Given as lectures in 1912, these chapters look for American traits in American books. Bliss Perry, former editor of The Atlantic Monthly, considers race, nation and book, American idealism, romance and the reaction against it, humour and satire, and the pull between individualism and fellowship, with Webster, Lincoln, Emerson and Whitman among his witnesses.
A thoughtful Progressive-era attempt to say what makes American writing American. Download the free EPUB.