Reviews for Uses of the Past in the Novels of William Faulkner

The average rating for Uses of the Past in the Novels of William Faulkner based on 2 reviews is 3 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-01-19 00:00:00 Steve Thompson I think the idea behind this project is important, but there could have been more done with the execution. It just feels like a lot of history and summary whereas I would have liked the see more emphasis on the analysis. It also felt a bit fragmentary. I'm not really sure what the overall argument ultimately was. At the same time, it is a sign of progress that you couldn't write this book today. Back in 1987 you could do a recovery project of people like Larsen, Fauset, Hopkins, Cooper, etc. And while people still ignore Black women far too much, I think you'd definitely draw some funny looks if you claimed to work in late 19th/early twentieth c. Afam fic and didn't engage some or all of these figures as a starting point to then work on whatever theoretical contribution you wanted to make.

Review # 2 was written on 2017-07-04 00:00:00 Michel Veillette Carby's recovery work on Afro-American women authors is phenomenal and traces the role that authors like Harriet Wilson, Frances Harper, and Pauline Hopkins played in shaping a distinctive tradition of American literature that has been historically underrepresented. My only critique of Carby's work is that it lacks any form of conclusion. This may be intentional as there is more to this tradition begin what Carby describes, but the abruptness of the ending makes me long to know what lies in the empty space beyond Reconstructing Womanhood.