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AMERICAN NOVEL  \n􀀂􀀃  \nLAWRENCE BUELL  \nTHE BELKNAP PRESS OF  \nHARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS  \nCambridge, Massachusetts  \nLondon, England  \n2014  \nCopyright © 2014 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America  \nPage 539 constitutes an extension of the copyright page.  \nLibrary of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data  \nBuell, Lawrence.  \nThe dream of the great American novel / Lawrence Buell.  \npages cm  \nIncludes bibliographical references and index.  \nISBN 978-0-674-05115-7 (alk. paper)  \n1. American fiction—19th century—History and criticism.  \n2. American fiction—20th century—History and criticism.  \n3. National characteristics, American, in literature.  \n4. Literature and society—United States—History—19th century.  \n5. Literature and society—United States—History—20th century.  \n6. United States—In literature. I. Title.  \nPS377.B84 2014  \n813.009—dc23 2013032745  \nTo my students at Harvard University and Oberlin College, from whom I’ve learned at least as much as I’ve taught  \nContents  \nAbbreviations xi  \nIntroduction 1  \nThe Plan of the Book 5  \nJust How “American” Is the GAN Idea? 10  \nWhy Now? 14  \nPART ONE . THE UNKILL ABLE DREAM  \n1. Birth, Heyday, and Seeming Decline 23  \nThe Birth of the Dream 24  \nDefining the Terms, Somewhat 28  \nMonumentalism and Mockery: Dos Passos, Stein, and Others 36  \n2. Reborn from the Critical Ashes 46  \nCritical Professionalism and Paradigm Change 47  \nThe Dream of the Great American Novel Miraculously Survives Its Discreditation 52  \nChaos Configured? Morrison and Updike as Great  \nAmerican Novelists 60  \nPART TWO . SCRIPT ONE: MADE CLASSIC BY RETELLING  \n3. The Reluctant Master Text: The Making and Remakings  \nof Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter 71  \nHawthorne as a Nonnational Writer 74  \nProvincial Discontent: Hawthorne’s Arts of Entrapment 76  \nImagining Euro-Atlantic Diaspora: New England Derealized 84  \nGreat American Novel Despite Itself: The Retellings 91  \nviii Contents  \nPART THREE . SCRIPT TWO: ASPIRATION IN AMERICA Introduction. American Dreamers in Context 105  \n4. “Success” Stories from Franklin to the Dawn of Modernism 109  \nAmerican Dilemma: Uneven Development of Early Fictions  \nof Development 112  \n(Mis)Making Men: The Franklin Legend as Model and as Target 120  \nWomen’s Up-From Stories: Antebellum to Wharton 129  \n5. Belated Ascendancy: Fitzgerald to Faulkner, Dreiser to Wright and Bellow 139  \nDouble Helix: An American Tragedy and The Great Gatsby 141  \nFitzgerald, Faulkner, and Beyond: Americanization of  \nObserver-Hero Narrative 151  \nDreiser, Wright, Bellow, and the Ethnic Turn in  \nUp-From Narrative 162  \n6. Up-From Narrative in Hyphenated America:  \nEllison, Roth, and Beyond 175  \nEllison’s Invisible Man as Literary Event 176  \nSurpassing a Classic Benchmark: Invisible Man versus  \nHuckleberry Finn 182  \nEllison to Neo-slave Narrative and Beyond 192  \nRoth’s American Trilogy: American Pastoral as Success  \nStory “Undone” 198  \nThe Way We Live Now? 208  \nPART FOUR . SCRIPT THREE: ROMANCING THE DIVIDES Introduction. Shifting Ratios, Dangerous Proximities 217  \n7. Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Its Aftermaths 226  \n“The Greatest Book of Its Kind” 228  \nSelf-Revision: Stowe’s Dred 240  \nNorth-South Divide Romances before and against Stowe 244 What Can Reform Fiction Do as Encore? Nineteenth-Century Novels  \nafter Stowe 248  \n8. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Its Others 258 Comedy as a Substitute for Politics 259  \nUnperceived Rivals: Cable’s The Grandissimes, Chesnutt’s The Marrow of Tradition 275  \nContents ix  \n9. Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom!, Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind,  \nand Literary Interracialism North and South 286  \nBurning the House Down: Absalom, Absalom! 288  \nRecouping Tara: Gone with the Wind 300  \nMirrors of Miscegenation for the Civil Rights Era and Beyond 308  \n10. Morrison’s Beloved as Culmination and Augury 317  \nReinventing Tale","cbCailtVlVPJqUPd","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCailtVlVPJqUPd","pdf",3111169,582,"English","# Contents\n## Abbreviations\n## Introduction\n## The Plan of the Book\n## Just How \"American\" Is the GAN Idea?\n## Why Now?\n## PART ONE - THE UNKILL ABLE DREAM\n## 1. Birth, Heyday, and Seeming Decline\n## 2. Reborn from the Critical Ashes\n## PART TWO - SCRIPT ONE: MADE CLASSIC BY RETELLING\n## 3. The Reluctant Master Text\n## PART THREE - SCRIPT TWO: ASPIRATION IN AMERICA\n## 4. \"Success\" Stories from Franklin to the Dawn of Modernism\n## 5. Belated Ascendancy\n## 6. Up-From Narrative in Hyphenated America\n## PART FOUR - SCRIPT THREE: ROMANCING THE DIVIDES\n## 7. Uncle Tom’s Cabin and Its Aftermaths\n## 8. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and Its Others\n## 9. Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom!\n## 10. Morrison’s Beloved as Culmination and Augury\n## PART FIVE - SCRIPT FOUR: IMPROBABLE COMMUNITIES\n## 11. Moby-Dick\n## 12. The Great American Novel of Twentieth-Century Breakdown\n## 13. Late Twentieth-Century Maximalism\n## Epilogue","[{\"question\":\"What central idea does the book examine?\",\"answer\":\"The book analyzes the “Great American Novel” (GAN) idea—how American fiction is imagined as a uniquely national form and how that claim is contested over time.\"},{\"question\":\"How is the book organized to study different writers and works?\",\"answer\":\"It structures the analysis into parts and “scripts,” grouping themes such as retelling, aspiration, romanticizing divides, and improbable communities across major authors.\"},{\"question\":\"Which major authors and novels are discussed in the contents?\",\"answer\":\"The table of contents names authors and works including Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, Fitzgerald and Faulkner, Stowe and Twain, Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom!, Morrison’s Beloved, and Melville’s Moby-Dick, among others.\"}]","The Dream of the Great American Novel - [Pure Main Title] | PDF",1789986250,896]