Archives of American Time: Literature and Modernity in the Nineteenth Century

American historians have typically argued that a shared experience of time worked to bind the antebellum nation together. Trains, technology, and expanding market forces catapulted the United States into the future on a straight line of progressive time. The nation's exceedingly diverse population could cluster around this common temporality as one forward—looking people.

In a bold revision of this narrative, Archives of American Time examines American literature's figures and forms to discl...