Product Description: C. Vann Woodward's The Burden of Southern History remains one of the essential history texts of our time. In it Woodward brilliantly addresses the interrelated themes of southern identity, southern distinctiveness, and the strains of irony that characterize much of the South's historical experience. First published in 1960, the book quickly became a touchstone for generations of students. This updated third edition contains a chapter, "Look Away, Look Away," in which Woodward finds a plethora of additional ironies in the South's experience. It also includes previously uncollected appreciations of Robert Penn Warren, to whom the book was originally dedicated, and William Faulkner. This edition also features a new foreword by historian William E. Leuchtenburg in which he recounts the events that led up to Woodward's writing The Burden of Southern History, and reflects on the book's--and Woodward's--place in the study of southern history. The Burden of Southern History is quintessential Woodward--wise, witty, ruminative, daring, and as alive in the twenty-first century as when it was written.
Essays from a Southern Intellectual This is a collection of essays on then contemporary southern culture and history. The essays generally deal with the transformation then taking place- the end of segregation, the civil rights movement, and surging population and industrial development.
The essays have a sentimental quality I don't find in more modern writings. They are short in the quality of thesis ('Southern Identity lies in a common memory', 'The country made ambiguous moves towards racial equality during the civil War and reconstruction' but is long in the quality of its prose. It's not a bad read, even if there is little new. Of course, you shouldn't be reading books from 1960 for new material in the first place.
So what was Woodward trying to tell his audience? I saw two themes. To the south he seemed to be asking people to let go of segregation as another lost cause. He doesn't condemn it in moral tones, but rather that fighting for it against the tide of history was futile and self destructive. To the north he asked for patience, pointing out that virulent racism persisted in the north well after the civil war. So the theme was getting people to deal peacefully with the concept of racial equality.
While most of the essays stuck to this theme, the last two essays stuck out.
'The Populist Heritage and the Intellectual' is an analysis of criticism of the populist movement by then contemporary historians. I've never heard the term Populist used in anything other then a derogatory fashion, Woodward suggests there is a lot more to it then that. Woodward suggests populism was an agrarian protest movement that failed to find intellectual support, and was consequently pilloried. He cites it as the one movement that sought to bring back civil rights to the south in the 1890's. It definitely warrants further reading.
`The Irony of Southern History' is a thoughtful essay comparing the cold war of the 1950's to the slavery conflict then incipient in the 1830's. The author cites the closing of discussion, the end to the great debates and experiments of the 1930's that challenged capitalism. The south in the 1830's similarly closed debate over slavery, it became treason to question the institution. Woodward sees southern intellectuals as obligated to comment on the cold war from the perspective of people who knew from experience that history does not take sides.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Tony's Online Tips
Trevor
