Description: The Radical Novel and the Classless Society analyzes radical U.S. literature from the late nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries through the lens of socialist thought, recognition theory, and intersectionality theory.
Review Quotes:
"Robert Birdwell's down-to-business The Radical Novel and the Classless Society freshly defines the tradition of American radical fiction as a synthesis of utopianism and proletarianism, cultural recognition and economic redistribution. Its inclusive but clear-eyed view of the progressive past is just what the doctor ordered in an era in which dreams of a classless society have never seemed less historical." --William Maxwell, Washington University St. Louis
"Birdwell establishes a timely dialogue between the utopian fiction of the 1890s and the tradition of the radical novel, reminding us forcefully of the power of literature to prefigure and inspire social hope and change. This important dialogue deserves to continue and expand." --Maria Giulia Fabi, University of Ferrara