The Fabrication of American Literature: Fraudulence and Antebellum Print Culture

Table of Contents

Contents Introduction: American Literary Fraudulence 1 Chapter 1. ‘‘One Vast Perambulating Humbug’’: Literary Nationalism and the Rise of the Puffing System 23 Chapter 2. Backwoods and Blackface: The Strange Careers of Davy Crockett and Jim Crow 65 Chapter 3. ‘‘Slavery Never Can Be Represented’’: James Williams and the Racial Politics of Imposture 101 Chapter 4. Mediums of Exchange: Fanny Fern’s Unoriginality 133 Conclusion: The Confidence Man on a Large Scale 162 Notes 177 Works Cited 211 Index 231 Acknowledgments 243 ...