A History of California Literature

This History explores the historical periods, literary genres, and cultural movements of California.

Blake Allmendinger (Edited by)

9781107052093, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 19 May 2015

441 pages
23.5 x 15.9 x 2.9 cm, 0.77 kg

Blake Allmendinger's A History of California Literature surveys the paradoxical image of the Golden State as a site of dreams and disenchantment, formidable beginnings and ruinous ends. This history encompasses the prismatic nature of California by exploring a variety of historical periods, literary genres, and cultural movements affecting the state's development, from the colonial era to the twenty-first century. Written by a host of leading historians and literary critics, this book offers readers insight into the tensions and contradictions that have shaped the literary landscape of California and also American literature generally.

1. Tales of native California Paul Apodaca
2. Indigenous peoples under colonial rule Lisbeth Haas
3. Spanish and Mexican literature Vincent Pérez
4. White explorers and travelers David Wyatt
5. The gold rush Nicolas Witschi
6. California nature writers Steven Pavlos Holmes
7. The black frontier Aparajita Nanda
8. California as political topography: Asian American literature before 1980 Catherine Fung
9. Mexican American literature Manuel M. Martin-Rodriguez
10. The protest fiction of Frank Norris, Upton Sinclair, Jack London, and John Steinbeck Susan Shillingsaw
11. Dreams, denial, and Depression-era fiction Jan Goggans
12. Modernism in the early twentieth century Geneva Gano
13. The hard-boiled California novel William Marling
14. Writing the hidden California Phillip Round
15. The Beats Kurt Hemmer
16. Bay area politics, 1944–81 Kaplan Page Harris
17. Los Angeles poetry from the McCarthy to the punk eras Brian Kim Stefans
18. African American uprising Charles Toombs
19. Of carnales and coyotes: Chicana/o literature of California Anne Goldman
20. Interracial relations: face and place in post-1980 Asian American literature King-Kok Cheung
21. California and the queer utopian imagination: 1981–2014 Cael Keegan
22. Modern California nature writing Michael Kowalewski
23. Making California's small towns and cities visible in the twenty-first century Nancy Cook
24. Science fiction and mysterious worlds Lynn Mie Itagaki.

Subject Areas: Literary studies: fiction, novelists & prose writers [DSK], Literary studies: from c 1900 - [DSBH], Literary studies: c 1800 to c 1900 [DSBF], Literary studies: c 1500 to c 1800 [DSBD]