Mechanic Accents Dime Novels and Working-Class Culture in America

by DENNING, MICHAEL

• ISBN13: 9781859842508
• ISBN10: 185984250X
• Edition: Revised
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1998-09-17
• Publisher: Verso

Summary

A second edition of this pioneering study. Mechanic Accents is a widely acclaimed study of American popular fiction and working-class culture. Combining Marxist literary theory with American labor history, Michael Denning explores what happened when, in the nineteenth century, working people began to read cheap novels and the "fiction question" became a class question. In a new afterword, Denning locates his study within the context of current debates on class and cultural studies.

Author Biography

Michael Denning teaches American Studies at Yale University. He is the author of Mechanic Accents, Cover Stories, Culture in the Age of Three Worlds, and The Cultural Front.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction	p. 1
The Figure of the Dime Novel in American Culture	p. 9
Fiction Factories: The Production of Dime Novels	p. 17
'The Unknown Public': Dime Novels and Working Class Readers	p. 27
The Uses of Literacy: Class, Culture, and Dime Novel Controversies	p. 47
Reading Dime Novels: The Mechanic Accents of Escapist Fiction	p. 65
Mysteries and Mechanics of the City	p. 85
The Molly Maguires and the Detectives	p. 118
Tramps, Outlaws ...: Figures of the Great Strike	p. 149
Arthurian Knights in Connecticut Factories	p. 167
Only a Mechanic's Daughter	p. 185
Conclusion: Happy Endings?	p. 201
Notes	p. 214
Bibliographic Note	p. 237
Cheap Stories	p. 239
Bibliography	p. 242
Afterword to the Revised Edition	p. 255
Index	p. 267
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