juxtaposing authors such as Hawthorne, Melville, and Thoreau with Native American, African American, and women authors. This book identifies an unresolvable conflict between America's multicultural history and its violent will to monoculturalism.
Trade Review"Timothy Powell's theoretically sophisticated and impressively researched book demonstrates that [multiculturalism] can ... produce literary criticism and historicism of the first order."--Christopher Diller, The New England Quarterly
Table of ContentsAcknowledgements vii Historical Interlude 3 Introduction Theorizing Ruthless Democracy 5 PART I: BEYOND NEW ENGLAND 25 Historical Interlude 27 Chapter One Nathaniel Hawthorne: History Imagined "Fantastically Awry" 30 Historical Interlude 49 Chapter Two John Rollin Ridge: Extending the Borders of "America" from New England to Alta California 52 Historical Interlude 75 Chapter Three Henry David Thoreau: "The Only True America" 77 PART II: TOWARD A TRANSNATIONAL UNDERSTANDING OF "AMERICAN" IDENTITY 101 Historical Interlude 103 Chapter Four Harriet Beecher Stowe: Uncle Tom's Cabin and the Question of the American Colonization Society 106 Historical Interlude 131 Chapter Five William Wells Brown: Mapping the American Diaspora 133 Historical Interlude 151 Chapter Six Herman Melville: Ruthless Democracy 153 Notes 177 Bibliography 207 Index 221
