Reading for Reform: The Social Work of Literature in the Progressive Era

An unprecedented examination of class-bridging reform and U.S. literary history at the turn of the twentieth century

Reading for Reform rewrites the literary history of late nineteenth and early twentieth century America by putting social reform institutions at the center of literary and cultural analysis. Examining the vibrant, often fractious literary cultures that developed as part of the Progressive mandate to uplift the socially disadvantaged, it shows that in these years reformers saw...