Twenty-five Books That Shaped America
Description
From the author of the New York Times bestselling How to Read Literature Like a Professor comes a highly entertaining and informative book on the twenty-five works of literature that have most shaped the American character.
Thomas C. Foster applies his much-loved combination of wit, know-how, and analysis to explain how each work has shaped our very existence as readers, students, teachers, and Americans. He illuminates how books such as The Last of the Mohicans, Moby-Dick, My Ántonia, The Great Gatsby, The Maltese Falcon, Their Eyes Were Watching God, On the Road, The Crying of Lot 49, and others captured an American moment, how they influenced our perception of nationhood and citizenship, and what about them endures in the American character. Twenty-five Books That Shaped America is a fun and enriching guide to America through its literature.
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Person
Thomas C. Foster is the author of How to Read Literature Like a Professor, How to Write Like a Writer, How to Read Nonfiction Like a Professor, and other works. He is professor emeritus of English at the University of Michigan, Flint, where he taught classes in contemporary fiction, drama, and poetry as well as creative writing and freelance writing. He is also the author of several books on twentieth-century British and Irish literature and poetry.
Content
- Intro
- Dedication
- Contents
- Introduction - In the Four Corners
- Chapter One - Maybe Just a Little Made-Up
- Chapter Two - A Man, a Plan, a Flintlock
- Chapter Three - The Allegory Man Cometh
- Chapter Four - Gotta Get Back to the Pond and Set My Soul Free
- Chapter Five - I've Been Workin' on the Whale-Road
- Chapter Six - The Good Gray Poet, My Eye!
- Chapter Seven - Girls Gone Mild
- Chapter Eight - About a Boy-and a Raft
- Chapter Nine - Twofer
- Chapter Ten - In Praise of Prairie
- Chapter Eleven - A Whole Heap of Ashes
- Chapter Twelve - Life Is a Carnival
- Chapter Thirteen - It Takes a Weary Man to Sing a Weary Song
- Chapter Fourteen - The Bird Is the Word
- Chapter Fifteen - So Big
- Chapter Sixteen - The Winepress of Injustice
- Chapter Seventeen - Like a Hurricane
- Chapter Eighteen - He Ain't Heavy, He's My Cousin
- Chapter Nineteen - American Candide
- Chapter Twenty - Me and My Shadow
- Chapter Twenty-one - When Reading Got Good
- Chapter Twenty-two - Walk a Mile in My Shoes
- Chapter Twenty-three - Not in Kansas Anymore
- Chapter Twenty-four - Race. Relations.
- Chapter Twenty-five - Home, Home on the Res
- Conclusion - Fifteen More and the G.A.N.
- Acknowledgments
- About the Author
- Praise for How to Read Literature Like a Professor
- Books by Thomas C. Foster
- Credits
- Copyright
- About the Publisher
