Literary Regionalism

Literary regionalism was, in a way, a bridge between the romanticism of the first half of the nineteenth century and the realism of the second half. Regionalism used the nostalgia of Romanticism to portray authors’ hometowns and the residents of the area. However, regionalists still recognized difficulty in the attitudes of the people they portrayed, with authors such as Willa Cather candidly addressing dislike of immigrants in her novels. Regionalism was mainly popular in the United States after the Civil War through the World Wars. Authors in this genre painted nostalgic pictures of a rapidly fading rural or small-town America. Oftentimes they used local dialects and strong description to immerse the reader in the town or countryside they were portraying. Regionalism began to die out around the time of the World Wars as the United States was thrust into the world stage and country-dwellers flocked to the cities. However, some modern authors such as Wendell Berry still maintain regionalist themes.

 Key Authors and Works:

Sarah Orne Jewett, The Country of the Pointed Firs

Willa Cather, My Ántonia

Ellen Glasgow, The Deliverance

Carson McCullers, The Member of the Wedding

William Faulkner, As I Lay Dying

Harper Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird

Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow