Racism in Literature - Clare R. Goldfarb (essay date summer 1971)
Clare R. Goldfarb (essay date summer 1971)
SOURCE: Goldfarb, Clare R. “The Question of William Dean Howells's Racism.” Ball State University Forum 12, no. 3 (summer 1971): 22-30.
[In the following essay, Goldfarb examines Howells's attitude toward racism in the United States as revealed by the themes and characters of his novella An Imperative Duty.]
William Dean Howells' attitudes on race and other social problems are worth studying. Examining our writers, past and present, for social attitudes has been part of the intellectual scene for a long time, and the examination is even more intense today. In particular, our preoccupation with race and racial attitudes is central. It is a fact of contemporary American life. We ask questions which must be asked and search for solutions which must be found if we are to survive as a nation.
Always concerned with our growth as a nation, William Dean Howells made social justice part of his...
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