Lynching in Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism
The theme of lynching in nineteenth-century American literature reflects the societal tensions and racial violence prevalent in the post-slavery era, particularly in the South. This brutal form of mob justice targeted African Americans and served as a method for maintaining racial hierarchy, with its rise often linked to the end of slavery. Literary responses varied, with some works endorsing and others vehemently opposing the practice. According to Bruce E. Baker, folk ballads like those in North Carolina are essential cultural artifacts that offer insight into community attitudes toward lynching. In contrast, novels such as Hallie Erminie Rives's Smoking Flax and Stephen Crane's The Monster dramatize the alleged provocations for lynching, often exposing societal biases and racial stereotypes.
African-American authors and journalists took a bold stance against lynching, portraying it as a moral atrocity through their works. Figures like Ida B. Wells-Barnett became prominent anti-lynching activists, using journalism and pamphleteering to challenge the dominant narratives and expose the truth behind many lynching crimes, as detailed in Simone W. Davis's analysis of her work. Wells-Barnett's efforts, alongside other African-American authors such as William Wells Brown and Charles W. Chesnutt, highlighted the false pretenses often used to justify lynchings, as noted by Trudier Harris.
While the African-American press uniformly criticized lynching, the white press frequently minimized or excused it, as observed by Donald L. Grant. This disparity in representation contributed to the ongoing struggle against racial violence. However, thanks to the persistent activism of figures like Wells-Barnett, the occurrence of lynching decreased significantly by the mid-twentieth century, leading to a corresponding decline in its literary depiction.
Contents
- Representative Works
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Criticism: Lynching In Literature And Music
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Literary Lynchings and Burnings
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Harris provides an overview of works addressing the theme of lynching and argues that raising the topic was, for many writers, a consciously political act.
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North Carolina Lynching Ballads
(summary)
In the following essay, Baker examines ballads associated with three lynchings in North Carolina and contends that, more than novels and poetry, folk music offers insight into attitudes toward lynching in the communities where they occurred.
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Disabling Fictions: Race, History, and Ideology in Crane's ‘The Monster.’
(summary)
In the following essay, McMurray argues that Stephen Crane's novella The Monster recalls the 1892 lynching of Robert Lewis in Crane's hometown.
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Literary Lynchings and Burnings
(summary)
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Criticism: Ida B. Wells-Barnett And The Anti-Lynching Movement
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The ‘Weak Race’ and the Winchester: Political Voices in the Pamphlets of Ida B. Wells-Barnett
(summary)
In the following essay, Davis examines the anti-lynching activities of Ida B. Wells-Barnett through the texts of Wells-Barnett's anti-lynching pamphlets, Southern Horrors and A Red Record. In her powerful anti-lynching pamphlets of the 1890s, Black activist Ida B. Wells-Barnett taught her contemporaries how to read politically, presenting a savvy manipulation and exposé of the dominant ideologies enmeshing contemporary race, class, and gender issues.
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Indictment of Lynching: ‘The cold-blooded savagery of white devils.’
(summary)
In the following essay, McMurry delineates Ida B. Wells-Barnett's anti-lynching activism and career after the journalist's controversial departure from the Memphis Free Speech.
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Introduction to On Lynchings
(summary)
In the following essay, an introduction to three of Ida B. Wells-Barnett's writings on lynching, Collins provides an overview of Wells-Barnett's activism and career and situates Wells-Barnett inside a feminist tradition.
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The ‘Weak Race’ and the Winchester: Political Voices in the Pamphlets of Ida B. Wells-Barnett
(summary)
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Criticism: Resistance To Lynching In Society And The Press
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The Role of the Press, Education, and the Church in the Anti-lynching Reform
(summary)
In the following excerpt, Grant examines the treatment of lynching in both the white and black press.
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‘We Live in an Age of Lawlessness’: The Response to Lynching in Virginia
(summary)
In the following essay, Brundage details responses to lynching by politicians and the press in Virginia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
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The Role of the Press, Education, and the Church in the Anti-lynching Reform
(summary)
- Further Reading